Can not write RDB to disk - error message in Media Toolbox

[Slayer]

Just thinking out loud here

Have you examined your drive closely, no jumpers tucked away somewhere which toggle capacity or modes? Perhaps google your drive and see if there is any settings available to it that could cause a conflict in a situation like this?

Generally if something should work then it's likely it's just being prevented from doing so.

I mean I'm not sure why XBox HDs are locked for example and need to be unlocked before you can use it for something that I can't recall but sounds similair no?

hmmm

Just re-reading your messsage again, perhaps if you track down a HDTools application that allows you to undefine a drive (takes it back to it's factory condition - IIRC I believe PP&S software for the Zeus Accelerator Board for the B2000 had this functionality) you might be able to read the definitions in and then write it.

Send me that drive, I want to fix it now LOL

[ZeroG]

@tonyw
English is not my native language, but maybe this is the problem:
http://slacksite.com/2010/03/scsi-3-per ... ns-part-i/
http://wintelguy.com/2011/20110514_scsicmd.html
http://www.13thmonkey.org/documentation ... pc3r23.pdf

[danbeaver]

ZeroG, that for the first time may be a solution!

I have PC Adeptec Pci controller I can try this with, although not from a server, from Win 7. It sounds like the problem I have with Fuhitsu drives and any that had been on a Mac. I do have 2 drives that worked ok in 3.9 but not OS 4.1 that it doesn't seem to fit, but I'll try. In any event if I can get the others working I'll put them out there for sale. Right now I have 6 fast high capacity Maxtor UW drives spread over two A4000Ts that I'm very happy with. I just added a U320 @ 10k with 142GB capacity (I'll be able to use that until we get to Amiga OS 10).

[Calgor]

If you don't have important data on the disks, you could try to completely reinstall the RDB first using OS3.9 and/or OS3.1 HDToolbox, and then afterwards reinstall the RDB using Media ToolBox in OS4.1.

OS3.x HDToolBox can sometimes fix up the RDB section of the drive if something has happened to it (I once needed to use O3.1 HDToolbox when my filesystems in the RDB were messed up causing OS3.9 HDToolBox to crash on loading the drive, and OS4.1 Media Toolbox could not correct the error).

[danbeaver]

Interesting Calgor's, I have 2 ex-Mac 9gbs that act "locked" and although they are stored, could just as well be door stops. What more is known about locking hard drives like the XBox?

Missed your input for the past few weeks

[Calgor]

Interesting Calgor's, I have 2 ex-Mac 9gbs that act "locked" and although they are stored, could just as well be door stops. What more is known about locking hard drives like the XBox?

Missed your input for the past few weeks

I am lucky to have not had the pleasure of having to deal with "locked" hard drives - yours may be different to that described as common with XBoxes in this thread? I think that the Xbox locking is related to the ATA spec password ability - at least some laptops use this. Some SCSI drives have write protect jumpers, on the other hand if it is password protection I would have thought erasing the entire drive would fix that. As to errors on modifying the RDB like the OP in this thread, you can try to install the RDB using different programs such as an old HDToolBox or Phase5's SCSIConfig program.

Good to know my input is appreciated as is yours

@Amigafan

In addition to my last post, you could also try removing Reselection and Synchronous Transfer in Media Toolbox - if the problem may be related to the faster 68 pin hard drives compared with the slower 50 pin hard drive if you don't have a very good quality SCSI chain. You may not have these options enabled in OS3.9 from the PPC card BIOS. But I doubt this is the solution. Do other writes to those hard drives work in OS4.1? Is it only Media Toolbox that cannot write to the drive?

[Amigafan]

I've connected every drive (one at the time) to A3000 internal SCSI and using HDToolBox from AOS 3.1 write RDB, create partition and install AOS 3.1 on it.
Every one of them works fine and boot without problems.
Then I've connected these drives (one at the time) to CSPPC as a second drive (first one is 50-pin with OS4).
Three out of five drives started to work correctly - using OS4 media toolbox I was able to create RDB, make partitions and finally install OS4 on them.
Two of the drives still had the same problem ( can not write changes in media toolbox) and also the partition made in os 3.1 was not visible.
When I've connected these two drives to A3000 internal SCSI again, OS3.1 was still there and partition made using os3.1 HDToolBox was intact.

So it is "limited success". I've managed to make three of my drives to work again with AmigaOS 4.1 and trace the problem to messy RDB.
Is there any tool (for OS4 or OS3) that is able to completely erase RDB? I am hoping for solution as one of the drives which still does not work is the fastest of them 35 GB HDD.
On CSPPC it gives about 17 MB/s transfer rate while my other drive (with OS4) gives only 7MB/s (using scsispeed).
Format in PC does not seems to solve the problem so maybe there is some special tool to erase RDB?

[ZeroG]

KillRDB
http://thomas-rapp.homepage.t-online.de/download.html

[Calgor]

So for the 3 drives that were fixed up. what were the exact steps you followed? (Given initially you could not fix them using solely Media Toolbox).

For your fastest drive if that does not work with ZeroG's suggestion, you might want to look at first artifically slowing down the drive (e.g. no synchronous mode) or simplifying your SCSI chain in case it is has a smaller margin than your other drives, being faster.

[Amigafan]

I've described my procedure in previous post.
I've connected each drive to A3000 internal SCSI, boot using Install 3.1 disk and used HDToolBox to read configuration and create one small (<100MB) partition (FFS).
After reset the partition was formatted (quick format) and read/write/boot checked by copying Workbench 3.1 disk on it and then booting from this partition.
Then I've reconnect the drive to CSPPC as a second disk (first one is with OS4), boot OS4 and use Media Toolbox without any problem.
It was working for the disk that I've made photos in the first post (9GB) and two other drives (9GB and 4 GB).
It was NOT working for 35 GB drive - photos in 4th post of this thread.