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ISA HDD / Floppy Controller - SCSI Controller - Floppy Issue

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Smack2k

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Jan 8, 2013
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Pittsburgh, PA
Trying to setup a 386 PC (Forex FRX/386DX is the name on the boot screen, cant find this actual board online) and having the following issue:

When I hooked things up with just the SCSI controller (Adaptec AHA-1522A) the system boots fine, sees the attached floppy drives and hard drive, and boots from either floppy or hard disk, depending on which I choose. I have a 1 GB SCSI Hard Drive, a 3 1/2", and a 5 1/4" Drive hooked up to the SCSI controller.

When I then install an IDE Controller (so I can hook-up the CD-ROM and Zip Drive) to the system (Goldstar Prime, PT-604A) and set the jumpers to disable the floppy drive, the system will boot up, sees the floppy drives, but wont boot from them, the A: Drive just lights up for about 2 seconds before moving on and the hard drive boots up...I dont have the CD-Rom and Zip hooked up to the controller yet, but the floppy controller is disabled on the card and Hard Drive / IDE Enabled....

I have tried several ISA IDE Controllers and they all do the same thing....disabling the floppy AND Hard Drive from the IDE Controller causes the Floppy Drive to light up and stay lit up, but nothing happens and the system sits there until powered off....

Am I doing something wrong here?? Removing the IDE Controller allows the system to boot up again fine from floppy....I checked all the labeled jumpers on the board to and dont see anything strange.

I also have a Soundblaster 2 Pro and a TSENG ET4000 1 MB Video Card and an ISA NIC Card hooked up to the system.
 
I personally run a 1542c (extremely similar) in my 386. Once that was installed, it completely negated any need for IDE anything. So I haven't had the issue you are describing. That said, it sounds like a DMA/IRQ conflict. I would bet on the ide card not playing nice here. The scsi card has well documented jumpers, those ide/serial/parallel cards are notoriously under documented.

You said SB2 pro, that has ide on it IIRC. is that disabled too?
 
Xacalite said:
Did you try to disable the FDC on AHA-1522A, and enable the FDC on PT-604A ?
Click to expand...

I did not, but I can certainly try it....

I know before when I tried to set this up with just the IDE Controller and both floppy and IDE Enabled, the same issues with the floppy drive happened where the light comes on the floppy and it say "Error reading disc". Now, I am disabling the floppy and getting the same error when the IDE / Floppy Controller is installed.

But i can try that method and let you know...
 
Smack2k said:
I know before when I tried to set this up with just the IDE Controller and both floppy and IDE Enabled, the same issues with the floppy drive happened where the light comes on the floppy and it say "Error reading disc"....
Click to expand...
Sounds like that card has issues.

Try another card.
 
Son of a bitch if it didnt work.....

The IDE / Floppy Controller enabled and the floppy controller on the SCSI Card disabled, it works....floppy boots, works...SCSI Hard Drive works...

I cant explain it, this wasnt working before....

Either way, I can build the 386 now with both floppies, hard drive, CD-ROM and Zip Drive.....good to go!!

Thanks for the idea to swap the floppy controllers...still dont know how it works now...it didnt work time and time again...
 
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