Jump to content

137GB limit - ESDI_506.PDR and other limits

Petr

By Petr
in Windows 9x Member Projects

 Share

Recommended Posts

Marius '95

Marius '95

Posted
Posted

Eck, may I see that readme file?

I'm asking because I seem to have a different one (see attached file). It doesn't say anything about not supporting large drives, and my southbridge is listed among the supported chipsets.

On VIAArena website I found this description:

The VIA IDE Miniport driver does not install with the VIA Hyperion 4in1 drivers. The VIA SCSI IDE miniport driver supports all VIA chipsets and Microsoft Windows including NT4.0/Win95/Win98/WinMe/Win2000/WinXP. It is recommended for systems with a VIA chipset and:

-Systems where the user wants better IDE performance. VIA IDE SCSI miniport dirver implements performance enhancement to acheive higher benchmark scores.

-IDE Zip drive, under all Microsoft operating systems, with a 686b southbridge chip

-ATA100 hard drives with Windows 2000 prior to Service pack 1

-ATA133 hard drives under Windows 2000 and Windows XP

"bugs associated with optical drives and IDE file tranferring, copying"?

Bugs with optical drives - OK.

But I didn't notice any problems with the hard drives. I have been using it for more than 2 years and I keep .SFV files for all stored data (everything exept Windows and Program Files). They are all OK.

Where did you get this information?

I don't know if it can be uninstalled or not. I never tried. But that method proposed by RainyShadow looks very suspicious. When I have to remove a driver (any driver) I do it this way:

- Stop computer

- Remove hardware (not in this case)

- Start windows in safe mode

- Remove driver using Add/Remove Programs (if it's there) OR

- Remove the device from Device Manager OR directly from registry (this is the proper way to make sure no garbage remains in the system)

In this case remove:

- HKLM\Enum\PCI\VEN_1106&DEV_0571&SUBSYS_05711106&REV_06 (VIA Bus Master PCI IDE Controller)

- HKLM\Enum\MF (the two IDE Ports of the controller are listed here)

- HKLM\Enum\SCSI\[name of HDD] (the drives are listed here, remove only those connected to IDE controller if you also have a SCSI controller or SATA or RAID)

- Remove .INF files form \Windows\INF\Other\

- Remove driver files (.DRV, .VXD, .MPD, etc.). They are all listed in the .INF file.

- Restart windows

That's it! It always works.

After the restart Windows will detect that the IDE controller has no driver installed (the device was removed from Device Manager or registry) and it will install the default driver (because the .INF file was removed from INF directory)

IDE_Miniport_Driver_v3.20B_Release_Note.doc

Link to comment
Share on other sites

RainyShadow

RainyShadow

Posted
Posted

Marius '95, I followed nearly the same removal procedure as the one described by You, but after windows installed the old driver there were the same problems as with the Via driver (Nero tools, Feurio and some other programs can't detect my CD-RW).

After deleting some registry parts the VIA Hyperion 4in1 drivers failed to install...

I had to make a separate installation of Win98 and get the correct registry entries from it, only then the original driver started working fine.

Seems that the Via IDE miniport (AKA Busmaster) driver writes some switches to registry which don't get undone after the uninstall, and this leads to further misbehaving of drivers installed afterwards.

Still glad that I managed to fix this, because a reinstal of 98 would be a grand disaster for me and a lot of work to restore all the modifications done for 2 years :thumbup

Link to comment
Share on other sites
noguru

noguru

Posted
Posted (edited)
That Via driver does not include 9x support for larger hard drives. I read such in the readme for it. It also shouldn't be used unless using an old 686b Via southbridge chipset with Windows 2000.

Although it installs and runs on other combinations, there are many bugs associated with optical drives and IDE file tranferring, copying, etc.

It also helped with Zip 100 parellel port drives on 9x. But it screwed up other things.

It also cannot be successfully uninstalled once installed. A format is necessary to get things working properly again. They also warn of this in the readme.

It can be removed without format, quite simpel. I did because of the mentioned problems.

Change first and second IDE controller in devicemanager to the windows default. Reboot.

Then remove the Via Bus master IDE controller from the devicemanager. After reboot the windows default drivers are installed. Now you can reinstall the normal Via 4in1 (Hyperion) drivers without the IDE miniport 3.20b. This solved all my issues like no smart, no Nero and stupid drive id as SCSI.

I have seen no troubles with register-enties or disk errors whatsoever. I really seem to have recovered after the VIA driver disaster using this method.

Edited by noguru
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Eck

Eck

Posted
Posted

We're looking to really tax my memory as I tried this driver way back when my system was on an Abit KT7A! I just remember well that one of the readme's for at least one of the versions of this driver explicitly read that once installed, this driver may not be uninstalled.

Of course, that's not saying it's impossible. Just unsupported officially.

I remember my cd drive's throwing me fits trying to figure why sometimes they couldn't read cd's, or if they could, with great hardship. Spinning, freezing, blue screening, etc.

I remember Nero burning some, losing more coaster's.

I remember trying to copy file's from cd to hard drive and lot's of errors.

The board ran everything fine without that driver, and everything flaky like with the driver. The old 4.38 4-in-1's and the USB Filter 1.1 were all it needed.

Recently I had been lurking about the ViaArena forums looking for info about this ESDI HD limitation thing and found several replies from folks helping others there. They usually recommended only using this driver on a 686B Southbridge and Windows 2000. That's where I got that from.

Mainly, I do recall in the current version's readme or at least somewhere in the official information about it on either Via's main site or ViaArena a specific warning that this driver does not solve the large hard drive issue on 9x/Me operating systems. That wasn't a poster (one fellow who post's there claims it does make 9x work with large hard drives, but according to the official info he is wrong), but the official comments about the driver.

As I was using it on a motherboard it was specifically designed for (to fix Zip drive problems) and still experienced many issues, it's not something I would recommend. I did use a USB Zip drive at the time, but learned not to use it! I joined the world of cd burning.

Funny. My main soundcard in those days was the SBLive and after making just a couple of adjustments in the bios settings that KT7A worked fine with it. And that was one of the boards everyone was complaining about with the SBLive. I sure wish my capacitors hadn't melted away! That was one awesome old motherboard. Heh. It still works. Just noisy, probably from those leaky cap's. But once I heard the noise I retired it from even playing around. I don't want my other hardware destroyed when it blows up or something!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Petr

Petr

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Has anyone developed a fix or work-around for this yet?
I'm working on it... though I'm quite busy and haven't really gotten the uninterrupted time I need to disassemble, analyse, and completely rebuild the driver. Maybe in the summer... but I haven't forgotten about it yet :)

It would be nice to consider SATA support as well.

I have read in the official document about SATA: "Though Serial ATA will not be able to directly interface

with legacy Ultra ATA hardware, it is fully compliant with the ATA protocol and thus is software

compatible. (www.SerialATA.org)"

There are also small adapters - converters from SATA to PATA and from PATA to SATA.

So it should be not so big problem probably.

Windows 98/SE/ME does not support SATA disk controller contained in Intel chipset (ICH5, ICH6, ICH7 southbridges) - yellow exclamation mark appears next to the IDE controller icon and maybe the ESDI_506.PDR modification could be very small?

Petr

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 4 weeks later...
erpdude8

erpdude8

Posted
Posted (edited)
Eck, may I see that readme file?

I'm asking because I seem to have a different one (see attached file). It doesn't say anything about not supporting large drives, and my southbridge is listed among the supported chipsets.

On VIAArena website I found this description:

The VIA IDE Miniport driver does not install with the VIA Hyperion 4in1 drivers. The VIA SCSI IDE miniport driver supports all VIA chipsets and Microsoft Windows including NT4.0/Win95/Win98/WinMe/Win2000/WinXP. It is recommended for systems with a VIA chipset and:

-Systems where the user wants better IDE performance. VIA IDE SCSI miniport dirver implements performance enhancement to acheive higher benchmark scores.

-IDE Zip drive, under all Microsoft operating systems, with a 686b southbridge chip

-ATA100 hard drives with Windows 2000 prior to Service pack 1

-ATA133 hard drives under Windows 2000 and Windows XP

"bugs associated with optical drives and IDE file tranferring, copying"?

Bugs with optical drives - OK.

But I didn't notice any problems with the hard drives. I have been using it for more than 2 years and I keep .SFV files for all stored data (everything exept Windows and Program Files). They are all OK.

Where did you get this information?

I don't know if it can be uninstalled or not. I never tried. But that method proposed by RainyShadow looks very suspicious. When I have to remove a driver (any driver) I do it this way:

- Stop computer

- Remove hardware (not in this case)

- Start windows in safe mode

- Remove driver using Add/Remove Programs (if it's there) OR

- Remove the device from Device Manager OR directly from registry (this is the proper way to make sure no garbage remains in the system)

In this case remove:

- HKLM\Enum\PCI\VEN_1106&DEV_0571&SUBSYS_05711106&REV_06 (VIA Bus Master PCI IDE Controller)

- HKLM\Enum\MF (the two IDE Ports of the controller are listed here)

- HKLM\Enum\SCSI\[name of HDD] (the drives are listed here, remove only those connected to IDE controller if you also have a SCSI controller or SATA or RAID)

- Remove .INF files form \Windows\INF\Other\

- Remove driver files (.DRV, .VXD, .MPD, etc.). They are all listed in the .INF file.

- Restart windows

That's it! It always works.

After the restart Windows will detect that the IDE controller has no driver installed (the device was removed from Device Manager or registry) and it will install the default driver (because the .INF file was removed from INF directory)

I got a new DFI CM33-TL motherboard a few weeks ago that uses VIA chipsets (and has BIOS revision C) to replace an old Jetway mobo that died because of faulty capacitors that leaked some yellow stuff. As I looked at the DFI downloads page for the CM33-TL mobo, it has BIOS updates that can support drives with 48-bit LBA [137Gb or higher]. ONLY CM33-TL Revision "C" BIOSes [not revisions A & B] can allow the use of 137Gb+ drives. the DFI board that I got does support 137gb HDs.

Edited by erpdude8
Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 4 weeks later...
Lunac

Lunac

Posted
Posted

Excellent. This is great news. I already bought a VIA based PCI SATA/PATA/RAID controller card last year (to handle my 160GB Samsung PATA HD under Win98SE) , but if your driver is functional (dosen't trash and/or corrupts data) then this card is going on eBay.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Lunac

Lunac

Posted
Posted

I understand.

Maybe a page that lists all tested PATA/SATA chipsets and/or HDs would not be a bad idea. Maybe a thread/sticky here in this subforum? Or is the driver itself chipset/hardware independent?

I wish I had a way to backup my data, but I don't. I will wait and see what happens. I am sure there are more intrepid individuals out there than me.

What's the ETA for the release anyways?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
krick

krick

Posted
Posted
Still glad that I managed to fix this, because a reinstal of 98 would be a grand disaster for me and a lot of work to restore all the modifications done for 2 years

As a last resort before I give up and do a format & re-install, I always try an "in place re-install". Basically, you re-install windows from the CD (or your cabs directory) over top of the old installation. I've brought crippled systems back from the dead that way. You sometimes need to re-install some drivers when you're done but your programs and data all survive from the previous installation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
randiroo76073

randiroo76073

Posted
Posted (edited)

Ever since I read a tutorial on partitioning[5 yrs ago] I've always kept my data on a seperate partition from my OS so that if my OS crashes[seldom] I can wipe C: and reinstall w/o loss of any data. My personal partitions are: C: = OS,

D: = Installed Programs, other partitions are personal prefs, I usually have about 6+ :)

I've also used Krick's method too when I didn't want the hassle of a clean install.

Edited by randiroo76073
Link to comment
Share on other sites
RainyShadow

RainyShadow

Posted
Posted

I've used this method before, but it cancels a lot of OS/driver/etc. modifications and customisations i have. So far i managed to keep my more than 2 year old instalation working fine by just trying hard when i screw it up, and when nothing else works i install a separate copy of Win98 and look for differences until i fix my main one (in contrast to some my friends which format and reinstall their OS several times a month just for the sport ;))

Link to comment
Share on other sites
MDGx

MDGx

Posted
Posted (edited)

LLXX:

Suggestion:

You may wish to ask Gape to close this thread and eventually merge both [if possible], since you started this new one:

http://www.msfn.org/board/?showtopic=78592

which will have the links to your new driver.

Or wait until you release the driver and then close/merge this old thread.

This way all comments/questions/etc will be posted in the new one from now on.

Plus, after you release the driver, the new thread needs to be made a sticky.

HTH

Edited by MDGx
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...