DEC RD54 from Maxtor

From: Ethan Dicks <erd_6502_at_yahoo.com>
Date: Tue Mar 4 10:40:00 2003

--- Kevin Handy <kth_at_srv.net> wrote:
> In my experience, anything but an RD54 is likely to be a problem.
> The RD54 usually had a two or three times longer lifetime than
> the other RD drives. That is probably why RD54's are in such
> demand.

They were also the largest DEC-supplied drive and were useful as
system disks up into the early versions of VMS 6.x (maybe not
officially, but practically - I have either 6.0 or 6.1 on an RD54
that a friend of mine built for me; dunno what he had to leave out).

I'm glad that I don't have to buy any (but I might consider swapping
one for a Qbus SCSI controller ;-)
 
> If you want something for long-term usage, I'd really recommend
> getting a SCSI interface, then you have a much larger choice of
> media.

Indeed, but if you are into vintage hardware, not always practical
(the uVAX-2000 comes to mind).
 
> >You may also be able to use non-DEC ST-506 drives, but be warned: AFAIK,
> > the only VAX that can perform a low-level format on its own
> > ST-506 drive is the VAXstation/uVAX 2000. It allows you to choose one
> > of the DEC models, or enter your own drive geometry, IIRC.

My experience with the uVAX2K ROM formatter is that you can *not*
randomly specify geometry. You can low-level format a DEC drive, but
I'm not positive you can take a drive from a PC that has never seen
DEC use and turn it into a DEC drive (bad block table, ident tracks
and the like).

You _can_ do all these things with the Field Service formatter on a
Qbus uVAX and an RQDX3. I have taken several Seagate, Maxtor and
Miniscribe drives from PeeCees and made them useful to DEC controllers
with the FS tape. Given that it takes a *looong* time to load, I'm
interested in exploring the XXDP/VTserver route and a PDP-11 CPU board.
That might be less hassle. Dunno yet.

-ethan
Received on Tue Mar 04 2003 - 10:40:00 GMT