Apple II SCSI hard drive questions

[KennyPowers]

Anyone have experience using SCSI hard drives with an Apple II? I have yet to ever use a hard drive of any kind with any of my Apple II's, so I have no clue where to start with that, but I found this CMS SCSI card in one of my IIgs's:



I also have this CMS model SD30U external SCSI drive:



They came from the same owner, so maybe they were used together? The previous owner also had a few compact macs though, so I guess it's possible the drive was used with one of those instead (or not used at all). I also have two copies of each of these 3.5" and 5.25" floppies (all of which I've Applesauced):



I'd like to see if there's anything on the drive. I guess the first thing to do would be to just try booting the IIgs off of it? The controller card was in slot 7, suggesting that a bootable drive was connected to it.

I'm also curious if any of the SD-card SCSI solutions could be made to work with that CMS controller card

 

[KennyPowers]

Oh snap, I started to remove the drive's PSU to recap it (why not?)...maybe I shouldn't turn this thing back on

 

[skate323k137]

I use a BlueSCSI with the GGLabs SCSI card (which is a clone of the Apple SCSI card). It works fine, but I am booting GSOS from a microdrive, and using the BlueSCSI as a convenient sneakernet / removeable [when the machine is off...] drive.

 

[skate323k137]

Looking at your card and the GGLabs SCSI card, they share the AM5380PC SCSI Controller IC, so your odds of success with a BlueSCSI or other modern SD solution are probably decent.

 

[Drake]

I can also attest to success using Bluescsi on IIGS, I use the Apple SCSI card and have been trying the RamFast (but having compatability issues perhaps related to ZipGS).

 

[KennyPowers]

So I've been trying to get this card working with an external DB25 BlueSCSI in my IIgs and I'm stuck. Keep in mind, I've never used SCSI on an Apple II before. I found the manual for the card here:

https://mirrors.apple2.org.za/ftp.apple.asimov.net/documentation/hardware/storage/disks/CMS%20SCSI%202.0%20Manual.pdf

All of the card's jumpers are in their default positions as-pictured in my first post. I created a blank 32MB hda file, named it "HD60_512 HD1.hda", and copied it to a freshly-formatted exFAT SD card. I put it in the BlueSCSI (which I've used successfully with multiple macs), plugged the BlueSCSI into the card, powered the BlueSCSI via USB since the card wasn't supplying enough power, and booted into the SCSI utility on the card's included floppy. The utility sees the "drive" at SCSI ID 6:



but it always shows those error codes and I'm not sure what they mean. The manual has an incomplete list of "Sense Key Errors" on the last page that describes $02 as "Not Ready - The SCSI device is not ready for access (slow device or removed media)"...don't know if that's what it's trying to tell me. Attempting to format the "drive" appears to succeed, but the optional post-format verification check immediately fails with this:



Attempting to use FILER to initialize/partition the drive after formatting as the manual describes fails as FILER doesn't seem to see the drive.

I've tried multiple SD cards, the BlueSCSI's log files always appear good...any ideas or suggestions?

 

[Drake]

So I've been trying to get this card working with an external DB25 BlueSCSI in my IIgs and I'm stuck. Keep in mind, I've never used SCSI on an Apple II before. I found the manual for the card here:

https://mirrors.apple2.org.za/ftp.apple.asimov.net/documentation/hardware/storage/disks/CMS%20SCSI%202.0%20Manual.pdf

All of the card's jumpers are in their default positions as-pictured in my first post. I created a blank 32MB hda file, named it "HD60_512 HD1.hda", and copied it to a freshly-formatted exFAT SD card. I put it in the BlueSCSI (which I've used successfully with multiple macs), plugged the BlueSCSI into the card, powered the BlueSCSI via USB since the card wasn't supplying enough power, and booted into the SCSI utility on the card's included floppy. The utility sees the "drive" at SCSI ID 6:

View attachment 10034

but it always shows those error codes and I'm not sure what they mean. The manual has an incomplete list of "Sense Key Errors" on the last page that describes $02 as "Not Ready - The SCSI device is not ready for access (slow device or removed media)"...don't know if that's what it's trying to tell me. Attempting to format the "drive" appears to succeed, but the optional post-format verification check immediately fails with this:

View attachment 10035

Attempting to use FILER to initialize/partition the drive after formatting as the manual describes fails as FILER doesn't seem to see the drive.

I've tried multiple SD cards, the BlueSCSI's log files always appear good...any ideas or suggestions?

Put of curiosity have you tried Eric's apple II bluescsi image? Or another compatible image?

 

[KennyPowers]

Put of curiosity have you tried Eric's apple II bluescsi image? Or another compatible image?

Ya, Eric suggested I make a 32MB ProDOS image with CiderPress...tried that and no change.

It has been awhile since I used this BlueSCSI, and I don't have a mac handy that it would be easy to test it with. I tried updating it to the v1.1-20220917 firmware, but that didn't change anything. It writes a good log file to the SD card, but I suppose something else could be wrong with it. Solder joints all look good. Was going to order another DB25 BlueSCSI kit to rule out problems with this one, but nobody seems to have them in stock in the US.

I suppose the 30+yr old SCSI card could be bad too. Thought about ordering the GGLabs SCSI card since that one's known to work with BlueSCSI and has term power (CMS card won't power the BlueSCSI), but it would be neat to get this CMS card working. It uses the same SCSI controller IC as the GGLabs card, so I was hopeful. This CMS card has a lot more jumper blocks (described in the manual linked above) than the Apple or GGLabs cards. I wonder if any of them need to be tweaked from their defaults to work with a BlueSCSI?

 

[Drake]

Ya, Eric suggested I make a 32MB ProDOS image with CiderPress...tried that and no change.

It has been awhile since I used this BlueSCSI, and I don't have a mac handy that it would be easy to test it with. I tried updating it to the v1.1-20220917 firmware, but that didn't change anything. It writes a good log file to the SD card, but I suppose something else could be wrong with it. Solder joints all look good. Was going to order another DB25 BlueSCSI kit to rule out problems with this one, but nobody seems to have them in stock in the US.

I suppose the 30+yr old SCSI card could be bad too. Thought about ordering the GGLabs SCSI card since that one's known to work with BlueSCSI and has term power (CMS card won't power the BlueSCSI), but it would be neat to get this CMS card working. It uses the same SCSI controller IC as the GGLabs card, so I was hopeful. This CMS card has a lot more jumper blocks (described in the manual linked above) than the Apple or GGLabs cards. I wonder if any of them need to be tweaked from their defaults to work with a BlueSCSI?

I had no luck myself getting RamFast to utilize my DB25. The boot rom could see the bluescsi, format it etc but it couldn't boot from it.
I don't know enough about the cards to say what the issue is. Is it far fetched to assume these cards are injecting something upon format/install traditionally that isn't present in the .hda images?

 

[retr01]

Generally, ProDOS .hdv images are bootable for the Apple II series. For example, the Total Replay v5.0-beta.3 HDV images should be bootable.

 

[KennyPowers]

Tried a different, known-working BlueSCSI...same behavior. Just ordered the GGLabs SCSI card since it's known to work and term-power will be convenient

 

[jokker]

Tried a different, known-working BlueSCSI...same behavior. Just ordered the GGLabs SCSI card since it's known to work and term-power will be convenient

Hmm I'd be interested in renting/borrowing that card to see if there is something I could fix in the firmware.

@Drake same would go for the RAMFast as well honestly. I don't want to keep the cards but I'd like to see if I can fix any issues causing it not to work.

I've used my GGLabs clone with my IIe and IIGS to generally make sure that things are ok with BlueSCSI/PiSCSI and fix any issues I've found. However back in the day everybody did things just a little differently

 

[KennyPowers]

@jokker and I went back and forth with a few debug BlueSCSI firmwares he made me trying to figure out what this card is doing. In the process, I discovered that I actually own two of these CMS cards. Both of them were exhibiting the same behavior with the BlueSCSI with all other variables eliminated (tried multiple SCSI cards, multiple Apple II systems, multiple BlueSCSI's, multiple SD cards, multiple volume sizes, etc). So, I've shipped @jokker one of my CMS cards for further analysis

 

[jokker]

Indeed, it is a strange behaviour that I'm seeing and I would assume watching things under the analyzer will help me figure out the problem. So much thanks for @KennyPowers for access to his time and his hardware.

I've also recently acquired a Rev C Ramfast and an Apple High Speed SCSI card to test against as well.

I do see issues with the Ramfast so it's possible they are symptoms of the same cause of the CMS card's issues.

More as situation develops...

 

[KennyPowers]

In related news, my GGLabs SCSI card arrived today, and I had GS/OS booting off a BlueSCSI within 20 minutes

 

[jokker]

Just an update that I've got both CMS and Ramfast cards working with BlueSCSI. Still testing things out and there should be an update released sometime in the near future.

Does anyone know of any other troublesome SCSI cards for the Apple II?

Thanks again to @KennyPowers for sending me the CMS card to help figure this one out.

 

[jdmcs]

Any updates on getting the CMS card to work with a BlueSCSI? I just picked up one of those CMS SCSI cards as part of a lot of Apple II cards.

 

[KennyPowers]

Any updates on getting the CMS card to work with a BlueSCSI? I just picked up one of those CMS SCSI cards as part of a lot of Apple II cards.

@jokker should be able to provide a more specific answer, but as I understand it, the BlueSCSI firmware changes required for compatibility with the CMS card (and other A2 SCSI cards) exist and are working...they just haven't been merged into an official firmware release yet. I think it maybe got delayed by the recent focus on BlueSCSI v2. @jokker did mention to me that he thought the BlueSCSI v2 should work as-is with the CMS card, but I don't have a v2 to try.

 

[eric]

Good timing - I just cut a prerelease with a bunch of things for v1 - give it a try and let us know https://github.com/erichelgeson/BlueSCSI/releases/tag/prerelease

 

[KennyPowers]

Good timing - I just cut a prerelease with a bunch of things for v1 - give it a try and let us know https://github.com/erichelgeson/BlueSCSI/releases/tag/prerelease

I flashed that firmware, plugged in the CMS SCSI card, and stuck in the SD card I've been using to boot my IIgs with the GGLabs SCSI card...booted right into GS/OS:



Interestingly, the drive didn't appear on the desktop until I clicked "About this Apple IIgs" from the Apple menu, and then the icon wasn't the same as when I boot off the GSLabs card. For all I know, that could be a driver thing, some jumpers needing adjusting on the CMS card...I dunno. It does work though!