jmarsh wrote on 2020-11-25, 07:58:

FAT16 has several possible partition table IDs: 04: FAT16, < 32MB 06: FAT16, >= 32MB 0E: FAT16, >= 32MB, using INT13 extensions […]
Show full quote

darry wrote on 2020-11-25, 00:33:

There must be some slight difference between different partitioning/formatting tools that the FC1307A either likes or does not like . Offset from beginning of disk may be one of them or not .

FAT16 has several possible partition table IDs:
04: FAT16, < 32MB
06: FAT16, >= 32MB
0E: FAT16, >= 32MB, using INT13 extensions (CHS beyond 1023/16/63 limits).

I would guess "FAT-16 Huge" would be the last one.

What about Windows NT?
Didn't it have some special flavor of FAT16/VFAT that supported long file names etc? 😕

darry wrote on 2020-11-24, 23:05:

That could definitely be the case. My FC1307A adapters identify as FC1307 in their BIOS . Another possibility is that there are […]
Show full quote

red-ray wrote on 2020-11-24, 20:45:

My controller uses an FC1307A and having the first partition as FAT-16 is fine, maybe this is down to it being the A […]
Show full quote

darry wrote on 2020-11-24, 20:12:

make sure that the first partition on the card is FAT32 or NTFS, otherwise you will almost certainly have issues. That first partition does not need to be big or usable by DOS,or even set to active . If the first partition is FAT12 or FAT16, all the FC1307 based adapters that I have tested will see the disk as blank on power up .

My controller uses an FC1307A and having the first partition as FAT-16 is fine, maybe this is down to it being the A

I have Windows 98SE installed on the first partition and WXP + W2003 on the NTFS partitions

That could definitely be the case. My FC1307A adapters identify as FC1307 in their BIOS . Another possibility is that there are multiple BIOS versions circulating for these and not all of them have the issue .

If anybody can post a BIOS dump from an FC1307 or FC1307A that does not have an issue with a FAT16 or FAT32 partition being first on the disk, it might help explain why some people, like jmarsh and myself, have the issue, but others do not .

EDIT: Are those all partitions on an MBR disk or are some of them volumes in an extended partition ?

What revision does your card report itself as being? Mine reports as Rev 1.2.

All but the first are volumes in an extended partition, given I have 98SE on the system then this is the sensible way to setup the disk.

As I recall I used MS-DOS 6.22 to create the first partition, installed 98SE into that, used 98SE to create the extended partition + other FAT-16 partitions, finally created the two NTFS partitions as I installed WXP with Windows 2003 being the last software I installed.

jmarsh wrote on 2020-11-25, 07:58:

FAT16 has several possible partition table IDs: 04: FAT16, < 32MB 06: FAT16, >= 32MB 0E: FAT16, >= 32MB, using INT13 extensions […]
Show full quote

darry wrote on 2020-11-25, 00:33:

There must be some slight difference between different partitioning/formatting tools that the FC1307A either likes or does not like . Offset from beginning of disk may be one of them or not .

FAT16 has several possible partition table IDs:
04: FAT16, < 32MB
06: FAT16, >= 32MB
0E: FAT16, >= 32MB, using INT13 extensions (CHS beyond 1023/16/63 limits).

I would guess "FAT-16 Huge" would be the last one.

No, 0x0E is PARTITION_XINT13_EXTENDED which SIV reports as "Xint13 Extended". " FAT-16 Huge" is PARTITION_HUGE (0x06) which looks to be a Huge partition for MS-DOS V4 and later

1//
2// Define the partition types returnable by known disk drivers.
3//
4
5#define PARTITION_ENTRY_UNUSED          0x00      // Entry unused
6#define PARTITION_FAT_12                0x01      // 12-bit FAT entries
7#define PARTITION_XENIX_1               0x02      // Xenix
8#define PARTITION_XENIX_2               0x03      // Xenix
9#define PARTITION_FAT_16                0x04      // 16-bit FAT entries
10#define PARTITION_EXTENDED              0x05      // Extended partition entry
11#define PARTITION_HUGE                  0x06      // Huge partition MS-DOS V4
12#define PARTITION_IFS                   0x07      // IFS Partition
13#define PARTITION_OS2BOOTMGR            0x0A      // OS/2 Boot Manager/OPUS/Coherent swap
14#define PARTITION_FAT32                 0x0B      // FAT32
15#define PARTITION_FAT32_XINT13          0x0C      // FAT32 using extended int13 services
16#define PARTITION_XINT13                0x0E      // Win95 partition using extended int13 services
17#define PARTITION_XINT13_EXTENDED       0x0F      // Same as type 5 but uses extended int13 services
18#define PARTITION_PREP                  0x41      // PowerPC Reference Platform (PReP) Boot Partition
19#define PARTITION_LDM                   0x42      // Logical Disk Manager partition
20#define PARTITION_UNIX                  0x63      // Unix
21
22#define VALID_NTFT                      0xC0      // NTFT uses high order bits
23
24//
25// The high bit of the partition type code indicates that a partition
26// is part of an NTFT mirror or striped array.
27//
28
29#define PARTITION_NTFT                  0x80     // NTFT partition

1CONST TCHAR *dev_get_part_type(         // get the partition type
2           TCHAR           *ptb,        // partition type buffer
3           BYTE             ptc )       // partition type code
4{ CONST    TCHAR           *ptp;        // partition type pointer
5
6  switch( ptc )                                                                 //
7  {                                                                             //
8  case PARTITION_DM:              ptp =  TEXT( "OnTrack DM"       );  break;    //
9  case PARTITION_ENTRY_UNUSED:    ptp =  TEXT( "Unused"           );  break;    //
10  case PARTITION_EXTENDED:        ptp =  TEXT( "Extended"         );  break;    //
11  case PARTITION_EZDRIVE:         ptp =  TEXT( "EZ-Drive"         );  break;    //
12  case PARTITION_FAT_12:          ptp =  TEXT( "FAT-12"           );  break;    //
13  case PARTITION_FAT_16:          ptp =  TEXT( "FAT-16"           );  break;    //
14  case PARTITION_FAT32:           ptp =  TEXT( "FAT-32"           );  break;    //
15  case PARTITION_FAT32_XINT13:    ptp =  TEXT( "FAT-32 Xint13"    );  break;    //
16  case PARTITION_GPT:             ptp =  TEXT( "GPT"              );  break;    //
17  case PARTITION_HUGE:            ptp =  TEXT( "FAT-16 Huge"      );  break;    //
18  case PARTITION_IFS:             ptp =  TEXT( "NTFS"             );  break;    //
19  case PARTITION_LDM:             ptp =  TEXT( "Logical Disk"     );  break;    //
20  case PARTITION_NTFT:            ptp =  TEXT( "NTFT"             );  break;    //
21  case PARTITION_OS2BOOTMGR:      ptp =  TEXT( "OS/2 Boot"        );  break;    //
22  case PARTITION_PREP:            ptp =  TEXT( "PowerPC (PReP)"   );  break;    //
23  case PARTITION_SPACE:           ptp =  TEXT( "Protective"       );  break;    //
24  case PARTITION_UNIX:            ptp =  TEXT( "Unix"             );  break;    //
25  case PARTITION_XENIX_1:         ptp =  TEXT( "Xenix 1"          );  break;    //
26  case PARTITION_XENIX_2:         ptp =  TEXT( "Xenix 2"          );  break;    //
27  case PARTITION_XENIX_1 | 0x80:  ptp =  TEXT( "Unix Swap"        );  break;    //
28  case PARTITION_XENIX_2 | 0x80:  ptp =  TEXT( "Unix Disk"        );  break;    //
29  case PARTITION_XINT13:          ptp =  TEXT( "Xint13"           );  break;    //
30  case PARTITION_XINT13_EXTENDED: ptp =  TEXT( "Xint13 Extended"  );  break;    //
31  case VALID_NTFT:                ptp =  TEXT( "NTFT Array"       );  break;    //
32  case 0x12:                      ptp =  TEXT( "Service"          );  break;    //
33  case 0x27:                      ptp =  TEXT( "Recovery"         );  break;    //
34  case 0x84:                      ptp =  TEXT( "Hibernation"      );  break;    //
35  case 0xDD:                      ptp =  TEXT( "CTOS Backup"      );  break;    //
36  case 0xDE:                      ptp =  TEXT( "Dell (0xDE)"      );  break;    //
37  default: stprintf( ( ptp = ptb, ptb ), TEXT( "Type 0x%02X"      ), ptc );     //
38  }                                                                             //
39
40  return ptp;                                                                   //
41}

In relation to a dos/Win3x machine

ide to cf card
+ adapter is cheap, fast & reliable, native IDE (no performance hit)
- CF Cards are expensive

ide to sd card
+ SD cards are cheap, fast & reliable
- adapter is bit more expensive, not IDE (slight performance hit)

scsi to sd card
+ larger disk support, SCSI is cool!
- more complex setup, very expensive, performance benefit doubtful

Personally id go with IDE CF or SD unless you really want to mess around with SCSI, and even then I'd mess around with a real HDD first.

Strangely only the IDE to CF adapters come mounted to a I/O bracket.

CF to IDE works well in my 486 and is pretty straightforward plus came with mounting bracket.

Only issues I had was the bios correctly detecting drive geometry but that was solved by xt-ide bios (it may well have been to do with the fact I dont have a floppy drive and had formatted the cards and installed dos in a virtual machine before moving to the 486 though)

CF cards new are pricey new but second hand on ebay are pretty cheap - used a couple of transcend 4Gb cards for various windows 9x/2000/nt experiments and have a 128mb card I just had knocking about for win3.1/dos.

red-ray wrote on 2020-11-25, 08:23:

No, 0x0E is PARTITION_XINT13_EXTENDED which SIV reports as "Xint13 Extended".

Partition Definitions from winioctl.h

Copy code to clipboard

1#define PARTITION_XINT13                0x0E      // Win95 partition using extended int13 services

Given Win95 originally didn't support FAT32 (and the fact that FAT32 has its own types), it should be obvious what a "Win95 partition" refers to.

Here's the same definition from the libparted source code:

1#define PARTITION_FAT16_LBA	0x0e

jmarsh wrote on 2020-11-25, 11:09:

Given Win95 originally didn't support FAT32 (and the fact that FAT32 has its own types), it should be obvious what a "Win95 partition" refers to.

Given SIV is a Windows utility it should and does use the Windows header files. It should be obvious these are what should be checked rather than none Microsoft Windows header files.

Further whenever I make an error in a post I correct it and feel others should do the same.

thank you so far for advice and comments

i did cross my mind to keep the old seagate drive for the sounds and slight nostalgia and use a cf/sd/scsi card/adapter for performance increase on games where this build meets the requirements no issues but doesn't preform well as i said pure dos is ok (so far) but in windows 3.11, some don't, despite meet well above min system requirements

i am also looking for faster cd-rom drive (from the double speed one that came with this system) that would still fit the era-ish of machine (4x speed min, 8x speed recommended and 16x speed max)

seems cf card might the most easy way to use sounds like a performance increase over a the seagate 3000rpm hdd

if i did go down the scsi route, since i do have pci scsi card - i am guessing i will need edit a dos setup disk with scsi drivers in there config.sys and autoexec.bat for dos 6.22 setup to see the drive and format and install etc

red-ray wrote on 2020-11-25, 12:08:

Given SIV is a Windows utility it should and does use the Windows header files. It should be obvious these are what should be checked rather than none Microsoft Windows header files.

Further whenever I make an error in a post I correct it and feel others should do the same.

Then maybe you should rewrite that post, because you've redefined several types from the winioctl header (the Unix disk/swap types are apparently xenix | PARTITION_NTFT - how does that make sense?) and you've also added several types not present in the header, so you're aware it is not an authoritative reference.

red-ray wrote on 2020-11-25, 08:12:

What revision does your card report itself as being? Mine reports as Rev 1.2. […]
Show full quote

darry wrote on 2020-11-24, 23:05:

That could definitely be the case. My FC1307A adapters identify as FC1307 in their BIOS . Another possibility is that there are […]
Show full quote

red-ray wrote on 2020-11-24, 20:45:

My controller uses an FC1307A and having the first partition as FAT-16 is fine, maybe this is down to it being the A […]
Show full quote

My controller uses an FC1307A and having the first partition as FAT-16 is fine, maybe this is down to it being the A

I have Windows 98SE installed on the first partition and WXP + W2003 on the NTFS partitions

That could definitely be the case. My FC1307A adapters identify as FC1307 in their BIOS . Another possibility is that there are multiple BIOS versions circulating for these and not all of them have the issue .

If anybody can post a BIOS dump from an FC1307 or FC1307A that does not have an issue with a FAT16 or FAT32 partition being first on the disk, it might help explain why some people, like jmarsh and myself, have the issue, but others do not .

EDIT: Are those all partitions on an MBR disk or are some of them volumes in an extended partition ?

What revision does your card report itself as being? Mine reports as Rev 1.2.

All but the first are volumes in an extended partition, given I have 98SE on the system then this is the sensible way to setup the disk.

As I recall I used MS-DOS 6.22 to create the first partition, installed 98SE into that, used 98SE to create the extended partition + other FAT-16 partitions, finally created the two NTFS partitions as I installed WXP with Windows 2003 being the last software I installed.

I have a rev 1.3 in a micro SD to CF adapter , a rev 1.4 in a microSD to 2.5" IDE adapter and a rev 1.2 in a microSD to 3.5" IDE adapter . I just realized that I have versions other than 1.2 (which I dumped and is identical to the one here https://goughlui.com/2019/02/03/tested-generi … dapter-sd35vc0/ ). They all have the same "disappearing partition" issue if a FAT12 or FAT16 primary partition created by either Windows 10 disk management console or my Roland VS-880EX is the first partition on the disk .

Creating and formatting the same type of partition either with Easus Partition Master 11.9 or CentOS 7 fdisk and mkfs.vfat -F 16 works fine with the FC1307A .

Some more details here : Re: Using a vintage multi-track recorder as a mixer, namely the Roland VS-880EX - might apply to other Roland VS- units

Does your Bios have any built in limits? https://www.win.tue.nl/~aeb/linux/Large-Disk-4.html If you can find a drive that fits your needs and doesnt exceed your bios limit, it may make the retro computing more enjoyable. Overlays can help, but can also give you headaches if you move the drive between systems, depending on how you set things up, or cause performance issues in windows if you don’t have a protected mode driver.

What vintage of IDE controller will you be using? I had fewer compatibility issues using DOM modules & CF adapters with pre 1997 controllers, while the sinitechi SD adapater has had fewer issues with controllers made after 2000. That’s in my limitted sample size. Compatability issues could usually get resolved with a different firmware or overlay.

jmarsh wrote on 2020-11-25, 20:47:

red-ray wrote on 2020-11-25, 12:08:

Given SIV is a Windows utility it should and does use the Windows header files. It should be obvious these are what should be checked rather than none Microsoft Windows header files.

Further whenever I make an error in a post I correct it and feel others should do the same.

Then maybe you should rewrite that post, because you've redefined several types from the winioctl header (the Unix disk/swap types are apparently xenix | PARTITION_NTFT - how does that make sense?) and you've also added several types not present in the header, so you're aware it is not an authoritative reference.

Before I would suggest that others correct/improve their posts I would first correct incorrect guesses in related posts I had made and feel others should do the same.

The fact is that had you looked at the definitions in winioctl.h you should have seen #define PARTITION_HUGE 0x06 // Huge partition MS-DOS V4 and not posted incorrect information.

Again you are incorrect , by definition the Microsoft winioctl.h is the "authoritative reference", however it is not a complete reference which is why I added entries for non-Windows partition types as I found SIV user systems with these.

darry wrote on 2020-11-26, 02:11:

I have a rev 1.3 in a micro SD to CF adapter , a rev 1.4 in a microSD to 2.5" IDE adapter and a rev 1.2 in a microSD to 3.5" ID […]
Show full quote

red-ray wrote on 2020-11-25, 08:12:

What revision does your card report itself as being? Mine reports as Rev 1.2. […]
Show full quote

darry wrote on 2020-11-24, 23:05:

That could definitely be the case. My FC1307A adapters identify as FC1307 in their BIOS . Another possibility is that there are multiple BIOS versions circulating for these and not all of them have the issue .

If anybody can post a BIOS dump from an FC1307 or FC1307A that does not have an issue with a FAT16 or FAT32 partition being first on the disk, it might help explain why some people, like jmarsh and myself, have the issue, but others do not .

EDIT: Are those all partitions on an MBR disk or are some of them volumes in an extended partition ?

What revision does your card report itself as being? Mine reports as Rev 1.2.

All but the first are volumes in an extended partition, given I have 98SE on the system then this is the sensible way to setup the disk.

As I recall I used MS-DOS 6.22 to create the first partition, installed 98SE into that, used 98SE to create the extended partition + other FAT-16 partitions, finally created the two NTFS partitions as I installed WXP with Windows 2003 being the last software I installed.

I have a rev 1.3 in a micro SD to CF adapter , a rev 1.4 in a microSD to 2.5" IDE adapter and a rev 1.2 in a microSD to 3.5" IDE adapter . I just realized that I have versions other than 1.2 (which I dumped and is identical to the one here https://goughlui.com/2019/02/03/tested-generi … dapter-sd35vc0/ ). They all have the same "disappearing partition" issue if a FAT12 or FAT16 primary partition created by either Windows 10 disk management console or my Roland VS-880EX is the first partition on the disk .

Creating and formatting the same type of partition either with Easus Partition Master 11.9 or CentOS 7 fdisk and mkfs.vfat -F 16 works fine with the FC1307A .

Some more details here : Re: Using a vintage multi-track recorder as a mixer, namely the Roland VS-880EX - might apply to other Roland VS- units

I just checked what happens when I create a FAT-16 partition on Windows as compared to MS-DOS 6.22 and feel this explains things.

Basically FAT-16 is ambiguous and looking in winioctl.h there are three different types of FAT-16 partition and which you get depends on the size of the partition and which OS you use.

1#define PARTITION_FAT_16                0x04      // 16-bit FAT entries
2#define PARTITION_HUGE                  0x06      // Huge partition MS-DOS V4
3#define PARTITION_XINT13                0x0E      // Win95 partition using extended int13 services

With MS-DOS 6.22 you get PARTITION_FAT_16 or PARTITION_HUGE and with Windows 10 x64 Enterprise V10.00 Build 19042 20H2 you get PARTITION_XINT13. From what you said I suspect it's the XINT13 one that causes the issue, do you now also think this please?

Now I know XINT13 is FAT-16 I will get SIV to report FAT-16 Xint13.

Robhalfordfan wrote on 2020-11-25, 12:59:

thank you so far for advice and comments […]
Show full quote

thank you so far for advice and comments

i did cross my mind to keep the old seagate drive for the sounds and slight nostalgia and use a cf/sd/scsi card/adapter for performance increase on games where this build meets the requirements no issues but doesn't preform well as i said pure dos is ok (so far) but in windows 3.11, some don't, despite meet well above min system requirements

i am also looking for faster cd-rom drive (from the double speed one that came with this system) that would still fit the era-ish of machine (4x speed min, 8x speed recommended and 16x speed max)

seems cf card might the most easy way to use sounds like a performance increase over a the seagate 3000rpm hdd

if i did go down the scsi route, since i do have pci scsi card - i am guessing i will need edit a dos setup disk with scsi drivers in there config.sys and autoexec.bat for dos 6.22 setup to see the drive and format and install etc

I usually have spinning rust for C:\ gives you that authentic sound during boot and dos doesn't really benefit from faster drives.
I then have a CF card for D:\ where I install all my games. In my case Win 3.11 is on c:\ but no reason it cant live on d:\
on a 486 I don't find much need for a CD drive if you have networking but if your limited to 1 IDE header then you could go down the sound card with IDE route.

Just an option, A single CF and a CD-ROM is much easier setup if you don't care about boot sounds 😉

Which SCSI card do you have? if it has it's own bios no drivers are needed.

douglar wrote on 2020-11-26, 03:32:

Does your Bios have any built in limits? https://www.win.tue.nl/~aeb/linux/Large-Disk-4.html If you can find a drive that fits your needs and doesnt exceed your bios limit, it may make the retro computing more enjoyable. Overlays can help, but can also give you headaches if you move the drive between systems, depending on how you set things up, or cause performance issues in windows if you don’t have a protected mode driver.

What vintage of IDE controller will you be using? I had fewer compatibility issues using DOM modules & CF adapters with pre 1997 controllers, while the sinitechi SD adapater has had fewer issues with controllers made after 2000. That’s in my limitted sample size. Compatability issues could usually get resolved with a different firmware or overlay.

i dont' think it has limit as i try an 8gb ide hdd to see if i did have any hdd limits and it saw the full 8gb in lba mode

it told me that i could use 2gb or a 4gb drive/card of some type

the current seasgate drive is a 530 or 545mb ide drive and the bios puts that in lba mode if i leave it on auto in bios and if put the hdd detail it puts in chs mode

chinny22 wrote on 2020-11-26, 10:42:

I usually have spinning rust for C:\ gives you that authentic sound during boot and dos doesn't really benefit from faster drive […]
Show full quote

Robhalfordfan wrote on 2020-11-25, 12:59:

thank you so far for advice and comments […]
Show full quote

thank you so far for advice and comments

i did cross my mind to keep the old seagate drive for the sounds and slight nostalgia and use a cf/sd/scsi card/adapter for performance increase on games where this build meets the requirements no issues but doesn't preform well as i said pure dos is ok (so far) but in windows 3.11, some don't, despite meet well above min system requirements

i am also looking for faster cd-rom drive (from the double speed one that came with this system) that would still fit the era-ish of machine (4x speed min, 8x speed recommended and 16x speed max)

seems cf card might the most easy way to use sounds like a performance increase over a the seagate 3000rpm hdd

if i did go down the scsi route, since i do have pci scsi card - i am guessing i will need edit a dos setup disk with scsi drivers in there config.sys and autoexec.bat for dos 6.22 setup to see the drive and format and install etc

I usually have spinning rust for C:\ gives you that authentic sound during boot and dos doesn't really benefit from faster drives.
I then have a CF card for D:\ where I install all my games. In my case Win 3.11 is on c:\ but no reason it cant live on d:\
on a 486 I don't find much need for a CD drive if you have networking but if your limited to 1 IDE header then you could go down the sound card with IDE route.

Just an option, A single CF and a CD-ROM is much easier setup if you don't care about boot sounds 😉

Which SCSI card do you have? if it has it's own bios no drivers are needed.

i do like the sound the old hdd make during boot up and maybe thinking of keeping the seagate drive in and using a cf card/scsi card for games as a slave

would putting windows on the d drive help with performance or maybe put the windows swap file on the d drive

it a LSI logic symbios sym21002

i think it has it own bios as it appears as ncr-pci something during post but when i put in dos 6.22 setup floppy it doesn't see anything

but manage to find drivers that work in dos and has to use a later version of aspi manager driver for the card to work with and see anything connected to it, so i made me think that i need to install the drivers in dos first for a scsi drive to work

I'm sorry if this is obvious but DOS setup won't see anything if you have the controller installed but no drive attached. If you connect a SCSI HDD the controller's bios should handle it

Sorry yes you are 100% correct and I am wrong re the scsi card. I'm just too used to old adaptec cards and the like, I tend to forget about these new aspi based cards

With windows if all drives were equal then wouldn't be much benefit of windows on another drive but windows will benefit been put on a faster drive sure.
You may even get away with putting the swap file back on c:\ and save ware on the CF card, however I doubt the swap file really gets used much in 3x these days where we only have 1 or 2 programs open on PC's with plenty of ram.

chinny22 wrote on 2020-11-26, 13:58:

Sorry yes you are 100% correct and I am wrong re the scsi card. I'm just too used to old adaptec cards and the like, I tend to forget about these new aspi based cards

With windows if all drives were equal then wouldn't be much benefit of windows on another drive but windows will benefit been put on a faster drive sure.
You may even get away with putting the swap file back on c:\ and save ware on the CF card, however I doubt the swap file really gets used much in 3x these days where we only have 1 or 2 programs open on PC's with plenty of ram.

ok so if went down the scsi route - an old adaptec card would work out the box and would i t matter if it was isa of pci and would any adaptec card work or only certain ones without needing to install drivers first

i was thinking if did go for cf /sd/scsi and would that be "faster" than the old seagate drive but keep the seagate as a boot drive (until its time comes and start to fail) and put the swap file of the "faster" drive

the amount of ram is 32mb edo ram on my abit ab-pb4 rev 1.3 mobo

I have that same LSI card, it does work to boot DOS without drivers. Your card's BIOS may be disabled.

Another possibility: the card may not install its own BIOS int 13 routines if you have the main system BIOS setup with an IDE hard disk. If you try to boot from a floppy with *only* a SCSI disk connected it should appear as drive C: