Adaptec 1742A User manual

AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
EISA-to-Fast SCSI
Host Adapter
User’s Manual

AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
EISA-to-Fast SCSI
Host Adapter
User’s Manual

Copyright
© Copyright 1992 Adaptec, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means;
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written
consent of Adaptec, Inc., 691 South Milpitas Blvd., Milpitas, CA 95035.
Trademarks
AMI is a registered trademark of American Megatrends, Inc.
ASPI is a trademark of Adaptec, Inc.
IBM PC-AT and OS/2 are registered trademarks of International Business Machines
Corporation.
MCS is a registered trademark of Intel Corporation.
Microsoft, MS-DOS, and XENIX are registered trademarks and Windows is a trade-
mark of Microsoft Corporation.
Novell and NetWare are registered trademarks of Novell, Inc.
Phoenix is a registered trademark of Phoenix Technologies, Inc.
SCO is a registered trademark of The Santa Cruz Operations, Inc.
SunSoft Interactive Unix is a registered trademark of SunSoft, Inc.
UNIX is a registered trademark of AT&T Bell Laboratories.
USL Unix is a registered trademark of Unix Systems Laboratories, Inc.
Changes
The material in this manual is for information only and is subject to change without
notice.
Adaptec reserves the right to make changes in the product design without reservation
and without notification to its users.
Literature
The Adaptec Literature Department can be reached at 1-800-934-2766.
Additional information may be obtained from:
Adaptec, Inc.
Literature Department - M/S 40
691 South Milpitas Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035
ii

Technical Support
There are several ways to get technical assistance for your Adaptec product(s). Each is
described below. When requesting assistance, be sure that you have the following items
available (or if you write or FAX, send them along):
•the model of any Adaptec hardware product(s) you have.
•the model and version number of any Adaptec software product(s) you are
using.
•the type and version number of operating system you are using.
•the place at which you purchased your Adaptec product.
If you received your Adaptec host adapter as original equipment in a computer system,
first contact that computer manufacturer for technical assistance.
If you are an OEM, contact your local Adaptec sales office.
If you wish to contact Adaptec by telephone directly, our technical support phone num-
ber is: [phone].
Outside of the U.S. and Canada, contact your local authorized Adaptec distributor.
The Adaptec electronic Bulletin Board Service (BBS) is available 24 hours a day at
[phone]. You can connect at 1200, 2400 or 9600 baud, using 8 bits, 1 stop bit and
no parity. Questions may be posted to the system operator (sysop). In addition, user
manuals, utility programs, and other information are also available through the BBS.
You can write to Adaptecat:
Adaptec, Inc.
Technical Support
691 South Milpitas Blvd.
Milpitas, CA 95035
If you would prefer to contact us by FAX, our number is [phone].
iii

Table of Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Conventions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . x
Chapter One
Overview
General Product Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-1
Installation Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-4
BIOS Operation Modes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-5
System Caching Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-6
Product Specifications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-7
Associated Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1-8
Chapter Two
Hardware Installation
Unpacking and Inspection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-1
Preparation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-2
SCSI Terminators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-3
SCSI Parity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-4
SCSI ID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-4
Physical Installation in the System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-5
Chapter Three
Using the Configuration Utility
EISA Configuration Utility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-1
Host Adapter Interface Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-4
I/O Port Definition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-6
DMA Channel Definition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-7
Host Adapter BIOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-8
Host Adapter SCSI ID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-10
SCSI Bus Reset at Power-on . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-10
Advanced Enhanced Mode BIOS Options. . . . . . . . . 3-11
SCSI Device Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-12
v

Standard Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-13
Enable Parity Checking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-13
Initiate Synch Negotiation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-14
Enable Disconnection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-14
Enhanced Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-15
Error if Device Not Found . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-15
BIOS Support Option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-16
Send Start Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-17
Enable Parity Checking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-17
Initiate Synch Negotiation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-17
Enable Disconnection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-18
Maximum Synch Xfer Rate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-19
Chapter Four
Multiple Host Adapter Support
Standard Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4-1
Enhanced Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4-1
Standard and Enhanced Modes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4-2
Chapter Five
Adaptec Download Utility
Running the ADL Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-1
Download Firmware . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-4
Firmware Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-6
Low-Level Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-7
Exiting the ADL Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-9
Chapter Six
Host Adapter BIOS Operation
Standard Mode Operation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6-1
Enhanced Mode Operation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6-3
adaptec AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
vi

Chapter Seven
Troubleshooting
Determining Problems Using the LED . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7-1
Problems Detected During Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7-2
Problems Booting the System from a SCSI Drive . . . . . . 7-4
Problems Using a SCSI and a Standard Disk Drive . . . . 7-4
Problems Using Two SCSI Drives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7-5
Appendix A
Disk Drives Over 1 Gigabyte
Extended Translation (Using DOS 5) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-1
The DOS 1 Gigabyte Limit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-1
When to Use Extended Translation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-2
With DOS Version 5 Only . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-2
Drives With Mixed Partitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-2
Using Extended Translation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-2
Using Fdisk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-3
Load ASW-1410 v3.0a . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A-3
Questions and Answers About Extended Translation . . A-3
Appendix B
Loading the I/O Operating Environment Software
DOS/Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B-1
Novell NetWare . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B-2
OS/2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B-2
Unix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B-2
Glossary
Index
Table of Contents
EISA-to-Fast SCSI Host Adapter
vii

List of Figures
Figure 2-1. SCSI Device Termination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2-3
Figure 3-1. System Configuration Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-2
Figure 3-2. System Configuration Detailed View . . . . . . . . . 3-3
Figure 3-3. Change Resources Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-5
Figure 3-4. SCSI Configuration Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-12
Figure 3-5. Global Configuration Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-13
Figure 3-6. SCSI Device Configuration Settings . . . . . . . . 3-15
Figure 5-1. Host Adapter Listing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-2
Figure 5-2. ADL Main Menu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-3
Figure 5-3. Download Firmware Screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-4
Figure 5-4. Download Warning Message Screen . . . . . . . . . 5-5
Figure 5-5. Enhanced Mode Firmware Information . . . . . . . 5-6
Figure 5-6. Low-Level Format Device Selection Screen . . . . 5-7
Figure 5-7. Low-Level Format Option Selection Screen . . . 5-8
Figure 5-8. Exiting the ADL Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5-9
Figure 6-1. Standard BIOS Boot Message . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6-1
Figure 6-2. Enhanced BIOS Boot Message . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6-3
Figure 6-3. Boot Message with Error Detection Enabled . . 6-4
List of Tables
Table 1-1. AHA 1740A/1742A/1744 Program Files . . . . . . . . 1-4
Table 1-2. AHA 1740A/1742A/1744 Operation Modes . . . . . . 1-5
Table 1-3. AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 Product Specifications . 1-7
Table 3-1. BIOS Installation Limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3-9
Table 7-1. AHA 1740A/1742A/1744 LED Flash Codes . . . . . 7-2
adaptec AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
viii

Preface
This User Guide provides information relating to the operation
of the Adaptec AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 EISA-to-Fast SCSI
Host Adapter in an EISA (Extended Industry Standard Archi-
tecture) system.
Chapter One, Overview, provides general information and a
list of files provided for configuration.
Chapter Two, Hardware Installation, describes the installa-
tion of the AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 host adapter in your EISA
system.
Chapter Three, Using the Configuration Utility, contains
information on configuring the host adapter with a configura-
tion utility.
Chapter Four, Multiple Host Adapter Support, explains how
more than one host adapter can be used in an EISA system.
Chapter Five, Adaptec Download Utility, explains firmware
download procedure, which is available for the AHA-1740 and
AHA-1744 only.
Chapter Six, Host Adapter BIOS Operation, explains the
standard and enhanced BIOS operation modes.
Chapter Seven, Troubleshooting, offers information relating
to the LED functioning and possible problem occurrences dur-
ing host adapter operation.
Appendix A, Disk Drives Over 1 Gigabyte, contains configura-
tion information relating to disk drives with a capacity of more
than
1 Gigabyte.
Appendix B, Loading the I/O Operating Environment Soft-
ware, contains a description of software used to connect more
than two fixed disk drives.
ix

Conventions
The following typographic conventions are used throughout
this Installation Guide.
bold
Used for keystrokes (.. press the Enter key ..) and screen selec-
tion fields (.. select Backup Device and ..).
Helvetica
Used for operator entry that must be typed exactly as shown
( .. device=c:\cdrom\cdrom.tsd ..) and for screen messages (.. En-
ter Password ..).
Helvetica Italics
Used as a place holder for text you must determine and type in
(.. enter
nn for number ..). Also used for program and file names
in body text (.. the
autoexec.bat file ..).
Italics
Used for emphasis (.. is only supported ..) and document refer-
ence (.. refer to Chapter 2, Installation ..).
ALL CAPITALS
Used for acronyms, such as SCSI.
Hexadecimal Numbers
Are followed by an ’h’, e.g., 330h.
End Mark
The ❐symbol marks the end of text for each chapter.
❐
x

Printed in Singapore
STOCK NO.: 510215-00
Rev B
LL 8/93
691 south milpitas blvd. •milpitas, ca 95035 •[phone]

Chapter One
Overview
This User Guide provides software installation information for
the Adaptec AHA-1740A, 1742A, and the 1744 EISA-to-fast-SCSI
bus master host adapters. Cumulatively the cards are referred to
as AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 in this guide. The Adaptec
adl.exe
download utility and the ASW-C174 and ASW-M174 software
packages are described, as well as available software support.
General Product Information
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 provides a high performance connec-
tion between the EISA (Extended Industry Standard Architec-
ture) bus and the SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) bus.
The AHA-1740A/1742A are single-ended SCSI host adapters that
support single-ended disk drives. Single-ended host adapters and
devices can support cable lengths of up to 6 meters (about 18
feet). Most of the SCSI drives on the market today are of this
type. The AHA-1744 Host Adapter is adifferential SCSI host
adapter that supports differential type SCSI devices. The use of
differential SCSI drives and adapters allows the SCSI cable
length to be up to 25 meters in length (about 75 feet). Other than
this basic difference, and other slight differences discussed in this
document, the AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 are installed and operate
identically.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 is a bus master device and transfers
data into host memory at burst rates of 33 MBytes/sec. These
transfers are generally 32 bits wide, unless transferring data into
8- or 16-bit memory. This form of transfer is known as bus mas-
ter DMA (Direct Memory Access). Bus mastering minimizes host
CPU overhead, since the AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 has an on board
processor to transfer data directly to memory. This is the highest
performance type of data transfer available for the EISA bus in
multitasking operating systems.
1-1

The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 supports asynchronous, synchro-
nous, and Fast SCSI data transfers on the SCSI bus. Asynchro-
nous data transfers support up to 2 MBytes/sec, synchronous
transfers support up to 5 MBytes/sec, and Fast synchronous trans-
fers support up to 10 MBytes/sec. Devices using different trans-
fer rates can all be used on the same SCSI cable. The
AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 is both SCSI-1 and SCSI-2 compatible,
and supports both SCSI-1 and SCSI-2 devices.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 fully supports the SCSI features of
disconnect/reconnect, zero latency reads, and tagged queuing. Dis-
connect/reconnect support maximizes SCSI bus utilization for
multiple target systems. Zero latency reads and tagged queuing
minimizes the mechanical limitations of SCSI fixed disk drives.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 has an on board BIOS that allows it
to be used in addition to, or in place of, a standard fixed disk con-
troller. Thus, up to two SCSI fixed disk drives can be used under
DOS without the use of device drivers. Up to seven SCSI fixed
disk drives can be used without a driver if MS-DOS 5.0 or higher
is used. Booting is also supported by the BIOS in the DOS envi-
ronment.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 fully supports scatter/gather, a fea-
ture utilized by device drivers to minimizes the number of I/O
commands into memory. The UNIX®/XENIX®and NetWare®op-
erating environments take advantage of this feature.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 has two modes of operation: stand-
ard mode and enhanced mode. The standard mode is software
compatible with the AHA-1540 series host adapter drivers. The
enhanced mode uses an advanced, high performance mailbox
interface and features full EISA 32-bit addressing. The
AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 in enhanced mode can support up to
4 Gigabytes of host RAM memory, while standard mode is limited
to 16 MBytes of host RAM. The operation mode of the
AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 is selected by running the EISA Configu-
ration utility program provided with every EISA machine. The
modes of operation are fully described in Chapter 6, Host Adapter
BIOS Operation.
adaptec AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
1-2

The AHA-1744 microcode is stored in an EEPROM. This allows
the microcode to be changed with the Adaptec
adl.exe program.
The
adl.exe program can also be used to determine the checksum
of the currently installed microcode and low-level format SCSI
fixed disks. Both the standard and enhanced mode microcode can
reside in the EEPROM at the same time.
The AHA-1740A/1742A uses an EPROM for the microcode, which
does not allow the microcode to be changed. However, the
adl.exe
program can still be used to low-level format fixed disk drives.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744, like all EISA I/O cards, do not have
jumpers to change various configuration options. These options
are changed via the EISA Configuration utility provided with
every EISA system. The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 does have a
jumper that is used to determine whether or not the host adapter
will supply terminator power to the SCSI bus. In addition, the
AHA-1742A has a jumper that is used to enable or disable the
on-board floppy controller.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 can be used to install up to 7 SCSI
devices. Up to 56 devices can be installed if bridge controllers are
used; however, this is not usually done.
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 supports processor target mode,
which allows the host adapter to be an initiator and a target. The
use of processor target mode is fully documented in the AHA-
1740A/1742A/1744 Technical Reference Manual.
EISA-to-Fast SCSI Host Adapter Overview
1-3

Installation Software
Software required to install the AHA-1740A/1742A/1744, in an
EISA system, is provided in the ASW-C174 software package.
The files consist of:
File Name File Description
!adp0000.cfg EISA configuration file for the AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
!adp0001.cfg EISA configuration file for the AHA-1740A
!adp0002.cfg EISA configuration file for the AHA-1742A
!adp0400.cfg EISA configuration file for the AHA-1744
adp0000.ovl Configuration overlay file
adp0000.ovr Configuration overlay file (for use with the AMI EISA
configuration utility)
adl.exe Adaptec download utility
standard.hex Standard mode microcode (AHA-1744 only)
enhanced.hex Enhanced mode microcode (AHA-1744 only)
sys$err.dta Support files for adl.exe
sys$help.dta Support files for adl.exe
sys$msg.dta Support files for adl.exe
firmhlp.hlp Support files for adl.exe
The ASW-M174 includes only the standard and enhanced mode
firmware, and is used to upgrade the firmware for the AHA-1744
if required.
Also required to install the AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 is an EISA
Configuration utility. This utility is provided by the EISA system
manufacturer.
Table 1-1. AHA 1740A/1742A/1744 Program Files
adaptec AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
1-4

BIOS Operation Modes
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 has two modes of operation: stand-
ard mode and enhanced mode. The standard mode is software
compatible with the AHA-1540 series host adapter drivers. The
enhanced mode uses an advanced, high performance mailbox
interface and features full EISA 32-bit addressing. The
AHA-1740A/1742A/1744, in enhanced mode, can support up
to 4 Gigabytes of host RAM memory. The two modes of the
AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 are selected by running the EISA Con-
figuration utility provided with every EISA machine. In general,
the enhanced mode of the AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 should be
used, whenever possible, for maximum performance.
The two operation modes are described in the table below.
Standard Mode
(ISA compatible mode) Enhanced Mode (enhanced mailbox interface)
32-bit host transfers at 33 MBytes/sec. 32-bit host transfers at 33 MBytes/sec.
Addresses up to 16 MBytes host RAM. Addresses up to 4 Gigabytes host RAM.
AHA-1540 series mailbox structure
(compatible with AHA-1540 software). New high performance mailbox structure.
Supports Fast SCSI devices up to
5 MBytes/sec. Supports Fast SCSI devices up to 10 MBytes/sec.
Boot only from SCSI ID 0. Boot from any SCSI ID.
Drives spin up only at power-on. Drives spin up at power-on, or from
SCSI Start Unit command.
Disconnect/reconnect, parity checking,
and synchronous negotiation enable or
disabled for all SCSI targets.
These parameters can be enabled or
disabled on a per target basis.
Up to four host adapters can be in-
stalled in the system. Up to twelve host adapters can be installed in the system.
BIOS support for drives up to 1 Gi-
gabyte in capacity under MS-DOS. BIOS support for drives up to 8 Gigabytes in capacity under MS-DOS
5.0 or higher.
BIOS support for a maximum of 2
SCSI drives. BIOS support for up to 7 SCSI drives (using MS-DOS 5.0 or higher).
Table 1-2. AHA 1740A/1742A/1744 Operation Modes
EISA-to-Fast SCSI Host Adapter Overview
1-5

System Caching Description
The AHA-1740A/1742A/1744 fully supports operating systems
caching to maximize overall system performance. Having RAM
on the host adapter can actually decrease overall system perform-
ance while adding cost. Operating systems such as Novell®Net-
Ware, OS/2®, UNIX, XENIX, DOS and Windowshave built-in
cache and caching the same data in the operating system and on
the host adapter can bog down system performance.
Overall system performance is increased by increasing the size of
the operating system cache (i.e. add more RAM to the system
motherboard), and by utilizing the advanced multithreading fea-
tures of SCSI to minimize the mechanical limitations of SCSI
peripherals (such as disk seek times by using zero latency reads).
adaptec AHA-1740A/1742A/1744
1-6