Conference hydra::amiga_v1

	We have a 1000 in shop I use. When it comes to fish disk I go
to my dealer an copy them. I find this to be much easier than dealing
with downloading the disks. If you bring your amiga to work the download
is a lot less painfull. This is not what you had asked but it is the
soultion i use.
							bill	

    Somewhere in this file recently Steve McAfee indicated that he had a
    TK50Z hooked up to his 3000 and it worked just fine.
    
    I haven't tried yet but I am going to get a cable and try to hook one
    up to my 2000 using the Wandel tape-handler and the tar software from
    WLG or TAPE and try it. If it works I will then be able to use the
    VMSTAR program to create tapes on the system at work and restore them
    on my Amiga. 
    
    So with the above software and any compatibilities fixed it should be
    possible to do what you want to do. (It was what I had in mind as
    well).
    
    John
    

    
    
    	The Wandel tape-handler will not support a TZK50. The handler
    was written with QIC standard fixed block tapes in mind. I do know
    how to fix it, but I have not had the time.
    	If anyone wants to do the work I would be willing to explain
    how to fix it.
    
    	I use a DEC TZK10 ( QIC ) drive to carry fish disks from work
    to home.
    
    		Steve Peters
    		Tape Eng. ( TZK10 project leader )
    
    P.S. The TZK10 works on DEC and amiga systems.
    

    Re: .3
    
    I am willing to do the work on the tape-handler. I don't know what is
    needed however. I only have PDC and NorthC. I haven't even looked at
    the source for the handler. 
    
    If you could send me a description of what needs done I'll try to make
    the changes necessary for the TK50Z. 
    
    John

    You mentioned connecting the TK50Z to you VAXStation 2000.  Does a
    VAXStation 2000 support SCSI?
    

re    <<< Note 4511.5 by GOBAMA::WILSONTL "Lead Trumpet (Read that...LEED!)" >>>

>    You mentioned connecting the TK50Z to you VAXStation 2000.  Does a
>    VAXStation 2000 support SCSI?

	I don't think so, but in my enthusiasm to grab a TK50Z I 
failed to check into that  -  I'll just have to hunt down another 
platform within dec, or buy an A500 just for the office - or get dec 
to buy me the A3000AUX (-:

	R	{I'll find a way....}    

    Re: last 2
    
    The 2000 tape port is a SCSI port (pre SCSI II, however). The 2000
    TK50s are 'hardwired' to unit 0 or 1 (I forget) and the controller is
    the other unit...
    
    There is no software support for SCSI on 2000s under VMS - I don't know
    about Ultrix.
    
    However a TK50 from a 2000 should stand as good a chance of working as
    a TK50Z except it would be at unit 0 instead of being adjustable.
    
    I'm no expert but I believe the above is correct (Steve Peters should
    know for sure).
    
    
    John

    re .5
    
    	The VS2000 does have a limited SCSI bus ( pre SCSI II ). The good
    news is that it was designed to support a TK50Z.
    
    	The TK50Z can be set to any SCSI id. There are dip switches on the
    SCSI controller card.
    
    	For the real question, How to make it all work ?
    1. Find a VAX VMS program that will read and write  UNIX TAR format
       tape. 
    
    2. The PD tape handler needs to be modified to support variable block
       tapes. The PD TAR program for the Amiga should work without changes.
    
    If anyone wants to do the work I'll be happy to explain exactly what
    needs to be done. The handler is written in Lattice/SAS C.
    
    		Steve Peters
    
    P.S. I have a online copy of the TK50Z specification.
    

>     	For the real question, How to make it all work ?
>     1. Find a VAX VMS program that will read and write  UNIX TAR format
>        tape. 
>     

There is a copy of VMS tar at WJG::X11R4:TARREAD.EXE that can only
read tar archives. The Amiga tar comes with source and should be 
pretty easy to port to VMS.

john

    I've got a full VMS tar that we use for 9-track tapes. If anyone is
    interested, let me know where I should put it and what format the
    archive should be in.
    
    	<mike
    

>                        <<< Note 4511.10 by MADRE::MWM >>>
>                              -< We have a VMS tar >-
> 
>     I've got a full VMS tar that we use for 9-track tapes. If anyone is
>     interested, let me know where I should put it and what format the
>     archive should be in.
>     
>     	<mike
>     
> 

you can put a copy on WJG::AMIGA: in whatever format you'ld like.

john

    
    For the record, the VS2000 supports the TZK50 drive. In fact, that's
    the only way it does support a TK50. I used to have a VS2000, and gave
    it up for a DS3100. I kept the TZK50, and the only modification I had
    to make to it in order to use it on the DS3100 was removing a couple of
    jumpers to modify its SCSI bus address.
    
    I suspect that, at the time, we didn't want to blatently advertise that
    we were using the SCSI bus on the VS2000. In any case, ULTRIX fully
    supports it on both architectures.
    
    No, I haven't tried it on my A500 - I don't have a SCSI controller for
    it (yet - one of these days...)
    
    Bayard Coolidge
    ULTRIX CSSE
    

I have a TK50-D and a BA40AAA (used to connect a TK50 to a VAXmate?).  Is this
a SCSI port TK50 or what would I need to make this SCSI.

...Ed

    
    
    	re .13
    
    ED, there is no VAXmate to TK50 connection. What do you have ?
    
    		Steve
    

    
    I also have a TZK50 which I have tried on an ICD Advantage 2000.  The
    format program shows 4 luns reporting on the SCSI ID in use by the
    tape.  Is this normal?  There do not appear to be any jumpers to
    control the lun's.  If this is normal then which lun would be the
    appropriate one to use?  In addition the device id is just garbage. 
    Thinking that this may be a bad unit I tried another one with the same
    results.  Both of these units are fairly old (ie: the early days of
    SCSI TK50's).
    
    Any suggestions on how to make this work would be appreciated.
    
    wayne
    

On my scsi tk50 there are dip switchs on the back near the power plug to
set the logical unit number.

Maybe one of these switchs is halfway between on and off...
It should only show up on one scsi logical unit number.

-steve

    
    re .15
    Wayne,
    
    	The TK50Z is pre SCSI-II. It was started pre SCSI-I. So the 
    device ID field is not supported. It will work using LUN 0. There
    isn't full support for the LUN field in the firmware and the LUN
    can't be set. It may ignor the LUN in many cases.
    
    		Steve Peters
    
    P.S. I will send out the specification on request.
    

    
    I have been trying to use the TK50 with a couple of different drivers
    provided (from WJG::) and have only succeeded in hanging the system a
    lot of times.  The MT driver appears to write the tape with TAR but any
    attempt to read the tape causes a hang (somewhere around the second
    block).  
    
    Steve Peters:  is there any update to the board which makes it a
    SCSI-II or is a complete replacement drive required?
    
    So at the moment with the available drivers I cannot seem to make
    things work.  Anybody else having any luck.
    
    (there are several people in our little DEC group who would like to
    share this drive for monthly backups, so we are quite interested in
    getting it to work)
    
    wayne
    

    
    Does anybody happen to know what the appropriate values for Blocksize
    and blocking factor would be for the TK50?
    
    Ultrix tar appears to write 512*20 (10240 bytes per block).  In setting
    up one of the available drivers it wants the blocksize and number of
    buffers, various values still hang the system but I may not have the
    correct sizes.
    
    BTW: the TLZ04 does work, however improper selection of blocksize does
    cause problems.  There appears to be too many variables and not enough
    information.
    
    wayne
    

>     lot of times.  The MT driver appears to write the tape with TAR but any
>     attempt to read the tape causes a hang (somewhere around the second
>     block).  
>     


Are you using a GVP scsi card? If so, I found a bug with their stuff when
using scsi direct.  If you try to issue a read with too large of a 
transfer size, the gvp hangs (until you open the tape door and close
it again on my system)

Try using the -B (?) switch on tar to make the blocking smaller.

	tar -B5 -t mt0:

(something like that)

john

    
    John, 
    	I tried hooking the TK50 up to a GVP-II which promptly hangs on
    boot if the tape is loaded.  If the tape is unloaded it doesn't appear 
    to mind.
    
    	I tried -B20 (which is default but I tried it anyways).  I give -B5
    or -B1 a try and see what happens.
    
    	Of interest, sometimes when I have had the system hang due to the
    tape on reboot it won't because it keep touching the tape, just as
    though it were trying to boot from it. (rewind/read over and over) Have
    to turn off the tape drive to clear it.
    
    wayne
    

    I tried the TZK50 on my GVP II and it hung on boot also, with or
    without a tape inserted.  I did get it to boot-once-but neither tabu,
    tar, nor any of the freely distributable tape drivers would get it to
    function.  With Tabu I kept getting "error code 45" and the others, Tar
    included, made the tape try to rewind then returned the shell prompt. 
    I figured I'd wait until I saved enough to purchase a wangtek or
    equivalent 150meg drive.
    
    mark

    
    	The TZK50 firmware has not been updated to follow SCSI-II
    standards.
    
    	The problem everyone is having is that the tape programs on the
    Amiga have all been written to support QIC standard tapes. These
    are fixed block mode tapes. The TZK50 is a variable block mode 
    tape. When you send fixed block mode commands to a variable
    block mode tape it doesn't work.
    	I'm on vaction Friday, maybe I can find some free time to
    modify the tape handler. I expect it to take 8-10 programming
    to fix it and test it.
    
    		Steve Peters
    

    Steve,
    
    The TK50 I happened upon sounds like it is the wrong one ;'(
    
    The model number is a TK50-D.  It's in a approx 8"W x 5"H x 14"D case
    with a 50 pin EIA style connector.  I was also given a metal box
    (supposedly from a VAXmate I was told) that has a 50 EIA style connector, a
    centronics connector and 20, 40 and 50 ribbon cable.  Opening the box
    reveils that the centronics connector goes to the 50 pin ribbon and the
    50 EIA style connector goes on to a small PCB with no components and a
    20 and 40 ribbon cable output.
    
    So what do I have for an interface?  DEC private TK50 bus? SCSI? ST506?
    
    
    Any ideas?
    
    ...Ed

      Steve, 
    	It seems mine suffers the same fate as the others, my Cypher also
     only adheres to SCSI I protocol (so I'm told/I'm no expert in the
    field.) It also does similar to the Tk50 with tabu, it gets about a
    1/9th of the disk backed up and bombs out with a error 45.
       Is it that the Tape unit can't handle any scsi protocol II comands?
    
    								Thanks;
    									Ed

    
    re .24
    	The TK50 drive has a non-standard interface. The SCSI TK50 is a
    standard TK50 with an adapter card ( controller ) that converts from
    TK50 to SCSI. The adapter is not simple. It includes a Z80 processor
    and lots of firmware.
    
    re .25
    	I have used the Cipher st-150 ( 150 MB QIC tape ). It will work
    with the debug handler John Guineau worked on. In fact John uses the
    cipher on his system. What SCSI controller are you using ? What rev
    firmware ?
    
    		Steve Peters
    

    I'm using a GVP Series II card. It has the lates roms, but I can't 
    remember the version # (3.1?).
     I tried the tape-handlers before, ( the old Help with Tape needed note
    ).
    	But continually recieve an error 45 independant of the
    software/handler I use, (either that or it doesn't work at all).
    
    							Ed
    

    
    Steve,
    	If your time is tight could I get a copy of the tape drive to work
    upon?  After all there are several of us at this office that have a
    real interest in making this work, whereas I'm sure you would rather
    spend your time on more interesting things like all that new stuff you
    have mentioned in the other notes.
    
    wayne
    

Does TABU give a description of what error 42 is? is it an Exec IO status?
A SCSI sense key? a strange number pulled out of the programmers mind?

Is it the meaning of life itself?!?!? (sorry!)

john

    It says "do_io error 45" perhaps? I'll check the old tape-note, (or
    write it down tonight).
    

 Here it is.......
    
    
================================================================================
Note 4133.81              Help with Tape driver needed.                 81 of 81
SHARE::DOYLE                                         36 lines  27-FEB-1991 10:18
                                -< Back Again! >-
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  Now that I've worked out my other hardware problems, I'm back at work trying
     to find a workable Tape program for my Cypher 150.
  The demo programs on the recent Fish Disks for backing up haven't been much
 help.
  One doesn't do tape, another only works with Dos 2.0.. (if I had 2.0, I don't
 think I'd need a backup program :')), and the last one "Fastback" expects
 you to have a tape-handler already installed.
  The other assorted handlers for tape on these disks have already been in the
 Public Directories online here for some time.
  From whats been stated earlier my tape drive doesn't handle SCSI II protocol.
 Perhaps this is why the various programs don't work with my setup.
  Unfortunately, I know nothing about SCSI protocol let alone the differences
 between 1 & 2.
  The closest I've come to haveing it operate correctly is with TABU.
  Here are some results.
  
	Tabu using File backup - The first time I'd get about a third into
				 the file By file backup and it'd choke
				 on a particular file.
				 After further investigation this file was
				 protected against RWED. After altering the
				 protection the program backed up about 2
				 thirds of my drive and then came back with
				 Tape_write do_io error:45
	
	Tabu using block backup - This also runs for a while then kicks back
				 an identical error to the one above.
 
  Can someone report back thier Expierences with this program. What does the
 error message mean?
  I'm running.... an A500/Bodega-Bay/GVPseries II/Quantum 80/Cypher st150/3meg
  system.
								Thanks;
									Ed

 

Considering all these comments I'm amazed the SCSI TK50 works with
BRU which comes with 2.0.  But it does.  BRU is available (I think)
in the public domain or freeware or shareware for UNIX.  There was
an article about 4 to 6 months ago in UNIX Review about bru.

Fred Fish himself ported this to the amiga.  There is an older version
on one of the fish disks, but I don't know if that one supports tapes
or not.  I know the one which comes with AmigaDOS 2.0 works fine for me
and is I think a later version of Fred's port.

Maybe someone could find an ftp site which has the bru sources or
better yet give Fred a call and see where he got his.  I wouldn't be
surprised if someone hasn't already ported this to the DECstation.

-steve

    I would like to use a TKZ50 for tape archiving since the cost is within
    my means(a property pass) at the moment.  But, in general, is anyone
    using a reliable tape backup system(hardware & software) with the
    capabilities that are provided by Quarterback?  i.e. able to
    backup/restore single files, directories, by attribute bits, can be
    script driven, etc...
    
    mark
    

    
    re .33
    
    	NOTE 4577 describes where to get a copy of the TK50Z software
    I did this weekend. It is not as complete as quarterback. It is
    based on a good version of TAR.
    
    	Amigados 2.0 includes tape support software that does work with
    a TK50Z. The software seems to have all the features you want.
    
    		Steve Peters