Installation Issues (Nt, I2O Drivers, Capacity, Booting, Irq Settings) - Promise Technology FASTTRAK66 User Manual

Manual EN 05-08-1999 11:30
Appendix
Installation Issues
(NT, I2O Drivers, Drive Capacity, Booting, IRQ Settings)
Q: Why are some drives recognized by the FastTrak66 Array Setup
utilities with only partial capacity?
A: Some hard drive models are shipped with a jumper that reduces the addres
sable capacity of the drive to prevent problems with older systems which
won't support larger drives. Consult the documentation accompanying the
hard drive to set the jumper appropriately in order to utilize the full capa
city of the drive.
Q: How can I change the system boot sequence in order to boot from the
FastTrak66 array?
A: The boot sequence is controlled by the system BIOS. As far as the system
BIOS is concerned, the FastTrak66 controller and defined arrays are cate
gorized as a "SCSI" device (even though the BIOS will not attempt to
access the FastTrak66 as any type of SCSI device). This allows you to set
the boot sequence in your BIOS CMOS setup utility to boot from "SCSI"
(an add-in controller like the FastTrak66) first, rather than "IDE" (an IDE
controller built onto the motherboard or one which effectively replaces it).
If there are multiple SCSI add-in controllers in the system, then the boot
sequence among them will be determined exclusively by their PCI slot
priority. PCI slot #1 will be first, slot #2 second, etc. Put the FastTrak66
controller in the PCI slot where it will be accessed ahead of other SCSI
controllers if you want to boot from the array.
Q: How can I change the boot sequence between a PCI SCSI card and the
FastTrak66 RAID array?
A: Since all PCI devices are all PnP, it is difficult to determine which device is
addressed first. Some newer motherboard BIOSes may use advanced
options that identify devices and allow you to select which device will be
assigned resources first. Otherwise you may have to physically switch the
device cards on the PCI slots so that the boot device is in the highest
priority slot number (see previous question). If you do not require the
FastTrak66 BIOS to boot from an array and it is only to be used through a
driver under the O/S, one simpler solution would be to disable the
FastTrak66 BIOS so that it does not affect the boot sequence at all.
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