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Partitioning Large Disks
The K2600 can address a maximum of 8 G of disk space, so there's not much point in connecting
a larger disk to the K2600—unless you like to do a bit of hacking, in which case you may be able
to use a personal computer to format the extra space for use with that computer.
There are several disk-formatting utilities available for the Mac and PC. You may be able to use
one of these (including FDISK for the PC) to format a large hard disk with 8 G of space for the
K2600, and additional space that's accessible to your computer.
Working With Partitions
Once your hard disk is formatted and partitioned, you should verify each partition before
attempting to store files. The quickest way to do this is to execute a Load command for each
partition. If the K2600 can read the disk (even though there are no files), the partition is OK. The
display informs you if there's a problem addressing the partition.
One you've verified each partition, you can start using the disk with your K2600, and optionally
with a personal computer. If your disk is attached to the K2600 and nothing else, you'll interact
with the hard disk exclusively through Disk mode. If you're in Disk mode and you can't get to a
partition, try reformatting the partition (see When Disks Are Already Partitioned on page 3-3). If
that doesn't work, do a hard format on the disk, then format and partition it again.
If your hard disk is also attached to a computer, the computer should be able to address each
partition. PCs can address each partition as an individual drive (at a DOS prompt or via icons in
Windows), while Macs display a file icon for each partition.
Having a computer hooked up to the hard disk gives you another way to verify the formatting
and partitioning of the disk. Look at the disk from the K2600, then from the computer. If they
don't have the same partition data (number of partitions, size of each partition), you could have
a formatting problem. In this case, you should start over by doing a hard format, then
proceeding to formatting and partitioning.
Managing a SCSI Chain that Includes a Computer
If you create a SCSI chain that contains both a K2600 and a computer, you'll need to use caution
to prevent file corruption. We'll explain how this risk of file corruption occurs, then describe
how to avoid it.
When you boot up your computer, it addresses the SCSI devices to which it's connected, and
attempts to mount every SCSI device whose format it recognizes. While mounting a disk, the
computer examines the disk's file allocation table (FAT). The FAT contains the locations of all the
data on the disk. Consequently, the FAT gets updated every time you write data to the disk.
Here's where the risk of file corruption occurs.
When you write to your hard disk from the K2600, the K2600 updates the disk's FAT. But there's
no way to instruct the computer that the FAT has been changed, so the K2600 and the computer
have different versions of the disk's FAT. If you write to the disk from the computer at this time,
you run the risk of writing over the data you just stored from the K2600.
You can eliminate this risk by ensuring that the K2600 and the computer have the same version
of the disk's FAT before writing from the computer. The most foolproof way to ensure this is to
adopt the following rule: Whenever you write to the hard disk from the K2600, unmount and
remount that disk before writing to it from your computer. If it's a removable-media drive,
ejecting the disk and reinserting it will update the computer's version of the FAT.
Disk Partitioning
Working With Partitions
3-5
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