Member Avatar for bolander

Sorry this is not much of a conversation point. I've bought two seagate 19 gig cheetah drives off e-bay over the last couple of months, for my ageing but lovely 7300/200. I got a connector thing with the first one (and its working fine). My first dumb question is what exactly would that thingy be called (and where can i buy it cheaply); the second (probably dumber) can i get a pci lvd controller for my system, & if so would it make any real difference.
Thank you for your time - whoever reads this

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Brief follow-up tied to 's thread and 's pointer, with practical steps to make the drive usable and reliable in a 7300/200.

If the drive powers and spins with the connector you already have, focus next on a proper PCI host adapter that has working Mac drivers for the OS you run. When shopping, prefer a 32-bit/33MHz PCI card with external/internal headers that match how you will mount the drive, and that offers built-in termination or auto-termination so you do not end up with two terminators on the same bus. Avoid cards that list drivers only for Windows; confirm Mac OS 9 or OS X driver availability before buying.

Hardware checklist before you power up:

  • Confirm how the adapter routes power to the drive header. Some enterprise drive headers expect the backplane to supply power; cheap adapters sometimes require a separate Molex connection or misroute pins. Double-check pinouts before connecting.
  • Set a unique SCSI ID for each device on the bus (via the adapter or the drive’s jumper block). Duplicate IDs will prevent the bus from working.
  • Ensure only the ends of the SCSI chain are terminated. If you add a controller that supplies termination, disable any termination on mid-chain devices.
  • Keep cable lengths within SCSI specifications and avoid mixing signaling families on the same bus unless the adapter explicitly supports it.

Software and testing:

  • Install the adapter’s Mac driver and reboot. Use System Profiler (or Drive Setup/Disk Utility on older Mac OS) to confirm the drive appears.
  • Initialize/format the disk with the filesystem you need after confirming detection.
  • Expect sensible airflow; older high-speed drives can run warm, so confirm adequate cooling and stable power.

Final cautions: back up any data before swapping drives, do not hot-plug unless the controller/backplane is designed for it, and if unsure about pinouts or termination, post exact drive and adapter model numbers for targeted advice.

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Member Avatar for alc6379

Question 1:
It's called a converter. If you're talking 80-pin SCA to 50-pin, it should work fine. You can get them on ebay for under $10 US, shipped, even. I've got an 80-pin to 68-pin adapter on a 10,000RPM Ultra SCSI drive, and it's pretty nice, I must say.

Also, you probably would do well to pick up an LVD controller. I'm not entirely sure what the speed increase would be, but it's bound to spank the internal SCSI controller, since it's only Wide SCSI-2.

Member Avatar for bolander

Thanks Alex - thats very helpful.
all the best
steve

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