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| Thread ID: 48105 | 2004-08-14 04:41:00 | Is my removable harddrive hotswapable? | willie_M (5608) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 261546 | 2004-08-14 04:41:00 | Hey guys, I another thread i said that i got a removable hard drive with one of my papers at uni. The removable tray interfaces with the cradle with what I believe is SCSI. Then the cradle is plugged into the master plug on the 2nd ide channel. On the front of the tray it has an on/off switch and on the box it says its hotswapable. However I took that to mean HSWPable hardware wise. I didnt think windows would like me turning off and removing the drive helter skelter.... It has a usb interface on the tray beside the ide plug however the cheapass university wouldn't pay the extra $2 for the cable... The model number is ViPower VP-10LSFU-133 also I have usb 2 so if i use usb to connect it to the computer will it run at 300mbps (logical 2.0 speed) or will it run at 133mbps (what i take ATA-133 to mean)? |
willie_M (5608) | ||
| 261547 | 2004-08-14 04:47:00 | It's best not to treat it as Hotswappable. SCSI can handle it (for servers) but IDE converted to SCSI can't really, and the Windows (and most likely Linux) won't handle it without software. Which I don't think either has. :D USB can be hot-swappable, but it still best to unmount a disk before removing it in Linux. I don't think Windows will know what you're taking about. :D On USB the speed you will get will depend. ;-) It should be acceptable with USB 2.0 (If the drive case is USB 2.0). |
Graham L (2) | ||
| 261548 | 2004-08-14 05:44:00 | I have hotswapped IDE drives before with this (www.vipower.com) software. The swap went perfectly fine with no adverse affect on the drive or the rest of the system. In theory it shouldnt work as removing the drive while the system is still running should destroy the drive and possiably kill the PSU I know when i "accidently" hot swapped an old CD-RW the drive was shot and the PSU blew its fuse. The server i use at a LAN party i organise has hotswappable SATA drives, but i think this is due to the controller used, as the SATA standard doesnt support hot swapping. The next SATA standard will allow hotswapping and increase the speed of the interface to 300Mb/s. >I didnt think windows would like me turning off and removing the drive >helter skelter.... windows doesnt seem to mind it does have plug and play after all. It seems strange that your removable HDD tray supports so many standard are you sure the interface is SCSI? It seems strange that a university would waste money on an interface that isnt widely used in the desktop enviroment. Is this (www.vipower.com) your removable drive tray? |
Pete O'Neil (250) | ||
| 261549 | 2004-08-14 06:25:00 | yes thats it... | willie_M (5608) | ||
| 261550 | 2004-08-14 06:35:00 | I use ATA 133 IDE cradle mounted drives here extensively, and they too are touted as "hot swappable" because the unlocking also switches power off . I assure you though, Windows XP did NOT like it when I tried it with a slave drive . It sulked for a very long time while it repaired system files, and required a prolonged SFC to complete the task . |
godfather (25) | ||
| 261551 | 2004-08-14 07:32:00 | you know, how long does it take to turn the machine off, unplug the HDD and turn it back on? ;) | DangerousDave (697) | ||
| 261552 | 2004-08-15 03:14:00 | Hot swappable doesn't really come into this, thinking about it. The idea is to boot (or not) from the removable. You have to shutdown one OS to boot another. The worst problem with hot swapping disks is that the file allocation tables, and directories are usually cached in memory by the OS. If the OS isn't told that a disk is to be removed, it doesn't know to write out the cached stuff. OSs do automatically write them out periodically, of course, but there is a well known law of nature which says that disasters will happen. CP/M had the Ctrl/C "command" to tell it that you had changed a floppy. If you didn't tell it, it didn't know,and there were always tears before bedtime. CP/M would always use its cached directory (although it wrote it out each time it changed). If that happened to be the directory for the previous disk... :_| Sometime after MSDos came out one line of the 34 pin interface was allocated to be "Disk Changed" and a switch added to the 5¼" drives to make it work.:D Another problem ... many computers can't boot from a USB device. It might be a good idea to keep a boot floppy handy.;-) |
Graham L (2) | ||
| 261553 | 2004-08-16 04:24:00 | >you know, how long does it take to turn the machine off, unplug the HDD and turn it back on? too long. I got that software SwapManager but it doesn't seem to work. I'll just connect it to usb so I can really hotswap it. Can I really use a boot floppy to boot of a USB drive? |
willie_M (5608) | ||
| 261554 | 2004-08-16 04:39:00 | I haven't done it, but I'd guess that if you have a linux with an initrd kernel (small enough to be on a floppy), which has the USB disk support (or can load the appropriate modules) it should be no problem. Your BIOS might allow booting from a USB device (probably meant for CDs, but might work). You'll have to experiment. This is how you learn. :D | Graham L (2) | ||
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