Path: menudo.uh.edu!barrett From: The_Doctor@nesbbx.rain.com (Michel J. Brown) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.reviews Subject: REVIEW: Oktagon 2008 SCSI-2 host adapter Followup-To: comp.sys.amiga.hardware Date: 27 Mar 1994 23:07:29 GMT Organization: The Amiga Online Review Column - ed. Daniel Barrett Lines: 223 Sender: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu (comp.sys.amiga.reviews moderator) Distribution: world Message-ID: <2n53jh$s4k@menudo.uh.edu> Reply-To: The_Doctor@nesbbx.rain.com (Michel J. Brown) NNTP-Posting-Host: karazm.math.uh.edu Keywords: hardware, SCSI, SCSI-2, host adapter, Zorro II, commercial Originator: barrett@karazm.math.uh.edu PRODUCT NAME Oktagon 2008 (rev. 7) [MODERATOR'S NOTE: This review was updated on May 23, 1994. Search for the text "[UPDATE:" to find updated information. -Dan] BRIEF DESCRIPTION Oktagon 2008 is a SCSI-2 controller card with up to 8MB of RAM for the Amiga 2000/3000(T)/4000 models of personal computers. The card also functions as a hard card, with supplied mounting hardware. AUTHOR/COMPANY INFORMATION Name: BSC Broautomation AG Address: Lerchenstraae 5 80995 Mnchen 50 Germany Telephone: ++49/89/357130-0 FAX: ++49/89/357130-99 E-mail: None given, although I suspect that there is one. LIST PRICE I do not know the list price of the product, but I paid $129.95 (US) from my local Amiga dealer in Portland, OR, USA. SPECIAL HARDWARE AND SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS HARDWARE A SCSI-1/SCSI-2 3.5-inch or 2.5-inch form factor hard drive is required for operation. I have installed a Quantum 1080 Empire SCSI-2 hard drive on my controller card. [UPDATE: "It is not. I use the Oktagon 2008 with only a CD-ROM attached." Thanks to c.creutzig@hot.gun.de (Christopher Creutzig) for this update. - Dan] No RAM is required on the card for operation, but ZIP style sockets provide for up to 8MB of Fast RAM. 1X4 ZIP chips in groups of four, either Static Column or Page Mode, are supported. All sizes of hard drives are supported, as long as they are as I described previously. The card is processor independent for compatibility, but a faster CPU probably means faster speed. Supports all current Motorola CPU's including the 68040. SOFTWARE The Oktagon comes with its own HD toolbox, on a single, autobooting, double-sided, double-density 720K floppy disk. Surprisingly, it works with all revisions of the AmigaDOS. All features are implemented with the latest revision of the OS, while some selections are ghosted out for older revisions (like AmigaDOS 1.3 and below). Full functionality is obtained with AmigaDOS 2.1 and above, yet even though compatible with AmigaDOS 3.0, it doesn't seem to take advantage of any of the newer features present in 3.0 as far as I know. As the Oktagon is a Zorro II card, this may be the reason for this decision. COPY PROTECTION None. MACHINE USED FOR TESTING Amiga 2500 (rev 4.5) 2 MB Chip RAM, 4 MB Fast RAM Kickstart version 37.300, Workbench version 38.35 (AmigaDOS 2.1). INSTALLATION Installation is simple, as the Commodore Installer software is used. I selected the "Expert" mode, and found most of the defaults to be standard, so even the "Novice" mode wouldn't be much different. You can even choose the language in which the installation will occur (English is the default, while French and German are supported), and if you have AmigaDOS 2.1 or above, locales are also supported. The Amiga Style Guide is completely supported throughout the entire installation process. REVIEW The Oktagon 2008 is a SCSI 1 and SCSI 2 host adapter for the Amiga 2000 family of computers, and supports the A3000T, and the A4000 as well. The card is packaged quite securely, and comes with the mounting hardware for the drive, a short, but easily installable 50 pin ribbon cable, and a power cable. The documentation is written in a "German first, English second" booklet labeled "Harddisk Controllers & HD Installation Tools". It was well written, and includes both a step-by-step and expert installation description. Throughout the book were suggestions, warnings, and helpful tips about hard drive installation, use, and maintenance. [UPDATE: "The documentation unfortunately leaves out a lot of important subjects. For example, the terminators on-board are nowhere described. They are there, nevertheless, and as soon as you get an external drive attached to the controller, you will have to pull them out (the two black lines next to the connector for the internal drive), unless you do not use an internal drive." Thanks to c.creutzig@hot.gun.de (Christopher Creutzig) for this update. - Dan] After I assembled the hard card, and powered up my A2500, the installation software had an automatic mode by default (which I don't recommend, unless you want one single partition), or can be changed to manual mode (for creating multiple partitions). After selecting the appropriate mode, you can set the number and size of partitions by using the intuitive editor. One caveat here, though, is that you must specify the size of the partitions in blocks, so a calculator is handy. Once the size and number of each of the partition(s) are set, then you have to format each using the AmigaDOS "Format" command from a gadget tool on the requester. Depending on the size of your drive, this can take quite a while for large drives, and seems more like formatting a large floppy than a hard drive. After formatting your partition(s), you can either install AmigaDOS (for which there appears to be no utility included), or restore from your favorite backup program. One nice feature is the ability to update the AmigaDOS type through the corresponding utility. You can also save the RDB contents to a file on a floppy should disaster strike, like a corrupted RDB sector. All in all, this is a fine product from a supportive and growing company, and I would highly recommend getting the card if you are in the market for a fast and inexpensive host adapter. DOCUMENTATION The printed documentation comes in a 136-page, perfect bound booklet, with the first half in German, the second in English. My congratulations to the writers for the excellent translation and low spelling error count. The docs are very straightforward, and cover every aspect of installation, use, and maintenance. All levels of expertise are covered, and beginners to experts alike won't be disappointed or confused by the nomenclature. LIKES AND DISLIKES I like the ease of use, the intuitive system that is completely style guide compliant, and the use of many of the advanced features found on the more recent AmigaDOS upgrades. About the only dislike I had was that in order to properly partition off the hard drive, I had to enter the number of blocks manually. This requires a calculator, or figuring out manually the size of the partition(s) in blocks, rather than using the sliding type of gadgets found on other, more intuitive installation tools, like Commodore's HD Tools. My suggestion to BSC: dump the manual entry of partition block size, and use sliding gadgets with a readout of partition(s) size in megabytes. One surprise was the inclusion of the program GigaMem. This virtual memory manager is included in the startup disk supplied, and includes the documentation, but not the registration. I will give a review of GigaMem v3.0 in a later installment, after fully testing and evaluating it. As it sells for $79.95 (US funds) at my local Amiga dealer, it makes for the frosting on the cake, so to speak. COMPARISON TO OTHER SIMILAR PRODUCTS I have owned three hard drive controllers and three hard drives in the past several years, and the Oktagon compares quite favorably. As it stands, it's easily the fastest and most compatible of the three controllers I have owned. Unlike previous products, this one was up and running in less than half an hour, which by my previous experience is a record. The external 25 pin SCSI connector is also a plus, and has provision for both snap-in and screw-in connectors, while past controllers used only one or the other. BUGS None noted. VENDOR SUPPORT Full addresses and phone/fax numbers are supplied, but the hotline for technical support is sent back only after registration card is received by BSC. I am not associated with the vendor in any way other than being a satisfied customer of BSC/Alfa Data. WARRANTY Full one year warranty on parts, and the installation software. Warranty appears to be transferrable, as no mention is made about the transfer of title to warranted merchandise. CONCLUSIONS This is an excellent product at a fair price. Considering the performance capabilities exhibited, I would hazard a guess that the faster your machine, the faster the throughput. According to SysInfo 3.14, I get 2.5 MB/sec reads, and 2.48 MB/sec writes. Diskspeed 4.2 also gave very high marks, and I will UUencode the tabulated results to anyone with a valid E-mail address, if requested. Seek speed showed my drive had seeks of about 6 ms from beginning to end of each partition, and 2 ms average seek from adjacent tracks, and 4 ms for 8 random seeks on 90 percent of the drive. It would appear that faster processors coupled with faster drives will produce the best results, naturally enough, but faster than your average comparable equipped host adapter. I'd give BSC and Alpha Data (the manufacturers) a rating of 4+ stars out of 5, and a full five stars if they make the appropriate changes to the partitioning software. COPYRIGHT NOTICE Copyright 1994 by Dr. Michel J. Brown. All rights reserved. --- Daniel Barrett, Moderator, comp.sys.amiga.reviews Send reviews to: amiga-reviews-submissions@math.uh.edu Request information: amiga-reviews-requests@math.uh.edu Moderator mail: amiga-reviews@math.uh.edu Anonymous ftp site: math.uh.edu, in /pub/Amiga/comp.sys.amiga.reviews