Return to BSD News archive
Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!spool.mu.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!library.ucla.edu!news.mic.ucla.edu!news.lmu.edu!s069.infonet.net!cynjut.infonet.net!not-for-mail
From: burgess@cynjut.infonet.net (Dave Burgess)
Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.questions
Subject: Re: Q on FreeBSD and SoundBlaster-SCSI
Date: 4 Nov 1994 10:26:57 -0600
Organization: Configuration Management Svcs, Inc.
Lines: 44
Message-ID: <39dnch$es@cynjut.infonet.net>
References: <38o84v$lrj@due.uninett.no> <39bogm$jr0@clavin.uprc.com> <39cb09$ah0@dagny.galt.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: s069.infonet.net
In article <39cb09$ah0@dagny.galt.com>, alex wetmore <alex@phred.org> wrote:
>> From what I understand, the SCSI portion of the soundblaster is Adaptec
>> 1542 compatible, so you ought to be able to use it.
>
>Actually, its a 1510, which is a different beast altogether (its compatible
>with the 1520 and 1522). Its not as advanced as the 1542 because it doesn't
>support bus-mastering, so performance is a lot lower.
>
>I think someone in the NetBSD group hacked out a driver, but I'm not positive.
>There is a Linux driver for it.
>
Yes. AIC support has been built into NetBSD for a long time. After a
recent wind-fall, an actual Adaptec 1522 was provided to members of the
core team and it is now supported as well.
Actually, 'better' is a relative term. Since the card does not do
bus-mastering, it is one of the few ISA SCSI cards that is capable of
talking to more than 16Meg of memory without bounce buffers.
I'll grant that it is slower than DMA, but it is still a respectable
little card.
>A better choice (with the appropriate money) would probably be to get a bare
>SB16, a bare 3xi, and a better SCSI card.
>
There are two problems with your sentiment. First, (as you already
pointed out) is money. The second is that, if your system is like mine,
every bus slot HAS to count. There are exactly 0 free slots in my
machine right now. As soon as I get the bugs worked out of this Sound
Booster Pro code so that it configures to look like the Sound Blaster
with a Mitsumi interface, I will have a slot available for a SCSI card.
A soundblaster with an AIC6360 (?) would also solve my second problem.
Unfortunately, problem 1 still plagues me.
While I agree that the Soundblaster SCSI is not a 'perfect' solution,
for some people, it is a better solution than any of the alternatives.
--
TSgt Dave Burgess | Dave Burgess
NCOIC, USSTRATCOM/J6844 | *BSD FAQ Maintainer
Offutt AFB, NE | Burgess@cynjut.infonet.net or ...@s069.infonet...