old 486

[SinJax]

Hey all

For first time playing with PCs I decided to grab some old computers and have a play ...
I got 2 486s....

box 1
-------
486DX2 66Mhz
16Mb RAM
530Mb HD
CD-Rom drive and Floppy


box 2
-------
486SX2 33Mhz
16 Mb RAM
330Mb and 334Mb HDs
Floppy

What I’ve been doing is basically putting box 2 into box 1.....I put the RAM in...No problems....box 1 also has 2 IDE things on the motherboard....IDE0 and IDE1 (I know nothing about the lingo so give me a break )

Anyways, what I thought was that I could take the IDE cable out of box 2...and use it along with box 1's own IDE cable

The setup I'm attempting is as follows:
IDE0 - 530Mb HD MASTER
- CD-ROM SLAVE

IDE1 - 334Mb HD Stand Alone

Now, I’m told by a friend that this setup will work....
I also think I have the jumper settings right, I have the hard drive on IDE0 set as master (which in this case is the first 2 pegs on the left)....and the CD-ROM as slave (which is the 2 middle pegs in this case)

Also, the other hard drive on IDE1 has a label on the back that sez for "stand alone" situation the pegs should be in the master place...which again I followed...

Also, in the case of IDE0...what I've done is attach one end of the cable to the motherboard, attach the middle bit to the hard drive and then the end to the CD-ROM...Also I’m pretty sure they are all inserted the right way...all with the colored bit facing the power cable....I think that’s right

Same goes for IDE1....but that’s just the hard drive on its own attached to the central thing in the IDE cable...

Now...problem....

in Bios...for IDE0 Master and Slave...it seems to be right...it recognizes the 530Mb Hard Drive....and does nothing for the CD-ROM....which is a sign of work age for CD-ROM apparently as the Linux I have installed on the 530Mb hard disk allows me to mount it...so in this setup....530Mb hard disk and CD-ROM seem to work

The problem is with IDE1 and hard disk...the bios cant find it....the automatic thing says nothing is there...

also with a windows boot disk, I checked to see if its there... and it isn’t .....


Now I’m sure it isn’t the 330Mb Hard drives problem, as in a similar setup but with the 330Mb hard disk replacing the 530Mb hard disk, the BIOS recognizes the hard disk straight away....

So....any ideas?! ..... Unless it isn’t clear what I’m trying to do is to setup 2 hard disks and one CD-ROM to work together on this machine….I’m not even sure if that’s possible on older computers….so tell me if it isn’t….also any arrangement other than the one I’ve tried is welcome ….don’t let my ideas cloud ur creativity

I’m lost...and I think I’m in way over my head here

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Thanks

- SinJax

 

[Big B]

Hmm...I'm still looking over this stuff, so I may have more ideas or someone else may too.

What you're trying is possible on older machines. IDE has been spec'd to support up to 2 devices per channel (2 per cable). The connections sound okay. From the looks of it, it sounds like you have a "gotcha jumper" setting with the hard drive--this means just playing with the jumpers (this is my one gripe about Western Digital brand hard drives).

Another possibility is that IDE 1 is dead.
I forget the exact number, but it is in the 500MB range in size, but the original IDE specification had a 5xxMB limitation on hard drive size. If this is the case, you can see if you can find a BIOS update (may be difficult to find and is not guaranteed) or buy an IDE add-on card (will use PCI--white--slots). The only problem I see with the 2nd option is the hardware you're working with: you may not have the proper slots and/or may not have a fast enough system to support it.

Things to try:

--Connect the IDE connector at the end of the cable to the drives.
--Try a different cable
--Make sure the 530MB hard drive does the same thing on both machines.