How to format HP C2490A

[Dilandau]

I have acquired 2 HP C2490A.

I have a pci to scsi adapter Adaptec AVA 2904 which I have use with other SCSI 50 Pin old drives without problems.

I am trying to access the drive. The drive does not appear under Disk Management console on windows XP so I am not able to format it on Windows XP.

The disk does appear in Disk Management under Windows 7 (it was very surprising). But when trying to format it on windows 7 it gives I/O error: 0x8007045D. The same happened if I try to do it like a new installation.

I would think that the disk is wrong but happens exactly the same in both HP C2490A I have.

Do you think both drives are faulty? Do I need another adaptec pci card to try? What other tests I can try to make it work?

[Torsten.]

What you want to do with this old and sloooow stuff?

IIRC this is a 2GB single ended SCSI drive, so you need to use scsi ID between 0 and 6 and a single ended terminator.

[Dilandau]

Here is where I got the jumper settings

http://stason.org/TULARC/pc/hard-drives-hdd/hewlett-packard/HP-C2490A-002-2100MB-3-5-HH-SCSI2-DIFF.html

I am configuring it with parity and "Drive will spin up automatically at Power-On".

I don't see any jumper for single ended configuration.
I have tried with different SCSI Ids from 0 to 6 with same result.
Hardware is recognized by Windows 7 Management console but no other operative system ( neither Ubuntu, nor Norton Ghost, nor Windows XP)
And none of them is able to format it.

I am in need of using this hard drive as I have to fix a very old system witch make use of a SCSI 50 pin 213 MB storage size.

[Torsten.]

How about the terminator? Is it installed?

[Dilandau]

I have had other SCSI 50 pin in my hands but I have to say I am not an expert at all.
What I saw in other models is that there was always a pin to shortcut for single ended function... unfortunatelly not in this one.

Anyway, I recognize there should be a terminator for SCSI bus but I dont know how is it or where to put it.
To be honest I have not worry of it with previous hard drives I have tried which worked.

Here there is a picture of this hard drive without any pin. When I connected it, it had only the parity and ID=1 jumpers.

http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/2691/220720101415.jpg
[URL=http://img27.imageshack.us/i/220720101415.jpg/][IMG]http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/2691/220720101415.th.jpg[/IMG][/URL]

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[Dilandau]

After checking my PCI to SCSI adapter (Adaptec AVA 2904) I see this spec:

"
Auto termination feature will enable or disable onboard termination automatically
"

So I suppose this is why I did not have problems with other drives. I also suppose that termination is installed.

[Torsten.]

Auto termination means the controller terminates an open connector. If devices (disks) are installed, the controller cannot (!) terminate this end of the bus.




You need a terminator behind the disks!



Without you get what you have, sometimes it looks like working, sometimes not, sometimes never.

[Dilandau]

Well.
I have installed a terminator. Actually the drive does have 2 pins for termination purposes:

"

15 Terminator Enable
--------------------
Front Pin: GND; Rear Pin: Terminator Enable

15 OPEN On-board active terminators disabled. Terminators not
connected to SCSI connector
15 CLOSED On-board active terminators enabled and connected to SCSI
bus. TermPwr source determined by placement of Terminator
Power pinset jumper.


16 Terminator Power
-------------------
Front Pin: SCSI pin 26; Rear Pin: TermPwr

16 OPEN TermPwr for on-board terminators provided by the drive
only. Drive TermPwr is not connected to SCSI connector pin
26.
16 CLOSED TermPwr for on-board terminators provided by the drive, and
drive TermPwr is connected to SCSI connector pin 26.


"

I have use both, so now I have: parity, ID=1, Power On and both terminations with jumper "CLOSED"

Still same results, I/O error when trying to format it