
                PROMISE TECHNOLOGY - COMPATIBILITY NOTES



1. QEMM STEALTH (DC200, DC4030VL series)

When the Disk I/O Handler is set to Turbo mode, part of the Promise BIOS 
is shadowed into the last 1K of  conventional memory. This conflicts with 
the Stealth option in QEMM because both are trying to intercept INT13 calls. 
(This is also why MFT and the MEM command will show there being 639K of 
conventional memory instead of 640K). There are three different ways of 
getting around this -
    
       a) Set the Disk I/O Handler to FAST
       b) Run Optimize / Stealth - QEMM will then attempt to come up with 
          some parameters to get around the conflict.
       c) Add the parameter XSTI=13 on the line in CONFIG.SYS that loads 
          QEMM - This tells Stealth to exclude Stealthing INT13

The first option will allow Stealth to load for certain. We have had mixed 
success using these last 2 options, possibly depending on what hardware and 
software are on the system.



2. WESTERN DIGITAL HARD DRIVES (DC200, DC420, and DC4030VL series)

We have gotten reports that some Western Digital drives will not work when 
they are in a Master mode with a Slave attached. This is not a consistent 
problem as we have many customers using Western Digital drives in a Master 
mode with no problem and we have experienced no problems with the Western 
Digital drives in our labs. However, we have received reports that a system 
will not boot up with a Western Digital drive in a Master mode. When the 
drive is configured as a slave or a single drive, there is no problem.

This is not specific to any particular model. Even among the same model 
number, some drives will have no problem, but others will. For example, one 
customer had 3 WD2340's. One would work as a Master but the other 2 wouldn't. 


Workaround Options-

       a) Try different drive orders. As stated before, some Western Digital 
          drives will be fine in a Master mode. Or, if the Master drive is a 
          non-Western Digital, there should be no problem with Western Digi-
          tal as a Slave drive.

       b) If you have a DC200 or DC4030VL and 2 Western Digital drives and 
          neither one will work in a Master mode, configure each drive as a 
          Single drive and hook them up separately, one to each IDE 
          connector on the controller card. In this configuration, only the 
          first drive would be set up in the system CMOS. The second drive 
          would be accessed by loading the driver DOSDRV.SYS from CONFIG.SYS.

       c) In some cases, removing all jumpers from the Master Western 
          Digital drive allowed the system to boot where it would not boot 
          if the Master jumper was on the drive. 



3. SEAGATE DRIVE IN SLAVE POSITION (DC200, and DC4030VL series)

Some Seagate drives in a slave postion will be slow to respond to an 
IDENTIFY_DRIVE command such as that issued by the DC200 and DC4030VL series 
controllers. This will cause a delay on a reboot.

Workaround Options-

       a) Change drive order

       b) If you have 2 drives, configure each drive as a single drive and 
          hook each one up to it's own connector on the controller card. In 
          this configuration, only the first drive would be set up in the 
          system CMOS. The second drive would be accessed by loading the 
          driver DOSDRV.SYS from CONFIG.SYS.



4. SYQUEST, BERNOULLI (All caching models)

The Promise caching controllers will not recognize a disk change in the 
removable media drives. This is because when these drives send the disk 
change signal, it is a command that our caching algorithm does not under-
stand. The system must be powered down in order for the new disk to be 
recognized.



5. DRIVES LARGER THAN 528MB (All IDE controllers other than EIDE2300Plus)

Under DOS and Windows there is a limitation of 528MB for each hard drive 
(504MB as reported by FDISK). For a small charge there is an upgrade BIOS 
available for the DC200/200M, DC4030VL-1, and DC4030VL-2 controllers which 
will do LBA (Logical Block Addressing) and allow DOS to recognize drives 
larger than 528MB. To receive this upgrade BIOS, call 408-452-1180 and 
follow the voice prompts for if you have a DC4030VL series controller and
want to support drives larger than 528 MB under DOS.



6. ON-TRACK DISK MANAGER 

On-Track's Disk Manager cannot be used in conjunction with the DOS drivers  
(PTIDOS.SYS, DOSDRV.SYS, DC2000.SYS, DC4000.SYS, DC2300.SYS, VLIDE.SYS, and
EIDE2300.SYS)for Promise controllers or other manufacturer's controllers 
which use Promise chipsets. 

(DC200 and DC4030VL-x) - If there is only one or two hard drives attached, 
there is no problem using Disk Manager, although you may need to update to 
Disk Manager version 6.02 or newer if you experience the system locking up 
when the Disk Manager driver is attempting to load.




7. IDE INTERFACE TAPE BACKUP AND CD-ROM DRIVES (All caching models)

IDE interface tape and CD-ROM drives are not compatible when attached to 
these controllers. Tape backups that attach to the the floppy connector will
work fine.



8. DR DOS 6.0 (DC2032, DC200, and DC4030VL series)

If you are using DR DOS 6.0 and earlier, you will be limited to partitions 
no larger than 32 MB on any drives attached to the second IDE connector on 
the controller. This is because DR DOS reports back as being MS DOS 3.3 to 
the PTIDOS.SYS or DOSDRV.SYS driver. This problem will not occur with NOVELL 
DOS 7.0.



9. SYMPHONY CHIPSET OR UMC CHIPSET REV. 82C491F and WINDOWS NT/ NORTON 
   BACKUP FOR WINDOWS/ MSBACKUP FOR WINDOWS (DC200, DC4030VL series, and 
   DC4000)

If you have a motherboard with one of these chipsets and are using Windows 
NT, it is not possible to format a floppy disk. The National Semiconductor 
2.88 floppy controller chip used on these controller cards has a conflict 
with Windows NT and these motherboard chipsets. At the this time there is no 
workaround. 

There is no problem with Windows NT and any other chipset, and there is no 
problem formatting floppies with Windows 3.1x and either the Symphony or the 
UMC chipset.

There is also a problem with Norton Backup for Windows with these chipsets. 
When doing the compatibility test it will report a DMA and Video conflict. 

MSBACKUP for Windows will also fail with these chipsets.



10. ORCHID P9000 VIDEO CARD (All controllers with External BIOS)

By default this video card comes set to use upper memory address C000-DFFF. 
This takes up all the areas that the PROMISE BIOS can reside, so the BIOS 
will not load and the controller cache count and Cache Setup Utility message
will not be displayed. In order for the PROMISE BIOS to load, the video card 
must be set to 8-bit mode. The video card will then use C000-C7FF.



11. SECURITY KEYS (DC2000,4000, and DC2300)

There are some software programs that look for a security key, or a dongle, 
attached to the parallel port. The parallel port of the DC2000 and DC2300 
must be set to "Output Only" for the software to recognize these security 
keys. The DC4000 comes set to Bi-Directional and has no jumpers to change 
this setting, so those software programs would not be compatible.

