From: Neal Benson (nbenson@ufl.edu)
Date: Fri Jul 31 1998 - 08:12:02 EST
Andreas, While I'm not familiar with that particular drive, most Bering products incorporate a self-test when they start up, or perhaps there's another way to activate it. Results are often indicated by a sequence of lights on the rear of the drive. Hopefully you still have a manual for it - see if it describes a self-test. (You may have to read up on the test procedure, like whether it needs a blank cartridge installed, etc.) If it fails, you definitely have a hardware failure, and will need to have either BD or Bering repair/replace it. If you no longer have the manual, BD should be able to supply you with the information to check the self-test. Neal At 02:45 AM 7/30/98 +0200, you wrote: > >Dear Flow-ers, > >maybe one of you out there has the decisive tip or recommendation >concerning a heavy problem. All other efforts including praying to God, >calling B-D technical support service for a couple of times have not been >successful yet. > >Our computer system for the Becton-Dickinson FACScan shows some severe >problems I was unable to fix last six days (and nights). All problems >relate to the initialization of our backup media, magneto-optical disks >(MOD). > >First problem occurred as follows: On trying to initialize a blank MOD with >consort32 system utilities, following error message was displayed after >approx. 5 minutes of initialization: > >>>> ERROR -27 >>>> Graphics Routine Error >>>> ----------------------------- >>>> Restart with Debugger (Y/N)? > >Before this message came up on the screen, neither created superblocks have >been displayed nor any other message indicating ongoing mod initialization >was shown on screen. Due to our assumption that this error could be based >upon some graphical OS routine located in masterpage or consort software, >we attempted to initialize MOD on the operating system level by running >MEDIAINIT.CODE. This action led to two results: > >(1) The system hanged up and crashed after approx. 5 minutes of MOD >initialization with the MOD drive having no audible activities like e.g. >spinning sounds. The computer had to be restarted. After restarting the >system an additional attempt to initialize a MOD in the aforementioned >manner led to the same result. > >(2) The MOD was initialized after approx. 30-45 minutes. No error messages >came up by the system or by MEDIAINIT. On using the initialized MOD, >several problems occured. On one occasion the logical unit #13: was not >accessible for CONSORT utilities or master page file utilities. Using the >"reconfiguration disk drives" command in consort utilities (option 6) did >not solve the problem. Returning to OS level made the MOD accessible, but >other problems came up as a consequence. Copying files onto MOD was not >possible, deleting files and directories on MOD was not possible, too. >Nevertheless the creation of new directories on MOD was possible >immediately after initialization. > >Repetitive HFS checks by HFSCK.CODE were run on the problematic MOD that >showed "BAD CYLINDERS", "PARTIALLY ALLOCATED INODES", "BAD SUPERBLOCK >NUMBERS" and so on, that all were fixed by HFSCK. Nevertheless any >following attempts to copy files onto MOD or to create directories on MOD >resulted in "failures to access drive", "corrupted file system", "can not >read block 314747" etc. > >Using other blank MODs showed the same behavior and problems. MODs that had >been initialized prior to these events are still accessible by the system. >Files can be stored upon, directories created and deleted on MOD. > >Interestingly initialization of diskettes does not show any problems at >all. Both hard disk drives present in our system did not show any anomalies >either. > >All calls directed to B-D technical service personnel yielded neither >solutions nor answers to our problem. Extensive searches on B-D and HP >websites showed no existing support for the HP-based FACScan. Therefore I >would like to rely on any expertise or opinion anyone of you might have on >this issue. BTW, we already have ordered 200 diskettes and feel set back to >the times where floppies were considered as state of the art backup medium >and a mac-G3-based FACSstation is on its way ;-) > >Our hard- and software configuration is as follows: >>>> Hardware >--- Becton Dickinson FACScan >--- Hewlett-Packard HP340 computer (Motorola MC68030 CPU, 4 MB RAM, >BMP-Video, HP-IB Bus System) >--- Bering MOD Drive (linked to CPU via HP-IB Bus; capacity max. 512 MB per >MOD side, real 314 MB) >--- Verbatim MOD, 512 MByte max. capacity per side, 1024 Bytes per sector, >double-sided >--- HP Hard Drives, 40 MB capacity (unit #11:), 60 MB capacity (unit #12:) > >>>> Software >--- HP Pascal Operating System Version 3.22 >--- Becton Dickinson Master Page Version 1.1.2 >--- Becton Dickinson CONSORT 32 utilities Version 1.0.2 >--- Becton Dickinson LYSYSII Software Version 1.1 > >Any help is greatly appreciated and will be honored by sufficient >quantities of german beer (in case any of you being in Duesseldorf ;-) > >Thanks a lot in advance > > > >_________________________________________________________ >Andreas Christaras >Heinrich-Heine University Children's Hospital Duesseldorf >Lab. of Experimental Hematology (KMT-Labor) >Bldg. 14.82 (Gebaeude 14.82) - Moorenstrasse 5 >4 0 2 2 5 D U E S S E L D O R F - G E R M A N Y >--------------------------------------------------------- >Fon: +49-211-81-16103 Fax: +49-211-81-16191 >E-Mail: christar@uni-duesseldorf.de >_________________________________________________________ > > -- Neal Benson University of Florida nbenson@ufl.edu
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