To all CFFA ProDOS 2.x users:
Note: this problem does not appear to affect GS/OS users.
Howard Katz has discovered a problem after formatting the 3rd and 4th partitions on a 128MB CF card under ProDOS 2.x on an Apple IIe Enhanced. He noticed that the 4th partition would return errors during a verify using several different programs. From the information provided by Howard, the problem's symptoms appear to be that the partition size is not correct when compared to the actual size report by the CFFA firmware.
I passed this information along to Dave Lyons who immediately found the root of the problem: Both Copy II+ (probably all versions)and Apple System Utilities v3.1 have a bug in them that will not allow them to obtain the proper partition size for remapped paritions when the CFFA card is in slot 7 and possibly other slots. Dave believes that both of those programs were written before ProDOS 2.x.x came out, and they violate the SmartPort slot remapping rules.
On a IIe the incorrect parition size that Howard was seeing was $FC46 (64582) even though the actual parition size for the last partition on a 128MB SanDisk card should be $D400.
2 possible work-arounds:
#1) Use a program that doesn't have the bug!
Dave's Davex Utilities should work fine.
ProSEL may also work (not tested yet)
OR
#2) Move the CFFA card to Slot 5 to do the formatting with Apple Sys Utils or C2+.
Slot 5 is treated differently by ProDOS and uses an older remapping mechinism. Once you format your upper partitions you should be able to move the CFFA to any slot and it should work fine.
(THIS WILL NOT WORK FOR PARTITIONS #5, #6, #7, #8. You will have
to get another tool like Davex)
NOTE: The work-arounds have not been tested yet. I expect to hear something from Howard on them soon. I will make another post when I know more.
_________________
Thanks,
Rich
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: rich on 2002-05-29 20:57 ]</font>