re how do i put an hd on an xt in article apr ultb isc rit edu rxg ultb isc rit edu r x getter writes this may be a dumb question but i need to put a hard drive on my father s pc xt either mfm rll or ide i know how to hook it up but how do i tell the computer the geometry of the drive on my you set it in the bios but i doubt that s how it s done on an xt i thought it might be software with the controller card but the ide card for xt s that i saw didn t come with any also how do i low level format it once it s on the computer assuming a drive which needs formatting since there is no bios support for st interface hard disks in an xt that support must come from a bios extension rom on the mfm rll hard disk controller usually the controller has a rom based low level format program a common jump address is c you can type g c from debug to see and a small table of drive geometries it knows about sometimes these are selectable using jumpers on the card sometimes you can enter them manually in the llf menu failing that you must use a third party hd prep program like speedstor disk manager or the like ide drives come formatted already and since the is controller part of the drive mechanism itself concerns about geometry are irrelevant plug it in and go to fdisk mike schuster schuster panix com compuserve com schuster shell portal com genie mschuster
