Device errors

[Carl "Art" McIntosh]

I posted an article last week regarding use of the mkpart(1M) command.
I ended up supposedly resolving my problem by reformatting my drive.
The drive had been running fine for approx. 2 months when I encountered
the following message from the ISC 2.02 driver:

*** DEVICE ERROR: Uncorrectable data error in sector ***
*** Controller 0 (Primary AT Hard Disk), Disk 0 Absolute Sector # nnnnnn

Reformatting the drive seemed to fix the problem until today, when it reared
it's ugly head again.  The sectors seem to be at different locations when
the problem occurrs.  The drive is a MiniScribe 9380E, and ESDI drive.  The
controller is a DTC.  When I reformat the drive, i.e. low level with debug
g=c800:5, the controller does not find the errors the ISC driver found, I
repeatedly low leveled the drive approx 10 times in a row and exactly 29
errors exist.  I reformatted with sector sparing enabled, using 60 sector
translation as the ISC surface scan flips out when I use native 36 sector mode.
I also used the ISC format routine during install, which Eric of ISC says
should not be used with ESDI drives as the OS looses the ability to talk to
the controller if it is used.  However the drive seemed to be fine, everything
installed ok and was running up til today. I'd appreciate it if ANYONE with
experience in this area could share their knowlege. It's a pain in the %^%&
to keep having to reinstall everything whenever this sucker occurs, even tho
I do have a tape drive 1/2 :^).
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