Please forget your anger for a minute and  _listen_ to the below point-

 WC> Booted on my system with hard drive on IDE channel 0 and the
 WC> ATAPI CD drive on IDE channel 1 the CD drive was utterly
 WC> unresponsive. The damned LED didn't even blin on boot nor would
 WC> the tray eject or respond.
 WC> OTOH it didn't destroy the CD drive which promply worked on the
 WC> motherboard I/O.

Promise card is still in this machine here, and  -
After a number of experiments, with no Promise drivers loaded, no
Winders running, and etc., on both onboard and Promise card IDE
connectors, even with onboard IDE ports disabled, Promise card BIOS not
loaded during POST, and etc. - -  The _ONLY_ way I can replicate your
symptom of no CDROM drive LED blinking, and no CDROM drive tray eject,
is by plugging in the IDE cable from the CDROM drive onto either the
onboard connector or the connector on the Promise card _backwards_.

With ribbon cable from the CDROM drive connected with proper polarity, I
_always_ got blinks during POST, and tray ejection whenever button was
pushed, on both onboard and Promise card connectors.

Only conclusion I can draw - - you had the ribbon cable from your CDROM
drive plugged into the Promise card _backwards_ when you observed the
above noblink/noeject symptoms.

No matter how this ends up, even though my patience is now being worn
thin - I think no way I can be accused by you or anyone else of not
continuing to _try_ to help you thru your current difficulties.

- - -  JimH.












 -> Of course, the card _does_ support ATAPI devices, _after_ the Windows
 -> driver is loaded. (I know this, because I did it here).

 WC> How many times must I go over this?
 WC> I've a Windows OEM software CD here.

 -> Back at that
 -> time, we both thought the card might give CDROM support using the M$
 -> DOS-based CDROM drivers (it does not), and I was _trying_ to encourage
 -> you to give that a try,

 WC> Don't claim I EVER had any idea the card had ANY hardware ATAPI
 WC> support, it's not in the docs and I've said that repeatedly.

 WC> I elected to believe you against my better judgement.
 WC> I even said I usually do not usually do not proceed with an unknown
 WC> practice unless I get TWO opinions from two independent sources.
 WC> You said "I was borderline paranoia" about proceeding.
 WC> This time I violated my usual verification  practice and I paid the
 WC> price.

 -> as a "simple hardware check."  _That_ is what
 -> you were bordering on paranoia about, back then.

 WC> Linux did a simple hardware check and caused no difficulty at all.
 WC> The Windows 98 OEM first release and they > 64 Gig drive
 WC> I repeatedly expressed to you was a concern of mine you
 WC> dismissed.

 WC> I screw stuff up sometimes and when I do I ADMIT to it.
 WC> This time I relying on your assurances had help SCREWING up
 WC> against my better instincts and "paranoia."

 WC> I killed a drive one time with static outside of the machine by
 WC> brushing my elbow into a monitor but this is the VERY FIRST I've killed
 WC> with software and it was on your advice.

 ->  TW>> But the Western Digital Diagnostic program, OR the LINUX program
 ->  TW>> soemone mentioned can recover the Drive by zeroing out the MBR.

 ->  WC> No if Linux can't see the drive.
 ->  WC> Wrote Roy's command down but if fdisk -l and fdisk /dev/hde fails
 ->  WC> I don't see the dd command working either.

 -> For HDD connected to the Promise card, I think the main concern is
 -> whether the BIOS on the card autodetects the drive, as shown on a splash
 -> screen during POST. If the HDD is scrogged so badly that the card no
 -> longer autodetects the HDD, I think you will need to take the HDD to a
 -> newer machine, and if the BIOS on that machine will autodetect the drive
 -> and its CHS parameters, then may be able to zero it out and proceed to
 -> fdisk, repartition and format it.  Since old Win98 FDISK scrogged the
 -> drive, I'd start with the new Win98 FDISK, rather than the Linux
 -> version, but that is just me. YMMV (and it usually does).

 WC> There is no more mileage on the drive, it's toast and Windows
 WC> rendered it so.
 WC> NO MORE WINDOWS PERIOD.
 WC> What BIOS on the Ultra card?
 WC> It translates to the 137 Gig barrier and supports Windows >
 WC> than 64 Gig drives ( with software drivers) and NOTHING more.
 WC> IT is NOT hardware ATAPI compliant.


 ->  WC> Drive's still in the machine but power and cable unconnected.
 ->  WC> I'd need to slip the I/O card in again too to try again.

 ->  WC> Due to my circumstances all this must be done laying on my back
 ->  WC> with the computer on a roll cart and a light shining into the case.

 -> So why not make it easy on yourself, and stop taking the card in and
 -> out, in and out, to the point of recently starting to fret yourself
 -> about yet another Waynesworld concern - worrying that you may be wearing
 -> out your PCI slot?

 WC> Not to worry, that card is never going near my machine again EVER
 WC> for any reason.
 WC> It's not needed for Linux and I'll never run Windows again
 WC> except for 3.1 which happily co-exists on my lowly 486
 WC> with a primitive Linux release.

... Computer Hacker wanted. Must have own axe.
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