Tape Drive Options

Some confusion over the recommended tape drive options under SCO Xenix and SCO Unix has arisen; this bulletin is intended to clarify the situation and should be copied to salesmen within your organisation.

The use of the Irwin unit in the standard products (Qi 350ti and Qi 660ti) is fully supported under SCO Xenix 2.2/2.3. To make use of the drive it is important to follow instructions given in previous Intermediate Product Bulletins (notably 3034) and for version 2.3.2 SCO Xenix to ensure the kernel parameter DMAEXCL is set to 0. A fix disk has been supplied from SCO which is now available on the bulletin board (XNX146). This fix improves the functionality of the Irwin 40MB unit.

Unix support recommend that the Qi PC, Qi PCi and the Qi 900 make use of the TS150/5 1/4" cartridge tape streamer which offers greater capacity and flexibility in data exchange. When a customer upgrades to higher specification machines the Irwin units could leave him transferring data via floppies where as 1/4" tapes are the accepted standard for Xenix/Unix machines because they are so transferable.

Furthermore, we recommend that all SCO Unix systems use 1/4" cartridge drives (or DAT units when these become available in three months time).

Further details on recommended configurations for complete systems are being prepared to assist our dealer base in supplying the most flexible and capable solution.

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