Author Topic: Idea: Adding second hard disk (Read 17634 times)

RobM · « **on:** June 16, 2005, 09:37:54 pm »

If it's possible to have two disks on the one IDE bus (i.e. if the PhatBox IDE controller supports master/slave)...

1) Mount the PB 20GB from the DMS internally and put our bigger HD in the DMS cart
2) Hack one of the players (and sign it with plsign)
3) Kill phatd/51d
4) umount /dos/Data
5) Mount our drive on /dos/Data
6) Restart phatd

Any ideas on feasability?

judb · « **Reply #1 on:** June 17, 2005, 12:00:21 am »

We've been discussing this. What we don't know at this point is if its possible to hook up the second drive from the standpoint of the IDE interface (much less the cable required) and if the box can power both drives is the other question.

As for the feasability, I think with things set up the way they are we could do that very simply. The hard part will be building a script that signs the files / creates playlists on the second drive that works cross platform. PMM wont work like that so we'll hvae to hack something together.

I am not really focusing on this method however because it would require hacking the case of the phatbox and getting a new cable and or power connector worked out and I think it would be a very involved modification for people to do.. lets work on other methods first.

bushing · « **Reply #2 on:** June 17, 2005, 01:20:17 am »

I hadn't thought of that before. It's actually not a bad idea!

The interface should support it just fine -- it's a plain vanilla IDE interface. You wouldn't even have to kill / restart phatd/51d -- you could just use a hack script to mount the second drive as a subdirectory of /dos/data (ie /dos/data/drive2).

As far as getting PMM to handle it, I believe that there is a poorly-documented WinXP capability to use unix-like mount points...

-b

judb · « **Reply #3 on:** June 17, 2005, 01:59:25 am »

While you are correct about the mount point functions in windows since 2000, thats for NTFS formatted volumes only if I recall correctly so the DMS would not work like that to the best of my knowledge.

I am really starting to think I post too much on here because people dont seem to read my posts. I suggested this very same thing as a possible solution and listed off my issues with it in another thread a LONG time ago (well in the scheme of this forum a long time ago.. hehe)

Edit: yep NTFS not FAT32 .. http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/fileio/fs/volume_mount_points.asp

bushing · « **Reply #4 on:** June 17, 2005, 04:05:36 pm »

Quote

I am really starting to think I post too much on here because people dont seem to read my posts. I suggested this very same thing as a possible solution and listed off my issues with it in another thread a LONG time ago (well in the scheme of this forum a long time ago.. hehe)

You know, I looked and can't find your old post...

But yeah, you're right -- that would only work with NTFS. So ... you could certainly do it if you had software that could cope (IE phat4x), and maybe you could coax PMM into handling it (make an empty NTFS partition somewhere, mount both drives into it, and convince PMM that your NTFS partition is really your phatbox...) -- but that's a royal pain!

-b

judb · « **Reply #5 on:** June 17, 2005, 05:11:09 pm »

http://forum.phathack.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=dmshack;action=display;num=1118041688;start=4#4

You have to search for stuff by changing the default search window lenght to greater than 7 days almost all the time. I think Paul should set the default to 30 days but for the DMS hacking forum serach it should be from the very beginning of the forum.

para · « **Reply #6 on:** June 17, 2005, 08:48:19 pm »

Quote

The hard part will be building a script that signs the files / creates playlists on the second drive that works cross platform. PMM wont work like that so we'll hvae to hack something together.

Guess what Phat4X can be used for... By the end of the month Qt4 for Windows will be released as freeware! It's easy to add a feature for another mountpoint

Apart from that PN does support ext3 as PHTDTA filesystem with a custom kernel which implies the usage of symlinks from your PHTDTA to the new mountpoint.

Para

bushing · « **Reply #7 on:** June 18, 2005, 01:37:54 am »

Quote

http://forum.phathack.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=dmshack;action=display;num=1118041688;start=4#4

You have to search for stuff by changing the default search window lenght to greater than 7 days almost all the time. I think Paul should set the default to 30 days but for the DMS hacking forum serach it should be from the very beginning of the forum.

You know ... I read that thread, and your post, when you posted it. I blame lack of sleep due to too much time in front of the disassembler... :/

To atone for my sin of poor reading comprehension, I've posted something in the Etiquette thread.

-b

judb · « **Reply #8 on:** June 18, 2005, 02:58:54 am »

Quote

You know ... I read that thread, and your post, when you posted it. I blame lack of sleep due to too much time in front of the disassembler... :/

To atone for my sin of poor reading comprehension, I've posted something in the Etiquette thread.

-b

Bad bushing, no biscuit!

its no big deal, I just felt it would be easiear to point to the thread where I discussed (largely with myself) the issues I saw with that idea.

A543 · « **Reply #9 on:** June 19, 2005, 05:53:25 am »

As far as PMM goes, couldn't one just set up the smaller drive as PHTSYS and the bigger drive as PHTDTA and have them both mounted under XP at the same time? PMM just looks for the volume label I think.

judb · « **Reply #10 on:** June 19, 2005, 06:04:06 am »

You cannot dismount the /dos partition and the playlists that are signed by PMM point to /dos/data for the files to be played back. I am not sure if we could dismount /dos/data and point it to /dev/hdb1 or something for the new drive.

What I see as a potential solution is that we mount a /dos/data2 (or something better for a name) using a script to replace the wma player or something. We change the startup sound to be a file of the type of the replaced player so it mounts on startup the new disk.

Then we would only need to make sure that the databases / playlists that are on the /dos/data filesystem point to /dos/data2 for the files on that drive.

PMM wont work like that for us.

sbingner · « **Reply #11 on:** June 19, 2005, 06:13:31 am »

Quote

You cannot dismount the /dos partition and the playlists that are signed by PMM point to /dos/data for the files to be played back. I am not sure if we could dismount /dos/data and point it to /dev/hdb1 or something for the new drive.

What I see as a potential solution is that we mount a /dos/data2 (or something better for a name) using a script to replace the wma player or something. We change the startup sound to be a file of the type of the replaced player so it mounts on startup the new disk.

Then we would only need to make sure that the databases / playlists that are on the /dos/data filesystem point to /dos/data2 for the files on that drive.

PMM wont work like that for us.

could always just mount the second drive OVER /dos/data or mount it as say /dos/data/drive2 and have your playlists configured to include files in a subdir called "drive2"

AndyMan · « **Reply #12 on:** June 19, 2005, 07:09:59 pm »

The cable I got for doing this was faulty, I got it from myCableShop.com, unfortuately, they're pretty unresposive sooo, I'm gonna "build" me a cable o do just that (with the difference of) I'll be mounting a regular 3.5 drive as secondary rather than a 2.5 and pulling 12V from the battery.

With what spin found out about the signing of files, I'll be putting ALL my files onto a separate hard drive which will only be limited by bios as to how big it can be EVERYTHING on the 10gb drive will be overlayed by a separate mount into /dos/data THEN, I should be off and running, UNFORTUNATELY the 44pin ide (female) connectors are difficlt to find.

It's also down to available time as well (not much this end)

Basically, I'll actually be building 2 cables, 1 for loading the 3.5 drive (using a spare caddy I have) and the 2nd being a 2.5 AND 3.5 connector.

Time being available, I might be able to test this sometime in the next 6 months or so

sbingner · « **Reply #13 on:** June 19, 2005, 09:13:15 pm »

if you can't find a connector, try http://www.mouser.com they have most everything

AndyMan · « **Reply #14 on:** June 22, 2005, 01:42:21 am »

Just ordered the cable, crimpers (yeah I hear you say... crimpers, thats what pliers are for, yeah right!) and connectors from cablesonline.com.... I'll advise everyone when they arive

sbingner · « **Reply #15 on:** June 22, 2005, 02:16:47 am »

Quote

3) Kill phatd/51d

When I killed those it did Bad Things(TM) -- ended up having to reflash, not sure why yet but be careful

Of course it could have just been coincidence...

judb · « **Reply #16 on:** June 22, 2005, 02:48:03 am »

51d communicates with the 8052 controller and I could see how killing it might cause the state of that device to be wonky to the point of needing a reflash to reset it. I would strongly avoid touching that if we can help it.

(edit, thats because the power to the box isnt killed until you disconnect the phatbox from the headunit I am pretty sure.)

sbingner · « **Reply #17 on:** June 22, 2005, 03:35:49 am »

I tried pulling the power from the wall, but I suspect that the little capasitor/power cleaner (?) on the back of it may have still been supplying enough power for it not to reset? I don't know but I'm not going to try again

AndyMan · « **Reply #18 on:** June 24, 2005, 12:16:29 pm »

Crimper, cable and connectors arrived today, assuming the honeydo list isn't too big this weekend, I might just be able to make a cable up and do first tests with spin's mods to load in a second hard drive

AndyMan · « **Reply #19 on:** June 26, 2005, 04:19:03 am »

GOT IT!!!!!

It's still only playimg 57 "tracks" rather than the 580+ on the 2nd drive BUT it'splayin stuff that I don't recall eing on the oiginal DMS

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Author Topic: Idea: Adding second hard disk (Read 17634 times)