******************************************************************************
* This file contains important notes on HDDRIVER 8.18. Please read this text *
* carefully before installing the software.                                  *
*                                                                            *
* 1. The most important changes in the latest versions                       *
* 2. Background transfers                                                    *
* 3. The SCSI Driver                                                         *
* 4. Phase Change drives                                                     *
* 5. Falcons with processor boards                                           *
* 6. Other                                                                   *
* 7. Note of thanks                                                          *
******************************************************************************


1. The most important changes in the latest versions.

- HDDRUTIL provides for a bus rescan. As a result devices switched on
  after booting will be recognized by HDDRUTIL and other programs (except
  HDDRIVER). The IDs of these devices must have been known to HDDRIVER when
  booting, i.e. they must have been configured with "Devices and
  Partitions" (7.70).
- Support for the SCSI Driver's target interface (TT/Falcon only) with the
  "SCSI Processor Device" setting. TT and Falcon are visible for other
  computers connected to the same bus and can execute the mandatory commands
  for processor devices listed in the SCSI-3 specification.
- The function "Partition Assignment" is now available under "Devices and
  Partitions", after double clicking on the button for the respective device.
  The device IDs are specified by the common syntax for Atari compatibles. A
  device is identified by its bus ID and its device ID. For devices connected
  to the ACSI or SCSI bus the device ID is the same as the SCSI ID. For IDE
  devices master 0 means device ID 0, slave 1 means device ID 1. Master 1 is
  identical with device ID 2, slave 1 with device ID 3. (7.80)
- NOTE: IN CASE THE ROOT OR BOOT SECTORS ARE WRITE PROTECTED AND AN OLD
  VERSION OF HDDRIVER < 7.81 IS INSTALLED HDDRUTIL >= 7.81 DISPLAY A WRITE
  PROTECTION ERROR MESSAGE. IN THIS PARTICULAR CASE THE MESSAGE CAN BE IGNORED.
  PLEASE REPLACE OLD VERSIONS OF ZIPCTRL.CPX AND HDDRCONF.CPX BY THE CURRENT
  VERSIONS. (7.81)
- Except for pressing the Alternate key when starting HDDRUTIL the language of
  the GUI can be changed with the option "-g"/"--german" or "-e"/"--english",
  respectively. (7.82)
- HDDRUTIL supports creating partitions in the FAT32 format. When creating
  TOS compatible FAT32 partitions enter the partition type "F32", for PC
  compatible partitions the type is "$0b". For partitions of more than 2
  GBytes HDDRUTIL automatically creates FAT32 partitions. (7.90)
- HDDRIVER and all of its tools now support any platform for which a SCSI
  Driver is available. In particular now, besides Atari and Milan, also
  MagiCMac and MagiCPC are supported. Under MagicMac/MagiCPC HDDRUTIL installs
  HDDRIVER in the AUTO folder of drive C:. HDDRIVER must be started after the
  SCSI Driver for these platforms (see below). (8.00)
- On the Milan the communication between HDDRIVER and the SCSI Driver for
  PCI SCSI does not use a proprietary protocol anymore but directly uses the
  SCSI Driver. (8.00)
- Faster verify with drives that do not support verify with ByteCheck. (8.00)
- Extended ID check. Now all buses backed by a SCSI Driver are
  supported. (8.00)
- FAT32 partitions are supported when initializing partitions. Before the
  initialization the partition type should be set to "F32" and the "---" fields
  of the popups have to be selected. (8.00)
- Extensive optimizations and cleanups have been done. HDDRIVER 8 is several
  KBytes smaller than HDDRIVER 7.9, but provides more features. The same
  applies to HDDRUTIL. (8.00)
- On startup HDDRUTIL checks whether a user has sufficient user privileges.
  This is relevant for MiNT in case it is configured with a high security
  level. (8.02)
- HDDRIVER like HDDRUTIL also checks the user privileges on startup. (8.03)
- Improved compatibility with the CT2 fast RAM. (8.04)
- Improved compatibility with the Afterburner fast RAM. Please add the
  AB040FIX program from the folder FIXES as the first program to the AUTO
  folder. (8.10)
- HDDRUTIL provides for activating and deactivating partitions under
  "Change Partition Type". This way partitions can be hidden. A double click
  on an entry in the partition list activates or deactivates the partition,
  respectively. Changes become valid when booting the next time. (8.10)
- The drives A: and B: can be write protected with HDDRUTIL in case they are
  managed by HDDRIVER. (8.10)
- HDDRCONF.CPX provides for a bus rescan. (8.10)
- AUTOPARK supports parking and ejecting of media in drives A: and B:, provided
  they are managed by HDDRIVER. (8.11)
- Fixed bug relevant for using sound software like ANIPLAYER. (8.13)
- Added the SYNCHRONIZE CACHE command to the SCSI-3 emulation for IDE
  drives. (8.14)
- Fixed bug relevant when accessing byte-swapped drives. (8.15)
- The partition information can be saved to the clipboard. (8.15)
- Improved support for IDE CompactFlash adapters. (8.16)
- When automatically creating FAT32 partitions for partitions > 2 GByte all
  partitions > 2 GByte are handled, not only the first one. (8.17)
- Fixed error in HDDRUTIL when retrieving partition data of drives with more
  than 29 partitions. (8.17)
- Fixed crash during boot on ST/STE with ICD compatible adapter and certain
  SCSI-3 devices. (8.18)

This list only comprises a subset of changes.

******************************************************************************

2. Background transfers

The transfer mode "Background DMA (MagicAtari)" may only be used when all
drivers for devices connected to the ACSI or SCSI bus make use of the SCSI
Driver integrated in HDDRIVER. Not taking care of this may result in loss of
data. METADOS is not compatible with background transfers. Use the CD-ROM
driver ExtenDOS pro (http://www.anodynesoftware.com/) or SPIN! 
(http://www.muenster.de/~reschke/) instead.
The line with the keyword "_TSL" has to be removed from the MAGX.INF file. On
TT and Falcon background transfers require the "SCSI Processor Device" setting
to be enabled.

******************************************************************************

3. The SCSI Driver

The SCSI Driver is a standardized software interface that provides for using
any SCSI peripheral (with HDDRIVER ATAPI and IDE as well) with the Atari, the
Milan, MagiCMac and MagiCPC. For the Atari compatible ACSI, SCSI and IDE port
and the Milan's IDE port a SCSI Driver is included in HDDRIVER.
Additionally HDDRIVER supports the SCSI Driver's so-called "target interface".
A TT or Falcon with the "SCSI Processor Device" setting enabled is recognized
as a SCSI-3 compatible device by other devices connected to the SCSI bus.
Using the target interface TT and Falcon can execute proprietary SCSI commands.
Using HDDRIVER it should be possible to write SCSI-based networking software,
for instance. Sample code in the C programming language for implementing
proprietary SCSI command is available on request. Note that this only makes
sense for programmers with a thorough knowledge of SCSI and know how the
target interface of the SCSI Driver works.
In order for the target interface to work flawlessly all drivers accessing
SCSI peripherals must do this by using the SCSI Driver integrated in HDDRIVER.
Users running third-party software that uses proprietary SCSI code (e.g.
Cubase Audio) should turn off the "SCSI Processor Device" option in HDDRUTIL.
This means that on TTs and Falcons background transfers are not possible
anymore in this case.

HDDRIVER and all tools can also be used under MagiCMac and MagicPC, provided a
SCSI Driver is installed. More information can be obtained by Steffen Engel:

Steffen Engel
Muehlentrift 5
38126 Braunschweig
Germany

Please direct any questions concerning the SCSI Driver specification to Mr.
Engel.

A note on MagiCPC: When using HDDRIVER neither CBHD.PRG nor CBHD.CPX but only
SCSIDRV.PRG should be installed. Otherwise HDDRIVER may crash. Installing CBHD
in addition to HDDRIVER is not recommended because this leads to a loss of
functionality since CBHD does not support the latest revisions of the XHDI and
SCSI Driver specifications.

HDDRIVER supports the current (and most likely the last) version 1.01 of the
SCSI Driver. Some programs have a bug with respect to checking the version
number and thus fail with version 1.01. Please contact the authors in such a
case.

******************************************************************************

4. Phase Change drives

Phase Change drives (Phasewriter Dual, PD/CD) are a combination of an optical
drive and a CD-ROM drive. They support two operating modes: Mac compatible and
PC compatible. With the Atari both modes can be used. In the Mac compatible
mode the PD drive uses a single SCSI-ID with the logical device number 0
(LUN 0). In order to access both PD and CD-ROM media the hard disk driver and
the CD-ROM driver must manage the same device. In the PC compatible mode the
PD drive uses two logical IDs, namely LUN 0 for optical media and LUN 1 for
CD-ROMs. Using a PD drive in the PC compatible mode requires a CD-ROM driver
that can manage CD-ROM drives with LUN 1.
Whe using the PD drive in the Mac compatible mode the setting "CD-ROM Drives
like Removable Disk Drives" must be enabled in HDDRUTIL. In the PC comaptible
mode this setting should be turned off.

******************************************************************************

5. Falcons with processor boards

None of the available processor boards for the Falcon is fully compatible with
an unmodified Falcon.

The Afterburner does not integrate the 68040 correctly, in particular with
respect to handling the processor cache. As a result accessing the SCSI bus
often fails, depending on the software used to initialize the Afterburner.
This means that booting from a SCSI drive may be impossible.
A suggestion for Falcons with the Afterburner board: Install HDDRIVER and only
enable the internal IDE drive. Now place the Afterburner software at the
beginning of the AUTO folder, HDDRIVER.PRG must be placed after that. Now use
HDDRUTIL to configure the HDDRIVER.PRG file in the AUTO folder instead of the
HDDRIVER.SYS file, which remains unchanged. Also follow the notes on AB040FIX
included in the FIXES folder on the HDDRIVER floppy disk.

CT060 boards with old firmware do not work properly with respect to the
interrupt handling. With the current CT060 firmware HDDRIVER has been tested
successfully. If you have any problems you need to get a current CT060 firmware
update.

******************************************************************************

6. Other

In case a SCSI drive is not recognized and this drive provides a jumper to
switch off synchronous transfers try to disable these transfers. There are
old SCSI drives (notably by IBM) with bad firmware that cannot disable
synchronous transfers by software. This firmware bug was not relevant before
HDDRIVER 8, but with HDDRIVER 8 it makes a difference because this is the
first version of HDDRIVER using extended SCSI messages.

Before installing HDDRIVER on existing Atari hard drives with more than four
partitions and which are still running the ICD hard disk software modify the
partition table with the ICD2AHDI program. This software is located in the
CONTRIB folder of the HDDRIVER driver floppy disk. Old versions of the ICD
software did not create an Atari compatible partitioning scheme but a
proprietary one. The README of the ICD2AHDI software provides more
information. 

HDDRIVER must not be copied to the AUTO folder, except when running MagiCMac,
MagiCPC and under certain circumstances (see above) with the Afterburner.
HDDRIVER should always be installed using the "Install HDDRIVER" menu item.
No further action is required.

The IDs of SLM laser printers should be disabled in the "Devices and
Partitions" settings.

When booting from a partition other than C: it is recommended that you move all
of your accessory files (.ACC) to your new boot partition and not use C: as a
boot partition at all. Note, though, that under TOS certain device drivers may
not find (looking for them on C:) their configuration files in this case.

******************************************************************************

7. Note of thanks

I would like to thank all those who have helped with beta testing HDDRIVER and
those who contributed the software in the CONTRIB folder. Please direct any
questions regarding this software to the authors.
Special thanks to Rainer Seitel and Thomas Binder for helping to realize the
DOS/Windows compatible partitioning, to Axel Gehringer for providing hardware
and Carl-Michael Ewert for running tests with a DVD-RAM drive.

******************************************************************************

In case of troubles with HDDRIVER please consult the help texts accessible in
the dialog windows. Information is also available in the internet:

  http://www.seimet.de/atari_english.html

If you need additional information or support, consult the above web site, in
case of a request please have the HDDRIVER serial number (on the original
floppy disk label) ready.


    Uwe Seimet, 26. January 2006
