Re: Getting a ram card
Umm, may I give my opinion on cisco routers cards? (dude, we really need a real BB for NPDS).
Cisco routers indeed provide a good source for linear cards. However, there is something you need to be aware of. These cards need to be replaced because flash technology means a limited number of write operations and the routers write to them a lot (why replace them otherwise?). Unfortunately, NewtonOS doesn't support cards with bad blocks (typically blocks which were written too many times), just like Cisco Routers I guess. And when you initialize a card for the Newton, it doesn't check for bad blocks. But when the Newton will try to write on a bad block, you'll get an error which generally means loss of data (sometimes the card will even no longer mount).
Some people think that when they insert the card in a laptop which tests for bad blocks and then maps them out, it will fix the problem. This is wrong as the bad blocks are mapped out just for the format (usually FAT something) the card is initialized in. If you put the card in the Newton, the list of mapped out blocks will be lost (since the Newton will initialize the card to another format) and the Newton will try to use every block.
I don't mean this to stress the interest in ATA cards and ATA Support driver, it's just that I saw too many folks coming and saying that their data was lost.
In the current stage, ATA versus Linear Flash cards and SRAM is a matter of the price of the megabytes on one side and the access speed on the other. Currently, ATA cards are less than twice slower than linear cards when half full, but they're definitely slower (and it actually depends on which cards you're comparing). I'll work on it (after 1.0 final release), but I'm not sure I could ever make ATA cards much faster than linear cards (for the NewtonOS storage system has been designed with linear cards in mind), although there is definitely room for improvement.
But the price of linear cards (and SRAM cards) is so high nowadays that ATA cards can be very attractive. Compare, for example, TimaSci prices (where I got my CF card).
Also check on eBay for linear cards. It's where most people get them, I guess. Beware that they weren't used in Cisco Routers.
Paul
Posted 11/8/01 2:39 AM By Paul Guyot| Return Home |
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Created: Thu, 08 Nov 2001 09:39:00 GMT
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