Date:	Sat, 9 May 92 20:35:00 -0400
From:	davidf AT lyra DOT cs DOT umbc DOT edu (Mr. David W. Flater)
To:	djgpp AT sun DOT soe DOT clarkson DOT edu
Subject:	HD Problems
Status:	O

joachim AT lysator DOT liu DOT se writes:

>Now, the problem was *not* djgpp and *not* Hyperdisk as it turned out. It was
>simple the number of wait states my computer used while accessing DRAM. When
>I tried (desperate) to increase the number of wait states, everything started
>to work again. And it was reproducable that the number of wait states actually
>was the problem. It just wasn't the first thing to think of as being a problem
>when it's the HD that isn't working...

So far it seems as if anything that slows down the program reduces the
incidence of these crashes.  I fear that your solution may work simply by
slowing down the whole computer without attacking the actual problem.  For the
benefit of myself and the rest of us who try not to mess with the contents of
our extended CMOS, can you explain how an overly tight RAM access cycle could
be the primary cause of these kind of hard drive-related crashes?

Thomas Heller proposed the idea that the problem is lost HD interrupts and
suggested changing STACKS in CONFIG.SYS.  Lost interrupts is definitely a
problem which would get worse the faster the program ran.  The Manual stateth:
"When there is a hardware interrupt, MS-DOS allocates one stack from n stacks
specified.  When stacks=0,0 [the default], MS-DOS will not switch stacks at
interrupt time."  My question now is, does this make any difference within the
go32 environment, or does go32 bypass all this?  I looked over the
simpler documentation, and still don't know.  I intend to try it next time I
start recompiling the offending programs.  Another question is, does it really
matter how many stacks you have if you are not multitasking?

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Mr. David W. Flater      davidf AT cs DOT umbc DOT edu                 "Nothing works."
Disclaimer:  Nobody ever holds my opinions.               "Nothing EVER works!"
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