Adaptec SlimSCSI 1460D, Win XP Pro on Toshiba Laptop
Hello!
I have just purchased a used Minolta Dimage Scan Multi 2 film scanner, and thought that it would be nice to install it on the laptop (Toshiba 5200 - equivalent to a 5250 in the US) as well as the desktop that I have. I pulled my old Adaptec 1460D SlimSCSI PCMCIA adapter out of storage, and proceeded to install the card. The card has drivers built into the OS, so install went easily.
This is where the bliss ends though. Once I attached the scanner, it was not detected. So I rebooted to see if it would see it after this. No such luck. So I decided to attach the old external scsi case that I have with a Cdrw in it to see if it was the scanner or the card/OS/software combo. (Since Minolta does state that this scanner can't be used with a laptop, but I figure that is likely because most people don't have a scsi card for their laptop, and don't want people frying their parallel ports.) The cdrw is also a no go. I thought that Daemon tools might be interferring, so I uninstalled this as well, and rebooted. Both the scanner and the cdrw were terminated and had an ID of 1, 2 or 3 ( depending on the troubleshooting step I was at) to get it working, the scsi card takes an ID of 7. I tried changing scsi IDs, IRQs ( even though XP reported no conflicts), and even the I/O range. Both scanner and External case were powered on, and connected properly.
The neat part is that as you are booting the machine up, or change any settings in the Device Manager, you can hear it seeking the cdrom, so obviously there is some measure of communication going on. I -do- see the Adaptec SlimSCSI 16-bit PCMCIA SCSI Host Adapter entry under SCSI and RAID controllers in the Device Manager,but cannot find the CDrom or scanner ( depending on which is attached of course) anywhere in the list, not DVD/CDRom drives, or Imaging Devices, Other Devices, Unknown, etc.
Because it's a laptop card, I can't change the cable to see if that's what's wrong, and I can't install EZ SCSI because it isn't supported on OSes newer than Win98 or NT 4.0. So far, I have been unable to find any other utility to see what the card is doing, or not.
If it had been just the scanner not working, I likely would have left it by now, believeing Minolta's support documents,... but now that the external case doesn't work either... it's a vendetta. :)
I have just purchased a used Minolta Dimage Scan Multi 2 film scanner, and thought that it would be nice to install it on the laptop (Toshiba 5200 - equivalent to a 5250 in the US) as well as the desktop that I have. I pulled my old Adaptec 1460D SlimSCSI PCMCIA adapter out of storage, and proceeded to install the card. The card has drivers built into the OS, so install went easily.
This is where the bliss ends though. Once I attached the scanner, it was not detected. So I rebooted to see if it would see it after this. No such luck. So I decided to attach the old external scsi case that I have with a Cdrw in it to see if it was the scanner or the card/OS/software combo. (Since Minolta does state that this scanner can't be used with a laptop, but I figure that is likely because most people don't have a scsi card for their laptop, and don't want people frying their parallel ports.) The cdrw is also a no go. I thought that Daemon tools might be interferring, so I uninstalled this as well, and rebooted. Both the scanner and the cdrw were terminated and had an ID of 1, 2 or 3 ( depending on the troubleshooting step I was at) to get it working, the scsi card takes an ID of 7. I tried changing scsi IDs, IRQs ( even though XP reported no conflicts), and even the I/O range. Both scanner and External case were powered on, and connected properly.
The neat part is that as you are booting the machine up, or change any settings in the Device Manager, you can hear it seeking the cdrom, so obviously there is some measure of communication going on. I -do- see the Adaptec SlimSCSI 16-bit PCMCIA SCSI Host Adapter entry under SCSI and RAID controllers in the Device Manager,but cannot find the CDrom or scanner ( depending on which is attached of course) anywhere in the list, not DVD/CDRom drives, or Imaging Devices, Other Devices, Unknown, etc.
Because it's a laptop card, I can't change the cable to see if that's what's wrong, and I can't install EZ SCSI because it isn't supported on OSes newer than Win98 or NT 4.0. So far, I have been unable to find any other utility to see what the card is doing, or not.
If it had been just the scanner not working, I likely would have left it by now, believeing Minolta's support documents,... but now that the external case doesn't work either... it's a vendetta. :)
_
Have you tested the CD and scanner on the desktop yet? To see if they are working?
ASKER
HI coral47,
Yes I have. The scanner makes beautiful scans when connected to the desktop. The CDRW was also in the desktop til I took it out to test it with the other machine.
Yes I have. The scanner makes beautiful scans when connected to the desktop. The CDRW was also in the desktop til I took it out to test it with the other machine.
OK. Then I would think the SCSI card went bad, or the Toshiba just doesn't like SCSI. I have had a new SCSI card that would install fine, but refused to see anything hooked to it. : /
I had a Canon DR5020 scanner that I tried to work on a laptop via an Adaptec 1480 SCSI PCMCIA card. I had the exact same problems as you describe. I contacted Canon about it who told me that their scanners will only work with PCI SCSI cards (i.e. desktops only). I did try a workaround by getting a SCSI -> FIREWIRE converter (as I have an iLink port on my Vaio) but that didn't work either. In the end, I just had to use a desktop!
ASKER
coral47 - I've been sitting here racking my brains, trying to think if I've used this card on this laptop. I'm sure I have. :) I think I used it to format a scsi drive before I gave it to someone. Since it was and still is the only XP machine in the house, and I recall the pain of waiting for the format to do it's thing under XP. So I know that at one time the combination of the laptop and the scsi card worked. How does a Scsi card go bad? I've pulled PCI Scsi cards out of storage in the past, slapped them in machines and had no problem.
Of course without another laptop here to try it on, I can't see if there's something on the laptop software wise that's grumping it out... unless someone can talk me through configuring and testing it under linux ( already installed with a dual boot on this machine)
BrianBoru - When you had that problem, did you have any other scsi devices to try and see if they worked as well? The thing that's frustrating is that I can't change the cable ( well I can, but I don't have any devices that will work with the other cable supplied with the card ) and I can't try it in another laptop.
Of course without another laptop here to try it on, I can't see if there's something on the laptop software wise that's grumping it out... unless someone can talk me through configuring and testing it under linux ( already installed with a dual boot on this machine)
BrianBoru - When you had that problem, did you have any other scsi devices to try and see if they worked as well? The thing that's frustrating is that I can't change the cable ( well I can, but I don't have any devices that will work with the other cable supplied with the card ) and I can't try it in another laptop.
Unfortunately I had no other SCSI device to test it with. I tried absolutley everything before giving up and getting a desktop. It was most frustrating.
You may want to chat to the technical people at dicom.com. These people are distributors for major scanner manufacturers and they supply PCMCIA SCSI cards. So there must be some SCSI scanners that work with these cards - or some cards that work with SCSI scanners.... They might be able to give you some pointers. I have always found them approachable and friendly (although you may want to tell them you are on a business call as opposed to a personal one).
You may want to chat to the technical people at dicom.com. These people are distributors for major scanner manufacturers and they supply PCMCIA SCSI cards. So there must be some SCSI scanners that work with these cards - or some cards that work with SCSI scanners.... They might be able to give you some pointers. I have always found them approachable and friendly (although you may want to tell them you are on a business call as opposed to a personal one).
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ASKER
dicom.com resolved to picture.com. interesting. I will have to poke around there a little more. I will have to see if I can track down the people you mention.
I'm going to see if I can dig up an old scsi drive, might have to borrow or steal one for this. And might even see if I can find my old win98 image for this laptop. (Not quite rich enough for 2 laptops ;)) I had sort of thought that XP might be interferring, but didn't have a clue which part of it might be meddling. I will try these things and report back!
Thanks guys!
I'm going to see if I can dig up an old scsi drive, might have to borrow or steal one for this. And might even see if I can find my old win98 image for this laptop. (Not quite rich enough for 2 laptops ;)) I had sort of thought that XP might be interferring, but didn't have a clue which part of it might be meddling. I will try these things and report back!
Thanks guys!
Sorry, try www.dicom.co.uk
>> might have to borrow or steal one for this << LOL Been there.
ASKER
Just an update on this. I have put out the word that I need a scsi drive for testing purposes. I'm also going to the local LUG meeting tonight,... I'm thinking most of the packrats in town will be there. ;) Then I'll give it a try and report back.
>> local LUG meeting tonight << that's using your head. : )
ASKER
Hello theLearnedOne,
My apologies for the long time away from the thread. I have been trying to locate a scsi drive to test with. I received it last night and hope to get to the full testing tomorrow and report back. I assure you that I haven't abandoned this question, only been delayed in finding a scsi drive to test with.
My apologies for the long time away from the thread. I have been trying to locate a scsi drive to test with. I received it last night and hope to get to the full testing tomorrow and report back. I assure you that I haven't abandoned this question, only been delayed in finding a scsi drive to test with.
ASKER
Update: I managed to get a scsi harddrive. (I believe that my scsi burner was fried.) But, this wasn't the problem under XP. I fought with the drive under xp for a while, but still couldn't get it to be recognised. I even tried a second external case ( a frankenstein creation I Have here with a different scsi connector) this ruled out the cable as being a problem. Now we had potentially a bad drive, a bad card, or an OS problem. What the heck I thought,... I'm a glutton for punishment... let's use the spare laptop drive I have, and install 98,.. it'll rule out the OS as a problem.
The OS is the problem. Both the scsi card and the scanner work under 98se. So I restored a "clean" ghost of my machine from when I first got it, and installed the scsi card. I have the same problem as with my more current setup. So,.. it would appear that there's something in XP doing it? There is no such thing as an updated driver from Adaptec, they say the driver is built into XP, so they don't make one.
Anyone have any ideas on where to go from here?
thanks
stormi
The OS is the problem. Both the scsi card and the scanner work under 98se. So I restored a "clean" ghost of my machine from when I first got it, and installed the scsi card. I have the same problem as with my more current setup. So,.. it would appear that there's something in XP doing it? There is no such thing as an updated driver from Adaptec, they say the driver is built into XP, so they don't make one.
Anyone have any ideas on where to go from here?
thanks
stormi
Hmmmmm.......interesting results. Other than trying different OS drivers (NT, W2K, maybe one of the Server verions), I don't have a clue.
ASKER
Alright,.. the weirdest thing just happened. At the risk of sounding like one of my users ;) ... I just put my regular drive back in, returning to my linux/winxp dual boot. After booting into XP, it goes " Found New Hardware: Minolta #2883 SCSI Scanner Device" - Like I hadn't been fighting for -that- all along!! All of the sudden everything works,... it just works. No changes... it fixed itself.(Any ideas on this one? Only thing I can think of is that the win98 driver was able to fix some state that the card was in that the xp driver couldn't??)
I'll be grumbling about this one all night now.
For the record, the Minolta Scan Multi 2 scanner works with an Adaptec 1460 SlimSCSI pcmcia card.
Anyways, if this is alright with the both of you, for the trouble that both of you went to to help me out, I'm going to split to points between coral47 ( for suggesting the alternate scsi drive to test with) and -BrianBoru- (for suggesting win98 because xp might be interferring) especially since it took me so long to manage to get ahold of a scsi drive to test with, making you both wait so long.
I'll be grumbling about this one all night now.
For the record, the Minolta Scan Multi 2 scanner works with an Adaptec 1460 SlimSCSI pcmcia card.
Anyways, if this is alright with the both of you, for the trouble that both of you went to to help me out, I'm going to split to points between coral47 ( for suggesting the alternate scsi drive to test with) and -BrianBoru- (for suggesting win98 because xp might be interferring) especially since it took me so long to manage to get ahold of a scsi drive to test with, making you both wait so long.
Thank you much. : )
>> it fixed itself << Hmmmmm.... Windows does that sometimes, but you might have somrthing about W98 "resetting" the SCSI card. Glad it is working now. : )
>> it fixed itself << Hmmmmm.... Windows does that sometimes, but you might have somrthing about W98 "resetting" the SCSI card. Glad it is working now. : )
ASKER
Anytime! Thanks for the help!
I've kept the w98 image in case it happens again. It will be easy to throw it back into the machine and reset the card again if that happens to be what made it work in the first place. This is why windows drives me nuts, at least with linux if it's broken, it only gets fixed if I fix it, it doesn't fix itself and deprive me the satisfaction of knowing what the heck went wrong. ;)
I've kept the w98 image in case it happens again. It will be easy to throw it back into the machine and reset the card again if that happens to be what made it work in the first place. This is why windows drives me nuts, at least with linux if it's broken, it only gets fixed if I fix it, it doesn't fix itself and deprive me the satisfaction of knowing what the heck went wrong. ;)
: D