Re: HP9000 scsi disk - HP proprietary BIOS on disk?

From: Benjamin Gawert (bgawert_at_gmx.de)
Date: 10/29/03 

Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 17:18:31 +0100

Ben Arnold wrote:

> We need a new internal SCSI disk for our HP9000. The failing disk is a
> Seagate ST34572WC.
>
> I've been told that the replacement disk must be purchased from HP,
> because it has a "special BIOS" branded on the device. Is this true?
> Can't I just insert and format a "compatible" SCSI disk?

Well, You can use any generic SCSI disk You want, You don't need necessarily
a HP disk.

It's true that some HP drives are OEM drives with HP firmware, but usually
there is no big difference between HP firmware and original firmware. HP
firmware usually is generic firmware that has been tested and verified by HP
to work flawlessly and that got a modified ident string so the disk
identifies itself as HP drive which is necessary for most drives to work
with the diagnostic software...

Otherwise, generic disks will work as fine as HP disks...

Benjamin

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Blockbusting news, this is important (Re: Why are bad disk sectors numbered strangely, and what
    ... but some blocks on drives that are used for archiving data may ... >> you a specialist firmware if you want to do data recovery, ... Well, the original firmware wasn't 'free' in any sense of the word, so ... data may get written to disk. ...
    (Linux-Kernel)
  • SUMMARY: 6120 Disk Array-> Remove and Replace Disk, does not enable
    ... the not-latest) firmware for the array which resulted in failure to ... I was able to source a pair of sun-part drives (good used working ... arrays has a disk that went bad - not a problem since we're running ...
    (SunManagers)
  • PC3000
    ... What happens if you have a hard disk which spins erratically, ... controller board failure or some mechanical or physical damage, ... controller board and firmware modules, such as Microcode Overlays, HDD ... PC3000 supports 3.5" ATA/SATA Hard Disk Drives from the following ...
    (comp.sys.laptops)
  • PC3000
    ... What happens if you have a hard disk which spins erratically, ... controller board failure or some mechanical or physical damage, ... controller board and firmware modules, such as Microcode Overlays, HDD ... PC3000 supports 3.5" ATA/SATA Hard Disk Drives from the following ...
    (comp.sys.mac.system)
  • PC3000
    ... What happens if you have a hard disk which spins erratically, ... controller board failure or some mechanical or physical damage, ... controller board and firmware modules, such as Microcode Overlays, HDD ... PC3000 supports 3.5" ATA/SATA Hard Disk Drives from the following ...
    (comp.databases.informix)