On Sat, May 29, 1999 at 01:25:46PM -0700, Winsor Crosby wrote:
> If there is anything you can say about SCSI except FAST, it is complicated.
> There are standards for SCSI, SCSI 2, deep, wide, ultra and probably other
> variations.
They all interoperate: newer standards will negotiate down to the lowest
common denominator of supported capabilities with older devices on the same
bus.
> Implementation to a widely accepted standard does not mean that
> it is going to work with_every_variation of card since there is more than
> one standard.
In practice, though, it means exactly that. It's truly unusual for a
peripheral to work with only one brand of controller chipset - and not all
of that manufacturer's: there's been at least one report of the Minolta
failing to work with an Adaptec PCMCIA SCSI controller.
> The fact that Minolta designs to and specifies Adaptec means
> that they realize that one also cannot assume that every card out there
> successfully implements accepted standards.
Why should Minolta take this attitude when every other peripheral out there
doesn't?
> Whether someone is successful in making a SCSI
> connection may also be about length of chain, quality of connnectors, SCSI
> number assignment, and appropriate termination, not to mention operating
> system set-up complications.
Both I and my father have extensive experience with SCSI, and have had no
trouble with interoperability. The considerations you mention have simple
rules that, if followed scrupulously, produce working configurations every
time.
> I am not sure why Minolta's SCSI implementation in the Dimage Scan Dual is
> an issue when you can buy an Adaptec SCSI card for as little as $59. For
> another $150 dollars you can get the higher resolution Minolta Quickscan 35
> plus and it includes the Adaptec card and cables. That is still hundreds of
> dollars cheaper than its competitors and better performance than most. Not
> a bad solution for those of us who save our bucks for used Oly stuff in LN
> condition.
It's an issue because 1) it's EXTREMELY unusual, 2) that it's broken in this
area means that they can't even guarantee it'll work with future Adaptec
products (see the PCMCIA adapter mentioned earlier), 3) that it's broken in
this manner raises the real possibility it's broken in other, more subtle
ways, and 4) why should you have to either soak up a slot with a
limited-capability SCSI card (that $59 Adaptec AHA-1505 (or its more
expensive PCI cousin, the AHA-2902) won't boot, for example) or else pay
real money for an Adaptec with real capabilities?
The Minolta has competition at its price point - the Olympus ES-10S, as an
example - and what I can only consider a serious implementation problem.
What really bothers me is that, instead of fixing the problem, they take the
position that everyone else is the problem. Manufacturers who behave that
way deserve to lose business.
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