storage_controllers Storage controllers

The Storage controllers page contains settings related to the emulated machine’s disk drive controllers.

HD Controller

Hard disk drive controller card to emulate. This box only lists cards supported by the machine’s expansion buses. MFM, RLL, ESDI and IDE controllers are available. Selecting an IDE controller is not required for machines with onboard IDE.

The Configure button opens a new window with settings specific to the selected controller card, such as the BIOS option ROM address.

FD Controller

Floppy disk drive controller card to emulate. Selecting a controller is not required, unless you wish to use one of the add-on controllers for adding high-density 1.44M floppy support to XT machines.

The BIOS option ROM address used by the selected controller can be configured through the Settings button.

Tertiary / Quaternary IDE Controller

Add a third or fourth (respectively) IDE channel to the emulated machine, through a generic ISA or VLB IDE controller card.

The IRQ used by each controller can be configured through its respective Settings button.

Note

The tertiary and quaternary controllers are not Plug and Play compliant by default; they may require manual configuration of emulated operating systems, and may not be bootable. See Tertiary and quaternary IDE for more information.

SCSI

SCSI host bus adapter cards to emulate. Up to 4 SCSI cards are supported. The selection boxes only list cards supported by the machine’s expansion buses.

The Configure buttons open a new window with settings specific to the corresponding SCSI card, such as the I/O port and IRQ for ISA cards.

Cassette

Enable IBM cassette tape emulation. Only available on machines with a cassette port. The cassette deck can be controlled through the status bar or Media menu.

Vision Systems LBA Enhancer

Add an IDE Enhancer option ROM card, which can help work around the hard disk size limits on many older machines. Hard disks up to 8055 MB (16367 cylinders, 16 heads, 63 sectors) in size are supported; they must be manually configured to 8 cylinders, 8 heads and 8 sectors on the machine’s BIOS setup utility for the Enhancer to handle them.

The BIOS option ROM address used can be configured through the Settings button.

Note

Added in 86Box 4.1.1.