Overview of Changes

In previous versions of HDDRIVER, there were numerous improvements, additional supported hardware, and other changes. This list gives an overview of the most important points. The Announcements area of the HDDRIVER forum provides details for each update.

The main changes in HDDRIVER 12

Manual: The download of the full version includes the up to date English and German manuals as PDF files.
HDDRIVER: More intelligent detection of IDE extensions: Mirrored IDE ports (duplicated devices) should not occur anymore.
HDDRIVER: Support for both IDE ports of the CTPCI board (in 060 mode) at the same time. The second port is mapped to IDE port 4.
HDDRIVER: Support for the SD slot of the ATW800/2 also for the VME version. To use the SD slot with the VME version from the first batch, the latest ATW800/2 firmware and a small hardware patch are required. Newer batches do not require any modification. The ATW800/2 team has successfully tested both the MegaST and the VME version. The SD slot functionality in both versions is identical, but TOS can only boot from the SD slot of the MegaST version. In the HDDRIVER forum there are ATW800/2 hints and an ATW800/2 FAQ.
HDDRIVER: Also with Falcons, HDDRIVER can be booted into Fast-RAM. A TOS with Fast-RAM support is a prerequisite. HDDRIVER in Fast-RAM offers particularly high IDE/SATA transfer rates and faster caches. With XFERRATE and a CTPCI board in 060 mode 12.8 MiB/s have been measured, with a DFB1 board 4.8 MiB/s, with a Raven 6.6 MiB/s. Hard drives or DOMs often provide higher values than memory cards.
HDDRIVER: On the Falcon, an undocumented behavior of the DMA chip limits the number of bytes that can be transferred via SCSI/DMA in one go to just under 8 MiB. This value is also used by AHDI. The accelerated transfer mode for Ataris without Alternate-RAM has been adjusted accordingly. For the ST nothing has changed: The transfer length in accelerated mode is still just under 128 KiB, which is the documented DMA chip limit. For each bus HDDRUTIL displays the respective limit with "Bus Information".
HDDRIVER: Fixed a bug in the LBA-48 access mode, which is used with IDE/SATA drives > 128 GiB.
HDDRIVER: Extended support of GUID Partition Tables (GPT) with every TOS, for all partition types relevant for the Atari.
HDDRIVER: If no LUNs are enabled when configuring a device with "Devices and Partitions", the SCSI Driver integrated in HDDRIVER manages the device, but no partitions are created. This is useful when cloning drives/memory cards, for instance.
HDDRIVER: HDDRIVER at startup does not probe anymore for ACSI/SCSI/IDE hardware when the respective buses are already managed by an existing SCSI Driver. This further improves the hardware independence.
HDDRIVER: When the cookie jar was extended in the "Basic Settings", HDDRIVER allocated more memory than needed. This has been fixed.
HDDRIVER: Fixed a bug with the optional verify with SCSI drives that do not support any verify.
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: A conceptual change and a new option under "Performance" makes ALTRAMFX/AB040FIX (for Falcons with Fast-RAM) obsolete.
HDDRUTIL: Under "Performance", for all Ataris without Alternate-RAM/Fast-RAM there is a new accelerated mode for transfers of big data blocks via ACSI or SCSI.
HDDRUTIL: The display of invalid partition data with "Check Boot Sector" has been improved.
HDDRUTIL: "Select HDDRIVER" (formerly "Locate HDDRIVER") before an update is needless, because just like with the initial installation, double-clicking the boot drive is sufficient. The manual explains when to use "Select HDDRIVER".
HDDRUTIL: Not only TOS partitions, but any partition can be saved as an image file and loaded from an image file.
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Drive->Clear Data" clears the FATs and the root directory of a partition. This is equivalent to deleting all files, but is much faster.
HDDRUTIL: The function "Test Sectors" was renamed to "Read Test" because there is now also a write test for the data of a medium. This test first reads the sectors and then writes them back. Nevertheless it is recommended to save the data before a write test.
HDDRUTIL: With "Edit Partitions" the GUID for the type of a GPT partition can be modified. The partition GUID and the 36 character GPT partition name can be edited after double-clicking the partition type GUID. The Atari can only display 8 bit characters, but the actual codeset is a 16 bit codeset. Therefore, with names outside of the ASCII range (created by other platforms), 16 bit characters may get lost.
HDDRUTIL: "Restore Root Sector" has been renamed to "Repair Partitions" and also repairs GPT data.
HDDRUTIL: The compatibility settings for partitioning have been simplified.
HDDRUTIL: The partition information export has been extended.
HDDRUTIL: Just like for Linux and Minix partitions, with "Devices and Partitions" you can configure whether HDDRIVER reserves drive IDs for FAT32 partitions.
HDDRUTIL: The "Help" buttons in the dialog windows have been removed. Each user of the full version of HDDRIVER 12 has an up to date manual as a PDF file, which provides a better help.
HDDRUTIL: Fixed a bug related to getting the Milan's boot parameters.
HDDRUTIL:After formatting floppy disks (e.g. in a USB drive) a TOS-compatible filesystem is created automatically. There is no need anymore to partition with an empty partition table.
HDDRUTIL: At startup, HDDRUTIL displays a warning if a faulty device driver is found.
HDDRUTIL: HDDRIVER can now only be installed on buses and on device IDs TOS can boot from.
HDDRUTIL: Two items were added to the "Windows" menu: "Cycle" and "Close". The respective keyboard shortcuts have always existed.
HDDRUTIL: An old bug in "Repair Partitions" has been fixed. This bug only occured when attempting to repair a root sector that was not actually corrupted. You should never overwrite the root sector without a good reason. It is recommended to write-protect the root sector and the boot sectors with HDDRIVER.

The main changes in HDDRIVER 11

HDDRIVER: Optional blitter support speeds up IDE transfers up to 20%, in particular with STs.
HDDRIVER: Support for 4Kn SATA hard drives with 4096 physical bytes per sector (Advanced Format Drive, AFD). Note that TOS cannot boot from these drives: The IDE interface will be blocked, so that such a drive cannot be operated as primary drive at the first IDE port.
HDDRIVER: Improved compatibility with some Delock IDE DOMs.
HDDRIVER: HDDRIVER only reports its name on the SCSI bus when its target ID (usually 7) is explicitly enabled in "Devices and Partitions" and the SCSI Driver Target Interface is available (see below).
HDDRIVER: Fixed a bug in the XHDI implementation which caused an issue when using byteswapped media with Big-DOS or MiNT.
HDDRIVER: Toggling the boot preference with dual boot systems (TOS and TT System V Release 4) is now triggered with the left shift key. The HDDRIVER forum provides details on the creation of dual boot systems for TOS/ASV.
HDDRIVER: Fixed a SCSI transfer issue affecting Falcons with Alternate RAM (Afterburner040, DFB1).
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: Support for media with a physical sector size of up to 4096 bytes. (Previous versions supported up to 2048 bytes.)
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: HDDRUTIL now can install two flavors of HDDRIVER: One with and one without SCSI Driver Target Interface. The version without target interface support is almost 3 KiB smaller. Only with target interface HDDRIVER with TT and Falcon acts as SCSI target and can execute SCSI commands sent by other devices connected to the SCSI bus. The HDDRUTIL settings offer an option to select the desired HDDRIVER flavor to be installed with "Install HDDRIVER".
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: If HDDRIVER is installed with the "Execute HDDRIVER Modules" option enabled, before loading HDDRIVER.SYS driver modules are executed. Such modules are in particular meant to install additional device drivers.
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: HDDRIVER can extend the cookie jar by an additional number of entries, which is configurable with the "Basic Settings". Just like before HDDRIVER extends the cookie jar automatically if required to set all of its own cookies.
HDDRUTIL: All settings to improve the data transfer rates are now located under "Performance".
HDDRUTIL: The SCSI specific settings for TT and Falcon are now configured with "Boot Parameters".
HDDRUTIL: "Show Details" displays the physical and logical sector sizes. With AFD drives (Advanced Format Drive) these can differ, e.g. with 512e SATA drives.
HDDRUTIL: When editing partitions of TOS/Windows compatible media you can choose whether to edit the TOS or Windows partition data.
HDDRUTIL: By selecting a device while the [Control] key is being pressed (until the "Format" dialog appears), the format function is available regardless of the device status.
HDDRUTIL: "Export Configuration" now also exports the SCSI ID configured in the NVRAM.
HDDRUTIL: With "Devices and Partitions" the bus and device IDs are editable for any device and not only for devices with a bus ID higher than 2.
HDDRUTIL: Improved error messages when evaluating the sector inputs for the sector test and for copying media.
HDDRUTIL: During the sector test the total number of sectors is displayed.
HDDRUTIL: Fixed a partitioning bug that prevented TOS/Windows compatible partitions < 16 MiB from actually being Windows compatible.
HDDRUTIL: Fixed a bug affecting creating TOS/Windows compatible partitions > 32 MB with TOS 1.00/1.02 compatibility.
HDDRUTIL: Faster copying of media by making better use of the available main memory.
HDDRUTIL: More intelligent device information query for devices which are not mass storage devices.
HDDRUTIL: Fixed a bug that prevented changing the physical sector size of a SCSI drive (in case the drive supports it) when formatting.
HDDRUTIL: The driver installation is only offered for partitions on drives TOS can boot from (ACSI 0-7, SCSI 0-7, IDE 0).
HDDRUTIL: In the partitioning dialog the partition ID "UNX" (TT System V Release 4) is now explicitly displayed.
AUTOPARK: Fixed a problem when being launched as an accessory instead of an application, which could cause a crash when displaying the desktop info.

The main changes in HDDRIVER 10

HDDRIVER: With the integrated SCSI Driver not only SCSI drives but now also IDE and SATA hard drives > 2 TiB can be addressed with their full capacity.
HDDRIVER: The SCSI emulation for IDE drives supports READ/WRITE/VERIFY (16) and READ CAPACITY (16).
HDDRIVER: Improved mapping of IDE to SCSI error codes.
HDDRIVER: Up to 15% higher IDE transfer rates compared to all previous versions.
HDDRIVER: Faster byteswapping.
HDDRIVER: The SCSI Driver does not convert the ATAPI/SATA packet commands READ/WRITE (6) to READ/WRITE (10) anymore. These commands are now passed through unchanged.
HDDRIVER: Timeouts are now dynamically calculated, based on the number of bytes to be transferred.
HDDRIVER: Support for GUID partition tables (GPT).
HDDRIVER: The SCSI emulation for IDE/SATA devices reports an error when trying to format drives compliant with ATA-4 or newer. ATA-4 and newer do not support the FORMAT command anymore.
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: Support for the "Reduced Block Commands" command set (RBC), for devices with limited features.
HDDRIVER: More than 4 partitions in the root sector without XGM structure (not AHDI compatible) are no longer supported.
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: On the TT and the Milan HDDRIVER can be installed in TT RAM by enabling the corresponding option in the "File->Preferences" dialog. This in particular makes sense for Ataris with Fast RAM and IDE interface, in order to increase the IDE transfer rate. Additionally, it saves ST-RAM. Note that hard disk drivers that reside in TT RAM cannot be booted from the ACSI bus.
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: Improved handling of boot sectors of media with a super floppy layout (media without a root sector).
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: Fixed a regression (since HDDRIVER 10.00) that could result in a crash or freeze on a Milan when booting or when running a device check.
HDDRUTIL: Support for 64 bit sector numbers, for media > 2 TiB.
HDDRUTIL: The functions for erasing, copying, loading, saving and testing sectors support media > 2 TiB.
HDDRUTIL: When loading or saving media images as well as when testing sectors the start sector and the number of sectors can be specified.
HDDRUTIL: In order to better support additional buses a new window with a list of all available buses has been added.
HDDRUTIL: All windows can be closed. Whether they are open or closed can be toggled in the new "Windows" menu.
HDDRUTIL: The device check sorts buses by their SCSI Driver ID.
HDDRUTIL: With "Scan Bus" only the selected bus is scanned for devices.
HDDRUTIL: When a bus, device or drive is selected all corresponding buses devices and drives are marked.
HDDRUTIL: If possible the capacity of a device/medium is displayed in the device window.
HDDRUTIL: "Device Information" displays whether the SCSI Driver supports all SCSI command classes for this device.
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Medium Details" displays details for the selected mass storage medium.
HDDRUTIL: Improved capacity usage with Windows and TOS/Windows compatible partitioning.
HDDRUTIL: When partitioning TOS or TOS/Windows compatible media in sector mode there is no automatic adjustment of partition boundaries anymore. The sector mode is meant to only be used by experts.
HDDRUTIL: HDDRUTIL makes use of the REPORT LUNS command, if supported by a device, in order to optimize the check for available LUNs.
HDDRUTIL: Partitioning does not anymore require an XHDI compatible driver to be installed, SCSI Driver compatibility is sufficient.
HDDRUTIL: With "Devices and Partitions" unknown GUID types can be mapped to the XHDI RAW type.
HDDRUTIL: The new menu item "Check Boot Sector" checks whether a partition is compatible with the currently running operating system and the current XHDI limits. It displays the boot sector parameters and, in brackets, the limits. Parameters that are not compatible with the limits are displayed disabled. Affected partitions may require a newer version of TOS or software like MiNT or MagiC to be usable.
HDDRUTIL: Clicking on "Save" in the HDDRUTIL preferences dialog saves the preferences and closes the dialog. The "Save Preferences Now" button has been removed.
HDDRUTIL: The "Partition" dialog displays the byte swapping status.
HDDRUTIL: After a sector test a defect list is only written after asking the user. There is no attempt anymore to write a defect list to a CD-ROM.
HDDRUTIL: Fixed a bug affecting the sector count calculation of "Check Boot Sector".
HDDRUTIL: Fixed a bug that affected the TOS/Windows compatible partitioning and could result in wrong partition data being calculated for other partitions than the first one. This bug only affected operating systems that support more than one Windows compatible partition per medium.
HDDRUTIL: In order to save space on the screen the information displayed in the info bars was moved to the window titles.
HDDRUTIL: Partition, drive and bus window do not have a minimum width anymore.
HDDRUTIL: When re-starting the system after partitioning MiNT is properly shut down.

The main changes in HDDRIVER 9

HDDRIVER: With suitable hardware extensions up to 4 IDE ports with up to 8 devices (addresses $FFF00000, $FFF00040, $FFF00080 and $FFF000C0) are supported. The additional ports must be compatible with the regular Falcon's IDE port.
HDDRIVER: Extended support for multimedia commands (MMC) of CD-ROM/DVD/BD drives and burners. In addition to DVD-RAM media, with many drives HDDRUTIL and HDDRIVER can now also format and write to DVD+RW and BD-RE media.
HDDRIVER: ICD compatible hardware, which supports drives with a capacity of more than 1 GiB connected to the ACSI bus, is now detected automatically. Therefore also for GigaFile, UltraSatan, Hatari and ARAnyM there is no special setting required anymore.
HDDRIVER: When booting, information about each configured device ID is displayed, even when no device is found.
HDDRIVER: The SCSI target interface supports all mandatory processor device commands of the SPC-2 specification.
HDDRIVER: The SCSI emulation for IDE drives supports all mandatory commands of the SBC-3 specification and returns more precise error codes.
HDDRIVER: Improved compatibility with special SCSI hardware combinations (Acard AEC-7720U combined with IDE-to-SATA adapter).
HDDRIVER: Updated XHDI limits for some versions of TOS.
HDDRIVER: Fixed a bug affecting ACSI/DMA transfers with STs to Alternate RAM.
HDDRIVER: Improved detection of Windows compatible media with a 12 bit FAT.
HDDRIVER/HDDRUTIL: Minor improvements related to the automatic detection of TOS/Windows compatible media.
HDDRUTIL: Completely new window-based user interface: HDDRUTIL displays two windows with all known devices and drives. The device or drive to operate on can be selected from these lists. The operations available for the selected item are enabled in the main menu and are also offered by a context menu.
HDDRUTIL: Sectors/Media can be copied by dragging the source device onto the target device with the mouse (Drag&Drop).
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Device Information" displays detailed information on a device.
HDDRUTIL: Details regarding the buses managed by the SCSI Driver can be displayed with "Bus Information".
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Export Configuration" saves an overview of all HDDRIVER settings.
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Execute Self-test" starts the built-in self-test of a device.
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Eject" ejects a medium if this is supported by the respective device.
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Erase All Data" overwrites any data on a medium.
HDDRUTIL: The new function "Show Details" displays important data regarding the layout of TOS compatible partitions.
HDDRUTIL: The supported LUNs can be configured separately for each device after double-clicking a device in the "Devices and Partitions" settings.
HDDRUTIL: Numerous help dialog texts were updated and some settings were renamed to less technical terms.
HDDRUTIL: If a shift key is pressed when launching, the saved HDDRUTIL settings are not loaded.
HDDRUTIL: The "System Limits" dialog additionally displays the number of clusters supported by the operating system for media with a 32 bit FAT and the maximum partition size.
HDDRUTIL: Automatic detection of existing byteswapped TOS compatible partitions when partitioning.
HDDRUTIL: Media can now also be ejected with the SCSI Driver for Hatari and ARAnyM.
HDDRUTIL: If a shift key is pressed when terminating HDDRUTIL, the current HDDRUTIL settings are not saved.
HDDRUTIL: When switching to TOS/Windows compatible partitioning the partition boundaries are recalculated.
HDDRUTIL: Because Windows compatible partition cannot be deactivated the corresponding button is now disabled for these partitions.
HDDRUTIL: "Export Configuration" now also exports the IDE settings.
HDDRCONF: In the error information dialog HDDRCONF.CPX additionally displays the Sense Key.

The main changes in HDDRIVER 8.4

HDDRUTIL-specific settings can be configured in a new dialog window.
TOS/Windows compatible media can now contain more than one partition. Note, however, that Windows only supports one partition on media it considers removable.
When creating Windows compatible media the creation of primary and logical partitions and thus the drive order under Windows can be influenced.
HDDRIVER can now boot from non-byteswapped TOS/Windows compatible media without pressing any key.
HDDRIVER and HDDRUTIL support 8 SCSI sub-units (LUNs) per drive.
The file "HDDRUTIL.INF" is now saved to the same folder HDDRUTIL is located in.
The language used by HDDRUTIL can be set in the "Preferences".
HDDRUTIL remembers the path of the HDDRIVER driver file configured last.
When creating TOS/Windows compatible media for each PC compatible Linux partition an Atari compatible Linux partition is created.
"Recover Data" also supports byteswapped media.
Fixed a bug that prevented the detection of partitions on byteswapped TOS compatible media.
Support for a second IDE port at address $FFF00040, not just like before for the Milan only. This port must be compatible with the Falcon's standard IDE port.
XHDI calls do not accept BIOS device numbers anymore that are higher than the maximum for the current GEMDOS.
The XHDI functions XHInqTarget() and XHInqTarget2() now also report the device name when there is no medium in a drive.
When partitioning, Windows compatible partitions > 2 GiB will automatically be created as FAT32 partitions.

The main changes in HDDRIVER 8.3

HDDRUTIL supports the complete and partial copying of hard drives.
HDDRUTIL can save complete hard disk or partition contents as image files and can load hard disk or partition contents from image files.
Improvements regarding the support of emulation environments.
When copying sectors and saving or loading drive or partition images the byte order can be changed.
When partitioning the display can be switched between MByte values based on 1000 or 1024 bytes per sector.

The main changes since version 8.00

Improved support for memory cards.
Improved support of byteswapped drives.
AUTOPARK supports parking and ejecting media for the drives A: and B:, provided that they are managed by HDDRIVER.
HDDRUTIL provides for activating and de-activating partitions.
Write-protection for the drives A: and B:, in case they are managed by HDDRIVER.
HDDRCONF.CPX supports bus rescan.

The main changes since version 7.90

HDDRIVER and all tools now run on any platform that provides a SCSI Driver.
The ID check now works for any bus for which a SCSI Driver is available. Additionally the complete bus names are displayed.
Creation of TOS and Windows compatible FAT32 partitions.
With MiNT Linux partitions can be accessed.
DVD-RAM drives are supported.
Support for FAT32 partitions under MiNT and MagiC.
Support for ATAPI LS-120 drives and ATAPI ZIP drives.
For ZIP and JAZ drives Auto-Sleep and for ZIP drives additionally Auto-Park can be configured.
The SCSI driver supports ATAPI peripherals and emulates the most important SCSI commands for IDE drives.
HDDRUTIL can create media with a single partition that are both TOS and DOS compatible. DOS/Windows, Linux and TOS can use these media without any additional software.
Cache settings can be configured for ATAPI devices.
Support for IDE drives > 8 GByte.