• Question:
Do I have to alter my computers operating system to use CoreSHIELD™.
• No,
CoreSHIELD™ is designed to perfectly emulate an IDE hard drive.
• Question:
Does CoreSHIELD™ use advanced ATA commands.
• Yes,
CoreSHIELD™ uses a specially designed ASIC chip with 48 bit internal
registers that allows full ATA-166 block transfers. Other write blocking
devices may
claim
to have
ATA-100 or ATA-133 compatibility, but they often use slower, multi-purpose
FPGA microchips that cannot handle the 48 bit ATA command sets. Utilizing
the CoreRESTORE™ ASIC is an advancement that places CoreSHIELD™ far
above any other write-block product.
• Question:
Can I use CoreSHIELD™ with IDE removable drive trays.
• Yes,
connect CoreSHIELD™ to the drive tray, connect the data cable
to CoreSHIELD™, then use the supplied power "Y" to connect
power to CoreSHIELD™ and the drive tray.
All hard drives placed into the
drive
tray must
be jumpered as “Master” or in the case of Western Digital
drives, “Single” or
CoreSHIELD™ will
not detect the drives.
• Question:
Can I use a single CoreSHIELD™ bridge card to protect more than
one hard drive.
• No,
each CoreSHIELD™ bridge card is designed to protect one hard
drive. Each hard drive you wish to protect must have a separate CoreSHIELD™ bridge
attached.
• Question:
Can I use CoreSHIELD™ to protect a RAID drive array.
• No,
this is not a tested application for CoreSHIELD™. Do not attempt.
• Question:
Can I use CoreSHIELD™ with external IDE controllers.
• Yes,
CoreSHIELD™ is compatible with external IDE controllers like
the Promise® brand of controllers.
• Question:
Can I use CoreSHIELD™ with my USB or Firewire to IDE bridge controllers.
• Yes,
place CoreSHIELD™ directly on the hard drive, then connect the
bridge controller to CoreSHIELD™. This will allow you to
protect drives connected to your computers USB or Firewire IO ports.
• Problem:
Can’t see the drive in the BIOS and the blue LED is not on.
• Be
sure power is being properly supplied to CoreSHIELD™. Check
the low voltage power cable and both Molex® connectors – to
both the drive and CoreSHIELD™.
• Use a quality
power cable in good condition with the proper, snug-fitting Molex® connectors.
• Problem:
Can’t see the drive in the BIOS blue LED is on.
• Check
the jumpers on the drive. The drive must be jumpered as a “Master” or
in the case of Western Digital drives, a “Single”. Never
use the “Cable Select” setting.
• Check the
IDE ribbon cable. Cables wires and pins become worn with continued
use and can suddenly become defective without warning. Replace the
IDE cable with a new 80 pin cable or one in known good condition.
• Check the
IDE ribbon cable for a 79 pin "Hardware Speed Select" type
cable. To identify this cable, check the ribbon cable towards the
outside connectors. If you see a mechanical punch removing one of
the wires, this is a called a 79 pin cable. This cable is not supported
by CoreSHIELD™. Replace
this cable with a new 80 pin cable.
• Check
the drive itself. Is the drive spinning properly? You should be able
to feel a slight gyroscopic effect from the spinning platters when
holding the spinning drive. Be very careful handling a powered hard
drive. Handle on a padded surface. Do not drop or jar.
• How old
is the drive? Many older drives use controllers which are not compatible
with the ASIC chip which runs CoreSHIELD™. Most IDE drives
with capacities of 2.1GB or more should be able to be seen by CoreSHIELD™.
• Problem:
The computer won’t boot with CoreSHIELD™ attached to
the boot drive.
• Occasionally,
some OS’s, such as Windows® NT4 and some configurations
of Windows® XP, are hardware specific. They don’t like
the expected drive device name of CoreSHIELD™. These configurations
may not be compatible with the booting abilities of CoreSHIELD™
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