Chapter 6: Notebook Computers

Features of Notebook Computers

Basic Considerations:

Size and weight of unit

Size and weight of AC adapter

Amount of RAM

Capacity of hard drive

Size and layout of keyboard. Does it have individual Page-Up, Page-Down, Home, and End Keys?

Does it have a 30-day, no questions asked, money back guarantee?

How long is the warranty. Where is warranty service provided? Is On-Site service available?

Processor Types:

Intel's SL and DX-4, IBM's SLC, and AMD's LV processors provide low-power 3.3v operation.

DX-2 and DX-4 clock doubler and tripling technologies.

True 32-bit 486, instead of Cyrix's 16/32-bit microprocessors.

OverDrive upgrade socket.

Power management features: display and hard drive power-down, peripherals power down (for standard ports), and standby and resume mode.

Does it have a secondary CPU cache? How large? Is it an option that is user install-able?

Displays:

Diagonal size of the display?

Monochrome gray scale. How many levels of gray scale?

Dual Scan color splits the screen into top and bottom regions and refreshes each region independently.

TFT, Active Color Matrix.

External Display Support:

Simultaneous internal and external display support?

Fast, local bus video?

What is the maximum resolution and number of colors in driving an external display.

Serial and Parallel Ports:

How many serial ports?

What type of UART - 8250 low-speed, single tasking, or 16550 for high-speed Windows multi-tasking communications.

What type of parallel port: unidirectional, bi-directional, EPP, or EPC?

Expansion Capability:

PCMCIA Slots, what type and how many cards are simultaneously supported?

Are the Card and Socket services pre-loaded?

Type-3 slot for hard drive or proprietary removable hard drive?

Proprietary memory slot? Saves PCMCIA for other cards.

Use standard SIMMs for off-the-shelf memory expansion?

Does it have a proprietary internal modem slot?

External Expansion Capability:

Does it have an external expansion connector?

Docking Station provides full desk-top expansion.

Mini Docking Station provides two or three 16-bit ISA expansion slots.

Docking Bars use the Docking Station expansion connector to provide port replication. Reduces the time and effect of attaching and detaching individual cables from each port on the notebook computer.

Battery Technology:

NiCad inexpensive, medium density, proven battery technology. It suffers from memory effect (hysteresis).

NiMH twice the cost of NiCad with 30% higher power density and no hysteresis.

Lithium Ion and Lithium Polymer new battery technologies with much greater power densities.

Pointing Device"

Free Standing: PS/2-Style mouse port for standard mouse.

Built In: integrated track ball or IBM's Track Point.

Snap-On: Microsoft's Quick Port and Ball Point Mouse.

Managing a Multi-Computer, Desktop/Notebook Environment

When dividing computer usage between a desktop and notebook computer, it can be difficult to ensure that data on both machines is current and synchronized. Traveling Software's LapLink V is a program designed to ease the problems associated with dual-computer usage.

LapLink V enables two computers to be connected via:

Parallel ports

Serial ports

Dial-up modems

IPX on Novell LANs

LapLink Copy Operations

When a connection is established the video display shows a split screen illustrating the local computer on the left and the remote computer on the right.

Disk drives and directories can be changed on either machine.

Files and Directories are simply selected and then copied.

LapLink provides many copy options such as ensuring that confirming file overwrites, including subdirectories, copying newer files only, existing files only, overwriting Read-Only files.

Speed Enhancements

Parallel transfers are faster than Serial transfers.

Parallel cables are limited to 25 feet, serial cables to about 75 feet.

Turbo Mode speeds transfers over a cable.

Compressed Data mode compresses files, transmits, and then uncompresses files. This speeds up large file and graphic file transfers.

A report can be generated that lists all file transfer information.

Duplicating PC Systems

The LapLink V Clone Drive command is designed to be used by PC support staff who routinely set up computers with company standard programs and data.

Clone Drive provides an efficient way of replicating a disk drive.

Requires that both systems have the same version of DOS.

Unless the system hardware is identical, files like SYSTEM.INI will have to be edited or recreated for the specific hardware.

LapLink's File Manager

DOS program that provides powerful file management features

Display directory structure

Finding files

Delete directories, including subdirectories with one command.

Move files

Rename directories

View and edit text files

Lap Link V SmartXchange Facility

Synchronize

Extremely useful in synchronizing desk-top and notebook computers data directories.

Two-way file exchange used to make the files in two directories identical.

Copies newly created files between the directories.

If files exists in both directories, overwrites the older file with the new file.

Clone Directory

Unlike Synchronize, does not change files in the source directory.

Replicates one directory onto another by adding, deleting, and updating files in the target directory.

Refresh: Updating a Directory

Used to back-up the same files from a working directory into a back-up directory.

Copies newer files from the source directory only if they exist in the target directory.

Appendix A: PC Expansion Slot Standards

Desktop PCs support one or more of the following expansion slot standards.

16-bit ISA: Clocked at 8-Mhz to maintain compatibility between a wide range of system boards, it's used in 80286 and above systems. 16-bit ISA remains the standard for low- to medium-performance I/O.

32-bit EISA: Clocked up to 10-Mhz, EISA provides high-performance bus-mastering to improve throughput. It's used almost exclusively in file servers utilizing a 32-bit, protected-mode Network Operating System.

Micro Channel Architecture-IBM's proprietary 16/32-bit PS/2 expansion slot. The MCA's most notable feature is that is supports auto configuration of expansion cards via an ADF (adapter description file).

32-bit VESA Local Bus-the Video Electronics Standards Association's Local Bus (VL-Bus) is physical and logical extension of 16-bit ISA. A synchronous bus, it's clocked at the same rate as the system's microprocessor (up to 33-MHz). VL-Bus supports high-speed, Super VGA Co-processor adapters, disk controllers, and SCSI host adapters. Most VL-Bus system boards support three VL-Bus and five 16-ISA slots.

64-bit PCI Local Bus-Intel's Peripheral Component Interconnection Local Bus is an extremely high-performance, asynchronous bus technology employed in Pentium PCs, RISC-based workstations, and MacIntosh Power-PCs. It's clocked at the same rate as the system's microprocessor (up to 40-MHz). After issuing a command to a PCI I/O adapter, the asynchronous operation enables the microprocessor to return to other computional processes without having to wait for the I/O device to complete its work.

Appendix B: SCSI Bus Signals

The control bus employs 9 lines, logically divided into three groups.

SCSI Control Signals

Group One - SEL & BSY permit an initiator to select a target.

Group Two - C/D, I/O, MSG, REQ, and ACK signals define the information transfer phases and provide handshaking.

Group Three - ATN and RST define the two asynchronous bus conditions.

The Initiator drives:

RST (Reset) - Asserted by the Initiator during the system power-up. Used to clear all SCSI devices from the bus and forces the bus in to a Bus Free state.

BSY (Busy) - Asserts that the bus is currently busy.

SEL (Select) - Selects a Target to perform a command.

ACK (Acknowledge) - Acknowledges a request from a Target.

ATN (Attention) - Informs a Target of a pending message. The Target responds at its convenience, requesting the message.

The Target drives:

RST (Reset) - A Target asserts RST upon its own power-up or power-down operations to compensate for electrical noise generated on the bus.

BSY (Busy) - Acknowledges selection and asserts that it has bus control.

C/D (Control or Data) - Specifies whether the Data Bus is currently transferring Control or Data information.

I/O (Input/Output) - Defines the direction data movement with respect to Initiator.

MSG (Message) - Indicates that a Message is being transferred. The Target sends a Command Completion message after the completion of each command.

REQ (Request) - Requests a data information In/Out transfer phase. The Initiator responds with an ACK to acknowledge that it has read/written the information. REQ/ACK handshake is used in all information transfers between the Initiator and Target.

SEL (Select) - Used to re-select an Initiator.

The Control signals are used to initiate one of eight bus phases:

Bus Free - Indicates that no SCSI device is currently using the bus.

Arbitration - If the bus is in a Bus Free phase, arbitration permits a SCSI device to gain control of the bus. Ensures that two devices will not simultaneously attempt to drive the data and control lines.

Selection - Permits an Initiator to select a Target.

Reselection - Reselection of a suspended operation permits overlapped I/O and multi-tasking SCSI operations.

Command - Allows the Target to request command information.

Data - Allows the Target to request a bus data read or write operation.

Status - Enables the Target to request that status information be sent to the Initiator.

Message - Allows the Target to request a message read or write operation.

SCSI Bus Signal Summary

A total of 50 lines.

Odd numbered lines and lines 20, 22, 24, 28, 30, 34 are connected to ground on the controller side.

Line 25 is open.

Line 26 supplies terminator power.

The bidirectional data bus employs 9 lines (8 data bits + 1 parity bit).

Parity is an option. If selected, it's implemented as odd parity and must be supported by every device on the bus.

The data bus carries data, commands, status, messages, and SCSI ID codes.

Appendix C: Advanced Card Services Reference

Card Services Software Configuration

The Card Services drivers also includes a configuration program. This program is used to configure the most popular types of PCMCIA cards.

Modem Cards:

Defines the characteristics of PCMCIA modem or FAX cards.

Sets the I/O port address and IRQ according to slot number or insertion order.

Enables audio and ring indicator.

Network Cards:

Sets I/O port address and IRQ.

Designates shared RAM address range.

ATA Cards:

Includes Flash Disks and rotating media (PCMCIA Type-3 disk drives).

Specifies the I/O address as the primary or secondary disk controller.

Card Insertion Parameters:

The insertion or ejection in DOS or Windows.

An unrecognized card.

A card configuration failure.

To continue/stop on configuration error.

System Resource Allocation

To provide the highest level of flexibility, the Card Services needs a list of system resources that are available to PCMCIA cards. When the Cards Services software is installed it creates a file which catalogs these resources:

A range of UMB memory addresses.

A list of the available blocks of I/O addresses. I/O addressed devices use addresses in blocks of 4, 8, 16 or 32.

A list of the unused IRQs.

Remember to add an Exclude command to EMS manager's command line. This ensures that the UMB memory addresses specified in the Card Services System Resource Allocation Table will not be overwritten with High RAM.

Typical drivers used to support Card and Socket services, and standard PCMCIA cards are:

Socket Services is proprietary to the PCMCIA chip set employed on the notebook computer.

Card Services manages system and card resources, and configuration.

Card Identification upon insertion, automatically detects the card type and configures the card and socket adapter. Also detects the rejection of a card. Communications with PCMCIA-aware drivers.

Memory Card Driver is the Microsoft driver for SRAM and flash card support.

IDE/ATA Type-3 Drive Support is a block driver used to support ATA hard disks. Also comes with a partitioning program for ATA drives.

Windows Enhanced Mode Driver loaded in SYSTEM.INI enables hot insertion in Windows.

Appendix D: Hard Disk Drive Performance Specifications

Hard Drive Interface Specifications

Disk drive performance specifications:

Track-to-Track Seek time:

The length of time to move the head carriage assembly from the current cylinder to the next adjacent cylinder.

Random Access Time:

Random Access Time is the most widely quoted hard disk drive specification. It's the average length of time to move the head carriage assembly from its current location to the location of the desired data. This calculates to the length of time to move the head carriage assembly across 1/3 of the total number of data tracks. However, on a well optimized drive once the data is located the heads are simply stepped sequentially, track-to-track to access the remaining sectors in the file.

Average Latency:

After the heads are positioned over the correct cylinder and the specified R/W head is selected, the controller waits for the specified sector to pass beneath the R/W head. The average latency is the time required to for the platters to make ½ a rotation.

Data Transfer Rate:

The speed at which data is transferred from the hard drive to the system RAM. The data transfer rate of a hard drive sub-system depends on many factors:

The type of hard drive interface: ST-506, ESDI, IDE, or SCSI.

The rotational speed of the spindle motor (3,600 - 5,400 RPMs). The rotational speed determines how quickly the data passes beneath the R/W heads and the average latency.

The data encoding method (MFM, RLL, ARLL, ERLL) determines the bit density.

The presence, size, and type of cache on the hard drive. Simple caches employ a 32-Kb readahead buffer. An Efficient and sophisticated read/write cache with a minimum of 128Kb of RAM greatly enhances performance.

The external clock speed of the system microprocessor.

The speed of the system RAM and the presence of a microprocessor memory cache.

The type of interface card employed as the disk controller: 16-Bit ISA, EISA, MICA, VL-Local Bus, or PCI-Local Bus.

The presence and size of a RAM cache on the hard disk controller card.

Whether software disk caching is an integrated feature of the O/S or an add-on device driver like SmartDrive.

Appendix E: ST-506 and ESDI Hard Drive Interface Standards

ST-506

The Segate Technologies 506 interface was used to support hard drives for the PC/XT and PC/AT computers. It has these key characteristics.

5-Mbit/Sec transfer rate, approximately 300-Kbyes/Sec. Adequate for a 12-MHz 80268 class PC.

Hard Disk Controller card installed in a standard 8-bit or 16-bit ISA slot.

Employed MFM encoding, yielding 17 sectors/track.

RLL encoding increased sector density to 27 sectors/track.

Complete compatibility between any MFM controller and hard drive. However, because of bad block marking and ECC considerations an ST-506 hard drive may need to be low-level formatted to work with a different controller.

Only one hard drive controller per system.

Controller cable is a 32-conductor flat, ribbon connecting a maximum of two drives to the controller.

Read/Write cables are 20-conductor flat, ribbon. Each drive requires an individual R/W cable.

Most CMOS Configuration RAM drive types are for the original, MFM ST-506 drives.

100% Compatible with system BIOS hard drive routines.

Easily low-level formatted with BIOS routine (XT) or hard drive diagnostics program (AT).

ESDI

Developed by Maxtor, the Enhanced Small Device Interface is a modification of ST-506. Moving the data separator circuit from the hard drive controller to the hard drive, increased the data rate by 2 to 3 times.

Used on many early LAN file servers. Uncommon, in desktop PCs.

Uses the same controller cable and R/W cables as ST-506. Visually, there is no distinguishing characteristic between ST-506 and ESDI drives.

Data transfer rates up to 750-Kbyes/second.

Compatible with INT-13 DOS disk devices request.

The system BIOS ROM in 80286 and above computers, contains ST-506 hard drive routines. The ESDI controller has its own 8-Kbyte Disk BIOS ROM, typically addressed at C800h.

Set-up in CMOS Configuration RAM as Type-1.

When the POST auto-detects the Disk BIOS ROM it transfers control to the hard controller. The hard disk controller determines the true (or translated) geometry of the drive creates its own Hard Disk Parameter Table, and then patches the INT-41 or INT 46, the disk parameter blocks.

The controller may determine the geometry of the device by reading Berg jumpers or DIP switches on the controller card.

Many ESDI systems are auto-configuring. The controller determines the drive's geometry by reading a secret sector on the drive itself.

The low-level formatting program is in the hard drive BIOS ROM. It typically resides at C800:5h.

The ST-506 and ESDI Control Cable

ST-506 and ESDI use an identical 34-conductor control cable that connects a maximum of two hard drives to one controller. Normally in a system with two hard drives the first drive must be jumpered as DS-0 (Device Select-0) and the second hard drive as DS-1. This enables the controller to specify which hard drive should respond to the current command.

IBM realized the complexities of physically setting drive select addresses. They developed a twisted cable which enables all hard drives to be addressed as DS-1, but the twist ensures that the DS-1 signal is inverted into a DS-0 signal for the first drive in the system. In a two drive system the terminator pack or jumpers must be removed from the second physical drive.

The floppy drive controller cable functions in a similar manner so floppy drives are also always select physically as DS-1.

***Caution***

Although hard drive and floppy controller cables may appear similar, they are not

interchangeable. They flip different wires for the drive select signals.

Appendix F: Preventative Maintenance

Periodic preventative maintenance (PM) dramatically reduces the number of catastrophic failures, and detects and repairs other failures before they affect the end-user.

Equipment and Software Required:

AC Circuit Tester ($4.95 at Radio Shack)

UL-1449 surge protector ($35.00 to 75.00)

ESD (Electro-Static-Discharge) kit ($20.00 for wrist strap and $45.00 for field engineer kit)

ESD-safe computer Vacuum ($85.00 to $120.00)

Floppy Alignment program (TestDrive shareware free) and Dysan Digital Diagnostic Diskette ($45)

Floppy drive head cleaning kit ($4.95 at Radio Shack)

The Norton Utilities ($49.00 upgrade or$115 retail)

1. One-Time Actions

a. Surge Protection: Most PC hardware failures are due to power line transients. Verify earth ground with the AC Circuit Tester and install a high-quality, UL1449 rated surge protector.

b. ESD Procedures: The second most common cause of PC hardware failures. Always use wrist straps and static mats when troubleshooting and installing new equipment. In high-static areas install 3-M First Touch static control strips on keyboards.

c. Rescue Diskette: Each machine should have a unique Rescue Diskette. Label it clearly and unambiguously to ensure that it won't e accidently used on any other computer.

2. End-User Level Actions

a. Defragment Hard Drive: At a minimum, use SpeedDisk or Defrag to defragment files weekly and optimize entire hard drive monthly.

b. Verify FAT & Root Directory On Start-up: Execute NDD with the /Q (Quick) parameter in AUTOMEXEC.BAT to preemptively repair logical disk errors.

c. Take snap-shot of Dynamic Data Structures: Place IMAGE in AUTOEXEC.BAT to provide NDD, UnErase and UnFormat with the latest two copies of the dynamic data structures.

d. Recognize Low-Battery Symptom: On power-up watch for more than 10 minutes of lost time on the internal clock. This indicates that the CMOS Configuration RAM battery should be replaced in the near future.

3. Quarterly Support PM

a. Completely clean computers with an ESD-safe Vacuum cleaner: Dust and dirt cause computers to run hotter and fail sooner. They also cause electrical shorts and intermittent operation in recently installed adapter boards. Vacuum system board, adapter slots, power supply and disk drives. Reverse hose and blow-out hard to reach areas. Never direct air stream at floppy or tape drive R/W heads.

b. Ensure diskette inter-changeability: Check floppy alignment specifications with Test Drive and the Dysan DDD. Clean R/W heads as indicated by alignment/sensitivity test.

c. Hard drive stress test: Execute Calibrate at Level 3 (40 patterns/sector) to ensure that every sector is reliable and refresh data. On notebook computers this should be done monthly.

Appendix G: SYSTEM.INI and WIN.INI Sections

SYSTEM.INI Sections

[Boot]

Specifies Windows device drivers and internal Windows components. Such as the display driver, keyboard driver, mouse driver, COM port driver, network driver, sound driver, alternative shell and task manager.

[Boot.Description]

Descriptions of drivers listed in [boot].

[Drivers]

A list of the names of install-able drivers which specify an alias name to be associated with an actual device driver.

An install-able driver is a DLL (dynamic link library) which Windows utilizes as a device driver.

A DLL is a collection of Windows executable procedures which can be simultaneously shared by multiple applications.

Enables command parameters to be specified for install-able drivers.

[Keyboard]

Specifies keyboard control driver and keyboard type.

[MCI]

Media Control Interface (MCI) drivers. MCI is a set of programming command for multimedia elements such as sound, graphics, and video.

[NonWindowsApp]

Controls DOS applications you run under Windows.

[Standard]

Controls Windows in Standard Mode.

[386enh]

Controls Windows' in 286 Enhanced Mode. Such as disk options, DOS applications, drivers, memory, ports, and system information.

WIN.INI Sections

[Windows]

Control Windows environment.

[Desktop]

Controls the desktop.

[Extensions]

Associate file types and applications.

[Intl]

International options.

[Ports]

Define serial and parallel ports settings.

[Fonts]

Define character fonts.

[FontSubstitutes]

Interchangeable font substitutes.

[TrueType]

TrueType font options.

[MCI extensions]

Associate media files with drivers.

[Network]

LAN Connection options.

[Embedding]

OLE (Object Linking and Embeddding) options. OLE enables an application to dynamically connect to another application to embed live data, images, and sound objects. OLE is the most sophisticated form of Windows data sharing capabilities.

[Windows Help]

Options for window size, placement, and object colors in the Windows Help Facility.

[Sounds]

Define sound files to play for specific Windows events.

[PrinterPorts]

List output devices.

[Devices]

List output devices that are used for compatibility with Windows versions before 3.0.

[Programs]

List alternative directory paths to locate an application.

[Colors]

Define colors for each Windows display element.

[Compatibility]

Lists compatibility information for certain Windows 3.0 applications that relied on features not present in Windows 3.1.