"block zero write failed!" Error message

[MoreGrog]

Hi, my first post here.

I used to swap amiga demos and games back in 1989-1994. And I suddenly got an urge to update my hw.

I have an Amiga 1200 v3.0 ROM and a CF Sandisk 2gb ultra that i want to use as a hard drive for the amiga. I am using WinXP + Winuae to prepare the CF as hard drive.

( I have followed the steps explained in another thread here. )

I'm setting 3 partitions in the menu and i select 0x1fe00 as maxtrans () for all partitions.
Finally when i select "Save Changes to Drive" I get this windows popup error message:

quote
winuae message
hd_usb mass storage device -|
block zero write failed!
unqoute

( And this also has a side effect, winXp wants to format my cf card after this happens (if i open the drive from windows) )

I tried using UAE and uaehf.device
and IDE0 and scsi.device

(What is the best device driver to use anyway?)

I have done this a couple of times now, always the same message.

My CF All in one card reader is this one:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...=STRK:MEWNX:IT

Any help would be helpful.

[thomas]

- deactivate all virus checkers, bootblock protectors or everything else which could protect the CF card from being written to
- use diskpart to clean the CF card before you use it
- remove the CF card safely and plug it back in after cleaning and before you use it in WinUAE
- be sure to have ticked the r/w checkbox in WinUAE's add harddrive dialogue.

And this also has a side effect, winXp wants to format my cf card after this happens (if i open the drive from windows)

This is a good sign. It means that WinUAE actually *has* written to the CF card, although it claims it couldn't.

[clueless]

Im sure thomas' help will sort it, he is excellent, but have had similar problems and I sorted it by using the real amiga to prep the card, then using it in winuae to install workbench etc worked.

[MoreGrog]

Thanks for the suggestions.
I think the problem might be the card reader i have. It managed to
destroy the directory on a sd card with photos.
I'm getting a new one to be sure.

[Toni Wilen]

WinUAE does extra check when real harddrive block zero is written:

- write block zero
- read block zero
- show "block zero write failed" dialog if data does not match

This test was added because in some situations write function does not report any errors but nothing is written to the disk either. (afaik for example when drive is mounted in Windows)

[MoreGrog]

Yes, as i suspected. The new card reader i bought today solved
all my problems. I have partitioned the CF card into 3 partitions.
And I have formatted the partitions.

Edit:
And I managed to get fat95 and cfd installed.
Tested it on real hardware. Boots nicely from the 2gb harddrive.
And when inserting a pcmcia card I can browse the contents of a SD 1gb card with some .adf files i found.
I Wouldnt have managed all this without WinUae. Because I dont have any of the Workbench or Kicstart disks. Lost them somewhere.