_________________________________________________________________
       STACKER NOTE                                         STACKER NOTE
                   USING SURFACE SCAN UTILITIES WITH STACKER
                       (Applies to All Stacker Versions)
       STAC FAX 3404  (09/07/93)
       _________________________________________________________________
       
       
       BACKGROUND
       
       If a physical hard drive flaw (bad sector) affects the operation
       of your Stacker drive, then a disk repair utility can be used to
       detect the damaged areas and correct them.  This document
       provides a general procedure for using a disk repair utility to
       scan and repair hard drive flaws in conjunction with Stacker.
       Norton Utilities Norton Disk Doctor, PC Tools DiskFix, and
       SpinRite are examples of disk surface scan utilities.
       
       SOLUTION
       
       To correct physical disk flaws that affect Stacker:
         Ensure that a file attribute utility is available
         Boot without loading device drivers
         Unhide the STACVOL file
         Correct the damaged, unreadable areas of your hard drive
         Correct coincidental damage to the Stacker drive
         
       First, locate file attribute utilities
       
       This step is not necessary if you are using Stacker 3.1 and MS-
       DOS 6.0.  Otherwise, copy two files, SATTRIB.* and SDIR.*, to the
       \STACKER directory on the uncompressed boot drive.
       
       Clean boot your system
       
       Clean boot your system using a bootable floppy diskette.  "Clean
       boot" means to start your computer without loading any device
       drivers into memory, including Stacker.  Refer to your DOS user's
       guide if you do not have a bootable floppy diskette.  Note:  if
       you use MS-DOS 6, the correct procedure is entitled "Making a
       Startup Disk" on page 178 of the MS-DOS 6 User's Guide.
       
       Unhide the STACVOL file
       
       After clean booting, your computer will display an A prompt.
       Select the appropriate procedure to unhide the STACVOL file:
       
       
       
       For MS-DOS 6.0
       From the A: command prompt, type:
       
            attrib -s -h -r drive:\STACVOL.* <ENTER>
       
       where drive is the letter of the drive you are repairing.  This
       command unhides all STACVOL files on the specified drive.
       
       
       For DOS Versions other than MS-DOS 6.0
       Switch to drive C:, change directory to \STACKER, and type:
       
               sdir drive:\STACVOL.* /h <ENTER>
       
       where drive is the letter of the drive you are repairing.  This
       command lists STACVOL file(s) which you must unhide individually.
       Consider the following sample SDIR output which lists two STACVOL
       files:
       
               Directory of  C:\
               STACVOL  000 27182080   6-3-93  7:22p  HIDDEN
               STACVOL  DSK 31415296   6-3-93  7:22p  HIDDEN
               2 File(s)  1048576 bytes free
       
       The following commands, typed at the command prompt, unhide both
       files:
       
               sattrib -s -h -r C:\STACVOL.000 <ENTER>
               sattrib -s -h -r C:\STACVOL.DSK <ENTER>
       
       Repeat this command for each STACVOL file in your SDIR listing.
       
       
       Run the surface scan on the physical hard drive
       
        1. Follow the disk repair utility's instructions for running
           from floppy.  Use the most rigorous pattern testing
           available (typically 80-pattern) to scan the physical drive
           containing the STACVOL file, and allow it to repair
           defective areas on the disk.  A rigorous surface scan may
           take several hours, depending on the size and speed of your
           hard drive.
           
           Note:  If you are using Norton CALIBRAT.EXE to perform
           pattern testing, it defaults to low-level formatting.  IDE
           drives cannot be low-level formatted, so you must override
           low-level formatting with the following command:
       
                  calibrat /noformat
       
        2. Remove all diskettes from the floppy drives and restart the
           computer.
            
       Correct coincidental damage to the Stacker drive
       
       Run the Stacker command CHECK /F (for version 3.0 or greater) or

       _________________________________________________________________
       Copyright 1993, Stac Electronics