EHP FAQ: Formatting PCMCIA ATA Flash PC Cards as FAT-16

From the EverythingHerePlus website.

Good Morning,

 

I would like to request your assistance

 

While attempting a QAR download the PCMCIA card installed had no data present. Following the aircraft Fault Isolation Manual the first step will be to format the card.

 

Could you please provide a procedure that our engineers can follow to format the PCMCIA card.

 

I have attached pictures of the cards we utilise

In your step 2., the instructions say "Use a PC to format the card to FAT 16"

We're not sure what operating system you use on your PC, so here's instructions for two popular ones: Linux, and The Windows.

Unix

Under Linux, and most Unix-like systems, formatting cards as FAT 16 using a command-line utility is both simple and straight-forward.

okinawa-pangolin:~> sudo mkdosfs -F 16 /dev/[specify your device here]
mkfs.fat 3.0.28 (2015-05-16)

The Windows

Under The Windows, locate the card's icon in The Windows Explorer. Right-Click the icon and choose "Format…" from the corresponding menu.

In the "Format Removable Disk" dialog, select "FAT" from the "File system" menu, and then click start. Generally, selecting the "Quick Format" check box expedite the formating process.

FAQ: Can I use two or more of these 3-port Hubs to connect several FW800 devices to my Mac?

Yes you may, but you might be better served using the Unibrain five-port, rather than the Unibrain three port hub. Here's a topology using two three port hubs:

              Hub_1
HOST --- = p1 |
              | p2 = --- DEVICE         Hub_2
              | p3 = ------------  = p1 |
                                        | p2 = --- DEVICE
                                        | p3 = --- DEVICE

This works out of the box for self-powered FireWire devices. Bear in mind that any bus power devices will require an optional power supply. Also, the total device count on a single branch cannot exceed 16, and understand that aggregating multiple devices on a single port does create a potential for over-saturating bus bandwidth if several high-performance (e.g. HDDs) devices are sending data at once. However, for most uses, tiered hubs are fine. Lastly, put your slowest devices on the end of the chain.

Hope this was helpful.