Subject: 8-inch disk drives

From: "Jo Cooley" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Jul 17 14:09:11 2003

Hi,

I'm new to the list and am currently trying to find a solution to
transfering data/software from 8-inch disks to a pc. 

We have a working minc-II with two floppy drives.  The  console is gone
but I currently have an old 386 hooked up to act as a terminal. 

What would be the best way to transfer the info from the old disks to the
'newer' pc? 

One suggestion was to get an old 8-inch floppy drive and hook it directly
to the pc, but it seems to me that would involve possible building a
hardware interface and writing driver software.

Any suggestions or pointers to web pages would be very welcome, I've
already spent a few hours searching the web without finding a solution.

Thanks!
Jo

--

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---

From: Fred Cisin <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Jul 21 13:47:08 2003

> What would be the best way to transfer the info from the old disks to the

You've already GOT it.  Tell the minc to display the file on the console.
Tell the 386 to save it to disk.  For non-text files, write a utility ON
THE MINC to take each byte, and display the numerical value of the byte.
Write the reverse for the PC.

> hardware interface and writing driver software.

DONE.
the 1.2M controller in the PC will operate MOST (those wishing to list
obscure exceptions,...) 8" "industry standard" drives, probably including
ones borrowed from the minc.

But,...
ARE YOU WILLING TO WRITE a complete file system handler to read and parse
the directory structure an fetch the individual sectors of the files?

--
Fred Cisin                      [email-masked]
XenoSoft                        http://www.xenosoft.com
PO Box 1236                     (510) 558-9366
Berkeley, CA 94701-1236

---

From: Ethan Dicks <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Jul 21 15:41:37 2003

--- Fred Cisin <[email-masked]> wrote:
> > We have a working minc-II with two floppy drives...
> > One suggestion was to get an old 8-inch floppy drive and hook it
> > directly to the pc...

> ones borrowed from the minc.

Umm... Fred, what you may not know is that a MINC-11 comes with an RX02
floppy drive - definitely not "industry standard" (unless your industry
is DEC ;-)

Personally, I'd go with the ASCII console as the easiest path.

-ethan

---

From: Fred Cisin <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon Jul 21 16:05:20 2003

> floppy drive - definitely not "industry standard" (unless your industry

You are right, I did NOT know that the Minc used RX02.  That was why I had
said "probably".

But I was mostly responding to the "all I have to do is get a drive
connected", and trying to get across the concept that connecting the drive
was trivial, and that it was NOT a matter of a simple device driver, but
writing a file system handler.

> Personally, I'd go with the ASCII console as the easiest path.

I completely agree, particularly since he already has that connected and
working.

---

From: Fred Cisin <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue Jul 22 19:12:53 2003

On Mon, 21 Jul 2003, Nico de Jong wrote:

> From: "Fred Cisin" <[email-masked]>
> To: <[email-masked]>
> Sent: Thursday, July 17, 2003 6:39 PM
> Subject: [Spam][95.7%] Re: 8-inch disk drives

I RESPONDED.
Please be careful with attribution.

> That depends on if you want to tinker yourself or want someone to do it.

It didnb't sound like the original poster had the requisite understanding
to be able to write a file system handler.

> I have used a MicroSolutions floppy controller for a project, where I had to be able to read each and every sector (128 bytes up to 1024 bytes) from an 8" disk (SSSD to DSDD).
> It was suggested, that you could use PC controllers for 1.2 meg disks for the job, but this is not the case, as they will only recognize 512 byte sectors and only DOS file systems.

The MicrosSolutions Floppy controller (Compaticard) IS an 8bit ISA PC 1.2M
controller.
THE ONLY difference is SOFTWARE!
The Microsolutions floppy controller (Compaticard) is my favorite, but it
is nothing magical.   It ALSO will "only recognize  512 byte sectors and
only DOS file systems".  What is needed is SOFTWARE!   And "Uniform" (the
software package from MicroSolutions) does NOT do Minc.
(Nor does Xenocopy - but he already has a working serial connection up and
running!)

> You can do a Google search on "media conversion", which gives many hits.
I've been there, done that, supported more formats than anybody else.
> You could also take a look at www.farumdata.dk/enindex.htm if you want to explore the possibilities i can offer in our servicebureau.
> Who many disks are we talking about ?
A service bureau, such as yours, would certainly be the best option if he
can't figure out how to do it with his existing serial connection.

---

From: "Nico de Jong" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue Jul 22 19:35:46 2003

Nico

---

From: "Nico de Jong" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed Jul 23 19:52:32 2003

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Fred Cisin" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Cc: <[email-masked]>

> It ALSO will "only recognize  512 byte sectors and
> only DOS file systems".
--
This is definitely not true. 
I've read and written IBM 3740 SSSD disks, and read DSDD (1024 bytes)
 And "Uniform" (the
> software package from MicroSolutions) does NOT do Minc.
---
Correct. It is mostly CP/M AFAIR

Nico

---

From: "Nico de Jong" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed Jul 23 20:00:58 2003

Subject: Re: 8-inch disk drives

> ones borrowed from the minc.

Being rather new (3-4 days) to this list, I dont know if what I am going to say now, has been discussed before. If so, please forgive me.

There seems to be a lot of discussions regarding handling old / odd floppy disk formats. What Fred said above is a truth with severe limitations. It is my experience, that modern floppy controllers, and _especially_ those embedded on motherboards, will not read anything other then 3.5" disks (720K, 1.44M and 2.88M) and 5.25" (360K, 1.2M).
The older formats, like 5.25" 320K, not to speak of 160K are not supported, or should I say are not supported on the systems I've delivered for the last 8-10 years.
Please note that I only take MS-DOs formats in consideration. Anything other, like CP/M or 8" disks, is totally out.

There was a mention of MicroSolutions UniForm software. The software (at least the version I had) was able to read (some) CP/M formats by doing nasty things to the parameters in the floppy controller. When I tried it again some years ago, it was a total flop, probably because of the limitations as described above.

So, what is the solution if you have some disks which are non-MS-DOS or MS-DOS with strange capacities? The first thing that comes to mind, is to get an old ISA card with floppy controller. There are many "super I/O" controllers to be found which support hard disk (maybe even up to 500 megs! ) floppies, printer and 2 COM ports. Those cards can normally be strapped, so only the floppy part is active. When you _then_ try with UniForm, you might succeed.

The second thing you could do, is to save an old 386 from the scrapheap just for this purpose. Or maybe even a museum piece: the IBM AT. In other words : the older the better.

Nico

---

From: Fred Cisin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat Jul 26 20:34:41 2003

> I've read and written IBM 3740 SSSD disks, and read DSDD (1024 bytes)
THAT is why it was in quotes.  Because it was a SOFTWARE problem, being
presented as a hardware one. Neither the MicroSolutions, nor generic PC
floppy controllers can do anything special without special software, and
neither are limited to "512 bytes and only DOS file systems" except as an
issue of software.

> Correct. It is mostly CP/M AFAIR

The MicroSolutions floppy controller (Compaticard) is a very nice one, but
it won't help with Minc any more than a generic controller.

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat Jul 26 20:36:20 2003

> There seems to be a lot of discussions regarding handling old / odd 
> floppy disk formats. What Fred said above is a truth with severe 
> limitations. It is my experience, that modern floppy controllers, and 
> _especially_ those embedded on motherboards, will 
> not read anything other then 3.5" disks (720K, 1.44M and 2.88M) and 
> 5.25" (360K, 1.2M).
>
> The older formats, like 5.25" 320K, not to speak of 160K are not 

I am wonderign how on earth you can make a disk controller (note, not the 
OS driver software, the physocal controller) that works correctly with a 
9-sector-per-track format, but fails with the 8 sector-per-track version, 
all other parameters being the same. Because that's the only difference 
between the 320K and 360K MS-DOS formats.

Similarly, I can't understand how you can make a controller that works 
correcty with a DS disk but fails with the SS version.

> supported, or should I say are not supported on the systems I've 
> delivered for the last 8-10 years.
> Please note that I only take MS-DOs formats in consideration. Anything 
> other, like CP/M or 8" disks, is totally out. 

Err, considering that the 8" drive and the 1.2M 5.25" drive are very 
similar at the hardware interface level, it would be difficult to make a 
contorller that worked with one but which fails with the other.

And some CP/M formats are pnysically almost identical to the standard 
320K MS-DOS format. Hardware that can read one can also read the other.

> 
> There was a mention of MicroSolutions UniForm software. The software 
> (at least the version I had) was able to read (some) CP/M formats by 
> doing nasty things to the parameters in the floppy controller. When I 
> tried it again some years ago, it was a total flop, probably because of 
> the limitations as described above. 

The main problem is that many PC disk controllers (going back to the 
original IBM card in the PC and PC/XT -- check the schematics) can't 
handle single density (FM) recording correctly. 

> scrapheap just for this purpose. Or maybe even a museum piece: the IBM 
> AT. In other words : the older the better. 

I happen to be typing this on a much-hacked PC/AT (orignal IBM, original 
motherboard with my own hardware mods, etc). Still works fine, and I have 
no intention of downgrading to a more modern machine.

-tony

---

From: Fred Cisin <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat Jul 26 20:38:01 2003

On Wed, 23 Jul 2003, Nico de Jong wrote:
> _especially_ those embedded on motherboards, will not read anything
> other then 3.5" disks (720K, 1.44M and 2.88M) and 5.25" (360K, 1.2M).
> delivered for the last 8-10 years. Please note that I only take MS-DOs
> formats in consideration. Anything other, like CP/M or 8" disks, is
> totally out.

IF your hardware supports 360K, then your HARDWARE supports 320K and 160K.
Any other problems you had were with your software.
With proper cabling and jumpering of the drive, the controller doesn't
know the difference between a 1.2M 5.25" and an 8" DSDD drive.  (That is
what the 5.25" 1.2M was originally INTENDED for!)

> There was a mention of MicroSolutions UniForm software. The software (at
> least the version I had) was able to read (some) CP/M formats by doing
> nasty things to the parameters in the floppy controller. When I tried it
hardly "nasty".  They were fully documented settings to the table pointed
at by INT 1Eh.  Fun stuff.

> again some years ago, it was a total flop, probably because of the
> limitations as described above.

WHAT limitations?????

Are you having hardware problems, or software problems?

> So, what is the solution if you have some disks which are non-MS-DOS or
> MS-DOS with strange capacities? The first thing that comes to mind, is
> to get an old ISA card with floppy controller. There are many "super
> I/O" controllers to be found which support hard disk (maybe even up to
> 500 megs! ) floppies, printer and 2 COM ports. Those cards can normally
> be strapped, so only the floppy part is active. When you _then_ try with
> UniForm, you might succeed.

Be aware, that NT (including Win2K and XP) will try very hard to keep you
from doing direct sector access.  Other that THAT, neither the hardware
nor OS (DOS,Win9x,ME) will interfere with Uniform, XenioCopy,
MediaMaster, etc.

> The second thing you could do, is to save an old 386 from the scrapheap
> just for this purpose. Or maybe even a museum piece: the IBM AT. In
> other words : the older the better.

YES!  But if it is lower density, such as 5.25" 360K, 720K, go with an XT.

Your overall chances of success are much better with the older equipment,
and using DOS instead of some of the new crap.

---

From: "Andy Holt" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat Jul 26 21:02:45 2003

Tony wrote
> I am wondering how on earth you can make a disk controller (note, not the
> OS driver software, the physical controller) that works correctly with a

Only if you were to make an "intelligent"* controller that was designed to
work as a sort of co-processor with less interaction with the main system.
> correcty with a DS disk but fails with the SS version.
as above.

However, the FDCs on even the most recent PC motherboards are fully
compatible (well almost, they may be slightly extended) with the original
Intel chip ... as can be shown by running older software on those
motherboards.

* whether this is or is not more "intelligent" from the end-users' PoV
depends entirely on whether said end-user needs the flexibility of a
main-cpu-controlled preipheral. There seem to be few complaints about such
high-level interfaces in (for example) Ethernat cards.

Andy

---

From: [email-masked] (Fritz Chwolka)
Date: Sat Jul 26 21:07:43 2003

>it won't help with Minc any more than a generic controller.

That's right and therefore I have some questions.

I took a look onto a MINC on a german webside and see that the minc is
an interesting part.

1. Dos the minc us rt-11 as his os?

2. How is the data orgnized on the disk ?

3. Is the MINC disk readable onto another dec pdp-11 or similiar ? If
yes isn't it better to try this first?

Greetings from 
Fritz Chwolka

<collecting old computers just for fun>
> www.alterechner.de <

---

From: [email-masked] (Tony Duell)
Date: Sat Jul 26 22:03:39 2003

> work as a sort of co-processor with less interaction with the main system.

OK... I'll bet that no normal PC motherboard uses such a controller, 
though...

I have found PC disk controllers that can't handle 360K disks. When used 
in 1.2M (360rpm drives), such disks have an effective 300kbps data rate, 
which the (broken-as-designed) controller didn't handle. I complained 
about this, only to be told that 'nobody uses 360K disks any more'. 
Hmmm... It claimed to be 'IBM compatible', and the IBM controller 
certainly handles 360K disks...

-tony

---

From: Luis Gómez <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed Jul 30 21:33:47 2003

I have a Einstein 256 without monitor. In this computer PSU is integrated into the monitor.

Somebody know pinout connections for power and video?

Regards.