Subject: Recovering data from disks...

From: Jim Donoghue <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed Mar 26 14:19:45 2003

I have several 5 1/4" *hard-sectored* floppy disks. These are in some
proprietary format, they are read by a controller that consists of a Z80
CPU, an EPROM, and some TTL chips. All this thing does is read the
entire contents of the disk, outputting the data in parallel format over
a ribbon cable. This is used to load CPU microcode into static RAMS.
I want to be able to read the data from the disks, as I no longer have
the controller/drive (or the mainframe it came from.)
Any ideas?
-- 
Jim Donoghue
Smithy Co.
(734) 913-6700

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From: Jim Donoghue <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed Mar 26 15:45:48 2003

On Wed, 2003-03-26 at 16:00, Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) wrote:
> 
> Is there a brand name?  (Somebody else might HAVE one)
>

The disks are 'CP4 CPU Microcode' disks for a Wang Laboratories' VS-90
minicomputer system. Their only purpose is to load microcode or
diagnostic routines into the control memory on the CPU board.
 
> Otherwise,the drive is almost certainly not a problem, and you can
> probably use an "industry standard" drive, such as a TM100-2.
> 
> But you will need a controller that can handle hard sectored diskettes.
> 
> Depending on the specs of the format (which you haven't tod us), it MIGHT
> be readable with Northstar hardware, or it MIGHT be readable with Vector
> Graphic hardware, etc.

I don't have, and cannot obtain, the specs of the format. What I do have
is a disassembly of the Z80 code from the EPROM. From what I have read
scanning old newsgroup postings, etc. today, I might be out of luck.
There's a dealer of old Wang equipment in Ohio that has one of these,
but they want a small fortune for it. I may have to abandon the idea of
reading these disks until I can locate hardware from somewhere else, or
the Wang dealer finally decides it's not worth keeping and scraps it
out.

-- 
Jim Donoghue
Smithy Co.
(734) 913-6700

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From: "Fred Cisin (XenoSoft)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu Mar 27 12:41:25 2003

OR, you could build an appropriate controller for a PC.

--
Fred Cisin                      [email-masked]
XenoSoft                        http://www.xenosoft.com