Hey guys,
Sorry it took me so long to reply to a thread I started! Haha,
I've been really busy lately.
Anyway, here's my issue. I have quite a few 800k (and a few 400k)
original disks for commercial software items. I collect vintage Mac
and PC (Win 3.1) software, I buy a lot from people here actually, so I
am always getting these disks in. Now I'm sure some of them really do
not work, due to age, magnetic exposure, etc. but we all know that
every single 800k disk I have (over 100) is not bad. So, all the disks
I'm talking about are the original disks for this commercial software.
A good example of an 800k I am having trouble with now is Symantec
Suitcase. I always make DiskCopy images of all the disks of software
that I get, first thing. Since it's all vintage software, a good
portion of it is on 800k disks. I have several Macs and PowerMacs, all
of which are in pristine condition. I keep all my vintage stuff really
clean, including internal components, such a disk drives. I have had
this issue for a really long time, I've tried every machine I have,
and none will read 800k disks, except one! My PowerBook 520c will read
just about any disk I throw at it, including SimAnt I mentioned
earlier. So for most of my disks, I create the images using my trusty
520c (internal drive), then put them on my external HD.
Now I am almost positive that I have read somewhere that this is a
common issue, but maybe I'm just dreaming. I am not talking about
making 800k disks HD and vise versa and so-forth. I know about all
that. I've been using Macs for many, many years. But to be honest, I
can't remember if "back in the day" I had this issue. I think that, on
the rare occasion I used a floppy (due to reliability issues), it
would have been HD anyway.
What you guys are saying makes complete sense. The drives should /
could / would need to read 800k disks, but none of my machines will.
When you insert the disk, it says Initialize floppy. All these
machines read 1.44Mb floppies fine. By the way, the drive in my newest
and primary vintage Mac is a 2.88 Sony. The machine is a PM 7100/80. I
think this may be an aftermarket drive?
So do you think I should just get a new Mac floppy drive? Try and
clean it better? Or just forget it?
This is really frustrating because it really doesn't make sense. I've
seen computers do some crazy things, but I can always fix it,
understand it once I investigate. But this one, it boggles my mind.
Thanks for your help everyone!
- gonzo
On Feb 11, 9:43 am, Matthew Wheeler <[email protected]> wrote:
> Ah, yes. Of course. I was thinking of a manually operated switch
> during my synnaptical connection lapse. :)
>
> I never had cause to make the 1.4 MB disk look like an 800 K, so it
> escaped my reason. Awesomely useful pictures, BTW.
>
> Mw
>
> On Feb 11, 2009, at 1:36 AM, Matthew S. Carpenter wrote:
>
>
>
> > ....The switch is in the drive.. at the front, inside the drive
> > slot....
> > little buttons.
>
> > At the top of an HD disk there are two holes.... the write protect
> > hole
> > which when opened enables write protection, and the High Density hole,
> > which is there to tell the drive that the disk is HD...
>
> > The HD switch in the floppy drive will be pressed down if this hole is
> > not present, telling the drive that the floppy is a DD floppy. If the
> > hole is present, the switch button will just go through the hole and
> > not
> > be pressed, telling the drive that it is an HD floppy
>
> > <http://dl.uncw.edu/digilib/chemistry/computer%20applications/hardware...
>
> > -Matthew S. Carpenter
> > "Yarg!"
>
> > Matthew Wheeler wrote:
> >> Is this switch on the drive or the disk? I'll be embarrassed if I've
> >> never seen one of these.
>
> >> Mw
>
> >> On Wed, Feb 11, 2009 at 12:53 AM, Bob C. <[email protected]
> >> <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>
> >> The original 800K Apple diskette drives had one switch to detect
> >> whether the
> >> disk-lock window was open or closed.
>
> >> The 1.4MB FDHD or "SuperDrives" had two switches, one for the
> >> disk-lock-detect, and one to detect HD diskettes (the "extra
> >> hole"). In
> >> fact, the presence of the two little switches at the front of the
> >> drive is
> >> the easiest way to determine if it's a 1.4MB drive.
>
> >> ----- Original Message -----
> >> From: "Matthew Wheeler" <[email protected]
> >> <mailto:[email protected]>>
> >> To: <[email protected]
> >> <mailto:[email protected]>>
> >> Sent: Tuesday, February 10, 2009 11:18 PM
> >> Subject: Re: 800k 3.5" disk drive for PowerMac 7100
>
> >>> The switch that was mentioned earlier was not an HD switch, but
> >> a disk
> >> lock.
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