formatting a
#Mega65 / #DiskDrive / #floppy / #HD / #data
formatting a
#Mega65 / #DiskDrive / #floppy / #HD / #data
speaking of floppies, anyone got disk 1 and 3?
Disk 2 now uploaded to the Internet Archive:
https://archive.org/details/deutsche_bahn_elektronische_stadteverbindungen_dutschland_1992_93
I also remember backing up onto #floppy disks back in the day, but this has always been rather impractical.
The #IBMPC #XT had a 10MB #HDD and 360kB FDD, so with a 2:1 compression ratio, you'd need 15 disks to back the machine up.
This didn't change much in the early '90s. You had a 1440kB FDD, but you also had a 40MB HDD, so you'd need 14 floppies to back it up.
The introduction of USB HDDs, especially compact bus-powered ones, has *greatly* improved the #backup situation.
Behold, the riveting saga of #booting #BeOS on a #Hitachi FLORA Prius—a task so thrilling it demands a 1999 user manual and a sprinkle of Japanese documentation. Because nothing screams cutting-edge #technology like juggling #floppy #disks and boot managers in the era of #Y2K panic.
http://testou.free.fr/www.beatjapan.org/mirror/www.be.com/support/guides/hitachi_boot.html #Prius #HackerNews #ngated
Flauntin' my wealth
Finally got the whole floppy family: 8", 5.25" and 3.5"
#retro #retrocomputing #floppy
New #blog post: I miss the days of ubiquitous portable data storage
https://rldane.space/i-miss-the-days-of-ubiquitous-portable-data-storage.html
653 words
cc: my wonderful #chorus: @joel @dm @sotolf @thedoctor @pixx @twizzay @orbitalmartian @adamsdesk @krafter @roguefoam @solusspider @clayton
(I will happily add/remove you from the chorus upon request! :)
My first #PC was a 486 machine with two #floppy drives. A: was the little-used 5¼ DSHD drive, and B: was the 3½ HD drive that saw the vast majority of use.
I only learned decades later that this was the opposite of the usual setup, in which A: is the 3½ drive.
I wonder why the builder went with this arrangement?
When I was a kid, I didn't know what the “thump thump thump” sound coming from a #floppy #disk drive was.
It also made a buzzing sound, which I figured was the head moving back and forth, but the thump was a mystery.
I'm still not sure, but I'm guessing it's the stepper motor moving by a single track. Am I right?
I wonder if a sufficiently large #RAID 0 array of #floppy drives could match the throughput of an #SSD, and if so, how many drives it would take.
Let's see…
The Crucial T705 does sequential IO at 13387 MB/s, or 109666304 kbps. A floppy drive can do sequential IO at 250 kbps.
So, an array of 438665 floppy drives should be about the same speed, and would store about 602 GB. Not bad.
Now, how do I connect 438665 floppy drives to one computer?
Just found an "autoprotec" 5.25" #floppy disc - with protections slides to make them writable or write-protect it.
My horribly old #desktop #PC is finally starting to die. Currently running a backup (using #zfs send/recv) to my server of one important local dataset.
Now I started looking for new hardware and to my surprise found a "modern" mainboard with a "real" parallel port (internal header, certainly good enough). This really helps with my retro hobby (#C64), years ago I soldered a simple interface cable that allows using a 1541 floppy on the PC, I even ported the #opencbm driver for that from #Linux to #FreeBSD. Without a parallel port, you'd need some complex USB interface instead including a microcontroller and "tons of shit", while the cable for the parallel port basically consists of a few diodes.
Now I wonder one thing: I'd also love to have a #FDC (#floppy drive controller) again. Is there any modern board coming with THAT as well or should I just forget about it?
A weekend with #8bit computing!
Trying out some new demos and games on the #Mega65 and of course I copy everything that works onto a 3.5" #floppy.
Playing #megachase, a game written in #BASIC65 while listening to Bill Gates memoir "Source Code: My Beginnings".
So #BASIC, #8bitcomputing and #retrocomputing is very much a theme to this saturday!
New video! I'm talking about boot selectors for the #Amiga showing off a DIY method and then trying out the #FireFloppySwap500, which is a super deluxe solution.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/FVRQ-UqaC3Y
PeerTube: https://makertube.net/w/fDDPnJfTC6uuPxMekEhNzK
#Wargames - My favorite #movie of all time. With the #Mega65 version for the Wargames simulator I can be David Lightman myself.
https://files.mega65.org/html/main.php?id=4baa92ff-94d2-4751-8f5d-1f1932b161bc
Copied it onto a 3.5" #floppy to run on the mega. It's simulating David's #IMSAI8080 and #CPM with dialers and everything!
It's a game to be played on an #8bit machine for sure!
Any UK folk have a need of these? I have no means to test them.
#retrocomputing #c64 #bbc #floppydisk #floppy
UPDATE: Thanks for all the tips, they are going to some good homes now.
Just saw this beautiful teardown of a 3.5" floppy drive with beautiful shots by Richi's Lab (CC-BY-NC): https://www.richis-lab.de/floppy.htm #retrocomputing #floppy