5.25" Floppy drives wanted

[lizardb0y]

swing by here as well since you'll be nearby, grab the HcX back for Matt.

Hooah! That's win all the way

[SpidersWeb]

If you can pick it up from Johnsonville, I have a Pentium with Windows 98 - networking + 1.2Mb HD + 1.44Mb HD + CD you're welcome to borrow.

Thanks for the offer. That would be fantastic - I'll have to open out up to connect thee KryoFlux, bit pocket than that I have no need to disassemble. I want to image about 20 floppies, at around 10 minutes each. If any are flippies I'll have to wait until I have a drive I can hardware modify a drive to read them, but I can do side 1 to start with.

I can come around over the weekend some time - I'll PM contact details when I'm no longer dribbling with a phone browser.

All good It has USB as well (two ports even!). I'll connect it up tonight and run a 1.2Mb disk through it.
Doing diags ROM this weekend for the 5150 provided I get my 5151 back today (95% sure I will). So might be worth bringing by your board or I can just lend you the ROM if I'm finished with it - have the adaptor. Eliminates or confirms RAM or ROM issues. WIll post up tonight how much success I have with it.

[lizardb0y]

[snip]
So long as the heads are prevented from waving freely and banging into each other during transit the drive should travel fine.

You would think people familiar with using this tech 'back in the day' would remember this ;o) Perhaps I should start making some to sell on to Trade Me sellers.

Yes, good advice, and not forgotten

I have had a quick nosey through my boxes, and can only turn up two HD floppy drives having got rid of the surplus several years back. Neither match the models listed. Is it something particular to the device that it is programmed to only work with specific drives?

I'd like to try out any HD drives that are available to check if they're compatible.

The drives I listed are ones known to work correctly with the KryoFlux, but other models may work just as well. The KryoFlux works by reading the magnetic flux directly from the disk rather than reading data off it, and some drives just don't seem to work as well as others. Ideally we want a drive that can read beyond the standard 80 tracks as well so allow for duplication of some copy protected formats that use these extended tracks. I compiled the list from this thread on the KryoFlux support forums:

http://forum.kryoflux.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=4

[recycled]

The KryoFlux works by reading the magnetic flux directly from the disk rather than reading data off it

Yes, I skipped over to one of their advertising pages and saw this too. I wonder what these guys have been smoking as the detail in their pictures, (http://kryoflux.com/kf_features.jpg) allows us to identify that the column of chips next to the drive socket are buffer chips (http://datasheetcatalog.com/datasheets_ ... T244.shtml ) which would be used to isolate the drive signals from the USB go-between chip. Such protection used to be all the rage for Acorn Archimedes owners wanting to add a 5 1/4" drive to their systems (http://acorn.chriswhy.co.uk/32bit_Upgra ... 525IF.html). This goes nowhere near magnetic flux which we would assume is being measured exclusively at the drive head. Again, any disc drive (possibly even 40track as it would only be an issue for the driver software) should be good to go. That marketing mumbo jumbo is great copy, but floppy drives get signals from your computer via the cable to do things, then read the disc surface magnetic phase changes and convert them into electrical signals that go back down the cable to the computer. This card is just the interface from floppy signal to USB signal. I expect the real voodo is in the driver software. Nice of them to drum up some sales for these dead drive manufacturers though - perhaps they have a few for sale on e_bay!

[lizardb0y]

OK, to be more accurate, it reads changes is flux as read by the drive, it does not measure the flux. You are correct - it is completely digital. The "USB go-between chip" is an Atmel ARM7 microcontroller which does all the heavy lifting of driving the FDD and doing the high resolution sampling.

The reason they have taken this approach is to allow it make format independent images of a floppy disk in a manner that will make true copies including all copy protection that may be present. The logical analysis of the raw dump is done in software to create logical images from the raw sample data.

The KryoFlux was designed for use with high density drives, but I have tested it with a 40 track double density drive unsuccessfully. Although I was able to partially image a known-good MFM encoded DOS formatted DD floppy, it was unable to reconstruct all sectors reliably.

Regardless of the necessity of taking this approach, there are very few products which are able to do this type of format independent imaging, so I'm quite happy with the price paid for the KryoFlux. The Archive Team have a small page on their wiki which identifies the other products capable of performing a similar job if you're interested:

http://archiveteam.org/index.php?title= ... oppy_Disks

[cjr]

swing by here as well since you'll be nearby, grab the HcX back for Matt.

sorry, all I've come up with is a Chinon FZ-502 in an A2000 that I'm looking at fixing for a friend. It's 360K though, not 1.2M.

However, I also found some 1989 bits & bytes, and some old AT disk controllers, an 8 bit vga card, a colorado jumbo tape drive, and other bits and pieces if you want them..

Oh, and manuals for Microprose Gunship, and Silent Service.

[lizardb0y]

swing by here as well since you'll be nearby, grab the HcX back for Matt.

sorry, all I've come up with is a Chinon FZ-502 in an A2000 that I'm looking at fixing for a friend. It's 360K though, not 1.2M.

I've located a 1.2MB drive, which I've been testing today. It keeps throwing errors, but appears to have successfully imaged a DSDD floppy into a readable image.

However, I also found some 1989 bits & bytes,

If one of them is February 1989 them I'm very interested!

and some old AT disk controllers, an 8 bit vga card, a colorado jumbo tape drive, and other bits and pieces if you want them..

Oh, and manuals for Microprose Gunship, and Silent Service.

Heh - not for me.

[SpidersWeb]

I'll gladly take any PC left overs! 8 bit VGA would go great in my 286XT.
If you don't want them and lizard goes to your place first that is.

*makes cute face*

[recycled]

<lots of great stuff clipped>

;o) OK, I got a bite, now I'll have a bite too.

Right, I've got it now. Right there on the front page - at the top no less,

precisely sampling the magnetic flux transition timing

is sufficient information to describe what is really going on, and probably why the search for specific floppy drives is so important. Along with being the bus arbitrator, the processor is measuring the transition period for the (M)FM encoding on the floppy, essentially the expected time between bits. Simple as that. This would require a drive with very accurate motor speed control. The data can be recovered from expected phase changes (or unexpected) if the 'transition time' is met. I was mis-understaning, thought they were reading the strength of the signal directly from the cookie - which would be completly wiped out by the buffer chips.

Reading through the development logs on http://www.softpres.org is educational, helped a lot. It's fun too. One comment that HD is not an option becuase the processor they have chosen is too slow, and not because they are programming it all in C for portability!
I've also read there that it should not matter about using 40 or 80 track drives, so long as the correct density floppies are used.

[lizardb0y]

I've located a Teac FD-55GFR, cleaned the dust out of it and successfully used it to create a working image of an Apple II floppy - Sail Around Australia with Peter Blake & Apple. I couldn't find this on Asimov, and Google comes up blank, so it's possible this is the only image available

http://www.vintage8bit.com/content/sail ... lake-apple

[cjr]

I found a box full of floppies, probably apple ][ 'ish vintage, yours if you want them..

[WelshWizard]

http://www.trademe.co.nz/computers/vint ... 967244.htm
Just come up on Trademe

I'm getting my KryoFlux up and running to start archiving old floppies, and find that I don't seem to have a compatible 5.25" drive to go with it.

Currently looking for any of the the following 5.25" drives which are noted as being compatible. Once up and running I'll be in a position to create disk images from most 3", 3.5" and 5.25" formats, and in future I may be able to add 8" to this list.

Epson, SD-600
Fujitsu M2553K-83B
Matsushita, JU-475-3EAF
MATSUSHITA, DDF5-27C
Mitsubishi, M4853-342M (DD only)
NEC, FD1157C
Newtronics (Mitsumi), D509, V2, 1989
Newtronics (Mitsumi), D509, V3, 1989
Panasonic, JU-475-4AK0
Panasonic JU-475-3B35
Tandon, TM75-8
Teac, FD-55GFR
Toshiba ND-0801GR
Panasonic JU-475-4AK0
Panasonic (Matsushita), JU-475-2 BGM
Y-E Data YD-380B

[lizardb0y]

http://www.trademe.co.nz/computers/vintage/auction-462967244.htm
Just come up on Trademe

Thanks. Looks like I'll have competition for them unfortunately. I'm hoping to get a spare drive that I can try the "flippy" modification on:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcqluH7dEj4

[SpidersWeb]

Yeah sorry
Want them for my 5170 project, just ordered a mainboard + VGA from the US, case and power supply in two weeks.

[lizardb0y]

Ah well, still looking.