Writing 8" floppies with SuperCard Pro

Chuck Guzis cclist at sydex.com
Wed Aug 12 22:08:34 CDT 2015


On 08/12/2015 07:22 PM, Jerome H. Fine wrote:


> One rather interesting aspect was that the DEC code did not
> alternate between side 1 and side 2 as the head advanced.  All of
> side 1 was processed first followed by all of side 2.  As a result,
> when a floppy media with a SS index hole was written on both side 1
> and side 2, a DEC  RX02 drive could still read all of side 1.


That's not unusual, at least in the CP/M world.  A very common ordering 
was all of side 1, then side 2, but in descending track order (i.e, from 
the innermost to the outermost cylinders).  Or side 1, then back to 
cylinder 0 on side 2.  Some started in the middle of the disk (i.e. 
cylinder 37 or so, then writing cylinders 36->0 and then 38->77, 
alternating sides--or not.

Wonderful stuff.

--Chuck


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