"Dave Baggett" <dmb(a)itasoftware.com> wrote:
However, the vast majority of the disks I have (circa
1979)
are HDOS disks. I would like to be able to read these
disks and use the software (e.g., Walt Bilofsky's C
compiler), but I can't get any of my bootable HDOS
disks to boot. Would anyone be willing to make me a
bootable HDOS disk and mail it to me? If so, I would greatly
appreciate it. Let me know by email (dmb(a)ai.mit.edu) if you
would be willing to volunteer. :)
Hi Dave
Before anyone can help you, you need to find out if the
drive is soft or hard sectored. The soft sectored disk can
be read on many of the PC controllers but the hard sectored
can't. To write on a soft sectored disk, you'll need one
of the older 360K drives because the track width is too
small on the 1.2M. You can tell if it has soft sectored disk
by rotating the floppy in the jacket. Soft sectored will
have only one hole in the media per revolution. Hard
sectored will have 11 holes. Compare the HDOS disk to the
CPM disk and make sure they are the same. If the machine
has a soft sectored controller, you may need to find a
hard sectored controller to read the files.
Dwight