23 Nov
2012
23 Nov
'12
5:40 p.m.
Chris Elmquist wrote:
I do have some DC100A that are not DEC labeled. They
are just Scotch
(3M) brand and have a hand written "DEC" paper label stuck to them.
This suggests to me that someone had a method for formatting them.
Other labeling on the tapes suggests VAX 4500 (?) may have been
involved so I wonder if it was possible to format raw DC100A on some
flavors of VAX?
It is remotely possible that there's an undocumented "format" command in
the protocol. However, I've heard multiple people claim that special
firmware was required.
As far as I can tell, the TU58 drive hardware should be perfectly
capable of formatting a tape, unlike e.g. disk drives that use embedded
servo.