10 Jun
2004
10 Jun
'04
6:45 a.m.
Ok, now you have to promise not to laugh too hard.
Does anyone know if it's possible to make a USB Floppy Disk Drive.
Oh, ...... I mean a 320k/360k 5.25" USB floppy disk drive.
[hey, you promised .....]
I occasionally need to transfer things between my PC and an old S-100
system, or a Z-100. The Z-100 has 5.25" disks, but not 3.5".
So .....
I actually wondered if one could buy a USB 3.5" floppy and use the
"controller card" with a 5.25" drive, since the interface is nominally the
same. However, these mostly use notebook drives, and while they may have
the same electrical interface, the physical interface is a flex cable.
Worse, some of the USB 3.5" drives may "integrate" the USB controller and
drive mechanism so that there is no standard floppy interface at all.
There may also be software issues.
Anyway, it seems like a question to post to this group, and in a few other
places.
[Next I will want a USB 8" drive ..... which, actually, with the right
software, would not be a bad idea !!]
10 Jun
10 Jun
8:49 a.m.
New subject: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
At 02:45 PM 6/10/2004, you wrote:
Ok, now you have to promise not to laugh too hard.
Does anyone know if it's possible to make a USB Floppy Disk Drive.
Oh, ...... I mean a 320k/360k 5.25" USB floppy disk drive.
I have been asking that question for a long time. I would love to
have the USB Connected 5-1/4" drive that would really work
and be able to read both high and low density disks from the past.
I would be willing to pay $150 for it.
9:02 a.m.
New subject: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
On Thu, 2004-06-10 at 20:49, Gene Ehrich wrote:
At 02:45 PM 6/10/2004, you wrote:
One thing I'd like is an inexpensive PC device to talk to a floppy drive
directly and then be able to do all the necessary processing in
software.
Not sure if such as a PC parallel port is fast enough to cope with the
data rate of a floppy drive and leave enough time for the CPU to do the
processing though... but that'd be nice; little more than a cable and a
bit of glue logic hooked up to a parallel port that could be quickly
swapped between machines.
cheers
Jules
Ok, now you have to promise not to laugh too
hard.
Does anyone know if it's possible to make a USB Floppy Disk Drive.
Oh, ...... I mean a 320k/360k 5.25" USB floppy disk drive.
I have been asking that question for a long time. I would love to
have the USB Connected 5-1/4" drive that would really work
and be able to read both high and low density disks from the past.
I would be willing to pay $150 for it. 
9:23 a.m.
New subject: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
Every external drive type I've seen up to now has had unintegrated
electronics, that is, it can be separated into a stock internal
drive with PSU and comms add-ons. (100%)
It's a pretty good bet (but<100%) that a random USB 3.5" will
be the same.
John A.
like the subject line says: do it.
9:55 a.m.
New subject: Parallel drive (was: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
On Thu, 10 Jun 2004, Jules Richardson wrote:
Not sure if such as a PC parallel port is fast enough
to cope with the
data rate of a floppy drive and leave enough time for the CPU to do the
processing though... but that'd be nice; little more than a cable and a
bit of glue logic hooked up to a parallel port that could be quickly
swapped between machines.
MicroSolutions (DeKalb IL) in their "BackPack" line, made parallel port
floppy drives. I have a 2.8M 3.5" from them, but they also made a lot of
other models.
10:06 a.m.
New subject: Parallel drive (was: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
On Thu, 2004-06-10 at 21:55, Fred Cisin wrote:
On Thu, 10 Jun 2004, Jules Richardson wrote:
Good point. I don't know how much work is done in the interface for
those though - quite possibly a microcontroller + some buffer memory. I
also remember taking one of their parallel CDROM units apart a few years
ago and they'd put black gloop on everything so that reverse engineering
was impossible - shame, as I never did get it working with Linux on an
old laptop and might have done so if I knew what it was doing...
I'm not sure what sort of data rate can be shifted through a parallel
port on a reasonably modern PC, so I don't know if it's even possible to
do the whole lot in software. Would be nice though.
cheers
Jules
Not sure if such as a PC parallel port is fast
enough to cope with the
data rate of a floppy drive and leave enough time for the CPU to do the
processing though... but that'd be nice; little more than a cable and a
bit of glue logic hooked up to a parallel port that could be quickly
swapped between machines.
MicroSolutions (DeKalb IL) in their "BackPack" line, made parallel port
floppy drives. I have a 2.8M 3.5" from them, but they also made a lot of
other models. 
11 Jun
11 Jun
6:56 a.m.
New subject: Parallel drive (was: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
I've been looking into this for some time. The parallel port lacks the
"through-put" to take the data on and off the floppy as serial data (as it
comes off the drive "raw") but if you added some hardware (like a Western
Digital FD controller) it will separate the data and convert it to
"parallel" data which the parallel port can support. The inverse is also
true (parallel data back to serial to fed the drive). The FDC can handle the
Single density issue. Processing power of the computer is not an issue
unless you have a painfully slow machine. I wish I had more time to work on
this project. Anyone have the Kilobaud article were someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
Best regards, Steven
----- Original Message -----
From: "Fred Cisin" <cisin(a)xenosoft.com>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Thursday, June 10, 2004 2:55 PM
Subject: Parallel drive (was: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
On Thu, 10 Jun 2004, Jules Richardson wrote:
Not sure if such as a PC parallel port is fast
enough to cope with the
data rate of a floppy drive and leave enough time for the CPU to do the
processing though... but that'd be nice; little more than a cable and a
bit of glue logic hooked up to a parallel port that could be quickly
swapped between machines.
MicroSolutions (DeKalb IL) in their "BackPack" line, made parallel port
floppy drives. I have a 2.8M 3.5" from them, but they also made a lot of
other models.
12 Jun
12 Jun
8:14 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone
connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue citation, I can make a copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
13 Jun
13 Jun
9:29 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Paul,
The reference came from an old Google search for "cctech" and floppy
interfaces which pointed to a posting by a "Mike" with an address like:
dogas(a)bellsouth.net I tried sending an Email but got no response.
Best regards, Steven
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Pennington" <paulpenn(a)knology.net>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Saturday, June 12, 2004 1:14 PM
Subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue citation, I can make a copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
14 Jun
14 Jun
8:40 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Dogas is Mike Haas who lives in Brunswick, Ga. He's a member of this list.
That is a good E-mail address for him.
Joe
At 02:29 PM 6/13/04 -0700, you wrote:
Paul,
The reference came from an old Google search for "cctech" and floppy
interfaces which pointed to a posting by a "Mike" with an address like:
dogas(a)bellsouth.net I tried sending an Email but got no response.
Best regards, Steven
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Pennington" <paulpenn(a)knology.net>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Saturday, June 12, 2004 1:14 PM
Subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue citation, I can make a copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
15 Jun
15 Jun
6:18 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Thanks Joe. I'll try sending another email request to him.
Best regards, Steven
Dogas is Mike Haas who lives in Brunswick, Ga. He's a member of this list.
That is a good E-mail address for him.
Joe
At 02:29 PM 6/13/04 -0700, you wrote:
Paul,
The reference came from an old Google search for "cctech" and floppy
interfaces which pointed to a posting by a "Mike" with an address like:
dogas(a)bellsouth.net I tried sending an Email but got no response.
Best regards, Steven
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Pennington" <paulpenn(a)knology.net>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Saturday, June 12, 2004 1:14 PM
Subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue citation, I can make a copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
6:52 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Let me know if you can't get him and I'll call him and tell to go check
his E-mail!
Joe
At 11:18 AM 6/15/04 -0700, you wrote:
Thanks Joe. I'll try sending another email request to him.
Best regards, Steven
Dogas is Mike Haas who lives in Brunswick, Ga. He's a member of this list.
That is a good E-mail address for him.
Joe
At 02:29 PM 6/13/04 -0700, you wrote:
Paul,
The reference came from an old Google search for "cctech" and floppy
interfaces which pointed to a posting by a "Mike" with an address like:
dogas(a)bellsouth.net I tried sending an Email but got no response.
Best regards, Steven
----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Pennington" <paulpenn(a)knology.net>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic Posts Only" <cctech(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Saturday, June 12, 2004 1:14 PM
Subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue citation, I can make a copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
7 Jul
7 Jul
12:41 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Hi Steven, Paul, Joe...
Sorry for the black-out. The Kilobaud issue that I was thinking of was
from Sept/79 with the article "Best of Both
Worlds." Although, I was
mistaken recalling a floppy interface when actually
the dude had interfaced
an Econoram and a Digital Group's video boards to the trainer....
;)
- Mike: dogas(a)bellsouth.net
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the
contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue
citation, I can make a
copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
4:04 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Mike,
Thanks for the update on the article. Guess I'll have to design one myself.
We are happy to hear from you. We were starting to worry that something
might have happened to you. Welcome back.
Best regards, Steven
Hi Steven, Paul, Joe...
Sorry for the black-out. The Kilobaud issue that I was thinking of was
from Sept/79 with the article "Best of Both
Worlds." Although, I was
mistaken recalling a floppy interface when actually
the dude had interfaced
an Econoram and a Digital Group's video boards to the trainer....
;)
- Mike: dogas(a)bellsouth.net
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the
contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue
citation, I can make a
copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
12:41 p.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Hi Steve,
Thanks for the update on the article. Guess I'll have to design one
myself.
I've had that project on the Begin Pile for awhile now too. I think I'll
try to go through a CoCo FD501 pac or DCB4E EXORcard here, but I'd like to
hear about your design and progress too. Run FLEX on it!!! ;)
We are happy to hear from you. We were starting to
worry that something
might have happened to you. Welcome back.
Alive and kicking (stubbing toes.) Thanks.
;)
- Mike: dogas(a)bellsouth.net
9 Jul
9 Jul
3:22 a.m.
New subject: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Mike;
Thanks for posting the reference to the Kilobaud article. I found it in
my set, but it does not seem to be useful now. The author uses a PIA for a
parallel keyboard input. Most people now will probably use a serial port to
whatever PC happens to be sitting on their desk. The output of the PIA was
a parallel connection to a video card, as well as a bit-banger serial
connection to a cassette interface. Memory expansion was a 16K S-100 card
(woo-hoo).
This is so much easier today. A 64K x 8 memory in one chip is available
for a few dollars. I plan on using an ACIA for the serial connection, and
adapting one of the many programs to connect to a PC. Once there, any of
the resources available on the PC can support the ET-3400 (files, printer,
perhaps internet?).
I can provide a hard copy by mail if anybody wants it, but again, it's
not useful.
Later,
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mike" <dogas(a)bellsouth.net>
To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts"
<cctalk(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Wednesday, July 07, 2004 8:41 AM
Subject: Re: ET-3400 Floppy Drive
Hi Steven, Paul, Joe...
Sorry for the black-out. The Kilobaud issue that I was thinking of was
from Sept/79 with the article "Best of Both Worlds." Although, I was
mistaken recalling a floppy interface when actually the dude had
interfaced
an Econoram and a Digital Group's video boards to
the trainer....
;)
- Mike: dogas(a)bellsouth.net
Steven wrote:
Anyone have the Kilobaud article where someone connected a FDD
to a Heathkit ET-3400 ?
I just looked through my end of year indexes for my
Kilobaud/Microcomputing magazines, but I didn't see this article (or any
ET-3400 articles, for that matter). Sometimes the titles hide the
contents
pretty well. If you can come up with an issue
citation, I can make a
copy
of the article.
Paul Pennington
Augusta, Georgia
10 Jun
10 Jun
5:24 p.m.
New subject: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
-SNip-
One thing I'd like is an inexpensive PC device to
talk to a floppy drive
directly and then be able to do all the necessary processing in
software.
-End Snip-
not the cheapest thing out there, but a catweasel does that pretty well...
10:30 p.m.
New subject: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
On Fri, 2004-06-11 at 05:24, Geoff Reed wrote:
-SNip-
sure, but as I'm broke it'd be nice to build something out of bits I
have lying around :-) The thing being external would be nice too, and
swappable between machines easily. Plus I gather there's still an
element of coding involved to get the Catweasel to actually do anything
useful.
Having said all that, I need to sit down and see if this is at all
possible. It's quite likely that the data rate through the port just
won't be high enough without external buffering - borne out by the fact
that I've never heard of anyone else doing this!
Plus I'm not sure how the raw data stream is clocked (rather, I have the
info here, I just can't remember without going to look it up). If the
floppy drive just starts spewing out raw data on a read but the clock is
handled at the host side then I might have problems there...
cheers
Jules
One thing I'd like is an inexpensive PC device
to talk to a floppy drive
directly and then be able to do all the necessary processing in
software.
-End Snip-
not the cheapest thing out there, but a catweasel does that pretty well...
11:06 p.m.
New subject: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
On Fri, 2004-06-11 at 10:30, Jules Richardson wrote:
On Fri, 2004-06-11 at 05:24, Geoff Reed wrote:
> -SNip-
>
> >One thing I'd like is an inexpensive PC device to talk to a floppy drive
> >directly and then be able to do all the necessary processing in
> >software.
> -End Snip-
rats, looks like the port just isn't fast enough (and the speed
limitation is related to ISA bus hang-ups, not the speed of modern
machines):
http://tinyurl.com/2d5gn
I suppose the only thing to do would be to stuff an entire track into a
large external buffer, then read it into the PC via the parallel port at
a slower speed for actual processing. (Presumably what the Backpack
drive does)
More effort than I can actually be bothered with at the moment :-)
cheers
Jules
11 Jun
11 Jun
11:01 a.m.
New subject: USB 5.25" floppy drive - do it
Plus I'm not sure how the raw data stream is
clocked (rather, I have the
info here, I just can't remember without going to look it up). If the
floppy drive just starts spewing out raw data on a read but the clock is
handled at the host side then I might have problems there...
That's exactly what happens. Well, some 8" drives have single-density
data separators built-in (this is the circuit which decodes the raw
bitstream from the head amplifier into clock and data pulses), but don't
bet on it, and don't expect it to work for double-density (MFM) data. And
I've never seen a 5.25" or 3.5" drive with a data separator built it.
I suppose what you really want is the equivalent of a the Catweasel (a
device which records the raw data stream from the read amplifier and lets
software figure out what it means) with enough buffer memory to hold 1
track of data, and an Unusable Serial Botch interface..
-tony
7238
days inactive
7267
days old
19 comments
11 participants
participants (11)
-
allain＠panix.com -
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
cannings＠earthlink.net -
cisin＠xenosoft.com -
dogas＠bellsouth.net -
gehrich＠tampabay.rr.com -
geoffr＠zipcon.net -
julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk -
paulpenn＠knology.net -
rigdonj＠cfl.rr.com -
Watzman＠neo.rr.com