26 May
2021
26 May
'21
11:12 a.m.
Depending on when you need them, VCFMW is coming up in a few months. I
have a number of Osborne 1's as well as a couple of 386 machines set up
with Teledisk (I bought it *years* ago when it became available to
listmembers), imagedisk, and *maybe* Dave Dunfields IMD(?). As VCFMW
gets closer and you still need these floppies read, let me know and I'll
put the machines in with the stash of "junque" to unload :).
I *think* you are on the East coast, and it would surprise me if the
RICM doesn't have working Osbornes.
Marvin
Message: 3
Date: Tue, 25 May 2021 10:37:03 -0700
From: Zane Healy <healyzh at avanthar.com>
To: Fred Cisin <cisin at xenosoft.com>, "General Discussion: On-Topic and
Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
Subject: Re: How to read Osborne 1 Floppies?
Message-ID: <13B8E14A-BCAD-4A5B-B81A-7E6E6F373B6B at avanthar.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
Yes, we need to be able to access the files.
I?m going to see if my old 486 will still boot up, I know I used to use it with imaging
RX50 floppies. I?m not an x86 collector, so have a pretty limited selection of PC
Hardware. I?m on my Sabbatical right now, so this request came in at a good time. Though
first I have to finish up on some VAX and Alpha systems I?m working on, so as to free up
space. That or finish a cleaning project in my office. :-) The cleaning project is needed
to finish the VAX/Alpha projects?
Is there any chances of reading these with Commodore 128 running CP/M, or a Kaypro 2?
The Kaypro is definitely on my ?project list?, it worked last time I played with it. I
*might* have a DEC Rainbow, or I might have given it away. If I do, I have no idea of its
condition. An Apple //e would be another old system with 5.25? drives, but seems more
unlikely. I might still have an old Kaypro PC, though it hasn?t been used since ?94 (and
there is a good chance it went to LCM).
My focus is DEC and Commodore, though I do have a lot of Apple // gear.
Zane
26 May
26 May
11:23 a.m.
On Wed, 26 May 2021, Marvin Johnston via cctalk wrote:
Depending on when you need them, VCFMW is coming up in
a few months. I have a
number of Osborne 1's as well as a couple of 386 machines set up with
Teledisk (I bought it *years* ago when it became available to listmembers),
imagedisk, and *maybe* Dave Dunfields IMD(?). As VCFMW gets closer and you
still need these floppies read, let me know and I'll put the machines in with
the stash of "junque" to unload :).
I *think* you are on the East coast, and it would surprise me if the RICM
doesn't have working Osbornes.
Yes, a working Osborne, with a serial port, XMODEM or equivalent, a null
modem cable, and a working "current" computer with serial port and XMODEM
equivalent should do just fine.
Since the task is to copy the FILES, (NOT image the disks), then Teledisk,
Imagedisk, etc. might be useful as an intermediate step, but will not do
what is needed.
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com
7:01 p.m.
On May 26, 2021, at 11:12 AM, Marvin Johnston <marvin at west.net> wrote:
Depending on when you need them, VCFMW is coming up in
a few months. I have a number of Osborne 1's as well as a couple of 386 machines set
up with Teledisk (I bought it *years* ago when it became available to listmembers),
imagedisk, and *maybe* Dave Dunfields IMD(?). As VCFMW gets closer and you still need
these floppies read, let me know and I'll put the machines in with the stash of
"junque" to unload :).
I *think* you are on the East coast, and it would surprise me if the RICM doesn't
have working Osbornes.
Marvin
Both the person with the floppies, and I are in Oregon.
I remember that Teledisk buy, thanks, you pointed me in the right direction, and I found
backups of my DOS C:\ Drive on my Mac with Teledisk and 22Disk, it looks like they?re both
unlicensed copies though. That group purchase was way in March ?99, I managed to find the
email from Bruce Lane, that was the HARD part, then I had to find the email attachment.
That was easy. If Mail.app would do a better job of searching my email archives, it would
have been easy to find the email itself.
Zane
8:12 p.m.
I don't remember the limitations of the unregistered Teledisk program,
but something in the back of my mind says Dave Dunfields IMD (?) will
translate Teledisk programs.
Something I've found very useful over the years is the Don Maslin
archive (I think also posted on bitsavers.) A quick check shows (at
least the ones I looked at) the Osborne protgrams available in Teledisk
format as:
Name Format Description
OS1BASIC SSSD Osborne 1 Basic disk
OS1DBASE SSSD dBase II program disk
OS1DIAS SSSD Osborne 1 diagnostics disk
OS1MCAL SSSD Osborne 1 communications disk
OS1MDM7 SSSD Osborne 1 Modem 740
OS1SYSS SSSD Osborne 1 system disk
OS1UTLS SSSD Osborne 1 utilities disk
OS1WRDST SSSD Osborne 1 Wordstar disk
OS1XUTLS SSSD Osborne 1 extended utilities
OS1NUEVO SSDD Osborne 1 with DD and 80 col mods
OS1SYSD SSDD Osborne 1 system disk (SSDD upgrade)
OSE-CPMA SSDD Osborne Executive CP/M 3.0 system disk #1
OSE-CPMB SSDD Osborne Executive CP/M 3.0 system disk #2
OSE-CPMC SSDD Osborne Executive CP/M 3.0 system disk #3
OSE-PSYS SSDD UCSD p-System disk for Osborne Executive
OSV-SYS DSDD Osborne Vixen CP/M 2.2 w/ MBasic & Media Master
OSV-WS DSDD Osborne Vixen bootable Wordstar & Supercalc 2
OSV-SC2 DSDD Osborne Vixen bootable w/ Supercalc templates
OS1DBASE ZIP dBase II v2.3 for Osborne 1
On 5/26/2021 7:01 PM, Zane Healy wrote:
On May 26, 2021, at 11:12 AM, Marvin Johnston
<marvin at west.net
<mailto:marvin at west.net>> wrote:
Depending on when you need them, VCFMW is coming
up in a few months. I
have a number of Osborne 1's as well as a couple of 386 machines set
up with Teledisk (I bought it *years* ago when it became available to
listmembers), imagedisk, and *maybe* Dave Dunfields IMD(?). As VCFMW
gets closer and you still need these floppies read, let me know and
I'll put the machines in with the stash of "junque" to unload :).
I *think* you are on the East coast, and it would surprise me if the
RICM doesn't have working Osbornes.
Marvin
Both the person with the floppies, and I are in Oregon.
I remember that Teledisk buy, thanks, you pointed me in the right
direction, and I found backups of my DOS C:\ Drive on my Mac with
Teledisk and 22Disk, it looks like they?re both unlicensed copies
though. ?That group purchase was way in March ?99, I managed to find the
email from Bruce Lane, that was the HARD part, then I had to find the
email attachment. ?That was easy. ?If Mail.app would do a better job of
searching my email archives, it would have been easy to find the email
itself.
Zane
8:49 p.m.
On 5/26/21 8:12 PM, Marvin Johnston via cctalk wrote:
I don't remember the limitations of the unregistered Teledisk program, but something
in the back of my mind says Dave Dunfields IMD (?) will
translate Teledisk programs.
Something I've found very useful over the years is the Don Maslin archive (I think
also posted on bitsavers.) A quick check shows (at least
the ones I looked at) the Osborne protgrams available in Teledisk format as:
Don's files are here in a better organized form
http://www.retroarchive.org/maslin/index.html
11:22 p.m.
On May 26, 2021, at 8:49 PM, Al Kossow via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
On 5/26/21 8:12 PM, Marvin Johnston via cctalk wrote:
I thought Don?s archive had been lost, when was it recovered? After looking through that,
I?ll have to look into my Kaypro 2, once I check out my 486.
Zane
I don't remember the limitations of the
unregistered Teledisk program, but something in the back of my mind says Dave Dunfields
IMD (?) will translate Teledisk programs.
Something I've found very useful over the years is the Don Maslin archive (I think
also posted on bitsavers.) A quick check shows (at least the ones I looked at) the Osborne
protgrams available in Teledisk format as:
Don's files are here in a better organized form
http://www.retroarchive.org/maslin/index.html
27 May
27 May
2:31 a.m.
On 5/26/21 11:22 PM, Zane Healy wrote:
I thought Don?s archive had been lost, when was it
recovered?
Don's daughter donated some of the contents of his storage locker in
2013 to CHM
I read several hundred of his floppies, and his pc hard disk.
https://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102703903
7:57 a.m.
On May 27, 2021, at 2:31 AM, Al Kossow <aek at bitsavers.org> wrote:
On 5/26/21 11:22 PM, Zane Healy wrote:
That?s awesome! The last I heard, it looked like this would likely end up in the trash.
The timing explains why I wasn?t aware of this, as that is about the time that work took
over my life, to the point that even my photography has suffered. For me, Covid-19 has
enabled me to do long overdue maintenance on some of my Classic Computer collection.
Zane
I thought Don?s archive had been lost, when was
it recovered?
Don's daughter donated some of the contents of his storage
locker in 2013 to CHM
I read several hundred of his floppies, and his pc hard disk.
https://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102703903 
8:20 a.m.
We're the viruses identified and cleaned from the archive? I recall a few
disks were infected.
On Thu, May 27, 2021, 9:57 AM Zane Healy via cctalk <cctalk at classiccmp.org>
wrote:
On May 27, 2021, at 2:31 AM, Al Kossow <aek at
bitsavers.org> wrote:
On 5/26/21 11:22 PM, Zane Healy wrote:
2013 to CHM
I thought Don?s archive had been lost, when was
it recovered?
Don's daughter donated some of the contents of his storage locker
in I read several hundred of his floppies, and his
pc hard disk.
https://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102703903
10:40 a.m.
On 5/27/21 9:51 AM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
On 5/27/21 8:20 AM, John Herron wrote:
Viruses? On CP/M-80 disks? When Don and I were exchanging samples, I
was unaware of such stuff.
Someone want to enlighten me on Z80/8080 viruses on CP/M floppies?
(FWIW, I do differentiate "virus" from "malware")
Since I'm in Oregon, I'd be happy to extract the files from your images,
if you can get them to image form. My recollection was that back in
1986, when I wrote 22Disk, O1 floppies were among the first samples I
received (after A1 format, anyway.
--Chuck
We're the viruses identified and cleaned from
the archive?
no 
11:08 a.m.
On Thu, May 27, 2021 at 1:40 PM Chuck Guzis via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
On 5/27/21 9:51 AM, Al Kossow via cctalk wrote:
IIRC there were IBM PC format files in there too, and some of them had
viruses. I scanned the "aadrvark tape backups" archive in 2014 and
found a few. The files were from a C and a D drive created in 1995,
96, 97. I thought the archive was no longer "lost"
BIll
On 5/27/21 8:20 AM, John Herron wrote:
Viruses? On CP/M-80 disks? When Don and I were exchanging samples, I
was unaware of such stuff.
Someone want to enlighten me on Z80/8080 viruses on CP/M floppies?
(FWIW, I do differentiate "virus" from "malware")
We're the viruses identified and cleaned from
the archive?
no
12:21 p.m.
On Thu, 27 May 2021, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote:
Viruses? On CP/M-80 disks? When Don and I were
exchanging samples, I
was unaware of such stuff.
Someone want to enlighten me on Z80/8080 viruses on CP/M floppies?
(FWIW, I do differentiate "virus" from "malware")
There were also some MS-DOS disks, and MS-DSOS files.
There could even have been some viral MS-DOS boot sector images that
wrote to first sector of some non-MS-DOS disks.
And, there were probably also some false hits.
Since I'm in Oregon, I'd be happy to extract
the files from your images,
if you can get them to image form.
And, now you have a perfect solution!
Chuck can do it, better than anybody else.
As I said, Teledisk and Imagedisk won't do the file transfers, but CAN be
an intermediate step, in this case making it possible to get images of the
disks to Chuck for him to do the transfers.
My recollection was that back in
1986, when I wrote 22Disk, O1 floppies were among the first samples I
received (after A1 format, anyway.
In 1981, when the Osborne 1 came out, I got some sample disks from it.
So, other than TRS80s, which I had, those were also the first samples that
I worked with. I manually, a sector at a time, copied some files from
those Osborne 1 disks using Superzap on TRS80. THAT was the preliminary
success that convinced me that it could be done, and gave the the impetus
and confidence to write XenoCopy, in the next few years, after the 5150
came out. (5150 came out August 11, 1981, but it took me 5 months to get
one) BUT, the 5150 couldn't do FM Single Density, so the PC-DOS version
of XenoCopy didn't get an Osborne format until the MFM Double Density
upgrade for the Osborne 1 came out.
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com
1:47 p.m.
On 5/27/21 12:21 PM, Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote:
In 1981, when the Osborne 1 came out, I got some
sample disks from it.
So, other than TRS80s, which I had, those were also the first samples
that I worked with.? I manually, a sector at a time, copied some files
from those Osborne 1 disks using Superzap on TRS80.? THAT was the
preliminary success that convinced me that it could be done, and gave
the the impetus and confidence to write XenoCopy, in the next few years,
after the 5150 came out.? (5150 came out August 11, 1981, but it took me
5 months to get one)?? BUT, the 5150 couldn't do FM Single Density, so
the PC-DOS version of XenoCopy didn't get an Osborne format until the
MFM Double Density upgrade for the Osborne 1 came out.
I'd been cutting floppy controller code since about 1975; the weirdness
of the IBM PC design really made for some head-scratching.
Sometime in the 5150/5160 days, I published instructions on how to
modify a PC floppy controller that used the 765 with a WD926 data
separator. It was quite simple--for some unknown reason, both of the
clock rate select lines were hard-wired. Getting FM support was mostly
a matter of lifting one of those lines and running a jumper to the
MFM/FM output on the 765.
But then IBM and clones did the same sort of thing with the parallel
port adapter. Changing one to bidirectional (and curiously
PS/2-compatible) was mostly a matter of lifting the output enable line
on an IC and tying it an unused bit in the control port.
Sometimes I wonder if IBM did this sort of stuff intentionally.
--Chuck
4:17 p.m.
On Thu, 27 May 2021, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote:
I'd been cutting floppy controller code since
about 1975; the weirdness
of the IBM PC design really made for some head-scratching.
I did some FORTRAN since 1967, but until the TRS80, I couldn't own a
computer, and hardly ever got a chance to touch them, and was strictly
limited on what I was even allowed to do.
So, I never talked to the FDC until about 1980. (when I found Bill
Barden's paper about talking to the TRS80 FDC)
Sometime in the 5150/5160 days, I published
instructions on how to
modify a PC floppy controller that used the 765 with a WD926 data
separator. It was quite simple--for some unknown reason, both of the
clock rate select lines were hard-wired. Getting FM support was mostly
a matter of lifting one of those lines and running a jumper to the
MFM/FM output on the 765.
But then IBM and clones did the same sort of thing
with the parallel
port adapter. Changing one to bidirectional (and curiously
PS/2-compatible) was mostly a matter of lifting the output enable line
on an IC and tying it an unused bit in the control port.
Sometimes I wonder if IBM did this sort of stuff intentionally.
I suspect that it was intentional, but through ignorance.
"Should we have FM?"
"Should we make the printer port bi-directional?"
To which some IBM manager with little or no technical expertise asked,
"Do we NEED to?"
and, assuming that it would cost, rejected the "UNNECESSARY expenditures"
for the extra capabilities.
I modified a PC parallel port, and played around with it. My goal,
XenoComm Parallel, was NOT to use it with software on both machines. I had
run into a few machines that had a Centonics port, but not RS232, and disk
formats that the PC FDC couldn't handle. (such as TRS80 mdel 1, Sirius
9000, Vector Graphics, etc.), I wanted to connect their parallel printer
port to a PC, tell the alien machine to PRINT its word processor files,
and have the PC emulate a printer to the alien machine, but capture and
save what the alien machine "printed".
Unfortunately, I found that many of them had a very narrow, below spec
strobe. I wasn't able to make a tight enough loop on minimal PCs, so I
had to add hardware to extend the pulse. I had hoped that eventually,
people would have the bi-directional ports, and that all that I would have
to supply was software and a simple dumb cable, with appropriate pin
swapping FROM Centronics female to DB25 male, that as a dongle on the PC
would let any Centronics capable computer plug to the PC instead of a
printer.
And, at Comdex, I found it extremely difficult to explain the concept to
people who either had NO need for data from such machines, or refused to
understand that existing PC TO PC parallel port transfer programs used
special software, not just a printer driver, on the sending machine.
Since Laplink, etc. PUT their own software onto the other PC, why couldn't
they use Laplink to PUT the special software onto the Vector Graphic?
So, I concluded that I did not have a market for making the PC emulate a
printer for getting alien machines to PRINT to the PC, for disk formats
that the PC could not handle.
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin at xenosoft.com
4:49 p.m.
On 5/27/21 4:17 PM, Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote:
I modified a PC parallel port, and played around with it. My goal,
XenoComm Parallel, was NOT to use it with software on both machines. I
had run into a few machines that had a Centonics port, but not RS232,
and disk formats that the PC FDC couldn't handle. (such as TRS80 mdel 1,
Sirius 9000, Vector Graphics, etc.), I wanted to connect their parallel
printer port to a PC, tell the alien machine to PRINT its word processor
files, and have the PC emulate a printer to the alien machine, but
capture and save what the alien machine "printed".
From about 1988 to 2000 I marketed a very successful
product to the law
enforcement community. One of the facets of it was the ability
to
transfer data from a subject machine via serial or parallel connection.
We could do either nibble-or-8 bit transfers, but nibble turned out to
be the most used. Lots of error checking and waiting for lines to
settle, but, like laplink and interserver, it could be done quite well
and it was faster than serial.
I seem to recall that the Victor 9000 had a bidirectional parallel
interface that could also double as a GPIB interface. Sometime around
1987, I wrote a parallel port TSR that could drive slow-speed GPIB
devices. I wrote it out of necessity--I needed to make a presentation
that involved color charts and the only plotter I could borrow was the
HP 6-pen plotter with GPIB interface. At the time, I was using
SuperCalc, which supported the parallel version of the plotter, so I
wrote a TSR to hook the INT 17H BIOS interrupt and directed the messages
through a printer port connected as a GPIB interface.
That one worked with the legacy PC printer port. Later, I modified the
port to be bidirectional and used it with an HP GPIB voltmeter.
I know the thing was discussed briefly in Nuts'n'Volts; it may still be
in the SIMTEL20 archive.
Years ago and far away...
--Chuck
1067
days inactive
1068
days old
15 comments
7 participants
participants (7)
-
aek＠bitsavers.org -
barythrin＠gmail.com -
billdegnan＠gmail.com -
cclist＠sydex.com -
cisin＠xenosoft.com -
healyzh＠avanthar.com -
marvin＠west.net