Re: reading ancient floppy formats

[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

 





On Mon, Sep 21, 2009 at 5:32 AM, Allan Swanepoel <allanice001@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:


On Sun, Sep 20, 2009 at 10:55 PM, D. Hugh Redelmeier <hugh@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
| From: Allan Swanepoel <allanice001@xxxxxxxxx>

| On Sun, Sep 20, 2009 at 8:34 PM, Jonathan Ryshpan <jonrysh@xxxxxxxxxxx>wrote:
|
| > On Sun, 2009-09-20 at 10:09 -0400, D. Hugh Redelmeier wrote:

| > > Why was the command dropped?  Would it no longer work?  Is there
| > > another way provided to accomplish the same thing?
| > >
| > > I think SuSE dropped the command too.  Debian and Ubuntu have it in the
| > > fdutils package.
| >
| > I would download the fdutils package from http://fdutils.linux.lu , try
| > to compile and install them, and (if that works) then see what happens.

Jonathan:

Sure, but there must have been a reason for it being dropped.  I also
suspect that when RedHat supported it, they patched it (I haven't
checked).

| technically, if the physical device is in your bios, you should see a
| /dev/floppy device .you should be able to mount this, or just dd it to a
| file
| dd if=/dev/floppy of=img1.img

Allan:

See fd(4).  If you use /dev/fd1, the driver tries to autoconfigure the
interface.  But I doubt that it can do so for oddball things like quad
density and 10 sectors/track.  fd(4) doesn't talk about quad density
but setfdprm(8) does.

I'm trying Fedora Core 3 on the box.  dding from /dev/fd1 gets a lot
of errors.  Here are the first few (from dmesg):
   end_request: I/O error, dev fd1, sector 18
   Buffer I/O error on device fd1, logical block 2
   end_request: I/O error, dev fd1, sector 24
   Buffer I/O error on device fd1, logical block 3
   end_request: I/O error, dev fd1, sector 32
   Buffer I/O error on device fd1, logical block 4
   end_request: I/O error, dev fd1, sector 40
   Buffer I/O error on device fd1, logical block 5

I don't quite know what those mean.  Is sector 18 in logical block 2?
That would seem odd.  Note that these errors are in dmesg and so are
from the kernel, not dd.

I tried a more modest dd:
       dd if=/dev/fd1 of=1 bs=512 count=1
The dd printed the in and out count and yet the drive continued to
make seeking noises (and perhaps recalibrating noises) afterwards for
a couple of seconds.  Odd.  There were no error messages.

The whole block is 0.  I don't know if that is expected (I don't
remember how the machine that wrote it laid down a 7th edition file
system on a floppy).  The machine was a Nabu 1600, not a PC clone (it
predates PC clones).


btw, if at first you don,t succeed, ask google
http://minnie.tuhs.org/UnixTree/V7/
 

firstly, it could be that the floppies are stuffed. These are among the first magnetic disks I know of. Any electronic interference could make these go haywire. How close are they to your cellphone? 
secondly, there could be a blown circuit on the controller board. this is capable of giving bad reads, as is a damaged cable.
and lastly, WTF are you doing with a machine that belongs in a museum next to the the freaking ark???


--



--
We live in an age when pizza gets to your home before the police.
 - Jeff Marder
------------------------------------------
Allan Swanepoel
allanice001@xxxxxxxxx
allanice.001@xxxxxxxx
dragonmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
+27 71 850 5554
Linux User #452990
Linux Machine #360914
-----------------------------------------------
IMPORTANT: This email is intended for the use of  the  individual addressee(s)  named  above  and  may  contain information that is confidential,  privileged  or  unsuitable  for  overly  sensitive persons  with  low  self-esteem, no sense of humour or irrational religious beliefs. If you are not  the  intended  recipient,  any dissemination,  distribution  or copying  of  this  email is not authorised (either explicitly or implicitly) and  constitutes  an irritating  social  faux  pas. Unless the word absquatulation has been used in its correct context somewhere  other  than  in  this warning, it does not have any legal or grammatical use and may be ignored. No animals were  harmed  in  the  transmission  of  this email,  although  the  yorkshire  terrier  next door is living on borrowed time, let me tell you. Those of you with an overwhelming fear  of  the unknown will be gratified to learn that there is no hidden message revealed by reading  this  warning  backwards,  so just ignore that Alert Notice from Microsoft: However, by pouring a complete circle of salt around yourself and your  computer  you can  ensure  that  no harm befalls you and your pets.



--
We live in an age when pizza gets to your home before the police.
 - Jeff Marder
------------------------------------------
Allan Swanepoel
allanice001@xxxxxxxxx
allanice.001@xxxxxxxx
dragonmaster@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
+27 71 850 5554
Linux User #452990
Linux Machine #360914
-----------------------------------------------
IMPORTANT: This email is intended for the use of  the  individual addressee(s)  named  above  and  may  contain information that is confidential,  privileged  or  unsuitable  for  overly  sensitive persons  with  low  self-esteem, no sense of humour or irrational religious beliefs. If you are not  the  intended  recipient,  any dissemination,  distribution  or copying  of  this  email is not authorised (either explicitly or implicitly) and  constitutes  an irritating  social  faux  pas. Unless the word absquatulation has been used in its correct context somewhere  other  than  in  this warning, it does not have any legal or grammatical use and may be ignored. No animals were  harmed  in  the  transmission  of  this email,  although  the  yorkshire  terrier  next door is living on borrowed time, let me tell you. Those of you with an overwhelming fear  of  the unknown will be gratified to learn that there is no hidden message revealed by reading  this  warning  backwards,  so just ignore that Alert Notice from Microsoft: However, by pouring a complete circle of salt around yourself and your  computer  you can  ensure  that  no harm befalls you and your pets.
-- 
fedora-list mailing list
fedora-list@xxxxxxxxxx
To unsubscribe: https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-list
Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Communicate/MailingListGuidelines

[Index of Archives]     [Current Fedora Users]     [Fedora Desktop]     [Fedora SELinux]     [Yosemite News]     [Yosemite Photos]     [KDE Users]     [Fedora Tools]     [Fedora Docs]

  Powered by Linux