ACB.TYM@OFFICE-2.ARPA (Alan Bomberger) (03/30/85)
[] The multiple disk format problem is mostly one of information. Almost any disk formatter can be made to format for a wide variety of 5 inch formats provided you have the source. The AMPRO MULTIDSK is a fine example. I have expanded it to handle many more disks simply by changing the tables in it. However, finding out the formats of disks is a problem. I wonder if there is a document of the various 5 inch formats available through this list. If not I propose to solicit the information and prepare such a document. I unfortunately expect to lose access to ARPANET within a few weeks, but would be happy to do what I can. Include the following information, I will figure out the best way to present it when I see the information. Name of system and format Size of Physical sectors Number of physical sectors per track Number of the "first" sector (ie 0 or 1 or 16) If two sided or not If two sided the number of the first sector on the second side (some offset them so that the numbers appear continuous) If two sided, whether or not the tracks are treated as cylinders or not (ie up one side and down the other or alternating side to side) The number of reserved tracks The number of CP/M sectors per track (not totally redundant when combined with the above. The QX-10 has 2 reserved tracks but believes that there are 80 sectors per track (both sides) thus reserving much to much ) The allocation size The number of directory allocations If you know all this is is possible to format the disks and to modify the BIOS disk blocks to use the format.
W8SDZ@SIMTEL20.ARPA (Keith Petersen) (03/31/85)
Alan, Bernie Eiben <EIBEN@DEC-MARLBORO> has already compiled a list of 5-1/4" formats. It's available from SIMTEL20 as: Filename Type Bytes CRC Directory MICRO:<CPM.GENDOC> FLOPPY.FMT.3 ASCII 9787 D3B8H Updates, corrections, additions to EIBEN@DEC-MARLBORO, please. Bernie is "keeper of the list". --Keith
ABN.ISCAMS@USC-ISID.ARPA (04/01/85)
Netlandians, A nice fellow did quite a bit of this a while ago - and his work proudly resides at LCG.KERMIT at DEC-MARLBORO. I just downloaded this file (DISK.FMT or something like that) the other day, and it has much of the referenced disk format information. If you'd like (and if someone can recommend a good common storage place) (SIMTEL, you there?), I can move it back up into this net. Regards, David Kirschbaum Toad Hall (ABN.ISCAMS@USC-ISID.ARPA)