18215MES@MSU.BITNET (12/13/89)
A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, and IT WORKED! I know this is probably not advisable, but is this the same trick they played on us with the 400 k disks - some of which worked fine formatted to 800k? (also risky I guess) Has Anyone else tried this? (those DS/HD are still pretty expensive)
6600pete@hub.UUCP (12/14/89)
From article <16918215MES@MSU>, by 18215MES@MSU.BITNET: > A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole > in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, > and IT WORKED! I know this is probably not advisable, but > is this the same trick they played on us with the 400 k disks - > some of which worked fine formatted to 800k? (also risky I guess) > Has Anyone else tried this? (those DS/HD are still pretty expensive) Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with this company. You can order a product for $39.95 that will do this for you. It's called DoubleDisk, and it is made by Biological Engineering Inc., who can be reached at 800-537-4226 (Colorado: 303-872-8945, fax: 805-644-1814). Apparently, the thing is very sturdy and dependable, as it is made of all steel, is good for 10K disks, has a replaceable punch, and is guaranteed to convert any DD 3.5" disk to HD (send them any floppy that fails and they'll send you an HD floppy) and is backed by an unconditional (yep, that's the word they used) money-back guarantee. (It's not really unconditional, because you have to send the unit back, but I think what they mean to emphasize is that you can send it back at any time and they won't question you. I wonder if this means you can wait till HD floppies are obsolete and THEN send it back... :-) ). Anyway, I plan to order one as soon as a defunct company decides to put its finances in order and pay me. (My Visa got cancelled this morning! Waaah!) Then I can back up my hard drive, which hasn't gotten that treatment since March, and has lived through at least two brownouts that I know of... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pete Gontier | InterNet: 6600pete@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu, BitNet: 6600pete@ucsbuxa Editor, Macker | Online Macintosh Programming Journal; mail for subscription Hire this kid | Mac, DOS, C, Pascal, asm, excellent communication skills
ar4@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Piper Keairnes) (12/14/89)
In article <16918215MES@MSU> you write: >A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole >in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, >and IT WORKED! I know this is probably not advisable, but >is this the same trick they played on us with the 400 k disks - >some of which worked fine formatted to 800k? (also risky I guess) >Has Anyone else tried this? (those DS/HD are still pretty expensive) I know a few people that REGULARLY format 800k disks to HD format. They don't drill the hole, they use a soldering iron. This decreases the amount of loose material floating around inside the disk. Anyways, here are the results: 5-15% failure rate for 800k -> HD 1% failure rate for color 800k -> HD The people using the 800k disks buy them from MEI Micro and have found that the disks that won't format to 1.4 meg will also not format at any other level. That is, if the disk is good to begin with, it will work at all formats. Now, I have bought about 100 disks from MEI Micro and have not had one failure. Must be my clean environment or maybe they had drive problems to begin with. Anyways, any way you go about it, the 400 -> 1.4meg is the cheapest way to go. Takes a little time to "burn" the holes in but it all for a good cause... For all the cheap people in the world, MEI Micro can be reached at: 1-800-634-3478 COLUMBUS, OHIO 3.5" DS/DD disks in quantities of 25 at 49 cents each 50 disks with shipping and 100 labels (my last order) costs $31.50 no failures yet!!! :------------------------------------------------------------------------------: | Piper Keairnes | ar4@mentor.cc.purdue.edu | General Consultant | | (317) 495-4273 | |Purdue University Computing Center| :------------------------------------------------------------------------------:
schabtac@porter.uucp (Adam Schabtach) (12/14/89)
In article <5912@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> ar4@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Piper Keairnes) writes: >In article <16918215MES@MSU> you write: >>A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole >>in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, >>and IT WORKED! I know this is probably not advisable, but >> [ . . . ] > > I know a few people that REGULARLY format 800k disks to HD format. They >don't drill the hole, they use a soldering iron. This decreases the amount >of loose material floating around inside the disk. [ . . . ] This reminds me of the good ol' days of the Apple ][ (remember it? no mouse, no windows, upper-case only display, but hey, it had slots and color :-), when we would make 5.25" floppies into "flippies" by punching a notch on the edge opposite the write-protect notch, creating a double-sided floppy. 'Course you had to flip them over by hand; hence the name. But back to the topic at hand: I knew a guy who went one step further, and put a switch on the front of his disk drive that allowed him to defeat the microswitch inside that "felt" the write-protect notch. That way, he didn't have to punch notches in his disk -- he'd just flip the switch, and the drive would merrily write onto a write-protected disk, or onto the back of an upside-down disk. Well, now, things are different, but a notch is a notch, and I see no reason why one couldn't perform a similar modification on a newfangled 3.5" drive. It might be more aesthetically pleasing to put the switch on the inside of the case somewhere, rather than drilling the front of your Mac II chassis. Naturally it would void your warranty, but 90 days goes by pretty quickly... No, I haven't tried it, but I might, once Santa brings me my new machine. --Adam * * * KILL YOUR TELEVISION * * * schabtac@stout.ucar.edu
pff@beach.cis.ufl.edu (Pablo Fernicola) (12/14/89)
In article <5912@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> ar4@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Piper Keairnes) writes: >In article <16918215MES@MSU> you write: > > I know a few people that REGULARLY format 800k disks to HD format. They > > IS YOUR DATA WORTH THE RISK? From what I know, using a single/double sided disk as a High density increases the changes of the disk going bad later (specially if you drill holes, Auch! pieces of plastic can fall on the disk drive or inside the disk). -- pff@beach.cis.ufl.edu - Pablo Fernicola - Machine Intelligence Laboratory - UF IF YOU CARE ENOUGH TO READ SIGNATURES ... I am graduating next year and I am looking for a job. MS/BS EE, my graduate work incorporates OO-DBMS/Graphics/Robotics/AI
CXT105@PSUVM.BITNET (Christopher Tate) (12/14/89)
In article <16918215MES@MSU>, <18215MES@MSU.BITNET> says: >A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole >in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, >and IT WORKED! I know this is probably not advisable, but >is this the same trick they played on us with the 400 k disks - >some of which worked fine formatted to 800k? (also risky I guess) >Has Anyone else tried this? (those DS/HD are still pretty expensive) Sure, this will work, but dollars to doughnuts says that you'll get a lot more than your share of disk crashes on the modified disks. The medium on the 800K disks simply isn't designed to maintain that high a density of magnetic polarity changes. I've heard that once double-sided disks became commonplace, the single-sided disks were just the ones that didn't pass factory inspection on one side. I wonder if the same principle applies (or will someday apply) to 800K disks as compared with 1.4M disks.... On the other hand, probably not, since the 1.4M medium is presumably harder to manufacture, and therefore more expensive. ------- Christopher Tate | "Oh wow: not only is 57 | prime, but it's also Bitnet: cxt105@psuvm | divisible by three!" Uucp: ...!psuvax1!psuvm.bitnet!cxt105 | Internet: cxt105@psuvm.psu.edu | - a very sincere math major
6600pete@hub.UUCP (12/14/89)
From article <5678@ncar.ucar.edu>, by schabtac@porter.uucp (Adam Schabtach): > I knew a guy who went one step further, and put a switch on the front of his > disk drive that allowed him to defeat the microswitch inside that "felt" > the write-protect notch. > ...perform a similar modification on a newfangled 3.5" drive. I believe the FDHD HD notch is read by a beam of light. So messing with it might be an order of magnitude more difficult. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pete Gontier | InterNet: 6600pete@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu, BitNet: 6600pete@ucsbuxa Editor, Macker | Online Macintosh Programming Journal; mail for subscription Hire this kid | Mac, DOS, C, Pascal, asm, excellent communication skills
dane@denali.stanford.edu (Dane Spearing) (12/14/89)
In article <16918215MES@MSU> 18215MES@MSU.BITNET writes: >A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole >in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, >and IT WORKED! . . . . . >Has Anyone else tried this? (those DS/HD are still pretty expensive) Yes, I have tried this, and it does indeed work. In fact, you can now buy "disk punchers" that poke nice square holes for you to accomplish the task. The only problem is that the (normally) 800K disks aren't inspected or made to handle the high density of data of a 1.44 Mb floppy. Hence, I've experienced roughly a 20% failure rate of disks treated in this manner. The simply won't initialize. I've never lost any data on those that did initialize though. Sort of a "use at your own risk" thing. Dane Spearing dane@denali.stanford.edu
russotto@eng.umd.edu (Matthew T. Russotto) (12/14/89)
In article <5678@ncar.ucar.edu> schabtac@porter.UCAR.EDU (Adam Schabtach) writes: > >But back to the topic at hand: I knew a guy who went one step further, and >put a switch on the front of his disk drive that allowed him to defeat the >microswitch inside that "felt" the write-protect notch. That way, he didn't >have to punch notches in his disk -- he'd just flip the switch, and the >drive would merrily write onto a write-protected disk, or onto the back of >an upside-down disk. Yup, I did the same thing, works quite well. > >Well, now, things are different, but a notch is a notch, and I see no reason >why one couldn't perform a similar modification on a newfangled 3.5" drive. >It might be more aesthetically pleasing to put the switch on the inside of >the case somewhere, rather than drilling the front of your Mac II chassis. The soldering job would be MUCH more delicate-- those Disk ][s had lots of space inside, plus fairly big connections. The switches for 800K (and presumably 1600K) drives are mounted directly on the PC board. > -- Matthew T. Russotto russotto@eng.umd.edu russotto@wam.umd.edu ][, ][+, ///, ///+, //e, //c, IIGS, //c+ --- Any questions?
russotto@eng.umd.edu (Matthew T. Russotto) (12/14/89)
In article <3308@hub.UUCP> 6600pete@hub.UUCP writes: >From article <5678@ncar.ucar.edu>, by schabtac@porter.uucp (Adam Schabtach): >> I knew a guy who went one step further, and put a switch on the front of his >> disk drive that allowed him to defeat the microswitch inside that "felt" >> the write-protect notch. >> ...perform a similar modification on a newfangled 3.5" drive. > >I believe the FDHD HD notch is read by a beam of light. So messing with it No, that doesn't make a difference-- assuming a photoresistor is used,all that would be required is a SPDT switch that connected a fixed size resistor instead of the receptor end of the photoresistor. For the microswitch, all that was required was to short it out entirely, -- Matthew T. Russotto russotto@eng.umd.edu russotto@wam.umd.edu ][, ][+, ///, ///+, //e, //c, IIGS, //c+ --- Any questions?
jrg@Apple.COM (John R. Galloway Jr.) (12/14/89)
In article <5912@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> ar4@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Piper Keairnes) writes: >In article <16918215MES@MSU> you write: >>A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole >>in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, >>and IT WORKED! I know this is probably not advisable, but .....[text deleted] > I know a few people that REGULARLY format 800k disks to HD format. They >don't drill the hole, they use a soldering iron. This decreases the amount >of loose material floating around inside the disk. > In the Decemeber 1989 issue of IEEE Computer magazine, on page 90 (in the product reviews section) there is a little article on a device specifically designed to punch a little square hole in DS/DD floppies to make them into HD floppies. The device is called the "DoubleDisk Converter", and sells for $39.95 from Biological engineering at 2674 E. Main St. Ventura, CA 93003 . Their phone number is (805) 644-1797. Quoting from the article, quoting from the manufacturer "There's a greater variation between different manufacturers' specifications for high density disks than ther is between a manufacturer's double density and high density 3.5 inch disks". Draw your own conclusions, I'm sure I don't buy enough floppies to warant hasseling with it either way, let alone buying this item but, if you were a real floppy-ite it might warant some investigation. -jrg -- apple!jrg John R. Galloway, Jr. contract programmer, San Jose, Ca These are my views, NOT Apple's, I am a GUEST here, not an employee!!
rcbaab@eutrc3.urc.tue.nl (Annard "Icon" Brouwer) (12/14/89)
Using a DS/DD disk as medium for DS/HD might save money but not your data. Due to different magnetic media, your disk may loose its data sooner (or if your lucky, later) than you think. At our computing centre we advise people (for their own ease of mind) to use floppies for the media they are created for, that is to say format DS/DD till ~1Mb and DS/HD till ~2Mb. Good luck! Annard. -- | Annard Brouwer Bitnet : rcgbbaab@heitue51 | Dreef 74 UUCP : rcbaab@eutrc3.urc.tue.nl | NL-5504 LD Veldhoven packet-radio : pe1koo@pi8mid | The Netherlands [44.137.28.6]
hammen@jolnet.ORPK.IL.US (Robert J. Hammen) (12/14/89)
Drilling holes into a DS disk to "fool" the SuperDrive into thinking it's a HD disk is a very risky procedure. The disk may appear to work for a while, but will eventually fail. The media for the HD disks is different than for other disks (particularly, its coercivity). It is also not a good idea to format a HD disk as a DS disk - and you should NEVER reformat that disk as a HD disk (or so the story goes). Robert Hammen | Technical Editor | Personal Publishing | hammen@ddsw1.mcs.com
sukes@eng.umd.edu (Tasuki Hirata) (12/15/89)
In article <3308@hub.UUCP> 6600pete@hub.UUCP writes: >From article <5678@ncar.ucar.edu>, by schabtac@porter.uucp (Adam Schabtach): >> I knew a guy who went one step further, and put a switch on the front of his >> disk drive that allowed him to defeat the microswitch inside that "felt" >> the write-protect notch. >> ...perform a similar modification on a newfangled 3.5" drive. > >I believe the FDHD HD notch is read by a beam of light. So messing with it >might be an order of magnitude more difficult. The FDHD does not detect the HD notch with a beam of light. It detects the notch by a mechanical switch. FYI: The write protect and disk presence is also done with a mechanical switch. -- / Tasuki Hirata (sukes@eng.umd.edu) | Intel 80386: / / UUCP: uunet!eng.umd.edu!sukes | Power Tool for the Power Fool /
tempest@wet.UUCP (Ken Lui) (12/15/89)
In article <89347.194237CXT105@PSUVM.BITNET> CXT105@PSUVM.BITNET (Christopher Tate) writes: >In article <16918215MES@MSU>, <18215MES@MSU.BITNET> says: > >>A student friend of mine said that a buddy of his drilled a hole >>in his DS/DD 3.5" floppy to convert it to a High Density disk, >>and IT WORKED! I know this is probably not advisable, but ... > >Sure, this will work, but dollars to doughnuts says that you'll get a lot >more than your share of disk crashes on the modified disks. The medium on >the 800K disks simply isn't designed to maintain that high a density of >magnetic polarity changes. ... Christopher is absolutely correct. I asked this question to a tech at work and he said that in order to store the extra information onto 1.44MByte diskettes, the disks rotate slower than a normal drive and higher fluxes are applied to the magnetic media. The double-density diskettes just won't be able to retain a higher charge for an extended length of time. This is the main reason why it seems to work at first, then some time down the road, the data may become irretrievable. Different magnetic materials exist in double-density and high-density disks. Ken -- _____________________________________________________________________________ Kenneth K.F. Lui | UUCP: ...{ucsfcca|claris}!wet!tempest tempest@wet.UUCP | Internet: cca.ucsf.edu!wet!tempest@cgl.ucsf.edu | -or- claris!wet!tempest@ames.arc.nasa.gov
art@loral.UUCP (Earthman Arthur Donavan) (12/15/89)
For what it is worth; I have read a magazine article concerning holes in disks to make them HD disks. The standard media has a magnetic coating of about 600 oersteds, and the HD media has a 700 oersted coating. Maybe there is some magnetic engineer out there in netland that can shed some light on the difference, and if the difference is great enough to worry about lost data. (Bits changing states, etc.) Sincerely; Arthur Donavan These comments are my own opinions, and in no way reflect opinions or policies held by Loral Instrumentation, or Loral Corporation, and/or its subsidiaries.
t-jacobs@cs.utah.edu (Tony Jacobs) (12/16/89)
In article <2427@loral.UUCP> art@loral.UUCP (Earthman Arthur Donavan) writes: >For what it is worth; > >I have read a magazine article concerning holes in disks to make them HD >disks. The standard media has a magnetic coating of about 600 oersteds, >and the HD media has a 700 oersted coating. > >Maybe there is some magnetic engineer out there in netland that can shed >some light on the difference, and if the difference is great enough to >worry about lost data. (Bits changing states, etc.) > My BS in ME & MS in EE roomate says if gauss is analogous to current then oersteds is analogous to voltage. He doesn't think that the oersted count should have any effect on how long it holds onto the field. It might mean it takes a little more to magnitize it and that it has a little stronger field once magnified. One question I'd like to know is if the High Density drives have more tracks, more bits per track or both. Tony Jacobs * Center for Engineering Design * U of U * t-jacobs@cs.utah.edu
lim@iris.ucdavis.edu (Lloyd Lim) (12/19/89)
If you are still thinking of punching holes in your DS/DD or even SS/DD and
you don't believe all the warnings posted here, then you'd better read this.
I've had a Mac Plus forever (it seems) and a Mac IIcx for almost as long as
it's been out. I've acquired a fair sized library of software which I store
on floppies (~150 disks). To save bucks back then when floppies were
expensive, I used single-sideds formatted as doubles.
When I got my IIcx, I experienced a very high rate of failure. I would lose
about one or two disks a week. I've since switched to real double-sideds
and have had no problem (using them as double-sideds). When I reformatted
all of the singles, I found that the FDHD rejected about 10-20% of them
while the 800K drives didn't care at all. Doesn't this indicate an actual
difference in the drives?
If you do go ahead and punch holes, be prepared to lose floppies at a greater
rate. The FDHD drives seem very sensitive. I've even lost a lot of high
density disks in the FDHD. At this point, I avoid using high density disks
and stick to the more reliable DS/DD.
+++
Lloyd Lim Internet: lim@iris.ucdavis.edu (128.120.57.20)
Compuserve: 72647,660
US Mail: 146 Lysle Leach Hall, U.C. Davis, Davis, CA 95616goldis@umaxc.weeg.uiowa.edu (Al Goldis,19 LC,335-5487,) (12/20/89)
I've been following this thread with a great deal of interest. People
keep adding their stories, some saying they've punched holes in DD
disks and it works, and other saying things to the effect of "you'll
be sorry".
The thing that's interesting is that so far, despite several notes of
caution, no one has said they've actually experienced a greater
occurence of data loss from DD-to-HD converted disks. Sounds like the
disks either work ok or they don't even format. It's been my
impression that HD disks tend to be much less reliable than DDs anyway
(someone please correct me if I'm wrong).
Unless someone can provide evidence to the contrary, my conclusions:
1) HD disks (whether purchased as HD or converted from DD) are less
reliable that DD.
2) DD-to-HD converted disks are not significantly worse than disks
purchased as HD (evidence?).
3) If I'm going to use (less reliable) HD disks, I might as well use
the less expensive DD with holes punched in them to make them HD.
Comments?
--
Al Goldis
Weeg Computing Center, The University of Iowa
Internet: goldis@umaxc.weeg.uiowa.edu BITNET: goldists@uiamvswilkins@jarthur.Claremont.EDU (Mark Wilkins) (12/20/89)
If it is so dangerous to do this hole punching, why is it that at least one of the several HD drives shipped with the IBM PS/2 series DO NOT CHECK FOR THE HOLE AT ALL AND ASSUME 1.4 MB FORMATTING? Needless to say, it greatly dismayed me when my IIci with Apple File Exchange offered to initialize my 1.4 Mb IBM floppies at 720K because they had no hole in them. Is is possible that Apple is being paid off by the disk manufacturers? -- Mark Wilkins wilkins@jarthur.claremont.edu
mnkonar@gorby.SRC.Honeywell.COM (Murat N. Konar) (12/20/89)
In article <3662@jarthur.Claremont.EDU> wilkins@jarthur.UUCP (Mark Wilkins) writes: > > If it is so dangerous to do this hole punching, why is it that at least >one of the several HD drives shipped with the IBM PS/2 series DO NOT CHECK >FOR THE HOLE AT ALL AND ASSUME 1.4 MB FORMATTING? IBM has their collective heads up their collective butts maybe? Sorry. All the flames and stuff getting thrown around in c.s.m over PC vs. Mac got me excited. ____________________________________________________________________ Have a day. :^| Murat N. Konar Honeywell Systems & Research Center, Camden, MN mnkonar@SRC.honeywell.com (internet) {umn-cs,ems,bthpyd}!srcsip!mnkonar(UUCP)
gillies@p.cs.uiuc.edu (12/21/89)
To those people who use DSDD disks as HD disks. Maybe you don't worry about losing a disk or two to data "evaporation", over a period of time (evaporation is not a big problem if you are rewriting the disks regularly through backups). Statistically, your chance of losing a small piece of time-critical work is low. But what if your HD floppy drive fails? Will a new floppy be able to read ANY of your counterfeited HD disks? The experience of lim@iris.ucdavis.edu suggests the answer might be *NO*. Imagine losing *all* your floppy disks at once. Have you considered this possibility?
brianw@microsoft.UUCP (Brian WILLOUGHBY) (12/22/89)
ar4@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Piper Keairnes) writes: >The people using the 800k disks buy them from MEI Micro and have found that >the disks that won't format to 1.4 meg will also not format at any other level. >That is, if the disk is good to begin with, it will work at all formats. Now, >I have bought about 100 disks from MEI Micro and have not had one failure. Must >be my clean environment or maybe they had drive problems to begin with. I understand that the high density pattern placed on an HD disk interferes with subsequent attempts to re-format at a lower density. Wouldn't you need to wipe the old formatting off (with an electromagnet, perhaps) before assuming that the disk REALLY can't be formatted at 800K either? On another note, our Compaqs don't appear to check the HD hole before formatting, anyway. So I started out using DD disks at 1.44M HD format. The problem is that I was making backups, and when I finally returned to examine the data on these over-formatted disks, there were a few sector failures. Not many, but you only need to lose one sector in the FAT or Root directory before you pay the price for skimping on disk costs. Brian Willoughby UUCP: ...!{tikal, sun, uunet, elwood}!microsoft!brianw InterNet: microsoft!brianw@uunet.UU.NET or: microsoft!brianw@Sun.COM Bitnet brianw@microsoft.UUCP