On Fri, Mar 11, 2022, 8:34 PM Fred Cisin <ci...@xenosoft.com> wrote: > >>>> I got more details from the guy with the disks. They are apparently > >>>> "360K" PC floppies with XYWRITE files, and he wants to load the file > >>>> contents into a "modern"? word processor. So hopefully, somebody can > >>>> help him, with a simple COPY *.*, and I think that he now understands > >>>> that he might also need to get back a copy of XYWRITE to turn the > >>>> file content into something usable. > > >>> It was mentioned that he would pay someone to do this. Why not just > >>> tell him to buy a $20 USB Floppy from Amazon and copy them himself? > > > On Fri, Mar 11, 2022 at 7:25 PM Fred Cisin via cctalk < > cctalk@classiccmp.org> > > wrote: > >> 5.25" USB floppies seem to be scarce now! > >> I didn't do any serious searching, but neither Amazon nor eBay showed > any > >> obvious (on first page) hits. > >> Some of the early USB drives, even if 3.5", MIGHT separate controller > and > >> drive enough to be modifiable, . . . > >> I would GUESS that the "modern" ones are too "integrated". > > On Fri, 11 Mar 2022, Warner Losh wrote: > > There are no 5.25" USB floppies. Well, not 100% true (there are values > > in the identifier strings that tell you it's a 1.2MB floppy vs a 1.44MB > > floppy), but as a practical matter, you can't find them. I've looked and > > gave up... That's how I wound up with my kyroflux + TEAC drive (though a > > greaseweasel is a better choice these days)... > > > > If these are the old 360k diskettes, then you'd be out of luck the USB > > route.. But an imager would be on the order of $30 for the greaseweasel, > > or similar, and another $40 for a working 5.25" drive and a few hours of > > your time to set it up and figure it all out... So anybody copying the > > disks for < ~$100 or $150 would be cost effective for this person... > > If somebody DID make a 1.2M USB floppy, it would seem likely that they > OUGHT TO include the 360K option within it, . . . >
It ought to... but that's not defined in the standard... But, if 1.2M USB drives exist, or ever existed, they're R@RE > I HOPE that the USB 1.4M drives handle 720K, . . . > That's what I hoped when I bought it, but no joy. Even trying nonstandard format values was no help. It would only read 1.44MB. Warner > The harder part is converting XYWRITE files into something more mordern... > > In his further detail private message, He seemd to understand that he > might have to get a replacement copy of XYWRITE (he said that he gave his > to Goodwill a few months ago), and do a load and SAVE-AS for each file. > > > Yes, it was always fun trying to explain to people that COPYing the > Wordstar file was NOT the cause of the "corruption of the last letter of > each word". Fortunately, THAT one was trivial to deal with. I don't know > anything about the file structure of XYWRITE. > > > [This reply was delayed by a power failure] > -- > Grumpy Ol' Fred ci...@xenosoft.com >
