Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Snidely Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc,alt.usage.english,alt.english.usage Subject: Re: Floppies Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2025 10:50:34 -0700 Organization: Dis One Lines: 47 Message-ID: References: <9fjemlxbio.ln2@Telcontar.valinor> <6jefmlxb6j.ln2@Telcontar.valinor> <10884l7$173em$1@dont-email.me> <1089ge2$1fvl9$8@dont-email.me> <10a68ql$16tjt$1@dont-email.me> <68c6bbc5$0$402$426a74cc@news.free.fr> <10a6rp4$1d082$5@dont-email.me> <2d9jplxvcn.ln2@Telcontar.valinor> <10a6t8d$1d082$8@dont-email.me> <4cnjplxbgm.ln2@Telcontar.valinor> <101fck52laaigefq5tubi6i7b0qpccmuic@4ax.com> <9DOdncYo-vBzE1r1nZ2dnZfqnPadnZ2d@giganews.com> <10a8mbc$1q6g1$8@dont-email.me> <10aca8j$2odbt$1@dont-email.me> <20250916133411.00001c32@gmail.com> <10ae1n4$34dgl$7@dont-email.me> Reply-To: snidely.too@gmail.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-15"; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Injection-Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2025 17:51:01 +0000 (UTC) Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="b494dad898099d144d05521fa61626da"; logging-data="3545051"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1+VfjPfb0vLHS2JWG8VZeNUH4gsffPybuQ=" Cancel-Lock: sha1:6thcQ6PEUUCnZsqrMupLK2tLm+0= X-Newsreader: MesNews/1.08.06.00-gb X-ICQ: 543516788 Xref: csiph.com comp.os.linux.misc:74409 alt.usage.english:1128309 The Natural Philosopher wrote on 9/17/2025 : > On 16/09/2025 23:42, Carlos E.R. wrote: >> I long ago read an article in a magazine that explained and included >> software to write and read floppies with a lot more capacity. I don't want >> to write a figure, because I don't remember. It played with gap sizes and >> numbers. > > I wrote a bios to read and write floppy disks for a minicomputer control > system. Based on IIRC an 80988 80988? I don't recognize that as an Intel part. Certainly not a processor. The i8088 was the processor IBM went with, the small-bus version of the 8086. There were some interesting coprocessors in that family, the i8087 numeric engine being the best known, but there wa an I/O coprocessor name the i8089 with a funky assembly language. The i960 would be a different development line with a RISC instruction set, and a stripped-down version would get used in some embedded processor designs, primarily printers. > it was the rom based boot computer that would > load software from floppy to pass along to the main computer - which I think > might have been a bit slice thing. This would have been mid 60s I think. Floppies in the mid-60s? Mid-60s "small computers" were the PDP-8 and the Nova, and the PDP-8 used DecTape when it didn't have a hard disk, and as portable storage when it did have a hard disk. > I > cant remember exactly what the drive specs were, but it was relatively easy > to implement a FAT filesystem and directories good enough to make a Clib that > could use the standard IO format calls to read and write and IBM DOS > compatible floppy. > > ISTR I interfaced to a WD floppy disk controller chip. So whatever that chip > could do I could have done in software, though I never strayed outside the > area of 'compatible with MSDOS' The FD1771 chip was introduced around 1980, it seems. /dps -- "I'm glad unicorns don't ever need upgrades." "We are as up as it is possible to get graded!" _Phoebe and Her Unicorn_, 2016.05.15