or machine. I have many of these disks that i hope are still good.
Any Ideas???
Thanks
There are companies that will copy these onto new media for you. Might be better than having another old machine around.
> or machine. I have many of these disks that i hope are still good.
>
> Any Ideas???
>
> Thanks
Maybe a museum...
You can buy both internal and external 5 1/4 drives on ebay very inexpensively.
Not gonna say it
Wouldn't be prudent;-) 😉 😉 😉
your local Goodwill is probably dumping old computers right and left, go ask.
JUST TOOK MINE TO THE DUMP YESTERDAY, PUT AN ADD ON CRAIGSLIST--TDD
You can pay to have them copied to CD which I have done with mixed success. A lot of those old floppies are blank when you try to read them.
I still have the dual 5 1/4 drive unit for the HP85. My 85 still works with small floppies, I've never had this 5 1/4 unit hooked up, though.
Is the data in the old HP format?
Rick
zip your fly up quickly, that sharp pain you feel, IS YOUR 5 1/4" FLOPPY.. 😀 TDD
HP-85/6/7 disk formats are completely different than that for PC's and DOS. There are some PD utilities available which MAY allow you to use a PC to read them. At least that is true for the 3.5 in. 720K diskette drives.
At least they are not hard sectored media, or at least I don't think so. Most of those drives were HP-IB so even having the drive could pose a challenge to use.
If you want me to dig out more info, let me know.
- jlw
Of course the original post didn't say anything about HP format floppys!!
Boy, if this conversation doesn't raise the red flag for a system-neutral archival data storage solution nothing does.
Or a little forethought which would have said "put the information on these 5 1/4" floppies onto 3 1/2" floppies or a hard drive" before disposing of the computer with the bigger floppy drive. The time to do this was about 10+ years ago.
I'm not unsympathetic. I looked unsuccessfully in my "junk box" for a 5 1/4" drive for one I might send him. I guess when the last 5 1/4" floppy went into the trash, so did the drive.
Ebay has them.
Ebay
There are some on there now. As I recollect, the Teac, Mitsumi and Panasonic are generally good. You'll need a cable for them too.
If these disks were from a ibm type pc, I don't think you'll have problems. If they are from old CPM computers, transfer could be very difficult now, even for data as the formats were completely different. I bought a program (forget the name) which could do the translations when I changed from a Kaypro to PC.
Good luck.
Ebay
Oswego Software used to have a program that would transfer/convert the older HP files into a format that could be used in the newer computers. I never purchased it, but have the information from them around my office someplace. I think they used to advertise in POB and Professional Surveyor Magazines.
Be sure and check if your Motherboard will support the internal drive.
Even if it does, the necessary plug may be missing.
I found that out my last rebuild and there is no place to connect for either size of floppy drive.
I made my transfer years ago. AT that time many of my early cord files were from an apple version of Carlson and they did not get transferred to CDs. Still have the floppies and never had access to another apple to even open and print the files.
Most 5 1/4 floppies do not have a very long shelf life.
I have two of them somewhere in storage.
just a thought...
if you have a printed coordinate list it can be entered into an Excel worksheet fairly quickly.
Naturally you would have had to print out a coordinate list way back when. The folks at Parks from the dawn of computer history were good about that but our predecessors at the current job may have left random print-outs at best in the file but it's hard to figure out which is current or not.
