27 Feb
2020
27 Feb
'20
5:11 a.m.
On Thu, 27 Feb 2020 at 03:49, Chuck Guzis via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
Hoo boy. I'll throw my experience in and see if you can avoid nausea...
First of all, you don't need a special controller to run most floppytape
drives, nor do you need to give up a floppy drive to use them--they
don't use the usual drive/motor select control for access. It's
perfectly permissible to have 2 floppy drives and a tape drive on the
same cable.
I didn't know that last trinket of wisdom, but agreed to the rest.
While there were special "double-speed"
controllers, such
as the Colorado FC-20, they're not necessary for functioning--they just
increase the data transfer rate.
Seconded.
Second, be prepared to set up a legacy system with the
OS that you used
back in the day. I think that NT 4.0 and maybe 2K still retained
floppytape support, but I don't believe that it went further than that.
If you used Windows 95 to do your backups, use that.
Agreed.
Third, tape backup software tends to be unique to the
generation of tape
drive and operating system.
Agreed.
For example Colorado backup for DOS chokes
on Colorado backup for Windows 95 tapes. So locating a copy of ResQ may
be to your great advantage.
Strongly seconded on that last bit.
If you can't find a copy, it may be possible to
read the tape in "raw"
mode using an old version of NetBSD or even old Debian using the ftape
driver. You'll have to recompile the kernel to incorporate the driver
code, but then you'll have access to the tape contents using the usual
Unix tape commands (mt, dd, etc.) The good news is that almost every
floppytape that I've seen uses 512 byte blocks.
All this assumes that various bits haven't turned to goo or gone slack
(e.g. tape drive capstans, cartridge tension belts, etc.).
Kevin, where in the world are you?
I have a Colorado parallel-port drive and install floppies and CDs for
Win9x and NT. I could be induced to part with them, _pace_ Chuck's
wise and insightful comments.
--
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