Table of Contents for this issue:
SPECIAL REPORT: The Disk Controversy / Moderator (Nathan Marler)
High-density 800K Disks: No
1.4 Meg Disks DO NOT Make Good 800k Disks
Intricacies of High-density Disks
HDs as DDs Can Be DOA
High-density as 800K Disk Incompatibilities
Re: 1.4MB Disks Masquerading as 800K Disks
Eudora and AppleScript: Mondo Mail
MacWeb 2.0 Problems?
System Software: You Must License It!
Your Centris CD
Re: PB 170 Problems
Re:Mass Micro Quick Image 24--What Is It
Follow-up: Two Printer Problems
Bad F-Lines
Centris CD: SCSI Devices
Re: File Attachments with Pine
PB 170 Ideas

I have watched in awe here as many, many posts concerning the battle over
1.4MB disks and whether they make good 800K disks and vice-versa have flown
through. I received one today that verged on being rude, so I decided to
investigate this fully by going to the source. I called Imation, whom some
of you may know as the subsidiary of 3M that manufactures their diskettes
and data cartridges. Here is what I learned from my chat with a very
helpful representative:

* Can you use high density disks in a low density drive _safely_?

No. The key to this being that last word--safely. Though it is possible
to just stick a 1.4MB disk in a Plus or other low-density drive machine,
the media used in a high density disk requires a newer, more powerful drive
to make it all work. It is possible that the older drive will successfully
magnetize the disk, but it is more likely that certain parts will remain
unmagnetized. The media wants a more powerful read/write head than the old
drive has to offer. Low-density disks are more easily magnetized. Also,
the newer disks are formulated to stay magnetized longer; this is a boon
for longer-term storage, but the old, low-density drive may not be able to
"knock-down" segments of the disk successfully; some parts may remain
stubborn and corrupt data by leaving bits of disk still magnetized. A real
foul-up all around. The medium down to its very basic structure is
incompatible with a low-density drive. The rep even noted "It's quite
possible that your data would not be written at all."

* And vice-versa?

No way. The fragile, easily-changed medium of low-density disks is not
capable of coping with the onslaught of the tinier tracks made by the
high-density read/write head. The medium would be very unstable at best as
a high-density disk, and would probably fall apart (in a very molecular
sense) when the head went whizzing by with data intended for somewhere
nearby. It would be acceptable to format a low-density disk in a
high-density drive _providing_that_ no fooling around with the notches (the
part of the disk that identifies it as high or low density) and whatnot was
going on.

Hark! The disk manufacturing gods have spoken. Thus, to any of you who
use different-density disks than what your drive was intended
for--congratulations! The best of luck! But the manufacturer has nixed
the whole idea, and I take their information as the gospel truth.

I have listed other posts after this that corroborate this theory and give
even more interesting details as far as how it works.

Thank you,
Nathan Marler
Moderator for Classic Macs Digest

This is NOT a good idea unless it's an emergency and you HAVE to get
data over to an 800k drive. DO NOT think that the data will be stable
(it won't). Sometimes it works great for months, sometimes the data is
lost. DON'T TRUST it.

JAG

Sorry Jag,

The 1.4meg disks are made of better media than the earlier 800k disks.
You could have had other problems. Or super cheap disks :) but there is
nothing magical about the media in general. The amount of data that a disk
can hold is merely a measure of the media quality.

I have to agree with Jag, HD disks are made of a different material,
finer 'grains', which require different settings in the drive and write
mechanism. On both 3 1/2" and 5 1/4' drives on various machines I have
found that HD disks don't like being used in Lower density drives.
Although I have had to look a bit harder, I have been able to find DD
floppies but not in the usual stores. I have also found several boxes at
the back of cupboards and been told to just take them away.

PBJ

> If you need a newer Mac to think a 1.4 meg disk is really an 800k disk,
>just take some tape and cover the hole in the disk which tells the disk
>drive on newer Macs that the disk is a 1.4 meg disk. Not the hole with the
>sliding tab, the "other" hole :)

>Mike

This is NOT a good idea unless it's an emergency and you HAVE to get
data over to an 800k drive. DO NOT think that the data will be stable
(it won't). Sometimes it works great for months, sometimes the data is
lost. DON'T TRUST it.

JAG

Sorry Jag,

The 1.4meg disks are made of better media than the earlier 800k disks.
You could have had other problems. Or super cheap disks :) but >there is
nothing magical about the media in general. The amount of data that >a disk
can hold is merely a measure of the media quality.

Mike

Mike Rehbein Minnesota, USA
N0AGG Ham Radio

Well I guess you've been lucky. Tricking a Mac's floppy drive by putting
tape over the hole on a floppy disc is DEFINITELY NOT a good idea. Apple
says so, Mac Bible says so, MacWeek's How To Upgrade and Repair Macs
says so and unfortunately, I've had several bad experiences with
numerous brands of discs with this unsafe proceedure before I wisend up.

Besides, there's no reason to do this. You can still buy 800k floppies
all over the place (720k if it's IBM). I get mine at WalMart (Imation
720k IBM).

I reiterate, DO NOT trust this scary procedure unless you're just
having fun and don't mind losing data. It's also a bad idea to put tape
over the holes because it sometimes comes off and gums up the floppy
drive.

JAG
Http://www.eden.com/~arena/jagshouse/jagshouseone.html

Date: Sat, 3 May 1997 22:13:26 -0500
From: Mike Rehbein
Subject: Re: 1.4MB Disks Masquerading as 800K Disks

> If you need a newer Mac to think a 1.4 meg disk is really an 800k disk,
>just take some tape and cover the hole in the disk which tells the disk
>drive on newer Macs that the disk is a 1.4 meg disk. Not the hole with the
>sliding tab, the "other" hole :)

Mike

This is NOT a good idea unless it's an emergency and you HAVE to get
data over to an 800k drive. DO NOT think that the data will be stable
(it won't). Sometimes it works great for months, sometimes the data is
lost. DON'T TRUST it.

JAG

Sorry Jag,

The 1.4meg disks are made of better media than the earlier 800k disks.
You could have had other problems. Or super cheap disks :) but there is
nothing magical about the media in general. The amount of data that a disk
can hold is merely a measure of the media quality.

Mike

Mike Rehbein Minnesota, USA
N0AGG Ham Radio

There's more to this than you might think...

Older disc drives (like Mac 800K drives) write fairly broad tracks with
low-power heads. Newer disc drives (like superdrives) write fairly narrow
tracks with high-power heads.

If you've got a *pre-formatted* 1.4MB disc, and you try to re-format it as
an 800K disc, there's two things that can go wrong that I can think of:

One is that if you re-format it with a Superdrive, the heads won't write
across the whole width of an 800K track; there'll be some residual
magnetism at the edges (or off to one side). If you then use this disc in
an 800K drive, this left-over data can screw things up a bit.

Another is that if you re-format the disc with an 800K drive, the low-power
head might not change the magnetic state of enough disc to create a
reliable track - bits of coating at the edge might not flip state, which
can screw things up - 1.4MB discs actually use a different sort of coating
with slightly different magnetic properties to 800K discs.

It's possible that the newer spec material itself is a problem in older
disc drives, but I don't know and it seems unlikely to me.

So Jag's got a point, but maybe not the point he was thinking of...

If you want to use a 1.4MB disc as an 800K disc, I'd be inclined to either
use a completely blank, never formatted disc; or bang it in a bulk eraser
first; or if you can't, format it as an 800K disc in a 1.4MB drive *and* in
an 800K drive; do the latter a couple of times just for good measure.

btw, if Jag and Mike didn't get this by email, can they email me and let me
know so I can kick my email software?

Just a few thoughts,
Rowland.

I'm with JAG on this one. My experience has been that HD's tricked into
being DD's are not as stable or dependable as real 800K disks. I read
somewhere that the medium actually is different (possibly a different
coercivity or remanance in the HD floppy material?), and my own experience
seems to support this.

FWIW.
Jon

This is NOT a good idea unless it's an emergency and you HAVE to get
data over to an 800k drive. DO NOT think that the data will be stable
(it won't). Sometimes it works great for months, sometimes the data is
lost. DON'T TRUST it.

JAG

Sorry Jag,

The 1.4meg disks are made of better media than the earlier 800k disks.
You could have had other problems. Or super cheap disks :) but there is
nothing magical about the media in general. The amount of data that a disk
can hold is merely a measure of the media quality.

Mike Rehbein Minnesota, USA
N0AGG Ham Radio

Actually, 1.44MB floppies use a higher-density method of storing data
(hence the name). There's a reason why 800K drives can't read HD
floppies as such: the media are significantly different.

I suggest reading Pogue and Schorr's _Macworld Mac Secrets_, which
treats this and many other topics in greater detail.

> If you need a newer Mac to think a 1.4 meg disk is really an 800k disk,
>just take some tape and cover the hole in the disk which tells the disk
>drive on newer Macs that the disk is a 1.4 meg disk. Not the hole with the
>sliding tab, the "other" hole :)

>Mike

This is NOT a good idea unless it's an emergency and you HAVE to get
data over to an 800k drive. DO NOT think that the data will be stable
(it won't). Sometimes it works great for months, sometimes the data is
lost. DON'T TRUST it.

JAG

Sorry Jag,

The 1.4meg disks are made of better media than the earlier 800k disks.
You could have had other problems. Or super cheap disks :) but there is
nothing magical about the media in general. The amount of data that a disk
can hold is merely a measure of the media quality.

Mike

Mike Rehbein Minnesota, USA
N0AGG Ham Radio

Amitai Schlair

Sorry Jag,

The 1.4meg disks are made of better media than the earlier 800k disks.
You could have had other problems. Or super cheap disks :) but there is
nothing magical about the media in general. The amount of data that a disk
can hold is merely a measure of the media quality.

Mike

Mike Rehbein Minnesota, USA
N0AGG Ham Radio

I disagree.

Jag is correct when he says that using a 1.4M disk as a 800K is risky - the
coercivity (the ability to retain magnetizaion) has been increased for the
1.4M disks. The 800K drive mechanism may not be able to completely
magnetize the data on the disk, leading to data loss.

Robert Zusman

On 5/3/97 4:57 PM, Nathan Marler wrote:

[MODERATOR'S NOTE: Yes, I goofed this all up. Emailer 1.0, which
apparently came with the Apple Internet Connection Kit, is what works on my
SE (but shouldn't). 1.1 will not work, and since I can't find 1.0 anywhere
else, I tried the dual-settings file trick for Eudora and it works
wonderfully. I just keep aliases to each settings file on my desktop, and
I click on either one to use the Digest settings or my personal account. I
think I'll just forget Emailer altogether for the meantime. Thanks to all
who helped me through this period of extreme bumbling ;-) --Nathan Marler]

Nathan: there's one other option that you might want to try:
Info-mac has a nifty little applescript that allows for simple handling
of multiple Eudora settings.

Of course, that doesn't help if you don't have/can't use applescript.

Something else (which also requires a/s) is a nifty little program called
MondoMail (also on Info-Mac) which allows you to create your own
customized mail program via applescript.

Hope this helps!

Andrew Ludgate

I know there's been extensive discussion on MacWeb, but I can't remember
a post which clearly answers a connundrum I have recently experienced.

The other day, I deceded to upgrade my parent's Mac Plus from verson
1.1a3 to version 2.0 of MacWeb. This cleared up all their
freezes/crashes, but I ran into a problem. Version 2.0 will
(understandably) not view JPEGs without Quicktime installed, but for some
reason, their Mac+ chronically requests a post-processor application for
GIFs as well. If MacWeb is selected as the post-processor app, the
program goes into some sort of infinite loop, with the menu bar items
being enabled/disabled, and the screen contents freeze up.

Does MacWeb 2.0 not display graphics *at all* on pre-CQD macs?

(I also have an early version of NCSA Mosaic on their Plus, but while it
views inline GIFs, it is based on HTML 1.0, and so doesn't have any of
the 2.0 features which are on virtually all pages today.)

TIA,
Andrew.

I'm writing this message *not* to be the software police (far from it), but
to share with others on this list my first hand experience with trying to
give someone copies of some discontinued System software they needed.

One cannot just offer to copy disks for someone for any Apple System
software unless they have an official license to do so from Apple.
Official user groups and other private individuals have licenses and may
provide you with copies of System software for your use. Please note this
applies to any and all computers Apple has ever made, including Apple II,
Lisa, Macintosh, Apple III, etc. Unless you see the System software you
need on Apple's FTP sites--where you can download it yourself--this is the
policy that is supposed to be followed. You are also not supposed to be
charged for this System software outside of the cost of the floppy disks.

I'm not sure if folks on this classic macs list that are putting Mac
*System* software on their websites are following this policy, but if you
are not, you are likely to be told about it from Apple. From what I
understand, the license fee for being an official "licensee" is minimal and
has to be paid to Apple on a yearly basis.

My personal experience with offering to copy a set of discontinued Apple
//c System disks for someone who just happened to pick up a //c at a thrift
store bears witness to this. I was flamed off comp.sys.apple.2 usenet
group for even offering to help the person in this way. I had no intention
of charging for the software, but was told that I could not offer to do
this without a license, regardless.

--bj

This isn't really a classic mac question but...

Why is it that every time I start up my Centris, my CD ROM drive has to be
on (it's an external) for it to mount automatically?

Thanks

Cause the driver software looks for a cd at startup and only loads if it
can find one.

PBJ

Dear Listmembers,

I was wondering whether any of you might have any ideas regarding my newly
acquired pb170.

After startup the screen seems to be covered in a repeated barcode-like
pattern and the hard disk makes a number of attempts to start-up. Sometimes
it gets stuck at the 'welcome to macintosh message' and sometimes it
starts. When it starts it seems to run okay and Norton Utlities doesn't
report any problems.

The modem port does not seem to be recognized by the modem and the printer
port only gives a very slow throughput. It says it connects at 14,400 ARQ
but the data transfer seems intermittent and very, very slow (I've had
faster throughput using the same modem and an old Mac Portable).

sounds like a power problem, either PRAM battery or Main battery/power
supply.

PBJ

i bought a used mac II, and found a nubus card in it that i can't figure
out. it is labled 'mass micro systems - quick image 24'. anyone has a
clue as to what it is? thanks for the help, you're a great bunch!

I don't have any firsthand experience with the card, but it sounds like a
24-bit video card; you can check because you should be able to plug your
(color?) monitor into the connector at the back.

Mass Microsystems was (is?) a vendor of things like hard drives and other
peripherals. You might look on the Web to see if they're still around.

sdropkin

To all Classic Mac reads:

I would like to thank all of the folks how responded to my post regarding
printer problems. To recap, the first was a LC II that would not print and the
second was a SE that forced a restart when not connected to a printer. There
were so many people who were able to help my father-in-law and I. The LC II
problem was partially corrected by turning AppleTalk off. There was an
additional problem inside the machine however. Seems that my father-in-law had
the 7.5.3 installed at his local dealer and needed to have the system battery
replaced at the same time. They apparently knocked a connection loose inside
and when he took it back to them (after your suggestions didn't completely
solve the problem) they fixed it, made sure AppleTalk was off and he's back in
business.

My SE problem was solved by taking all of the printer drivers out of the System
Folder and placing them in a dummy folder. I knew it had to be something very
simple.

One bad note: I was unable to convince my father-in-law to remain a Mac user.
One of his other son-in-laws showed him a slick Gateway Pentium 166 loaded to
the hilt with games. Ironically he wouldn't consider a Mac clone (Apple only)
but he is getting a Wintel clone. Although the PowerBase 180 with all Gateway
offered would cost him $ 200 more. I've got one more shot at convincing him to
stay with the Mac. Wish me luck.

Cheers,
Tom Chipley

Thought this reply may be useful re.Bad F-Lines:

F-line Instructions

The Motorola 680x0 architecture was originally
designed to support a floating- point coprocessor
chip. This chip, the Floating Point Unit (FPU),
communicates with the CPU via a special set of
instructions called F-line instructions. These
instructions always start with an operation word
beginning with the hex value F.

A program can be compiled to take advantage of the
hardware assistance the FPU provides, and thus yield
faster floating-point calculations than would be
available with SANE (the Standard Apple Numerics
Package). Such programs would have instructions in the
program which start with the hex value F. A program
only using SANE would never have an instruction
starting with the hex value F.

NOTE: Some Macintosh models, such as the Macintosh SE/
30, the Macintosh IIci, and the Macintosh IIfx,
shipped with an FPU coprocessor installed. Other
680x0-based Macintosh computers, such as the Macintosh
IIsi and the Macintosh Color Classic, had an optional
FPU coprocessor. For these machines, it was possible
to purchase an optional card with an FPU coprocessor.

So if the Bad F-Line message is encountered when using some unfamiliar
software, then one of the following is probably happening:

1. The program expects an FPU

or

2. The program is running garbage in the RAM somewhere. Some of the raw
data where it tries to run has the hex-value of any
F-Line-Instruction and is thus trying to access the FPU.

many thanks to Sascha Welter for this.

http://www.access.ch/private-users/swelter/

BTW, I guess SCSI RAM would never be worth the bother - it would never be
able to be addressed in the same way as internal RAM, and would need its
own power supply, and processor too ?

Richard Weltman

JAG writes:

This isn't really a classic mac question but...

Why is it that every time I start up my Centris, my CD ROM drive has to
be on (it's an external) for it to mount automatically?

SCSI devices are "intelligent," that is, they talk to each other. When
the Mac calls for devices, the ones that are turned off can't answer.

You can always use SCSI Probe to mount devices you turn on after the fact.

Hope this helps!
Larry.Kollar

If you're using Pine over ZTerm (as opposed to Telnet), then you can do
the file transfer using ZModem, assuming your UNIX host has it. (If not,
I believe Info-Mac has the sources in four parts and you can compile it
yourself -- but most self-respecting dialup hosts have it nowadays.)
Type 'sz' at the prompt (where you normally type 'pine'); you should get
a listing of command-line options, which means you have the sz (Send
Zmodem) command installed. This is important

In a message which has attachments, type V to view an index of the
attachments, then select the attachment you want with the arrow keys,
then press S to save it to a stand-alone file in your home directory.
(If you have multiple attachments, save them out to files too.)

Now quit Pine (and if you've been moving around in your directory
structure, type 'cd' to move to your home directory). Type 'ls -lF' to
see a long listing of your files. Finally, type 'sz file1 file2 file3'
and you're off!

sz also accepts wildcards, so if you have a bunch of files ending in
.hqx you can type 'sz *.hqx'.

If your UNIX system lacks sz, you can either figure out how to use sx (I
don't know; I'd guess it's similar), or install sz from the sources at
Info-Mac.

If you need any more help feel free to ask.

I'm not sure how to retrieve an attachment without using fetch.

I use Z-term and Unix and Pine. I have access to fetch, but I have a low
density drive so it makes it difficult to copy stuff without lugging around my
external hard drive.

Kamal Larsuel

Amitai Schlair

On 5/4/97 11:07 PM, Saul via Classic Posts wrote:

After startup the screen seems to be covered in a repeated barcode-like
pattern and the hard disk makes a number of attempts to start-up. Sometimes
it gets stuck at the 'welcome to macintosh message' and sometimes it
starts. When it starts it seems to run okay and Norton Utlities doesn't
report any problems.

Early/older hard drives were subject to a condition called "Stiction",
i.e. sticky friction, meaning they sometimes are slow to get rolling.
It's a sign that it's near the end of it's useful life. Since it's a
mechanical problem, Norton won't find anything wrong. If it spins, it's
fine; if it doesn't spin, Norton can't read it.

The modem port does not seem to be recognized by the modem and the printer
port only gives a very slow throughput. It says it connects at 14,400 ARQ
but the data transfer seems intermittent and very, very slow (I've had
faster throughput using the same modem and an old Mac Portable).

Not sure what this is about, but see thoughts on paragraph below.

Also the powerbook came with a small grey (matchbox sized) 9600 fax modem
that plugs into another modem port to the right of the serial ports as you
look at the computer. I can't get the computer to see this (yes, I've
selected 'internal modem' in the control panel). It looks like it needs
some software that I haven't got. Does anybody have this (I've looked on
the Apple site and tried installing a newer 'express modem' software but it
didn't install properly and didn't work.

The "small grey fax modem" that plugs in is probably a Global Village
PowerPort Silver (9600 bps) modem. The external device is sometimes
called a dongle (it has two phone line connections, right?) but there is
an internal card that does all the modem work. You'll need the Global
Village software to make it work. I imagine this is why the Express Modem
software doesn't function. Try visiting the Global Village site at:
http://www.globalvillage.com/

Since there is probably an internal modem
installed, your external modem port is probably affected by its presence.

All the best, Dave

Dave Bogart