Date   : Mon, 08 Sep 1997 18:38:46 +0200
From   : Wouter Scholten <wouters@...>
Subject: Re: Beebdos

Robert Schmidt wrote:
> 
> chris jubb wrote:
> >
> > Dear Conor & Robert,
> > I appreciate the efforts that you have made to keep the world of the
> > BBC
> > Micro alive.
> > I used to use Beebdos in the late 80's. I never got it to work very
> > well but
> > always thought it was my computer illiteracy that was at fault. Now
> > I've
> > grown older and my computer confidence has increased but I still find
> > Beebdos, as found on ' The BBC lives' website a no-goer. I've tried
> > different PC's and different disks from a BBC but no joy. All of the
> > disk
> > drives on the PC's are the 1.2Mb variety.
> > I still use a BBC for patient testing at Moorefields Eye Hospital and
> > need
> > to transfer files regularly to a PC. Until now I've transferred via an
> > Archimedes with a 5.25" drive attachment but now I'm loosing control
> > of that
> > drive.
> > I would be grateful if you could offer any advice.
> > Yours sincerely
> > Chris Jubb
> 
> (I've sent a copy of this reply to the BBC micro mailing list, which you
> might like to join.)
> 
> You can find information about transferring files between a BBC and a PC
> at http://www.nvg.ntnu.no/bbc/xfer-conv.html .
> 
> Using Mark de Weger's XFer seems to be the currently easiest, most
> foolproof way to transfer files, but you will have to make a serial
> communications cable.  (I think Wouter Scholten is also developing a
> similar program.)

My 'bbccom' is more or less finished (for a long time now!). It's
reliable, faster than xfer but is limited to running under linux (or
another unix like os). But I received no interest for this whatsoever!
For me, it's now the only way to transfer files.

> Reading BBC disks on a PC seems to be quite unreliable, because so few
> PCs are still in existance with the legacy floppy controller required to
> read the low density data.  I don't know how Beebdos compares to Wouter

No problems here on a brand spanking new ppro ! I really think it's more
to do with 1.2 M drives than the floppy controller.


> Scholten's hacked FDC - maybe you could try using FDC on your BBC disks
> to produce disk images, then use his bbcim program to split them up into
> individual files.

Yep, BTW, you can take your 5 1/4 drive from the bbc, disconnect it and
connect it to a PC. that might work better than 1.2 M drives (I have a
360K in my PC).

I think beebdos is easier to transfer single files. But it gives you a
lot of files on the pc side which I don't want (200+K compared to 6K for
FDC) for occasional use.

Wouter

PS,

>    jeg lukker et oye og ser halvt
>    jeg  lukker begge  og ser  alt            -- seigmen

I think you made a spelling mistake there :-)