Date   : Thu, 03 Aug 1989 04:27:33 GMT
From   : tank!eecae!upba!dsndata!unocss!mlewis@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu (Marcus S. Lewis)
Subject: Hard Sectors????

From article <8908012103.AA03920@lll-lcc.llnl.gov>, by rzh@LLL-LCC.LLNL.GOV
(Roger Hanscom):
 
>    A friend of mine just bought a used "H-89" computer (a
> Heathkit) that runs some form of CP/M.  I'd like to give
> him some PD software, but this machine runs hard-sectored
> 5.25" diskettes.  Is there an efficient way to do it?  I
> can read and write many 5.25" formats -- can a hard sector
> controller read anything but hard sector diskettes??  I can
> always do a serial patch between one of my machines and his,
> but that seems like "the hard way".  Any hard-sector users
> out there??  How do you get software??


There is the Heath User Group, who distributes a fair amount of
stuff in hard-sector format.  The _only_ other option is to 
hook up a serial link (preferably at 9600+).  My tertiary 
system is a Micropolis-based machine, 16-sector, 77 tracks,
SSQD, 315K per disk.  It doesn't have a whole lot, since I
have never managed to get a serial port to cuntion with the 
odd system clock I have on the CPU (1.8432MHz - most S100
systems demand a 2 MHz clock for a serial port).

Actually, as late as three years ago, you could have gone to a
Heathkit store for conversion.  A lot of them had -89's with 
two controllers in them.  One of his options is to add a second
disk controller (soft-sectored, of course), which will give him
a bit more storage to boot.  So I misspoke.  There are some options.


Marc

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