I do not know the density of the hard drives. I believe that most are high density- they come from computers that also have cdrom drives- relatively newer by comparison to when 3.5 in drives came out. They come from desktop and laptop computers. I assume that all the drives work, but will not test them. If a trade is not possible, i can also sell them for $5 each (including shipping). If any are found not working or not high density, I will refund the prorated price. I recycle and refurbish computers... if I can sell good parts for reuse, I'll give a fair deal. Thanks, Jason On Apr 20, 2014 12:47 PM, "Doug Reed" <n0nas at amsat.org> wrote: > Hi Mr B-o-B! > > You didn't say what kind of drives you are looking for; 3.5" high > density, 3.5" standard density, 5.25" high density, 5.25" standard > density 80 track or 40 track, double sided or single sided, or 8" high > density, low density, hard sector, soft sector, or Vydeck. > > I will say that if this is for a disk duplication project where you > will be using 3.5" or 5.25" HD drives, you have the best chance of > success. If you are doing anything that requires making both 5.25" HD > disks and 5.25" 360K low density disks, you should plan to have two > sets of 5.25" drives because the track read-write width was different > between 360K low density 40 track and 1.2MB high density 80 track. > > Chances are good you will not be using 8" drives, but if you do, there > used to be software that would let you read 8" drives on your PC if > you made your own control cable. It has been too many years to > remember now but I know there was something about the old PC floppy > disk controllers that made me buy a special controller card to get > full capability for reading odd disk formats. Linux might even be the > ideal OS for this kind of work since you can probably do anything you > want with the right drivers. > > The final recommendation would be that you consider your options for > proving the drives are good. I know that I've had good drives and bad > drives over the years. Good drives usually had a bit better read-write > head and electronics that gave a bit more margin on read. Bad drives > had less margin and tended to give more read errors with marginal > floppy disks, particularly when you get into high density media. > > And if you have 8 random drives from different vendors and manufacture > dates, you probably have 8 drives with different physical alignment of > the heads and no two the same. This tends to show up as difficulty > reading a test disk, particularly on the inner tracks where data bits > are packed the tightest on the media. I used to test my PC drives by > formatting disks on each of them, then doing a surface scan of the > disks as I swapped them between the other drives. Then I'd try to make > sense of which drives had read errors on which floppies. The "keeper" > drives were the ones that had no errors reading each other's disks > since I could reasonably assume they had similar alignment and good > read margin. > > 30 years ago in the TRS-80 days, I had 3.5", 5.25", and 8" floppy > drive alignment disks where I worked and I frequently aligned the > floppy drives when they were returned to the shop. I haven't seen > anyone selling alignment disks for along time now, and since 3.5" and > 5.25" drives are common as sand, I don't know that I'd bother with it > today. Easier just to get a couple more drives and test them as above. > > And if you are duplicating floppies, be sure to pay attention to > getting quality media. The cheaper disks are usually cheaper for a > reason. Anyone who fought with 5.25" HD media knows that very well. > The worst media I ever saw was at a three letter government agency and > came from the lowest bidder. When you held it to the light and looked > at the shiny surface, it looked like it had freckles. Each freckle was > a high spot on the media that had been scraped off when the head went > by and coated the read head like frost on your windshield on a cold > winter morning. The build-up on the head reduced read margin until the > drive couldn't read anything! > > If you can't collect enough old drives from the TClug list, you might > want to put a Want on Craig's List or simply pick up some of the > Free-haul-it-away computers on the list. Worst case I can give you the > email address for a guy who scraps old computers as his business, but > he might be the worst place to look since most of his scrap comes from > companies that got rid of 5.25" drives 15-20 years ago. > > <www.twinslan.net> > If none of the above pans out, your last option might be the local > hamfest (electronic swap meet, flea market) on June 7 in St Paul near > 3M Center. You'd have a pretty good chance of collecting a dozen > drives out there, although 5" drives are getting pretty old even for > hams...... I gave half a dozen old computers and drives to the > scrapper last fall. I might have a few more drives if I look and knew > what you wanted. :-) > > Doug Reed. > > > On 4/20/14, tclug-list-request at mn-linux.org > <tclug-list-request at mn-linux.org> wrote: > > Date: Sun, 20 Apr 2014 00:58:53 -0500 > > From: B-o-B De Mars <mr.chew.baka at gmail.com> > > To: TCLUG <tclug-list at mn-linux.org> > > Subject: [tclug-list] Need 8 floppy drives > > > > I am in need of as many old floppy drives that I can get my hands on. > > The magic # I am looking for is 8, but would be interested in more. > > I will give cash, or trade. > > If anyone still has a pile of these drives collecting dust let me know. > > Thanks! > > > > Mr. B-o-B > _______________________________________________ > TCLUG Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota > tclug-list at mn-linux.org > http://mailman.mn-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... 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