On 08/12/2015 07:22 PM, Jerome H. Fine wrote:
One rather interesting aspect was that the DEC code did not alternate between side 1 and side 2 as the head advanced. All of side 1 was processed first followed by all of side 2. As a result, when a floppy media with a SS index hole was written on both side 1 and side 2, a DEC RX02 drive could still read all of side 1.
That's not unusual, at least in the CP/M world. A very common ordering was all of side 1, then side 2, but in descending track order (i.e, from the innermost to the outermost cylinders). Or side 1, then back to cylinder 0 on side 2. Some started in the middle of the disk (i.e. cylinder 37 or so, then writing cylinders 36->0 and then 38->77, alternating sides--or not.
Wonderful stuff. --Chuck
