From: rugx...@gmail.com
> Hi,> > Almost none of them have it pre-installed these days. I bought a Sony>
> USB-hosted floppy drive, and it works (in DOS), but I've not used it a> lot
> lately.
I have one too, but mine isn't a Sony drive. I think mine is a Dell laptop
drive. I forget where I ordered it from, but in their descriptions, they
touted the Dell drive's reliability which surprised me, but so far, so good. I
was able to use clear packing tape to mount it inside an old aluminum HD cooler
that I had lying around. It does work in Win. I haven't tried it in DOS. I
use it in Win for quick-formatting the myriads of 1.44s I have.> > Yes, "old"
machines are more than adequate for most DOS stuff (and> sometimes better, due
to more compatible hardware).
I agree with that 100%!
> > Apparently the damn stupid "universal" serial bus (USB) has various>
> > versions and host controllers or whatnot. UHCI is one of them,> supported
> > by Intel and VIA motherboards, I gather. Unfortunately, some> computers
> > (like this Lenovo desktop) don't support it, only other> stuff (EHCI).
> > Blech.
Yesterday, I read a little about that USB 'junk'. I quickly realized how big a
mess it was! Typical of Intel to try & set a standard in hopes that it would
stick or take-off again. They did have some successes such as the PCI bus &
others, though. They also had failures, though. RAMBUS comes to my mind. That
reason and a couple others is why I'm now in the AMD camp. :)
BTW, in trying to get the FD (flash drive) going, I tried setting it to be the
first boot device. Currently, the first boot device is the CDR, #2 is the
floppy, then the HD is #3. I have #4 set to disabled. FDOS is perfectly happy
with this set-up. I knew I needed to add the flash drive as #1, if I wanted to
boot from it. I assumed the following choice was for USB, but wasn't sure.
Any clues on this:
Intel UNDI, PXE-1.0 (build dev.)
I haven't the foggiest idea as to what that is, do you? When I tried it as the
#1 boot device, I got a non-system disk error & to check cabling... After
that, I gave-up and set all my boot devices back the way they were.
> > I get it, floppies are small, slow, and error-prone. They're not> perfect.
> > I don't expect anybody to "want" to use floppies, but ...> it's so much
> > harder to get USB support on non-mainstream OSes.
You can say that again! :)
> USB is> just too complicated, but since "everybody" "only" uses Linux,>
> Windows, ... then "nobody" cares about complexity nor requirements of>
> anybody else.
Yes, I'm following you there. I chalk it all up to "mainstream marketing".
IOW, "if we can't make big bucks on it, we'll have to drop it."... :)> >
It's definitely a headache, at least for me. Maybe some others here> (Ulrich,
Mike B.) can give hints, if you're curious.
I kinda doubt it to be a worthwhile project. There are just a few documents &
text files that I would've liked to have... I figure that I've been without
them for this long... It's just one of those things where it'd be nice, but
there's not a dire need. I have to try to make it work, though.> > Go for the
flash drive. For me, RUFUS works well, so I can't complain> (too hard) about
lack of floppy support.
I'll try it. I haven't had too much luck with RMprepUSB anyways.> > Sure,
compared to floppies, it's fine. But I'm not sure long-term> storage is a
realistic goal. Mainly because I've heard (but can't> prove) that CD-Rs don't
last but about 5-7 years anyways.> That's tough to hear. I was under the
assumption that they're ultra-reliable since they're not affected by magnetic
fading or magnetic fields. Not to mention the lack of physical contact with
the drive hardware.
I thought CDs were pretty much indestructible...
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