ahh, the HP 9133A - the largest and heaviest external 3 1/2" floppy drive ever built.
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also the drive is running very smoothly now. a few days ago it was making horrible screeching sounds but i think that was the spindle bearing.
i've been running it upside down to allow the oil to warm up and drain back into the bearing.
digging around on this drive, i've found a bunch of software for the HP-85, including a program designed to control the HP 5005B Signature Multimeter. presumably none of this stuff has ever been preserved before.
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@bsdphk if you want to experiment, i put the whole disk image here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aTSBuvYilyCwlMffqJVZQTnmUwSarSrB/view?usp=sharing
@bsdphk David Gesswein pointed out to me by email that this image file has a software interleave of 9 and each track has a spare sector 31 which contains just a fill pattern and can be ignored. so that might explain some of the parsing difficulties.
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@bsdphk if you want to experiment, i put the whole disk image here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aTSBuvYilyCwlMffqJVZQTnmUwSarSrB/view?usp=sharing
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@bsdphk David Gesswein pointed out to me by email that this image file has a software interleave of 9 and each track has a spare sector 31 which contains just a fill pattern and can be ignored. so that might explain some of the parsing difficulties.
Ok, figured the interleave out:
Now we just need an examiner for the AutoArchaeologist to list the HP-BASIC programs
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People used to laugh when I said I'd fixed their squealing hard drive by oiling it.
Seagate used to have a grounding strip that sat atop a bearing on the end of the spindle (outside the drive) and at a push you could apply some graphite from a soft pencil to stop it being noisy.
Happy days.
@linker3000 I once had an HP calculator with a magnetic card reader. When the cards got dirty, you cleaned them with a pencil eraser.
Linux's knowledge of file formats can be investigated with
$ strings /usr/share/file/magic.mgc | more
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Ok, figured the interleave out:
Now we just need an examiner for the AutoArchaeologist to list the HP-BASIC programs
Hmm, i think there's still something not quite right about the interleave: I'm seeing too much 0x6d 0xb6 in places it should not be.
Or maybe there is a bad-block remapping we need to figure out.
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Hmm, i think there's still something not quite right about the interleave: I'm seeing too much 0x6d 0xb6 in places it should not be.
Or maybe there is a bad-block remapping we need to figure out.
Ok, I think I got it now.
The interleave is:
[0, 9, 18, 27, 4, 13, 22, 8, 17, 26, 3, 12, 21, 30, 7, 16, 25, 2, 11, 20, 29, 6, 15, 24, 1, 10, 19, 28, 5, 14]
I've also added a very rudimentary BASIC-detokenizer (git pull to get it), and updated the output here:
(Bedtime in Denmark now
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digging around on this drive, i've found a bunch of software for the HP-85, including a program designed to control the HP 5005B Signature Multimeter. presumably none of this stuff has ever been preserved before.
huh, i reconnected everything and plugged the drive into my HP85, and it actually works! i can read the files on it.
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huh, i reconnected everything and plugged the drive into my HP85, and it actually works! i can read the files on it.
one of the programs.
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one of the programs.
unfortunately the floppy drive isn't quite working. i can't format this new disk. the drive makes a very rattly sound, so it's probably something mechanical.
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unfortunately the floppy drive isn't quite working. i can't format this new disk. the drive makes a very rattly sound, so it's probably something mechanical.
3 1/2" = light mode
5 1/4" = dark mode
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huh, i reconnected everything and plugged the drive into my HP85, and it actually works! i can read the files on it.
Oh pretty HP85. HP and 3M executives never suffered the pain they should have for inflicting those damn DC100A cartridge/drives on users.
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3 1/2" = light mode
5 1/4" = dark mode@tubetime why do these seem like GPIB devices
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Oh pretty HP85. HP and 3M executives never suffered the pain they should have for inflicting those damn DC100A cartridge/drives on users.
@darryl_ramm yeah those are awful
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@tubetime why do these seem like GPIB devices
@xan they are HPIB which is technically not GPIB. but basically yeah.
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@xan they are HPIB which is technically not GPIB. but basically yeah.
@tubetime I knew it! They've got that testing equipment physiognomy (I wanted to say HPIB originally but I was honestly expecting to catch heat from somebody saying "WELL ACKSHUALLY" in the other direction)
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@darryl_ramm yeah those are awful
It's not like they were ever that reliable to start with.
**Insert ad for EBKS multipurpose storage/expansion module for HP80 Series**
- YouTube
Auf YouTube findest du die angesagtesten Videos und Tracks. Außerdem kannst du eigene Inhalte hochladen und mit Freunden oder gleich der ganzen Welt teilen.
(www.youtube.com)
Thanks Philip et al. My 85 and 87 have them.
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It's not like they were ever that reliable to start with.
**Insert ad for EBKS multipurpose storage/expansion module for HP80 Series**
- YouTube
Auf YouTube findest du die angesagtesten Videos und Tracks. Außerdem kannst du eigene Inhalte hochladen und mit Freunden oder gleich der ganzen Welt teilen.
(www.youtube.com)
Thanks Philip et al. My 85 and 87 have them.
@darryl_ramm i have one in this machine.
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one of the programs.
Cool!
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huh, i reconnected everything and plugged the drive into my HP85, and it actually works! i can read the files on it.
@tubetime so gorgeous and stunning
