linux-kernel - Re: floppy question of the hour

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Message-id: <200805281758.29018.gene.heskett@gmail.com>
Date:	Wed, 28 May 2008 17:58:28 -0400
From:	Gene Heskett <gene.heskett@...il.com>
To:	Lennart Sorensen <lsorense@...lub.uwaterloo.ca>
Cc:	Phillip Susi <psusi@....rr.com>,
	Stefan Richter <stefanr@...6.in-berlin.de>,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, Jens Axboe <axboe@...nel.dk>
Subject: Re: floppy question of the hour

On Wednesday 28 May 2008, Lennart Sorensen wrote:
>On Wed, May 28, 2008 at 03:38:05PM -0400, Phillip Susi wrote:
>> Lennart Sorensen wrote:
>> >Just do what the Amiga did:  Read the entire track into a buffer in
>> >memory, then deal with the sectors, and write the entire track back. :)
>>
>> IIRC, there is no way to detect the interleave factor that the media has
>> been formatted with, unless you maybe try several and see which one
>> reads fastest.
>
>Yeah, the Amiga trick wouldn't work.  The Amiga had no interleave.  It
>didn't even have sector gaps.  Just 11 consequtive sectors worth of data
>per track and one gap at the end of the track.  I really doubt any other
>system could emulate that floppy access method without extra hardware.

The drives, at least for the 880k format, were std chinon 3.5" drives.  However, 
I was under the impression there was about a 20 byte gap with the sector number 
and a short A5 A5 synch string between the sectors.  I still have a big box 
A-2k, with one DD drive, and one of the special 1760k 150 rpm HD drives too.

But its been nearly a decade since an HD failure prompted me to store it in the 
basement and learn to really use the first linux box I ever built in 1998, 
RH-5.1 on it.  So my memory could be hazy, after all its 73 years old & 
counting. :)

-- 
Cheers, Gene
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
My philosophy is: Don't think.
		-- Charles Manson
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