[Coco] Re: Help needed: problems with RETRIEV(E)ing DSK images

[Robert Gault]

Maybe there is no identifier on a 5.25" disk. I thought the drives would 
be able to use normal as well as HD disks but that was a guess on my 
part since I don't have such drives.

I should point out that while the MESS tools will work with .dsk images 
(of several types), they don't work with hardware. That means you can't 
read a real floppy with the MESS tools. Since it has become apparent 
(even to a slow learner like myself) that it is file transfer between a 
PC and real Coco disks, you should forget about the MESS tools for this 
purpose.

Torsten Dittel wrote:
>>Tape closed the disk hole/notch that indicates HD media. Why copy sector
>>by sector? That should not be necessary.
> 
> 
> Err... has the 5.25" floppy disk any hole/notch to indicate HD media?
> The 3.5" surely has. I wonder what happens if I use "flippy" disks with
> additional Write Protect notch and Index Holes punched in so I can use
> the second site by "flipping" the floppy around. However, if the 5.25"
> HD media has, my CoCo drives won't check it anyway, they are too old to
> have heart of HD media.
>  
> 
>>BACKUP may seem to use tracks but it actually divides memory into tracks
>>and then fills that memory sector by sector. The only Coco command that
>>uses tracks is DSKINI where a track is written in one pass. All other
>>commands are sector chunks.
> 
> 
> OK, thanks, didn't remember exactly because I wrote so many BACKUP tools
> 20 years ago (might find my "CerCompCopy" in these days, guess what this
> does... :-). Bill V., If you read this: I wrote this just for
> educational purposes).
> 
> 
>>>Aren't the MESS tools able to grab a DSK image in JV format?
>>
>>Yes.
> 
> 
> Do they have the same problem concerning sector 1? Or are they using a
> "track read" and do the sector ripping by software?
> 
> Regards, Torsten
> 
>