Need someone with an old physical Mac that can read 800K floppies

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2013, March 11 - 2:44pm

Wolf

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Joined: 2013 Feb 19

Need someone with an old physical Mac that can read 800K floppies

Hi !

I need someone that have a real (physical) Mac. It must be able to read 800 (720) KB floppies.

I have 2 old floppies that I used in high school (around 1994-1996) but they are the old 800 KB ones. Since this need special hardware to read I can't archive/backup them with the hardware I now have.

I'm willing to send the 2 floppies to someone (ideally in Canada or USA) via mail and pay back for the return (they have printed labels with my photo on it so it's a souvenir to me).

If you are willing to help and know how to archive floppies (ideally a perfect copy - which will keeps the timestamps intact), let me know.

Thanks !

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2013, March 11 - 3:25pm

retromacgamer

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Joined: 2011 Sep 19

Maybe I can help? Do you know what models had that type of drive? I have several old mac computers laying around. The oldest in working condition (aside from my brand new, never-used Apple //c) is a Power Mac 4400. But according to everymac.com that one has a 1.44MB floppy drive. Maybe you need something like Mac Classic?

2013, March 11 - 3:34pm

Wolf

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Joined: 2013 Feb 19

We were using Macintosh Plus in the Lab. We also had a Mac SE which was able to use 1.44 MB and 800K floppies (it was the only one). I'm not sure if a Power Mac can read 800 KB floppies...

2013, March 11 - 5:23pm

24bit

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Joined: 2010 Nov 19

The vintage experts will chime in, but AFAIK every Mac from the pre USB era can read 800k, 720k and 400k as the original Mac floppy drives were downward compatible.
Such floppy drives can still write 800k and 720k as well.
It may be, that according to the MacOS, the peferrable DC4.2 may not work - I think it was supported until MacOS 7.5.2.
A DC6 image should be fine too, as long as it is saved read only, but it will not resemble the floppy as closely as DC4.2 did.

2013, March 11 - 5:56pm

grawlix.computing

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Joined: 2009 Jun 1

Weren't there two kinds of 800K discs? High-density, Single-sided and alternately, Regular-density, Double-sided? Maybe I'm remembering it wrong. The 1.44M SuperDrives would read/write at least one of those types of disks back in the day. I have a Beige G3 now with a working floppy drive, but I have no idea what it can do.

2013, March 11 - 9:38pm

(Reply to #5) #6

MikeTomTom

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Joined: 2009 Dec 7

The single density (SD) disks were 400k and the the double density (DD) are the only 800k type floppy disks. SuperDrives are capable of read/writing to all, SD, DD & HD floppy media. But 400k SD support was dropped from the Mac OS in 8.0 (both MFS & Pro DOS 400k media)

A beige G3 has no problem read/writing to 800k media

2013, March 12 - 1:32pm

Wolf

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Joined: 2013 Feb 19

Thanks for the clarification guys.

I'm still looking for someone

2013, March 12 - 3:16pm

Gary

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Joined: 2011 Jul 21

I'm in the process of moving my entire floppy collection to hard disk. I have about 500 floppies of all kinds - both commercial and my own stuff.

I have the equipment to do the project.

My question to you is:
How do you want the results packaged?

Gary

2013, March 12 - 5:35pm

bertyboy

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Joined: 2009 Jun 14

Gary, good luck with that, I did my collection many years ago - albeit only about 200 floppies (although I keep finding more that I missed).
Read-only Disk Copy 4.2 images have worked for me. Others may have more refined opinion.

2013, March 12 - 7:41pm

#10

Wolf

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Joined: 2013 Feb 19

Yeah I did just archive my floppy collection. The tricky part was my Mac ones. I only used Macintosh during my high school years in the 90's. All the Mac 1.44 MB ones can be easily archived with a Mac to Windows driver except the (only) 2 that were 800K those can't be done with regular hardware.

Gary, two Disk Copy 4.2 images over email would be great. I would Pay by PayPal for the return of the two floppies since they have a special sentimental value for me...

2013, March 13 - 12:14pm

(Reply to #10) #11

Gary

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Joined: 2011 Jul 21

I've had mixed results with email delivery. Would a CD be acceptable?

2013, March 13 - 1:14pm

#12

Wolf

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Joined: 2013 Feb 19

Yes, we could try email and if it don't work, a CD would be OK... I can read any "modern" Mac media on my PC... It's just the old 800K floppies that is a problem.

2013, March 13 - 1:45pm

(Reply to #12) #13

Gary

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Joined: 2011 Jul 21

Contact me via gmail.com. My address is charleengary. Do the assembly yourself.

Gary