I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

On Fri, 23 Sep 2011 23:39:37 -0500, Ignoramus14736
wrote:

I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...
==========
After my recent computer disaster, I got a new computer, one
without a floppy drive and no bay to install one. Indeed
the motherboard did not have the header pins for a floppy
drive cable, so I was unable to cannibalize the old cables
and drives [3.5 + 5.25]

Walmart has a Sabrent USB unit that seems to work very well,
and is available through their site to store program with
"free" shipping. The one I got was 19.88$ + sales tax
http://www.walmart.com/ip/MicroPac-U...-Black/9871217

They also have a new unit *INTERNAL* unit also from Sabrent
for 17.22$ + sales tax that combines a USB 3.5 floppy drive
with a multi format memory card reader. I have not tried
this one or seen it in the flesh, but if you have an open
bay and can access the internal USB port header pins it
might be worthwhile.
http://www.walmart.com/ip/MicroPac-C...riter/11060821

FWIW -- I just got the recovered data from the fried hard
drive back from Fields Data Recovery Service. The did a
pretty good job, and recovered almost 50 gig of data. The
problem being that the file names and directory structure
were lost, and the recovered files have names like
103472.dwg, 1125712.doc etc. so the only way to make this
useful is open each of the files, rename and move to the
correct directory. Backups are much cheaper and easier... I
got good prompt service and the data was returned on a 500
gig Seagate SETA drive, which was quickly transferred to the
main system drive using another Walmart site-to-store
accessory.
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Sabrent-US...erter/15819320
Somewhat slower than a DMA connection, but works well with
both the new desktop and laptop through a USB hub.


--
Unka' George

"Gold is the money of kings,
silver is the money of gentlemen,
barter is the money of peasants,
but debt is the money of slaves"

-Norm Franz, "Money and Wealth in the New Millenium"

On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

You lucked out.
As I recall, 5.25's might hold for ~3 years.
3.5's might go for ~5 years; beyond that was iffy.

The hard drives were total opposites though--they could easily read &
write data 10-15+ years if they were retired before they had
mechanically failed.

"F. George McDuffee" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 23 Sep 2011 23:39:37 -0500, Ignoramus14736
wrote:
...

This looks useful for milder accidents:
http://www.piriform.com/recuva

jsw

On 2011-09-24, DougC wrote:
On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

You lucked out.
As I recall, 5.25's might hold for ~3 years.
3.5's might go for ~5 years; beyond that was iffy.

The hard drives were total opposites though--they could easily read &
write data 10-15+ years if they were retired before they had
mechanically failed.

I think that I was lucky because the diskette sat unused and was not
subject to mechanical wear.

i

On 9/24/2011 1:43 AM, DougC wrote:
On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

You lucked out.
As I recall, 5.25's might hold for ~3 years.
3.5's might go for ~5 years; beyond that was iffy.

The hard drives were total opposites though--they could easily read &
write data 10-15+ years if they were retired before they had
mechanically failed.

I've had no problem reading 5.25 disks written in the early 80s, but I
have had problems with the disk drive being inop - I think their
longevity is much longer than you suggest - maybe that's a worst case.
Just as CDs were to have a 10 year max shelf life and the printed ones
(aluminized) seem to (so far) be fine at over 25 years

On Sat, 24 Sep 2011 08:38:45 -0700, Bill
wrote:

On 9/24/2011 1:43 AM, DougC wrote:
On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

You lucked out.
As I recall, 5.25's might hold for ~3 years.
3.5's might go for ~5 years; beyond that was iffy.

The hard drives were total opposites though--they could easily read &
write data 10-15+ years if they were retired before they had
mechanically failed.

I've had no problem reading 5.25 disks written in the early 80s, but I
have had problems with the disk drive being inop - I think their
longevity is much longer than you suggest - maybe that's a worst case.
Just as CDs were to have a 10 year max shelf life and the printed ones
(aluminized) seem to (so far) be fine at over 25 years

Ive got a box of at least 1000 3.5" and about that same number of 5.25
disks in a corner, going to the dumpster. The disks are filled with
commercial software such as Novell; games and whatnot. Virtually every
one of them was readable/usable. Ive put some software on DVDs..but all
they really are good for is blanks after wiping. I did save the Windows
3.0-3.65 disks

Many of them came with Xts probably 20 yrs ago.

Gunner

"In the history of mankind, there have always been men and women who's goal
in life is to take down nations. We have just elected such a man to run our
country." - David Lloyyd (2008)

On Sep 24, 3:43*am, DougC wrote:
On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:

I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

You lucked out.
As I recall, 5.25's might hold for ~3 years.
3.5's might go for ~5 years; beyond that was iffy.

The hard drives were total opposites though--they could easily read &
write data 10-15+ years if they were retired before they had
mechanically failed.

I regularly read data error free from disks that are over +35 years
old.

Try that with the optical format from the 80's...or the 90's...or from
media from just 10 years ago.

One of the results of changing from magnetic to optical storage media
will be the loss of information during those decades.

TMT

Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

Sounds lucky to me as my experience is the opposite. The company I used
to work for back before 2001 used to back stuff up on floppies into the
mid to late 1990s and I found a few times that when trying to retrieve
data it was corrupted and the discs were only 2-3 years old. May have
been a computer drive issue but I did try retrieving the data on a few
computers. In those days the company only used 3M Imation pre-formated
discs IIRC as they found them to be movable between many computers
drives without issue, other brands and formatting on a machine would
often not be readable on other machines reliably. Up to the mid to late
1990s IIRC we were still sending releases out to a Swiss customer on
floppies and DHLing them to Switzerland and the customer being able to
read the discs was important. I do have a few discs though which were
still readable over 15 years later last time I checked which wasn't that
recently.

I had to get a USB floppy unit for my shop tower - no floppy
in it. Handy for laptops also.

Some software comes that way or requires to be connected...

Martin

On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

On 2011-09-25, Martin Eastburn wrote:
I had to get a USB floppy unit for my shop tower - no floppy
in it. Handy for laptops also.

This is what I had too.

I used Linux and the kernel recognized the device instantly.

i

Some software comes that way or requires to be connected...

Martin

On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

Bill wrote in :

On 9/24/2011 1:43 AM, DougC wrote:
On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

You lucked out.
As I recall, 5.25's might hold for ~3 years.
3.5's might go for ~5 years; beyond that was iffy.

The hard drives were total opposites though--they could easily read &
write data 10-15+ years if they were retired before they had
mechanically failed.

I've had no problem reading 5.25 disks written in the early 80s, but I
have had problems with the disk drive being inop - I think their
longevity is much longer than you suggest - maybe that's a worst case.
Just as CDs were to have a 10 year max shelf life and the printed ones
(aluminized) seem to (so far) be fine at over 25 years

Floppies can be attacked by some sort of mold. Not only will this trash
the floppy, but trying to read it will gunk up the drive. 5.25" floppies
tend to be worse than 3.5's, either because of changes in the materials,
or better sealing. It's mostly a problem if they've been stored where
the humidity is high and isn't well controlled.

I have a small collection of 5.25's that I would like to at least LOOK at
to see if they are worth transfering. Nobody seems to make a 5.25" to
USB drive. The IT folks at work may have something, and I need to check.

Doug White

Doug White wrote:

Bill wrote in :

On 9/24/2011 1:43 AM, DougC wrote:
On 9/23/2011 11:39 PM, Ignoramus14736 wrote:
I had a 17 year old diskette (1994) with some of my old C code
archives from 1988 or so. I could never get around to reading it,
finally bought a USB diskette reader. To my utter surprise, I could
read it and recovered all archives. Now I have my old MS-DOS library
that I wrote and made money using. Amazing...

You lucked out.
As I recall, 5.25's might hold for ~3 years.
3.5's might go for ~5 years; beyond that was iffy.

The hard drives were total opposites though--they could easily read &
write data 10-15+ years if they were retired before they had
mechanically failed.

I've had no problem reading 5.25 disks written in the early 80s, but I
have had problems with the disk drive being inop - I think their
longevity is much longer than you suggest - maybe that's a worst case.
Just as CDs were to have a 10 year max shelf life and the printed ones
(aluminized) seem to (so far) be fine at over 25 years

Floppies can be attacked by some sort of mold. Not only will this trash
the floppy, but trying to read it will gunk up the drive. 5.25" floppies
tend to be worse than 3.5's, either because of changes in the materials,
or better sealing. It's mostly a problem if they've been stored where
the humidity is high and isn't well controlled.

I have a small collection of 5.25's that I would like to at least LOOK at
to see if they are worth transfering. Nobody seems to make a 5.25" to
USB drive. The IT folks at work may have something, and I need to check.


I have plenty of 5.25" floppy drives. Mostly 360KB, but some 1.2 MB.

--
You can't have a sense of humor, if you have no sense.