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Copy file from floppy to different floppy in same drive?

T

themaritimegirl

Experienced Member
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Jun 15, 2011
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NB, Canada
Hello all,

I wouldn't doubt there is a simple solution to this problem, but nevertheless I can't figure it out. The title pretty much says it all - my XT clone has both 3.5" and 5.25" floppy drives, and I want to copy a file from a diskette in the 3.5" drive to a different diskette in the same drive, but I have no idea how! I can't use the COPY ... B: command or else it will try to copy it to the 5.25" drive.

I realize I could temporarily disconnect the 5.25" drive or copy the file to a 5.25" diskette and then copy the file to the intended 3.5" diskette, but surely there must be a simpler way to do this?

Thanks,
-Trent
 
You should be able to do it with a command along the lines of COPY A:<filename.ext> A: which would store the file in memory and prompt you to install the second disk.

Be careful, with big files, multiple disk swaps will be needed and it becomes easy to get confused with the order. Make a mistake and you can ruin both disks.

If you can, create a ramdisk large enough to store a floppy's entire data and use that as intermediate step.
 
Tried that, I get "File cannot be copied onto itself". I can do the RAMdisk, but that requires getting VDISK.SYS or RAMDRIVE.SYS from one of my 3.5" floppies to my startup 3.5" floppy... :p

I guess i'll go the 3.5-to-5.25-back-to-3.5 route for now. Or try the RAMdisk.

Thanks,
-Trent
 
You could use DRIVER.SYS to map a second logical drive onto the physical drive, and then COPY A:filename D: (or whatever letter DRIVER.SYS assigns).
 
Actually, what you original suggested is the most straightforward way to do what you need. If your file isn't too large, you could also make a RAMDISK to hold it. Obvious tricks like SUBST C:=A:\ won't produce the desired effect.

You could also use DEBUG to copy the file if the file isn't too large:

DEBUG source.fil
(change your floppies)
-w
-q

However, if you use this to copy an .EXE file, you'll have to rename it to something such as .DAT before you copy it and then rename the result. (DEBUG special-cases .EXE and .COM files)
 
Well, I found a blank 5.25" diskette among my 41 of them, so that will work fine to to exchange data between my 3.5" diskettes. I could have sworn there was an MS-DOS command for this sort of situation, but if not, I shall consider this solved. :)

Thanks for your help,
-Trent
 
Chuck(G) said:
Same problem--how does the OP get what he needs on the disk to begin with if the single program isn't the only thing?
Click to expand...

Perhaps I missed something. Diskcopy will gladly copy diskettes in the same drive. I often copy files that way. In fact when I first started playing with DOS I used to format diskettes that way because my format program was corrupted. It doesn't matter what's extra. Whatever you don't want can be deleted just fine. Use attrib on h/s/r files if needed.
 
Uh, yeah, Ole and so will a host of other programs. I happen to use COPYQM for that purpose, but that's just me.

But that wasn't the problem as I understand it. He needed to extract a single file and put it onto another disk that I'll assume has a system (of possibly a different version) and other programs on it.
 
I know I'm digging up a (few month) old thread, but you CAN copy files (or whole directories) disk to disk in the same drive with just DOS (I have only done this on 6.22, but probably works on other versions), there is one caveat, you can only have one floppy drive connected in the system. You simply use "copy a:\file.ext b:", when you only have one drive installed DOS will redirect B: calls to the only floppy drive, and prompt you with the message "Insert disk for drive b: and press enter" so copying from A: to B: will prompt you each time you need to switch disks (which is anywhere from once to what feels like a million times depending on your file size). You can use this "B: drive redirection" to your advantage with commands other than copy as well, you can "SYS A: B:" to too copy system files from one disk to another.
 
Stone said:
This is what DOS calls the Phantom Floppy and yes, it works on all versions.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the clarification, I had never personally used it on anything older than 6.22, so I wasn't sure if that was only something newer versions did.
 
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