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Disk imaging software for DOS?

J

jmnetus

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Feb 23, 2013
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I just received a large collection of old PC software on 360k 5.25" disks. I'm backing up as much of it as hasn't bitrotted onto the CF card I've got running on my 486 board. So far I've just been copying files but I'd like to image a lot of it, especially the bootable disks. So, what software do people here use to create disk images? I found an old dd.exe for DOS that was supposed to do it but it just barfs with "unsupported format" on these 360k disks, for whatever reason.

I guess I could get linux running via loadlin and get images fairly easily that way but I'd rather have a DOS native solution if possible. Any suggestions would be helpful!
 
ImageDisk seems to be the current popular utility for this kind of thing. Teledisk is also widely used, but ImageDisk basically does everything Teledisk does. For 1.4mb disks uncompressed WinImage formats are generally preferred.

Some image utilities will get confused and die on 8-sector or single sided formats - Especially if the disks were created by DOS 1.x and missing the media descriptor information. ImageDisk can handle those OK.

But there is a good chance what you are running in to are copy protected disks, and none of those utilities are designed to deal with that.

ImageDisk and Teledisk can read many non standard formats used in PCs, such as those used on "booters" or non DOS disks. But goofy intentionally damaged sectors will confuse them.

Your best bet for those disks is probably CopyIIPC with Snatchit, but not all copy protection schemes can be written back to a disk with a standard PC disk controller. The only way to be sure is to write it back to a blank disk and test it.

BTW, Linux wont help as programs to read non-standard stuff need direct access to the disk controller chip.

In your archives, I strongly recommend including disk dumps from multiple disk utilities where possible, as well as any raw files readable from DOS.

Oh, and to be sure these disks images last forever, upload them to teh innernets :)
 
Yeah, I guess I could get WinImage going. I'd have to get Windows running on this thing first though...

Thanks for the suggestions all. ImageDisk looks good, and I'll try some of the other stuff as well, see what gives good results. I don't think many of these are copy protected but I could be wrong.

(Oh, and I had seen DiskCopy around but mostly ignored these suggestions because I thought they were talking about the DOS utility diskcopy. Looks like this one is the DR-DOS version and can create images? Cool...)
 
I use an old Dual P3-600 system with 3.5" and 5.25" drives to image old DOS disks, then dump them to a server (easier to backup there).

There are old copy protected programs from the very early PC days, you are better off looking for cracked copies on the net then trying to back those up (or copy protection removing programs to copy the disk).
 
jmnetus said:
Oh, and I had seen DiskCopy around but mostly ignored these suggestions because I thought they were talking about the DOS utility diskcopy. Looks like this one is the DR-DOS version and can create images? Cool...
Click to expand...
No it's not the DOS utility. It's probably the DR-DOS version of DiskImage 2.01 that has been repackaged.
 
I always use diskimage utility of DCOPY.EXE for DOS (Normal Standard Track), Teledisk (Simple Copy Protected), TransCopy (Strong Copy Protected) from many of 5.25" disks
 
I use Mike Brutman's dsk2img program for imaging disks in DOS. Its great because it allows multiple retries in case a sector on your disk is hard to read.

If you use Windows, make sure your disks are write-protected. Windows likes to rewrite the first sector of a disk. While it ordinarily does no harm, it does make your disks impure.
 
WINIMAGE <-- Most popular Disk Imaging Tools on Windows. But all disks must be write protected! (Great Hierophant's mentioned this fact. That is right. Boot Sector / each directory or file attributes enable to be modified on windows without protection.) (No suppport for dumping copy protected disk)

DCOPY.EXE / DSK2IMG / WIMAGE.EXE <-- Disk Imaging Tools for DOS (No suppport for dumping copy protected disk)

Teledisk <-- Disk Imaging Tools for simple copy protected disk. (Not all the copy protected disks are dumped correctly. But many of copy protected disks are dumped.) / File format is .TD0
--> Recommend version is 2.1x (Early version may not work correctly without old 808x/80286 based CPU)

ImageDisk <-- Disk Imaging Tools for simple copy protected disk. (Not all the copy protected disks are dumped correctly. But many of copy protected disks are dumped.) / File format is .IMD

Snatchit <-- Disk Imaging Tools for simple copy protected disk. (Not all the copy protected disks are dumped correctly. But many of copy protected disks are dumped.) / File format is .CP2
--> But I don't recommend to use this without Write Protect disk. This program enable to destroy disk. This works under 80386SX CPU.

TransCopy <-- This software needs Copy II PC Option Board or TransCopy Board. This is very strong copying and disk imaging solution on DOS.
--> This runs on Pentium II with 440BX well. Most of copy protected disks are dumped correctly except laser burn hole disk and 2HD disks with copy protected. / File format is .IMG

Kryroflux <-- This is also very strong copying and disk imaging (but the files are large and seperated.) solution via USB port on Windows.
--> To dump copy protected disks on modern PC, this solution must be best choice.


I have over 1000 kinds of IBM PC 5.25" Game software including 2HD.
(Normal : 700+ / Copy Protected : 300+)

I've dumped almost of my disks and run on emulator.(PCE / DOSBOX)

PCE is IBM PC 5150 emulator to support copy protected disk image. (.td0 .imd .pfdc)

I think no emulator exists to support copy protected disk image just like PCE.

In other word, to run copy protected disks on DOSBOX, crack needs.
But on PCE, no needed to crack image, because PCE supports FDC of INT-13 well.

pfdc.exe from PCE emulator is nice tools to convert and edit disk image tool including copy protected disk image.

I've dumped many of TransCopy image (.IMG).
It can be converted to .pfdc .td0 .imd.

I'm always check TransCopy image if the dump is correct or attributes of each track and sector.

Only to do is pfdc doesn't support Kryroflux's disk image.
 
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Two issues about the copy protected disks :

1. What may work on the IBM PCE emulator in td0 or imd format may not work on real hardware.

2. I believe Kyroflux may read and write standard IMA files but it has no write support for its ipf format intended to replicate copy protection. Without write support, the product and software is of little more use than Winimage.
 
Great Hierophant said:
Two issues about the copy protected disks :

1. What may work on the IBM PCE emulator in td0 or imd format may not work on real hardware.

2. I believe Kyroflux may read and write standard IMA files but it has no write support for its ipf format intended to replicate copy protection. Without write support, the product and software is of little more use than Winimage.
Click to expand...


I agree.

I dump many of my 5.25" disks.
A few of software has copy protection.
So I dump a few of copy protected sotware as follows.

1. Standard Disk Image with non crack.
2. Copy protected Image (.td0 or .imd) to run PCE emulator.
3. Standard Disk Image with cracked.
4. TransCopy Image (*.img)


I don't have Kryoflux. If Kryoflux supports to copy and dump copy protected disks well, it should be very powerfull copy and backup solution.
 
If Atari ST writing works, then it may be possible to write copy protected PC games, as the disk formats are essentially (at least the 720K disks) or almost identical.
 
fs5500 said:
I agree.

I dump many of my 5.25" disks.
A few of software has copy protection.
So I dump a few of copy protected sotware as follows.

1. Standard Disk Image with non crack.
2. Copy protected Image (.td0 or .imd) to run PCE emulator.
3. Standard Disk Image with cracked.
4. TransCopy Image (*.img)
Click to expand...

I usually do something like this too.

One comment for you, fs5500: I got one of the images you dumped and you seem to be forcing 29h tracks, and all options on (keep track length, weak bits, copy across index, etc.). This is not recommended because many times it is overkill and the resulting image file is not guaranteed to write back to a diskette! In fact, forcing some options will actually make the image impossible to write back to disk on systems that aren't yours. So, my suggestion is to use the defaults when making an image, and only start turning stuff on/off if the defaults don't work.
 
Trixter said:
How? Is there a link to some utility?

That was an extremely thorough post, BTW. You listed everything exactly as I would have. Excellent work :)
Click to expand...


pfdc.exe of PCE emulator can convert TC image to .pfdc or other format.
But to convert TC image to other, you must rename *.IMG as *.TC.

http://www.hampa.ch/pce/download.html

pfdc.exe is included on bin folder.

USAGE :

pfdc file1.tc file1.pfdc

It is very simple case.
But pfdc.exe can't convert .pfdc to .tc back.
Also pfdc.exe support to convert .cp2 to .pfdc .td0 .imd or other.

If any disk image includes strange(?) track or missed track, you can edit this too.

But it is not so easy to do this.
 
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Trixter said:
I usually do something like this too.

One comment for you, fs5500: I got one of the images you dumped and you seem to be forcing 29h tracks, and all options on (keep track length, weak bits, copy across index, etc.). This is not recommended because many times it is overkill and the resulting image file is not guaranteed to write back to a diskette! In fact, forcing some options will actually make the image impossible to write back to disk on systems that aren't yours. So, my suggestion is to use the defaults when making an image, and only start turning stuff on/off if the defaults don't work.
Click to expand...

Yes, I don't dump disks to 29h (Track 42) except Gunship or other copyprotected game.
Gunship (429.01 , 429.03 , 429.04) must be dumped by Teledisk or TC from 0 to 41h.
Because INSTALL program seems to check hidden Track 40/41.

A few of copy protected program includes any simple information on Track 40.
 
GUI tool can convert transcopy / teledisk to standard floppy image. It also has a nice visual disk layout imager that lets you see strange gaps, unusual tracks and other anomalies. Supports other disk systems too.
http://hxc2001.free.fr/floppy_drive_emulator/


When converting to normal image though, sometimes it runs into problems with strange disks that have like a long sequence of 512 bytes - then a 1024 byte block - then normal 512 bytes. It may get confused and write funky data around those tricky copy protection areas - it usually messes up file contents after that point.


Thanks for the great PCE emulator btw! Handy for running software at more realistic speeds, or some pesky bootloader games.
 
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