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Dos 3.3 Question / Dos 5.0 Question

Stone said:
FWIW, if you use that image file I gave you the link to you just restore the image to a disk and you're done. :)
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Not that simple if you are trying to make a 360 disk and you're using a 1.2M disk drive. There is ample documentation and commentary on the web about the related issues, won't repeat them here. Best that a 360 disk drive is used to make 360 disks.
 
Now assuming you boot up your computer with dos 6 and a HD disk drive

The correct format command, with DOS 6 in drive A, to make a 360K disk is

format b: /F:360

WHen prompted insert your target disk in drive "B". DOS 6 gives logical drive assignments A and B for the same physical drive so you can swap disks. You have to keep it straight in your head which drive the computer currently thinks is drive A or B. Whenever asked to put in a disk for drive A, return the DOS 6 disk.

THEN repeat my original instructions. It'd be waaaay easier to do this than try to use image disk to make a 360 disk in a 1.2M drive, if you've never done it before.

All you really need to do with my method, the key to the whole thing, is verify for sure you have an actual 360K formatted disk before you start. That's the big caveat/hurdle. The rest is just DOS commands.

Bill
 
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That still leaves me with the issue of getting the boot disk (6.22 or 3.3) created on a disk that will boot right on the 360K floppy.

I think I have some DD disks put away in a box so I am gonna dig those out but I know for sure that these same disks worked on my 5160 before. Not the same disk but ones from the same set...

More to follow!!
 
vwestlife said:
This may sound silly, but make sure you are actually using a 360K disk. If it has a label, it will usually say "double density" or "500 KB" (the unformatted capacity). It will also usually have a hub ring around the center hole.

Formatting a 1.2 MB high density disk to 360K won't work, as the two densities use incompatible magnetic media. Sometimes formatting a 5¼-inch disk to the wrong density will appear to work at first, but the disk will soon develop read errors and become unusable, or else you'll already encounter lots of bad sectors when attempting to format it.
Click to expand...

By Hub Ring around the middle, do you mean a plastic looking different colored ring? If so, I found my disks

Can I format this one in a 1.2 MB Floppy Drive as 360 with no issues and then give it a try?
 
Yes... it never hurts to try although it's better to format it in a 360K drive and then write to it in a 1.2M drive if necessary.
 
I just verified that the disks I was trying to boot from BillDeg's process was in fact a 360K floppy formatted in a 1.2 MB drive, the only drive type I happen to have for 5 1/4"

Gonna just make a bootable 360K floppy and boot to the DOS 6.22 disk by copying the files onto the disk. Hopefully it works and I can finally get to my HDD on the 5160 as I dont see any other way I can get the needed boot files onto a 360K floppy outside making it bootable / copy the files onto it and give it a shot!
 
I have no way to do that....I have no 5 1/4" drive hooked up to a Windows machine and I'd have to build one to get it working as my main PC in the house has no floppy ports, only one IDE port and that is tied up by a HDD...

So I cant do it...I have a couple floppy drives, but no way to get em hooked up outside the 286 and 5160 that are currently running in my computer area. The 286 has DOS on it and the 5160 I am still trying to get DOS on.

EDIT - I found rawrite2.exe and gonna toss that on the 286 with the image and see if I cant get that image down to the disk and get the friggin trial of DOS boot disks over with!!
 
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Was able to write the image to disk....have to run out, but will be testing it on the 5160 later..

Just formatted the 360K floppy in my 1.2 MB Drive and used RAWRITE2 to get the image on the disk.

Didnt make the disk bootable when I formatted it, not sure if that mattered, but I will find out later...

Thanks for all the help so far, hopefully this part of the journey is over!!
 
Good news - the DOS 6.22 Boot Disk worked out and I was able to boot up the 5160

Bad News - when I run Debug.exe followed by -g=c800:5 I get a Parity Check 1 followed by ??????

Guess the drive is shot right? Oh well, have to toss an ISA Compact Flash Adapter in it then and have two FDD...

Thanks for all your help!
 
Parity check? That sounds more like a controller issue. Well, that error actually comes from the motherboard. Exactly what model of controller is in the system? Either way it doesn't say anything about the drive itself.

If you do "d c800:0000" what do you see?
 
OK,

Progress, then failure...

Booted up to DOS 6.22....ran debug and did the LLF format according to Minus Zero Degrees Site...it worked fine. Did the Zero Data in the first sector...it worked fine....both according to http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/ibm_xebec/ibm_xebec_llf_debug.htm.

Rebooted and tried to run FDISK - Got an Error Reading Fixed Disk

Got psyched that it ran the LLF but then it was not to be...hoping there is some other issue....I could check the controller but I dont think there are any jumper settings on it...

I dont get a 1701 on boot and the LLF only took a few minutes to run

EDIT - I read about checking the cabling and such for drive from the controller card, but if the drive is seen to low level format it, how could the cables be the issue? I have no issues checking that, but dont want to take it out from where it is, move everything around and get in unless I have to....
 
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