Swapmeet finds

From: Don Maslin <donm_at_cts.com>
Date: Sun Sep 27 19:47:20 1998

On Sun, 27 Sep 1998, John Lawson wrote:

> > > 2) A Jonos Escort portable, running CP/M 3.0.
  
> I've not had the time yet to take the case apart. This particular
> Escort has only a 1/2 ht HD and matching Syquest removable cartridge
> drive. There is a banner screen on boot-up that lists drives A: - G:,
> it calls out A: as a 'Syquest 5 Mb' and also B: the same. C: - F:
> are called out as 'Sony' and G: says '8 subsystem'. There are no
> floppies physically with the system, and BIOS issues the expected
> complaints upon trying to access these letters.

C: - F: would suggest that they had a whole bank of floppy drives on it!
And the G: '8 subsystem suggests another floppy controller. None of any
size presently installed, I take it.
 
> What concerns me is the Syquest cart drive, and what data may be
> lurking thereon. BIOS says bad things about 'Data table not found'
> and also 'controller error'. The cart drive does spin up and a
> pattern of access can be heard (the same each time), but no joy as
> far as CP/M is concerned. I don't intend to format the cartridge
> until I can come up with some blank/recyclable ones that I can back
> up the HD to.

Most likely, both HDs are off of the same HD controller as the early
Syquests were ST-506 interface. So, since the fixed drive boots, it is
more likely that the Syquest is the problem rather than the controller.
I think that a very early move should be to open it up and see what is
connected to what, cleaning connections as you go.

> A question for anyone who might know is: are the current Syquest
> carts still compatible with this unit? (c. 1983) If not.. has
> anyone some old ones they'd like to sell/trade?

I seriously doubt it! The cartridges are, as I'm sure you know, factory
formatted to lay down servo tracks that the drive can follow. You should
not perform a low level format on the cartridge. Check it with FDISK and
see if it will recognize it.

Sysquest made their early drives in 5mb and 10mb capacities. The problem
that I always had was that I wasn't smart enough to tell the 5s from the
10s and they were not interchangeable. There were no obvious markings to
differentiate them.

> Also: One key is broken on the keyboard; the upper right
corner > one. What is it's function?

Sorry, not a clue.
                                                 - don
 
Received on Sun Sep 27 1998 - 19:47:20 BST