archiving Heath H8/H89 hard-sectored disks

From: Dan Lanciani <ddl-cctech_at_danlan.com>
Date: Tue Aug 31 14:41:05 2004

"Jay West" <jwest_at_classiccmp.org> wrote:

|It was written...
|> I've come up with a way to read Heath hard-sectored disks with a
|1797-style
|> controller (with some modifications). I've now archived all of my old
|disks
|> with only one unrecoverable error in an unused sector (not bad for media
|that
|> is approaching 30 years in age). I do seem to have run through *drives*
|at
|> an alarming rate, though I hope that the cleaning disks I have on order
|will
|> restore some of them. Is anyone interested in:
|
|I have a huge cache of H8/H89/Z100 software, half a room full at the least
|(the other half of the room being documentation for same). Where are you
|located?

Gloucester, MA

|I'd rather not ship it all, but would welcome someone to come over
|and archive the bits.

I'd rather not move my computer, though. It's already reaching that
sensitive-to-shock stage, especially the Ethernet card. (Yes, my H100
has Ethernet, which is very convenient for the archiving process.)

|I would bet I have more than a few spare hard sector drives as well, many
|new in the box.

That might be good, since my cleaning kits arrived and they do not appear
to restore the drives in question. :( Of course, they just use isopropyl
alcohol which was never as good as the (now evil) chlorinated hydrocarbon
solvents. I wonder if there is something stronger I can use?

                                Dan Lanciani
                                ddl_at_danlan.*com
Received on Tue Aug 31 2004 - 14:41:05 BST