Date : Mon, 06 Jun 2005 22:34:16 +0100
From : "BeebMaster" <beebmaster@...>
Subject: Re: GoMMC versus hard drive. Which way to go?
I know what you mean about serial transfers! On a slightly non-related
subject (although it least
it gives me a chance to moan about Windows etc which is always good for
the mind) I found it
absolutely impossible to transfer my data from my old Win 95 laptop PC
(with no CD drive) to my new
Win XP desktop machine. Clearly nobody at M****soft has ever thought it
remotely likely that
anybody would ever want to transfer data from an old machine to a new one.
There is no support at
all for anything like this and the only way I could do it was to use Win
HyperTerminal which can
only transfer one file at once. So I had to zip the entire hard drive
on the old machine and send
it over as a single file to the new machine via the serial link at something
like 19200 baud which
took 28 HOURS!!!!!!!! Good old Bill Gates, what a genius.
Best wishes,
Ian
----- Original Message -----
From: Jules Richardson
To: bbc-micro@...
Sent: Mon, 06 Jun 2005 20:19:00 +0000
Subject: Re: [BBC-Micro] GoMMC versus hard drive. Which way to go?
On Mon, 2005-06-06 at 20:51 +0100, BeebMaster wrote:
> I'm definitely in favour of hard drives.
>
> I'm backing 1980s solutions for 1980s machines! You can't beat a good
old ST-506 hard drive
> connected up to the Beeb for that authentic 8-bit feel, not all this
new-fangled modern stuff
being
> bolted onto the BBC - that's cheating!
Heh heh, agreed. I suppose an ideal machine to me would have both; ST506
hard disk for the data but a new-fangled widget for ease of data
transfer to/from a modern machine. I assume that none of the widets
available will do that though - likely due to limitations in DFS code
more than anything I expect.
Transferring stuff via serial port - whilst easy enough - is s l o w...
> A hard drive the size of a shoe box which weighs the equivalent of a
couple of breeze blocks and
> clatters away like nobody's business, beautifully crafted by artisans
and still working after 20
> years
I'm not sure what remaining lifetime to expect out of such drives, but
I've not known a failure on any of the museum systems that are run
regularly. They must be *well* beyond expected lifespan though :-)
cheers
Jules