From: mpowers@vt.edu (Michael Powers) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Mon, 13 Jul 1998 18:19:52 GMT Organization: NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA, USA Lines: 33 Message-ID: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> NNTP-Posting-Host: abcfd1.larc.nasa.gov X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/32.235 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!news-peer.gip.net!news-penn.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!uwm.edu!lll-winken.llnl.gov!reznor.larc.nasa.gov!not-for-mail Yeah, I know this caused a flamewar last year, but I'm hoping that people who have a beef with underpaid tech support folks who have to deal with the Luser Legions can just not post to the thread. Um. Anyway, after alienating half the audience... Wandering through the pages of stories about wacky phone calls to tech support, I notice that many of them are the same. Often _exactly_ the same. Reported by--as far as I can determine--different people. Does this sound like an urban legend to you folks? (And if these are in a FAQ somewhere, let me know where so I can be content.) Some of the most common that I've seen: User crams multiple disks into a single drive without removing the previous ones ("It didn't say take them out!") User complains about computer not operating during power failure. ("Is it plugged in?" "Hang on, I'll get a torch and check.") The ever-popular "foot pedal" story. Tech: "Insert your disk in the drive and close the door." User: (closes office door) User complains about coffee-mug holder on computer being broken. Has anyone ever seen these? I'm trying to pick ones that are so amazingly implausible that I can't see how they could be true. Mike Powers ###### From: mitcho Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Fri, 17 Jul 1998 06:53:49 -0700 Organization: Goat Hill Rat Central Lines: 30 Message-ID: <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> NNTP-Posting-Host: 198.92.55.14 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0C-CISCOIS8 (Win95; U) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!su-news-feed4.bbnplanet.com!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!su-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!news-master.cisco.com!not-for-mail Michael Powers wrote: > > Yeah, I know this caused a flamewar last year, but I'm hoping that > people who have a beef with underpaid tech support folks who have to > deal with the Luser Legions can just not post to the thread. > [snip stuff we've seen before, many many times] > > Has anyone ever seen these? I'm trying to pick ones that are so > amazingly implausible that I can't see how they could be true. Here's one I think is true, but it might just be a legend. There's this guy who hangs around a Usenet newsgroup long enough to get a feel for the sorts of threads which are welcomed there, as well as those that are not. So one day he posts an article to the newsgroup, in which he declares that he *knows* he's about to start one of the unwelcome threads, but doesn't care and wants to do it anyway. The kicker is, though I can't confirm it, this guy will probably get all indignant when other people post to tell him he's a disruptive jerk. See? Pretty unbelievable, I admit, but since it can be true it must be true. Mitcho -------------------------------------------------------------------- mitcho@netcom.com Urban Redneck of Goat Hill, California TR15 2BU http://www.employees.org/~ozyman o http://www.urbanlegends.com ###### From: "George R. Gonzalez" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Fri, 17 Jul 1998 09:36:44 -0500 Organization: SkyPoint Communications, Inc. Lines: 40 Message-ID: <6oo0uj$lsu$1@shadow.skypoint.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: dial031.skypoint.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.2106.4 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.2106.4 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!newspeer.monmouth.com!newsfeed.concentric.net!news.winternet.com!skypoint.com!not-for-mail mitcho wrote in message <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com>... >Michael Powers wrote: >> >> Yeah, I know this caused a flamewar last year, but I'm hoping that >> people who have a beef with underpaid tech support folks who have to >> deal with the Luser Legions can just not post to the thread. >> >[snip stuff we've seen before, many many times] >> >> Has anyone ever seen these? I'm trying to pick ones that are so >> amazingly implausible that I can't see how they could be true. I've opened up computers and found diskettes stuck between the disk drive slots. Also in the Mac II's, they had little plastic covers over the unused floppy slots-- quite often you'd see these pushed in (they snapped in from the back, and not too securely) lying on the motherboard, alongside a diskette. Not to mention the folks that would push a Mac desktop bus connector into a DIN socket, or vice-versa. Thuis is partially forgivable as the connectors look alike. But you have to REALLY push on it to bend or break off the pins and get the connector seated. I've seen people take the mouse and wave it in the air. Or use it with the cord facing them, and with some ability, so they'd obviously been using it that way for quite some time and had gotten used to the backwards behavior. My favorite is the co-worker (a really smart woman) but she got fooled by CP/M. The disk was full and the DIR command reported "disk: 0K". She thought it meant "Okay" and came to ask me "Why cant I write to this disk? It says it's "okay". ###### From: lstowell@pyrtech.mis.pyramid.com (Lon Stowell) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 17 Jul 1998 14:32:18 -0700 Organization: Pyramid Technology Corporation Lines: 22 Message-ID: <6ooft2$oir@pyrtech.mis.pyramid.com> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: pyrtech.mis.pyramid.com Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!news2.ais.net!jamie!ais.net!uunet!in5.uu.net!news.pyramid.com!not-for-mail >Michael Powers wrote: >> >> Yeah, I know this caused a flamewar last year, but I'm hoping that >> people who have a beef with underpaid tech support folks who have to >> deal with the Luser Legions can just not post to the thread. > In article <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com>, mitcho wrote: >Here's one I think is true, but it might just be a legend. > >There's this guy who hangs around a Usenet newsgroup long enough to get >a feel for the sorts of threads which are welcomed there, as well as >those that are not. So one day he posts an article to the newsgroup, in >which he declares that he *knows* he's about to start one of the >unwelcome threads, but doesn't care and wants to do it anyway. The >kicker is, though I can't confirm it, this guy will probably get all >indignant when other people post to tell him he's a disruptive jerk. Hmmm, as part of my kinder and gentler personality, I would like to light the 1001th point of light and offer the alternative suggestion that perhaps he is such a cyberklutz he can't spell or understand the meaning of the name "alt.folklore.computers". ###### From: Kevin McQuiggin Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Fri, 17 Jul 1998 21:32:26 -0700 Organization: Simon Fraser University Lines: 10 Message-ID: <35B0255A.1413@sfu.ca> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> Reply-To: mcquiggi@sfu.ca NNTP-Posting-Host: rs27-annex3.sfu.ca Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0 (Win95; I) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!island.idirect.com!cyclone.mbnet.mb.ca!news.bc.net!news.sfu.ca!not-for-mail Michael Powers wrote: > Some of the most common that I've seen: > > User crams multiple disks into a single drive without removing the > previous ones ("It didn't say take them out!") I've seen this one while doing tech support where I work. This was with a 3.5" floppy drive. Kevin ###### From: l.lopez@worldnet.att.net (Max Froedge) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 18 Jul 1998 02:37:14 GMT Organization: AT&T WorldNet Services Lines: 16 Message-ID: <6op1oq$mt2@bgtnsc02.worldnet.att.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> <6oo0uj$lsu$1@shadow.skypoint.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: 12.66.4.179 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset=US-ASCII X-Newsreader: WinVN 0.99.8 (16bit) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!wn3feed!worldnet.att.net!135.173.83.225!attworldnet!newsadm In article <6oo0uj$lsu$1@shadow.skypoint.net>, grg@foundsys.com says... > > >I've opened up computers and found diskettes stuck between the disk drive >slots. Been guilty of that on a tower system. Tried to put a 5 1/4 inch floppy in while talking to a co-worker.... It was blank and the I suppose it still is. Went right between the slot covers. My mother-in-law had not seen a 5 1/4 inch drive before and stuck a CD-ROM in it.... Max ###### From: sean@panix.com (Sean Willard) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sat, 18 Jul 1998 04:27:53 -0700 Organization: Dis Associates Lines: 27 Message-ID: <1dccdty.7041c21c8m078N@istk-port1800.jps.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35B0255A.1413@sfu.ca> NNTP-Posting-Host: istk-port1800.jps.net X-Newsreader: MacSOUP 2.3.3 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!panix!news.panix.com!sean Kevin McQuiggin illustrates precisely the danger of which mitcho spoke: > I've seen this one while doing tech support where I work. This was with > a 3.5" floppy drive. Kevin, we don't care. Did you hear me? WE DON'T CARE. Go back and CAREFULLY READ Mike's ill-conceived post, and note the bit where he wrote > Wandering through the pages of stories about wacky phone calls to tech > support, I notice that many of them are the same. Often _exactly_ the > same. Reported by--as far as I can determine--different people. Does > this sound like an urban legend to you folks? Does this sound like he wants to hear *your* personal observations of similar incidents? No, he wants to explore the ULishness of them, the possibility that these stories are a form of Xeroxlore (which of course they are). Attention, all you good a.f.c folk: if you really *really* REALLY can't resist the urge to post each and every one of your own experiences with lusers, SET FOLLOWUPS out of AFU. Sean "Thank you kindly" Willard -- Blame Sean Willard for http://www.urbanlegends.com/afu.faq/ ###### From: keithlim@pobox.com (keith lim) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers Date: Sat, 18 Jul 1998 15:55:35 +0800 Organization: Kentucky Fried Centipede Lines: 19 Message-ID: <1dcdc28.8k7p0229pq82N@qtns03254.singnet.com.sg> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> <6ooft2$oir@pyrtech.mis.pyramid.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: qtns00306.singnet.com.sg X-Face: $7x-h?/si,2gH7Sfk7K\UFkv@LYf8lEa5-%Wmu%nZ/25YL[.[vy|aR,l$km~Z < wrote: > >Michael Powers wrote: > >So one day he posts an article to the newsgroup, in > >which he declares that he *knows* he's about to start one of the > >unwelcome threads, but doesn't care and wants to do it anyway. > > [...] perhaps he is such a cyberklutz he can't > spell or understand the meaning of the name "alt.folklore.computers". Or perhaps he didn't cyber-notice that the thread was cyber-crossposted to alt.folklore.urban, which is somewhat less cyber-tolerant than a.f.c about cyberhashed-to-death threads. (Note followups.) -- keith "the cyberchoice of cyberprefix for cyberweenies" lim keithlim@pobox.com http://pobox.com/~keithlim/ ###### From: justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sat, 18 Jul 1998 16:38:00 GMT Organization: Ability Online Support Network Lines: 20 Message-ID: <900780805@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: ablelink.org NNTP-Posting-Date: 18 Jul 1998 13:04:53 EDT Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!ubnnews.unisource.ch!News.Amsterdam.UnisourceCS!newshunter.cosy.sbg.ac.at!cosy.sbg.ac.at!news-feed.inet.tele.dk!bofh.vszbr.cz!uninett.no!newsfeed.nacamar.de!nntp.news.xara.net!xara.net!baron.netcom.net.uk!netcom.net.uk!tor-nx1.netcom.ca!tor-nn1.netcom.ca!ntserv1!justin.frim l.lopez@worldnet.att.net wrote: [snip] MF>My mother-in-law had not seen a 5 1/4 inch drive before and stuck >a CD-ROM in it.... One of my friends brought his computer to my house for repair and I found a 3.5" floppy stuck in the 5.25" drive! The disk was almost right about the hub motor, and it had also pushed up on the motor start switch, so while the computer was on the 5.25" drive hub motor was spinning constantly. I ended up cutting a circular groove almost right through the 3.5" disk jacket! TTYL, Justin Frim justin.frim@ablelink.org * 1st 2.00 ~ AbleLINK - Help the kids help themselves..., by modem! ###### From: jshinal@mindspring.com (John S. Shinal) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sat, 18 Jul 1998 19:17:37 GMT Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 55 Message-ID: <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> NNTP-Posting-Host: user-38ld8gq.dialup.mindspring.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Server-Date: 18 Jul 1998 19:16:18 GMT X-Newsreader: Forte Agent .99g/32.339 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!newsfeed.xcom.net!feed2.news.erols.com!erols!newsfeed.internetmci.com!207.69.200.13!news.mindspring.net!firehose.mindspring.com!not-for-mail On Mon, 13 Jul 1998, mpowers@vt.edu (Michael Powers) wrote: >Wandering through the pages of stories about wacky phone calls to tech >support, I notice that many of them are the same. Often _exactly_ the >same. Reported by--as far as I can determine--different people. Does >this sound like an urban legend to you folks? > >User crams multiple disks into a single drive without removing the >previous ones ("It didn't say take them out!") Yes, this ACTUALLY HAPPENED with one of my customers. I was a principal in a reseller of clone PCs in North Carolina (eastern USA) for about 3 yrs. We were a HIGH VOLUME discount dealer. It was a Word Perfect 6.x install, and I took the call. The user complained that "the drive won't take disk 3." I asked exactly what the symptom was, and she repeated, "The drive won't take the disk." Triage time. We were constantly swamped. So, thinking it was a faulty floppy, I had her bring it in. There were two 5 1/4 floppy disks already inside drive A:. Yes, this is the truth. You can't be too explicit for some people. (Plug keyboard into keyboard connector...). A similar call was that "The drive won't accept the disk." This occured most notably on two occasions. One time, with the customer's PC on my bench, and Our Hero (Me) on the case, I was surprised to find I couldn't insert a floppy into the 5 1/4 " drive. Peering into the narrow disk drive slot, I saw a shiny silver ribbon reflecting back at me. Careful use of hemostats enabled me to extract a CD from the drive. No bleedin' wonder. This was from a professional office, too... The second incident was trickier...a business card had been folded and inserted into the 3.5" drive by the customer's toddler son. Just like daddy...that kid has a future ! NOT AN URBAN LEGEND. People actually DO this stuff ! The most aggravating are the people that won't admit they made a mistake - and I'm Mr. Diplomacy when I explain it to them. $60 an hour isn't enough when it comes to the select few that do the most unbelievable stuff... I recall the guy who wanted money off on a $65 motherboard/CPU because he'd bought a defective one from some fly-by-night dealer at the flea market. "But can't you give me a break ? The one I got at the flea market didn't work !" It's a shame, but sometimes you have to fire a customer... John S. Shinal jshinal@mindspring.com ###### From: sbarker.nospam@uconect.net Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sun, 19 Jul 1998 03:08:56 GMT Organization: "SNET dial access service" Lines: 22 Message-ID: <35b162f6.1602449411@news.uconect.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35B0255A.1413@sfu.ca> NNTP-Posting-Host: ma28.uconect.net X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/32.235 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-fra.maz.net!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!howland.erols.net!news-peer.sprintlink.net!news-backup-west.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!204.60.0.212!nntp.snet.net!usenet On Fri, 17 Jul 1998 21:32:26 -0700, Kevin McQuiggin wrote: >Michael Powers wrote: >> Some of the most common that I've seen: >> >> User crams multiple disks into a single drive without removing the >> previous ones ("It didn't say take them out!") > >I've seen this one while doing tech support where I work. This was with >a 3.5" floppy drive. My personal favorite, people who put CD's in their 5 1/4 disk drives. Those are fun to try and get out. I saw that happen more then once, I'm kinda glad they did away with the 5 1/4 floppies. Sue "I have been asked for the keyboard with the any key" Barker If you are a dyslexic agnostic insomniac, do you lie awake at night wondering if there really is a dog? ###### From: slavins.at.hearsay.demon.co.uk@localhost (Simon Slavin) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sun, 19 Jul 1998 23:56:27 +0100 Organization: First Sirian Bank Message-ID: References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: hearsay.demon.co.uk X-NNTP-Posting-Host: hearsay.demon.co.uk:194.222.24.177 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 900889012 nnrp-04:4299 NO-IDENT hearsay.demon.co.uk:194.222.24.177 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net Lines: 19 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!news.demon.co.uk!demon!hearsay.demon.co.uk!user In article <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com>, jshinal@mindspring.com (John S. Shinal) wrote: > NOT AN URBAN LEGEND. People actually DO this stuff ! Please see the FAQ for alt.folklore.urban at . In the FAQ is our definition of an arban legend. Urban legends don't have to be about things that are false. There is no argument as to whether the incident happened or not. The argument is as to whether people want to read yet another report of it or not. Simon. -- Simon Slavin -- c/o junk-email-trap. | I have lurked in this wilderness for | forty days and forty nights. I have -------------------------------------+ shattered my rod upon Deja News, and rob6677@atsign@aol.com (Rob Heublein): upon the FAQ have I split my staff. ###### From: "Steve Caskey" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 20 Jul 1998 00:32:25 GMT Organization: n. organized body or system or society Lines: 32 Message-ID: <01bdb375$f3dceed0$140a69c0@furrfu> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: furrfu.minedu.govt.nz Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Microsoft Internet News 4.70.1161 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!dca1-hub1.news.digex.net!digex!intgwlon.nntp.telstra.net!news.telstra.net.nz!news.wlg.netlink.net.nz!not-for-mail John S. Shinal wrote: > It was a Word Perfect 6.x install, and I took the call. The > user complained that "the drive won't take disk 3." I asked exactly > what the symptom was, and she repeated, "The drive won't take the > disk." Triage time. We were constantly swamped. So, thinking it was a > faulty floppy, I had her bring it in. > > There were two 5 1/4 floppy disks already inside drive A:. Not that I disbelieve you (truly) but with disk 1 wedged in there how could the installation program have read disk 2 to the point where it had cause to request disk 3? I'm sure there's a simple explanation. > Yes, this is the truth. You can't be too explicit for some > people. (Plug keyboard into keyboard connector...). When the keyboard symbol by the keyboard connector doesn't look much like a keyboard, and the mouse icon on the mouse connector doesn't look at all like a mouse, and the user is a complete neophyte, this instruction is still completely useless. If the computer case has pretty little pictures on it instead of words, the instructions better do so too. >[...] > The second incident was trickier...a business card had been > folded and inserted into the 3.5" drive by the customer's toddler son. > Just like daddy...that kid has a future ! Been there, extracted that. Steve "the mouse port icon is the one that looks like a constipated budgerigar; the keyboard's the toothbrush in guacamole dip" Caskey ####### Message-ID: <35B34850.10B2D4F7@danet.com> Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 09:38:24 -0400 From: "J. Benz" X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: pc-135.danet.com Lines: 34 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!newshub.northeast.verio.net!newsserver.jvnc.net!news.nauticom.net!pc-135.danet.com John S. Shinal wrote: > On Mon, 13 Jul 1998, mpowers@vt.edu (Michael Powers) wrote: > > >User crams multiple disks into a single drive without removing the > >previous ones ("It didn't say take them out!") > > Yes, this ACTUALLY HAPPENED with one of my customers. I was a > principal in a reseller of clone PCs in North Carolina (eastern USA) > for about 3 yrs. We were a HIGH VOLUME discount dealer. > > It was a Word Perfect 6.x install, and I took the call. The > user complained that "the drive won't take disk 3." I asked exactly > what the symptom was, and she repeated, "The drive won't take the > disk." Triage time. We were constantly swamped. So, thinking it was a > faulty floppy, I had her bring it in. > > There were two 5 1/4 floppy disks already inside drive A:. > > The second incident was trickier...a business card had > been > folded and inserted into the 3.5" drive by the customer's toddler son. > Just like daddy...that kid has a future ! > > NOT AN URBAN LEGEND. People actually DO this stuff ! > > Yes, they do. I had a similar incident with "Insert disk 2 in drive A". Also, my kid once stuffed a whole envelope of photographs into the floppy slot of my PC. ###### From: losergeek@earthlink.net (RadioFlyr) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 11:32:17 -0400 Organization: like I wish Lines: 23 Message-ID: References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 1cust233.tnt2.nyc3.da.uu.net Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newsfeed.uk.ibm.net!ibm.net!europa.clark.net!207.172.3.49!feed2.news.erols.com!erols!newsfeed1.earthlink.net!nntp.earthlink.net!1cust233.tnt2.nyc3.da.uu.net!user I work at a public computer lab in a library. Managing disks (and discs) can be very tricky. Of course there are the patrons who put 3.5" disks in upside down, backwards, ets., with no ill effect, but there are also those who force the disks when they don't just pop in, bending the heads and causing other structural damage. The other day somebody reported to me that the CD (in its caddy - we are publicly funded) wouldn't fit, so I investigated. Something was preventing the caddy from being inserted. I looked into the bay and notices that some previous patron had inserted a CD without a caddy. A few years ago I was called downstairs after it was reported that a patron's 5.25" disk wouldn't read and it's lost in the drive. When I got downstairs I found that there was no disk in the 5.25" drive. I asked the patron about it and she said that she put it in "there (pointing at the thin space between the 5.25" and the 3.5" drives)." I had to take the computer apart (an old 286) and retrieve the disk for the patron. A 6" strip of book tape prevented that from happening again. John "I keep getting the same tech support UL in the mail" Hibbert ---------------------------------------------------------------- Visit the "Little web server," || Also my other pages: A Mac SE serving the web, at: || http://www.lpl.org/people/gianni http://149.96.1.33 || http://149.96.1.135 ###### From: Mike Swaim Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-980226 (UNIX) (FreeBSD/2.2.6-RELEASE (i386)) Lines: 10 Message-ID: Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 16:53:52 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.127.0.132 NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 11:53:52 CDT Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!feed2.news.erols.com!erols!nntp.giganews.com!news.giganews.com.POSTED!not-for-mail In alt.folklore.computers Michael Powers wrote: : User complains about coffee-mug holder on computer being broken. : Has anyone ever seen these? Abort-Retry-Fail in PC Magazine featured a picture from AutoWeek showing the cup holder in use. It's now tacked to my cubical wall. -- Mike Swaim, Avatar of Chaos: Disclaimer:I sometimes lie. Home: swaim@c-com.net Alum: swaim@rice.edu Quote: "Boingie"^4 Y,W&D ###### From: rich@vax2.concordia.ca (Rich Lafferty) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 20 Jul 1998 16:57:29 GMT Organization: Concordia University, Montreal, Canada Lines: 33 Approved: perhaps Message-ID: <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: alcor.concordia.ca NNTP-Posting-User: rich Mail-Copies-To: never X-No-Ahbou: yes X-Grep-Bait: qmail, Kibo, Wollmann, meow, Archimedes Plutonium X-Disclaimer: I speak for myself. X-Newsreader: slrn (0.9.4.3 UNIX) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!bignews.mediaways.net!news-lond.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!sunqbc.risq.qc.ca!newsflash.concordia.ca!not-for-mail RadioFlyr wrote: >I work at a public computer lab in a library. >Managing disks (and discs) can be very tricky. Of course there are the >patrons who put 3.5" disks in upside down, backwards, ets., with no ill >effect, There are eight possible ways to insert a 3.5" diskette. Four of those ways -- top-right-forward, top-left-forward, bottom-right- forward, and bottom-left-forward -- are not feasible because the disk is slightly wider than it is long. Three more of those ways -- top-back-forward, bottom-front-forward, and bottom-back-forward -- put a pointed corner in the front right-hand corner, such that the disk cannot be inserted into the drive. This leaves one, correct way. If they were able to insert the disk other ways, there were ill effects at least once, when the user inserted the disk so forcefully, he broke the catch inside which prevents the "three more of those" ways from working. Thanks for playing, though. >John "I keep getting the same tech support UL in the mail" Hibbert -Rich "I know the feeling" Lafferty -- Rich Lafferty --------------------------------------------------------- IITS/Computing Services | Concordia University | Nothing sucks like a Vax! (tm) rich@vax2.concordia.ca -----------------------------------------[McQ]-- ###### From: sean@panix.com (Sean Willard) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 17:22:29 -0700 Organization: Dis Associates Lines: 12 Message-ID: <1dch6aq.1xngmsk1xnel0cN@istk-port1428.jps.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35B0255A.1413@sfu.ca> <1dccdty.7041c21c8m078N@istk-port1800.jps.net> <6p069j$2t52@eccws1.dearborn.ford.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: istk-port1428.jps.net X-Face: )huKix7CL@Q"*t!]$;pE8',$xUv%3L5y*1!<_'c`)pZ*GUXA/q1Zf0@+!k4>u lU@hYTkk13aXTGo:Bn:&\%ER-awoBdU4yWePQR(MxJOh,3:{"]}u2~C%TNx*/[8`/F*F M~n5wYu%D)Q~6.g2L@:=zvMWCg?xACDf/4).}J[+L>$fQ\]fUM X-Newsreader: MacSOUP 2.3.3 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-was.dfn.de!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!howland.erols.net!panix!news.panix.com!sean Kevin McQuiggin wants to share with a.f.c his tech support experiences, which, as a quick Deja News search for "tech support" will tell you, AFU is really not interested in. I suggested that in future, followups on this subject be set out of AFU, but Mr. Harrington seems unable or unwilling to do so. Let's try again: If any of our dear friends over in alt.folklore.computers wants to swap luser stories, do please leave AFU out of followups. Thanks muchly. Sean -- Blame Sean Willard for http://www.urbanlegends.com/afu.faq/ ###### From: sean@panix.com (Sean Willard) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Followup-To: alt.folklore.computers Date: Mon, 20 Jul 1998 17:22:34 -0700 Organization: Dis Associates Lines: 19 Message-ID: <1dch6mh.1x7fh0knqydq8N@istk-port1428.jps.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> <6p024a$hdg$1@nntp1.u.washington.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: istk-port1428.jps.net X-Face: )huKix7CL@Q"*t!]$;pE8',$xUv%3L5y*1!<_'c`)pZ*GUXA/q1Zf0@+!k4>u lU@hYTkk13aXTGo:Bn:&\%ER-awoBdU4yWePQR(MxJOh,3:{"]}u2~C%TNx*/[8`/F*F M~n5wYu%D)Q~6.g2L@:=zvMWCg?xACDf/4).}J[+L>$fQ\]fUM X-Newsreader: MacSOUP 2.3.3 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!surfnet.nl!howland.erols.net!panix!news.panix.com!sean D. Peschel wrote: > In article <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca>, > Rich Lafferty wrote: > > >Three more of those ways -- top-back-forward, bottom-front-forward, and > >bottom-back-forward -- put a pointed corner in the front right-hand > >corner, such that the disk cannot be inserted into the drive. > > I have heard that some cheap disk drives don't contain the cam which detects > the pointiness of the corner (thus, making it possible to insert disks in the > wrong orientation). I have heard that some cheap newsreaders don't contain the wherewithal to set followups (thus, making it possible to bore the pants out of other newsgroups). -- Blame Sean Willard for http://www.urbanlegends.com/afu.faq/ ###### From: dpeschel@u.washington.edu (D. Peschel) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 20 Jul 1998 18:26:18 GMT Organization: University of Washington, Seattle Lines: 12 Message-ID: <6p024a$hdg$1@nntp1.u.washington.edu> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> NNTP-Posting-Host: saul6.u.washington.edu X-Trace: nntp1.u.washington.edu 900959178 17840 (None) 140.142.64.2 X-Complaints-To: help@cac.washington.edu NNTP-Posting-User: dpeschel Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!news.idt.net!feed2.news.erols.com!erols!wn4feed!worldnet.att.net!140.142.64.3!news.u.washington.edu!dpeschel In article <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca>, Rich Lafferty wrote: >Three more of those ways -- top-back-forward, bottom-front-forward, and >bottom-back-forward -- put a pointed corner in the front right-hand >corner, such that the disk cannot be inserted into the drive. I have heard that some cheap disk drives don't contain the cam which detects the pointiness of the corner (thus, making it possible to insert disks in the wrong orientation). -- Derek ###### From: tph@longhorn.uucp (Tom Harrington) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Followup-To: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Date: 20 Jul 1998 19:37:23 GMT Organization: Mechanist Industries Lines: 21 Message-ID: <6p069j$2t52@eccws1.dearborn.ford.com> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35B0255A.1413@sfu.ca> <1dccdty.7041c21c8m078N@istk-port1800.jps.net> Reply-To: tph@rmi.net NNTP-Posting-Host: cs0053.eld.ford.com X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2] Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!news.idt.net!newsfeed.internetmci.com!141.211.144.13!newsxfer3.itd.umich.edu!jobone!dailyplanet.srl.ford.com!eccws1.dearborn.ford.com!longhorn!tph Sean Willard (sean@panix.com) wrote: : Kevin McQuiggin illustrates precisely the danger of : which mitcho spoke: : > I've seen this one while doing tech support where I work. This was with : > a 3.5" floppy drive. : Kevin, we don't care. Did you hear me? WE DON'T CARE. Go back and : CAREFULLY READ Mike's ill-conceived post, and note the bit where he : wrote : Sean "Thank you kindly" Willard And thank you, Sean. I had almost forgotten why I stopped reading alt.folklore.urban. Thanks to your post, I remember. -- Tom Harrington --------- tph@rmii.com -------- http://rainbow.rmii.com/~tph "Your reality, sir, is lies and balderdash and I'm delighted to say that I have no grasp of it whatsoever." -The Adventures of Baron Munchausen Cookie's Revenge: ftp://ftp.rmi.net/pub2/tph/cookie/cookies-revenge.sit.hqx ###### From: hooperc@ibm.not (Craig Hooper) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1998 00:07:28 GMT Organization: Customer of Access One Pty Ltd, Melbourne, Australia Lines: 22 Message-ID: <35b2e977.1402540@news.syd.aone.net.au> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <01bdb375$f3dceed0$140a69c0@furrfu> NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.61.242.131 X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/32.235 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!news.mel.connect.com.au!news.mel.aone.net.au!newsfeed-in.aone.net.au!not-for-mail On 20 Jul 1998 00:32:25 GMT, in alt.folklore.urban "Steve Caskey" said something like: >John S. Shinal wrote: >> It was a Word Perfect 6.x install, and I took the call. The >> user complained that "the drive won't take disk 3." I asked exactly >> what the symptom was, and she repeated, "The drive won't take the >> disk." Triage time. We were constantly swamped. So, thinking it was a >> faulty floppy, I had her bring it in. >> >> There were two 5 1/4 floppy disks already inside drive A:. > >Not that I disbelieve you (truly) but with disk 1 wedged in there how could >the installation program have read disk 2 to the point where it had cause to >request disk 3? I'm sure there's a simple explanation. > Install programs can be pretty dumb, that's how. It may have asked for disk 2 even though it didn't actually need any files on it (disk 2 may contain drivers for a different model or OS for example, or options that the user didn't select). ###### From: lucvdv@null.net (Luc Van der Veken) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1998 02:54:26 GMT Organization: . Lines: 22 Message-ID: <35b8ffea.13748232@news.innet.be> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> <6oo0uj$lsu$1@shadow.skypoint.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: uu194-7-99-51.unknown.uunet.be Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.5/32.451 X-No-Archive: yes Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!rill.news.pipex.net!pipex!join.news.pipex.net!pipex!krypton.inbe.net!INbe.net!not-for-mail Also sprach "George R. Gonzalez" on Fri, 17 Jul 1998 09:36:44 -0500 to alt.folklore.computers: > I've seen people take the mouse and wave it in the air. You don't have to be dumb to do that - I once saw a reputed engineer pick one up, and start talking into it. He's so known that you may even have heard of him - his name is Doohan (James Doohan iirc). -- Q: How many *n*x users does it take to screw in a light bulb? A0: RTFM. A1: Several answers ranging from 0 to 0377, most of which are correct. A2: This is a trick question. They don't fit in a light bulb. Q:How many Windows users does it take to screw in a lightbulb? A0: Insert the Blb98 CD, and wait until it is installed. Your computer will now reboot. A1: What version of bulbsock.dll do you have installed? A2: This answer does not come from a trusted site. Do you want to read it? ###### From: losergeek@earthlink.net (RadioFlyr) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1998 06:40:15 -0400 Organization: like I wish Lines: 32 Message-ID: References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> NNTP-Posting-Host: 1cust125.tnt2.nyc3.da.uu.net Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newsfeed.uk.ibm.net!ibm.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!btnet-peer!btnet!newsfeed.internetmci.com!207.217.77.43!newsfeed1.earthlink.net!nntp.earthlink.net!1cust125.tnt2.nyc3.da.uu.net!user It wasn't just one patron, it was several over a period of time, and they weren't trying to see how many ways the disk might fit in. They just didn't have a clue which way it is supposed to fit. Sometimes they would force it enough to cause damage but most of the time they didn't. "Upside down, backwards, etc." doesn't mean "all eight ways." - jh In article <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca>, rich@vax2.concordia.ca (Rich Lafferty) wrote: [snip] > > If they were able to insert the disk other ways, there were ill effects > at least once, when the user inserted the disk so forcefully, he broke the > catch inside which prevents the "three more of those" ways from working. > > Thanks for playing, though. [more snip] > > -- > Rich Lafferty --------------------------------------------------------- > IITS/Computing Services | > Concordia University | Nothing sucks like a Vax! (tm) > rich@vax2.concordia.ca -----------------------------------------[McQ]-- ---------------------------------------------------------------- Visit the "Little web server," || Also my other pages: A Mac SE serving the web, at: || http://www.lpl.org/people/gianni http://149.96.1.33 || http://149.96.1.135 ###### From: lisard@zetnet.co.uk Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 21 Jul 1998 18:58:10 GMT Message-ID: <6p2oc2$gmh$3@irk.zetnet.co.uk> References: <01bdb375$f3dceed0$140a69c0@furrfu> NNTP-Posting-Host: man-031.dialup.zetnet.co.uk X-Trace: irk.zetnet.co.uk 901047490 17105 194.247.41.38 (21 Jul 1998 18:58:10 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: 21 Jul 1998 18:58:10 GMT X-Everything: Net-Tamer V 1.08X Lines: 16 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!news-feed.inet.tele.dk!bofh.vszbr.cz!nntp.news.xara.net!xara.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!peer.news.zetnet.net!zetnet.co.uk!not-for-mail On 1998-07-20 mindless@furrfu.minedu.govt.nz said: :Not that I disbelieve you (truly) but with disk 1 wedged in there :how could the installation program have read disk 2 to the point :where it had cause to request disk 3? I'm sure there's a simple :explanation. Single sided disks. (As for double-sided, no I can't explain that; given the way MS-DOS uses a double-sided disk, one or the other side would be obscured, and the whole disk would appear corrupt.) -- Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her... ###### From: lisard@zetnet.co.uk Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 22 Jul 1998 18:49:38 GMT Message-ID: <6p5c82$m8f$4@irk.zetnet.co.uk> References: <1dch6mh.1x7fh0knqydq8N@istk-port1428.jps.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: man-069.dialup.zetnet.co.uk X-Trace: irk.zetnet.co.uk 901133378 22799 194.247.41.86 (22 Jul 1998 18:49:38 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: 22 Jul 1998 18:49:38 GMT Followups-To: alt.folklore.urban X-Everything: Net-Tamer V 1.08X Lines: 17 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!news-peer.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!peer.news.zetnet.net!zetnet.co.uk!not-for-mail On 1998-07-20 sean@panix.com(SeanWillard) said: :> I have heard that some cheap disk drives don't contain the cam :>which detects the pointiness of the corner (thus, making it :>possible to insert disks in the wrong orientation). :I have heard that some cheap newsreaders don't contain the :wherewithal to set followups (thus, making it possible to bore the :pants out of other newsgroups). I have heard that some people are now intentionally neglecting to set follow-ups, just to piss Sean off. (Follow-ups set. And how.) -- Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her... ###### From: sean@panix.com (Sean Willard) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Followup-To: alt.folklore.urban Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1998 10:45:32 -0700 Organization: Dis Associates Lines: 13 Message-ID: <1dcm700.y5hz0ytgfmeoN@istk-port1355.jps.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> <6p024a$hdg$1@nntp1.u.washington.edu> <1dch6mh.1x7fh0knqydq8N@istk-port1428.jps.net> <6p5c82$m8f$4@irk.zetnet.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: istk-port1355.jps.net X-Face: )huKix7CL@Q"*t!]$;pE8',$xUv%3L5y*1!<_'c`)pZ*GUXA/q1Zf0@+!k4>u lU@hYTkk13aXTGo:Bn:&\%ER-awoBdU4yWePQR(MxJOh,3:{"]}u2~C%TNx*/[8`/F*F M~n5wYu%D)Q~6.g2L@:=zvMWCg?xACDf/4).}J[+L>$fQ\]fUM X-Newsreader: MacSOUP 2.3.3 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!news-peer.sprintlink.net!news-peer-east.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!psinntp!news.columbia.edu!panix!news.panix.com!sean wrote: > I have heard that some people are now intentionally neglecting to set > follow-ups, just to piss Sean off. > > (Follow-ups set. And how.) Ooh that smarts! That'll teach me to mess with those wily devils in a.f.c. Sean "sorry, lisard, it takes more than that to piss me off" Willard -- Blame Sean Willard for http://www.urbanlegends.com/afu.faq/ ###### From: Victor Eijkhout Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 23 Jul 1998 16:36:27 -0400 Organization: University of Tennessee Lines: 18 Message-ID: References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> NNTP-Posting-Host: prancer.cs.utk.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/Emacs 20.2 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-dc.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!news-peer.sprintlink.net!news-backup-west.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!192.249.1.30!utk.edu!not-for-mail Mike Swaim writes: > In alt.folklore.computers Michael Powers wrote: > : User complains about coffee-mug holder on computer being broken. > : Has anyone ever seen these? > Abort-Retry-Fail in PC Magazine featured a picture from AutoWeek showing > the cup holder in use. It's now tacked to my cubical wall. No idea if this was an April fools joke, but some guitar magazine had an add for a can holder with a guitar-type jack plug so that you could stick it in the unused input of your amp (guitar amps typically have different inputs for high/low impedance). -- Victor Eijkhout "The Navy began running shipboard applications under Microsoft Windows NT [..] The ship had to be towed into the Naval base at Norfolk, Va., because a database overflow caused its propulsion system to fail [...]" (GCN) ###### From: jnickelsen@acm.org (Juergen Nickelsen) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sat, 25 Jul 1998 09:42:38 +0200 Organization: [Posted via] Interactive Networx Lines: 15 Message-ID: <1dcn8l6.atf4x41voc99wN@n37-4.berlin.snafu.de> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> <6oo0uj$lsu$1@shadow.skypoint.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: n37-4.berlin.snafu.de X-Newsreader: MacSOUP 2.3 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!wuff.mayn.de!unlisys!news.snafu.de!jnickelsen George R. Gonzalez wrote: > Also in the Mac II's, they had little plastic covers over the unused > floppy slots-- quite often you'd see these pushed in (they snapped in > from the back, and not too securely) lying on the motherboard, alongside > a diskette. A former cow orker -- definitely no newbie -- once tried to insert a floppy into my SPARCstation. He realized that the machine neither had a cover over the floppy slot nor a floppy drive, wenn his disk fell down inside with a *clunk*. When he told me what had happened, I had to laugh so hard I thought I'd split. -- Juergen Nickelsen ###### From: "Ti m Hunter" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sun, 26 Jul 1998 00:22:50 -0700 Organization: gte.net Lines: 28 Message-ID: <6pelkv$gvl$1@news-1.news.gte.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> <6p024a$hdg$1@nntp1.u.washington.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: 2cust106.tnt3.krk1.da.uu.net X-Auth: DE058B180E84D0C756CC8491 X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.72.3110.1 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!newsfeed.internetmci.com!206.251.127.50!worldfeed.gte.net!newsfeed.gte.net!newsfeed2.gte.net.MISMATCH!news.gte.net!not-for-mail While repairing an old Novel Server for a customer I managed to put the power connector in his harddrive upside down (I know its not suppose to work that way but this one did - totally non-standard) With the customer standing over my shoulder, I turned on the power. The customer remarked "Look there's smoke....." We replaced his hard drive with a newer and better model. Tim huntert@gte.net D. Peschel wrote in message <6p024a$hdg$1@nntp1.u.washington.edu>... >In article <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca>, >Rich Lafferty wrote: > >>Three more of those ways -- top-back-forward, bottom-front-forward, and >>bottom-back-forward -- put a pointed corner in the front right-hand >>corner, such that the disk cannot be inserted into the drive. > >I have heard that some cheap disk drives don't contain the cam which detects >the pointiness of the corner (thus, making it possible to insert disks in the >wrong orientation). > >-- Derek ###### From: Dream@innocent.com (Duggan) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sun, 26 Jul 1998 00:40:41 GMT Message-ID: <35b0d01d.2535111@news.wwd.net> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> X-Newsreader: Forte Free Agent 1.11/16.235 NNTP-Posting-Host: 208.135.174.25 Lines: 18 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!newsfeed.internetmci.com!206.152.255.253!206.152.255.253!208.135.174.25 On Mon, 13 Jul 1998 18:19:52 GMT, mpowers@vt.edu (Michael Powers) wrote: >Yeah, I know this caused a flamewar last year, but I'm hoping that >people who have a beef with underpaid tech support folks who have to >deal with the Luser Legions can just not post to the thread. > >Um. Anyway, after alienating half the audience... > >Wandering through the pages of stories about wacky phone calls to tech >support, I notice that many of them are the same. Often _exactly_ the >same. Reported by--as far as I can determine--different people. Does >this sound like an urban legend to you folks? [various incidents snipped] You skipped the one about the user complaining that he kept pushing the "pedal" but it wasn't working and the tech support guy finding out the "pdeal" was actually the mouse. ###### From: hshubs@mindspring.com (Howard S Shubs) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sun, 26 Jul 1998 11:23:38 -0500 Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 10 Message-ID: References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> <6p024a$hdg$1@nntp1.u.washington.edu> <6pelkv$gvl$1@news-1.news.gte.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: user-38lcg64.dialup.mindspring.com X-Server-Date: 26 Jul 1998 16:22:51 GMT X-Newsreader: MT-NewsWatcher 2.4.4 X-Face: "S"r{U%bs].&Ud}Pc~~~0a]M:t5l>>EN\1Faw10M9NK1Xq59wo7-"s0S+[{etQorO /Nf-Ci"i9v'MT!R8)J]N[4|2&x1r^Iq&{SB"6dknr0=+6UFb.>+{zMn_1=rw&/V+"d@* ZS5\LoW_ Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!firehose.mindspring.com!hshubs In article <6pelkv$gvl$1@news-1.news.gte.net>, "Ti m Hunter" wrote: >We replaced his hard drive with a newer and better model. You let the magic smoke out?? Shame, shame. -- Howard S Shubs hshubs@bix.com The Denim Adept hshubs@mindspring.com ###### From: jcmorris@mwunix.mitre.org (Joe Morris) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 27 Jul 1998 12:35:52 GMT Organization: The MITRE Corporation Lines: 17 Message-ID: <6phs78$r7m@top.mitre.org> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> NNTP-Posting-Host: mwunix.mitre.org Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!coop.net!world!blanket.mitre.org!news.mitre.org!mwunix!jcmorris losergeek@earthlink.net (RadioFlyr) writes: >It wasn't just one patron, it was several over a period of time, and they >weren't trying to see how many ways the disk might fit in. They just >didn't have a clue which way it is supposed to fit. Sometimes they would >force it enough to cause damage but most of the time they didn't. > >"Upside down, backwards, etc." doesn't mean "all eight ways." Many years ago one of the Big Names in the computer industry was quoted as observing that "there are eight ways to insert a floppy disk into a drive, only one of which is useful." I'm drawing a total blank who said that, but it was someone sufficiently prominent that it was widely reported. Can anyone here identify the speaker and/or provide the correct quotation? Joe Morris ###### From: jcmorris@mwunix.mitre.org (Joe Morris) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 27 Jul 1998 12:43:45 GMT Organization: The MITRE Corporation Lines: 15 Message-ID: <6phsm1$rc5@top.mitre.org> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b0d01d.2535111@news.wwd.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: mwunix.mitre.org Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!newsfeed.atl.bellsouth.net!uunet!in2.uu.net!world!blanket.mitre.org!news.mitre.org!mwunix!jcmorris Dream@innocent.com (Duggan) writes: >You skipped the one about the user complaining that he kept pushing >the "pedal" but it wasn't working and the tech support guy finding out >the "pdeal" was actually the mouse. A couple of years ago the _Wall Street Journal_ did an article (front page of section 2) about wacky calls to tech support. The article appeared a couple of weeks after Christmas when the recipients of the new computers had started to call for assistance. The source for the stories were the tech support groups for the major manufacturers; the pedal/mouse report was one of the examples used. IIRC the report came from Dell, but I wouldn't swear to it. Joe Morris ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,alt.folklore.computers From: Derry Hamilton Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs In-Reply-To: <6phs78$r7m@top.mitre.org> X-Nntp-Posting-Host: tardis.tardis.ed.ac.uk Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Message-ID: Sender: cnews@dcs.ed.ac.uk (UseNet News Admin) Organization: Department of Computer Science, Edinburgh University References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> <6phs78$r7m@top.mitre.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1998 19:55:19 GMT Lines: 19 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!nntp.news.xara.net!xara.net!server6.netnews.ja.net!newsfeed.ed.ac.uk!dcs.ed.ac.uk!tardis.tardis.ed.ac.uk!rasilon On 27 Jul 1998, Joe Morris wrote: > > Many years ago one of the Big Names in the computer industry was > quoted as observing that "there are eight ways to insert a floppy > disk into a drive, only one of which is useful." I'm drawing a > total blank who said that, but it was someone sufficiently prominent > that it was widely reported. Can anyone here identify the speaker > and/or provide the correct quotation? If I recall correctly (still wincing over my WD40 error) this was approximatly the content of a Reuters poster that was supposedly nailed above the terminal in some of their more out of the way offices "There are seven wrong ways and one right way to insert a floppy disk."(Diagram followed) It was I believe referring to 5.25" disks and PCs. Derry Hamilton rasilon@tardis.ed.ac.uk ###### From: justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 02:13:00 GMT Organization: Ability Online Support Network Lines: 23 Message-ID: <901592383@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: ablelink.org NNTP-Posting-Date: 27 Jul 1998 23:05:54 EDT Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!howland.erols.net!news-nyc.telia.net!chippy.visi.com!news-out.visi.com!tor-nx1.netcom.ca!tor-nn1.netcom.ca!ntserv1!justin.frim Derry Hamilton wrote: RN>If I recall correctly (still wincing over my WD40 error) this was >approximatly the content of a Reuters poster that was supposedly nailed >above the terminal in some of their more out of the way offices "There are >seven wrong ways and one right way to insert a floppy disk."(Diagram >followed) It was I believe referring to 5.25" disks and PCs. There are some 5.25" floppies that can be inserted two ways, both correct. They were made for the old 180k single-sided drives, but contained a double-sided magnetic media disk inside the jacket. There were two sets of index holes punched in the jacket, and both sides of the jacket had the write protect notch cut in. The idea was you could just flip the disk over and get another 180k of storage! I think I still have one of these, but I just decided to format it to 360k and always insert it with the same side up each time. TTYL, Justin Frim justin.frim@ablelink.org * 1st 2.00 ~ Artificial Intelligence is no match for natural creativity! ###### Message-ID: <35BDCDEB.4ECB4789@danet.com> Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 09:11:08 -0400 From: "J. Benz" X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs References: <901592383@ablelink.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit NNTP-Posting-Host: pc-135.danet.com Lines: 20 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newshub.northeast.verio.net!newsserver.jvnc.net!news.nauticom.net!pc-135.danet.com Justin Frim wrote: > There are some 5.25" floppies that can be inserted two ways, both > correct. They were made for the old 180k single-sided drives, but > contained a double-sided magnetic media disk inside the jacket. There > were two sets of index holes punched in the jacket, and both sides of > the jacket had the write protect notch cut in. The idea was you could > just flip the disk over and get another 180k of storage! I think I > still have one of these, but I just decided to format it to 360k and > always insert it with the same side up each time. Actually, any 5.25 disk will work this way - all you need is a paper punch to make your own write protect notch. Used to do this all the time with my old Atari system, which only had a 1-sided drive - just punch a hole on the edge of the jacket in the right place, and you have twice the storage for the same price (hey, floppies were expensive then!). Careful not to cut the notch too deep and nick the edge of the media, though... ###### From: rob@hafernik.com (Rob Hafernik) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 09:50:36 -0600 Organization: SAC Lines: 9 Message-ID: References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BDCDEB.4ECB4789@danet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: as5-dialup-55.io.com X-Trace: hiram.io.com 901636066 29508 206.224.82.55 (28 Jul 1998 14:27:46 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@io.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 28 Jul 1998 14:27:46 GMT X-Newsreader: MT-NewsWatcher 2.2.2 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!nntp.giganews.com!solomon.io.com!hiram.io.com!as5-dialup-55.io.com!user > Actually, any 5.25 disk will work this way - all you need is a paper punch > to make your own write protect notch. Used to do this all the time with > my old Atari system, which only had a 1-sided drive - just punch a hole on > the edge of the jacket in the right place, and you have twice the storage > for the same price. Yep, and you remember what these were called, don't you? "flippy disks" ###### From: jcmorris@mwunix.mitre.org (Joe Morris) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 28 Jul 1998 13:13:23 GMT Organization: The MITRE Corporation Lines: 28 Message-ID: <6pkipj$92b@top.mitre.org> References: <901592383@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: mwunix.mitre.org Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newspeer.monmouth.com!newsfeed.atl.bellsouth.net!uunet!in2.uu.net!world!blanket.mitre.org!news.mitre.org!mwunix!jcmorris justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) writes: >There are some 5.25" floppies that can be inserted two ways, both >correct. They were made for the old 180k single-sided drives, but >contained a double-sided magnetic media disk inside the jacket. There >were two sets of index holes punched in the jacket, and both sides of >the jacket had the write protect notch cut in. The idea was you could >just flip the disk over and get another 180k of storage! I think I >still have one of these, but I just decided to format it to 360k and >always insert it with the same side up each time. Yup. The common name for these disks was "flippies", and of course they disappeared when the double-side drives finally drove the single-side ones out of the market. Oh yes...for PCs that should have been "160k" not "180k" until the 9-sector format mode became common (at DOS 2?). The original configuration used 8 sectors/track, so a SSDD disk contained 160 Kbytes...unless you wanted to count the contents of cylinder 41 which various copy-protect schemes used. The older format still survives as an option to the DOS FORMAT command, although I wonder if anyone uses it today. (One of the oddities I recall from those days was that I routinely found that disks marketed (and priced) as single-side were far more reliable when used as double-side than were the more expensive ones marketed and priced as double-side.) Joe Morris ###### From: tait@primeline.net (Gary Tait) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 28 Jul 98 15:01:30 GMT Organization: Bruce Municipal Telephone System Lines: 34 Message-ID: <901638043.31825@Virginia> References: <901592383@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: virginia.bmts.com X-Newsreader: News Xpress 2.0 Beta #0 Cache-Post-Path: Virginia!unknown@pm3-157.primeline.net Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!island.idirect.com!News.Toronto.iSTAR.net!News.Ottawa.iSTAR.net!news.istar.net!nr1.ottawa.istar.net!tait In article <901592383@ablelink.org>, justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) wrote: #Derry Hamilton wrote: # #RN>If I recall correctly (still wincing over my WD40 error) this was # >approximatly the content of a Reuters poster that was supposedly nailed # >above the terminal in some of their more out of the way offices "There are # >seven wrong ways and one right way to insert a floppy disk."(Diagram # >followed) It was I believe referring to 5.25" disks and PCs. # #There are some 5.25" floppies that can be inserted two ways, both #correct. They were made for the old 180k single-sided drives, but #contained a double-sided magnetic media disk inside the jacket. There #were two sets of index holes punched in the jacket, and both sides of #the jacket had the write protect notch cut in. The idea was you could #just flip the disk over and get another 180k of storage! I think I #still have one of these, but I just decided to format it to 360k and #always insert it with the same side up each time. # #TTYL, #Justin Frim # #justin.frim@ablelink.org # # * 1st 2.00 ~ Artificial Intelligence is no match for natural creativity! I once ran across (and still have) a bunch of Wang 5.25 360K floppies ,that have the lable along the edge,instead of the end. An unkowing person (I did it too), could insert the disk improperly,with the lable to the user. Gary Tait,VE3VBF ; Homepage http://www.primeline.net/~tait ------------------------------------------------------------------ Please note that I use the Internet as a research / entertainment tool ,and I shall not recieve Email regarding the purchase, trade ,or reccomendation of merchandise , services, or intellectual property , unless I explicitly request such materials. ###### From: tait@primeline.net (Gary Tait) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 28 Jul 98 15:02:48 GMT Organization: Bruce Municipal Telephone System Lines: 31 Message-ID: <901638120.191119@Virginia> References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BDCDEB.4ECB4789@danet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: virginia.bmts.com X-Newsreader: News Xpress 2.0 Beta #0 Cache-Post-Path: Virginia!unknown@pm3-157.primeline.net Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!europa.clark.net!205.252.116.205!howland.erols.net!sunqbc.risq.qc.ca!News.Toronto.iSTAR.net!News.Ottawa.iSTAR.net!news.istar.net!nr1.ottawa.istar.net!tait In article <35BDCDEB.4ECB4789@danet.com>, "J. Benz" wrote: # # #Justin Frim wrote: # #> There are some 5.25" floppies that can be inserted two ways, both #> correct. They were made for the old 180k single-sided drives, but #> contained a double-sided magnetic media disk inside the jacket. There #> were two sets of index holes punched in the jacket, and both sides of #> the jacket had the write protect notch cut in. The idea was you could #> just flip the disk over and get another 180k of storage! I think I #> still have one of these, but I just decided to format it to 360k and #> always insert it with the same side up each time. # #Actually, any 5.25 disk will work this way - all you need is a paper punch to #make your own write protect notch. Used to do this all the time with my old #Atari system, which only had a 1-sided drive - just punch a hole on the edge of #the jacket in the right place, and you have twice the storage for the same # price #(hey, floppies were expensive then!). #Careful not to cut the notch too deep and nick the edge of the media, though... # I just stuck 2 floppies back 2 back in an envelope,an cut the notch to match the notch on the other disk. Gary Tait,VE3VBF ; Homepage http://www.primeline.net/~tait ------------------------------------------------------------------ Please note that I use the Internet as a research / entertainment tool ,and I shall not recieve Email regarding the purchase, trade ,or reccomendation of merchandise , services, or intellectual property , unless I explicitly request such materials. ###### From: justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 16:20:00 GMT Organization: Ability Online Support Network Lines: 23 Message-ID: <901651804@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: ablelink.org NNTP-Posting-Date: 28 Jul 1998 15:04:31 EDT Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!syix.com!tor-nx1.netcom.ca!tor-nn1.netcom.ca!ntserv1!justin.frim "J. Benz" wrote: JB>Actually, any 5.25 disk will work this way - all you need is a paper punch t >make your own write protect notch. Used to do this all the time with my old >Atari system, which only had a 1-sided drive - just punch a hole on the edge >the jacket in the right place, and you have twice the storage for the same p >(hey, floppies were expensive then!). >Careful not to cut the notch too deep and nick the edge of the media, though I suppose, although I've heard doubts about that... I read in a few places that single-sided floppy disks have a slightly different magentic media. I don't know how true this is, or maybe a better question how different the two are, but I still format some of my old 1S2D disks to 360k (2S2D) ;) (of course, I always give those to my little cousin to store his data... I'd never trust them on my own stuff! haha!) TTYL, Justin Frim justin.frim@ablelink.org * 1st 2.00 ~ ###### From: justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 16:29:00 GMT Organization: Ability Online Support Network Lines: 45 Message-ID: <901651805@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: ablelink.org NNTP-Posting-Date: 28 Jul 1998 15:04:37 EDT Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!news.maxwell.syr.edu!syix.com!tor-nx1.netcom.ca!tor-nn1.netcom.ca!ntserv1!justin.frim jcmorris@mwunix.mitre.org (Joe Morris) wrote: JM>Oh yes...for PCs that should have been "160k" not "180k" until the 9-sector >format mode became common (at DOS 2?). The original configuration used >8 sectors/track, so a SSDD disk contained 160 Kbytes...unless you wanted to >count the contents of cylinder 41 which various copy-protect schemes used. >The older format still survives as an option to the DOS FORMAT command, >although I wonder if anyone uses it today. Yes, I have seen that too. I suppose I could format disks to 160k if I really wanted to, but I haven't come across any drives that can only read 160k. Well, maybe the 5.25" drive on my Texas Instruments TI-99/4A (silver!) computer expansion box... but who knows what that beast uses. I don't have any cartridges for the computer, so right now it collects dust. BTW, would anyone know if it's possible to use the computer without cartridges? I know it has built in super-slow BASIC... is it possible to access the RS-232c serial port, Centronics parallel port, or 5.25" disk drive from the built in BASIC? I don't have any manuals for the machine either. Can the computer also automatically load a binary program off the floppy drive? JM>(One of the oddities I recall from those days was that I routinely found >that disks marketed (and priced) as single-side were far more reliable >when used as double-side than were the more expensive ones marketed >and priced as double-side.) That is another thing I heard about... that many companies used the same magnetic media disk because it was cheaper to manufacture the same thing than two different types, and all they did was manufacture two difference stickers and boxes. And by raising the price on the disks sold in double sided boxes, people would be convinced that there was a difference and they would pay more money. I also heard that with some disks there is a difference and if you format them to 360k (2S2D), you will find that after a while the second side of the disk will give you data errors. (although I format all my "PRECISION, by Xidex" 1S2D disks to 360k and give them to my younger cousin to store his data) ;) TTYL, Justin Frim justin.frim@ablelink.org * 1st 2.00 ~ Ability OnLine - Linking disabled kids by modem. ###### From: Larry Anderson Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 19:22:14 -0700 Organization: Goldrush World Access, Ltd. Lines: 38 Message-ID: <35BE8756.E180603B@goldrush.com> References: <901592383@ablelink.org> Reply-To: foxnhare@goldrush.com NNTP-Posting-Host: jx-079.goldrush.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 (Macintosh; I; 68K) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.direct.ca!su-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!news.pbi.net!news.goldrush.com!usenet Justin Frim wrote: > > Derry Hamilton wrote: > > RN>If I recall correctly (still wincing over my WD40 error) this was > >approximatly the content of a Reuters poster that was supposedly nailed > >above the terminal in some of their more out of the way offices "There are > >seven wrong ways and one right way to insert a floppy disk."(Diagram > >followed) It was I believe referring to 5.25" disks and PCs. > > There are some 5.25" floppies that can be inserted two ways, both > correct. They were made for the old 180k single-sided drives, but > contained a double-sided magnetic media disk inside the jacket. There > were two sets of index holes punched in the jacket, and both sides of > the jacket had the write protect notch cut in. The idea was you could > just flip the disk over and get another 180k of storage! I think I > still have one of these, but I just decided to format it to 360k and > always insert it with the same side up each time. > > TTYL, > Justin Frim > > justin.frim@ablelink.org > > * 1st 2.00 ~ Artificial Intelligence is no match for natural creativity! Heck on the Apple, Atari and Commodore the disks were soft sectored and didn't need the index hole at all, all you needed to do was notch the other side, format the back and instant 'flippy' (as opposed to a single-sided floppy) I still have a bunch of flippys, floppys and notchers, and will make more as needed. ;) Old is a relative term. -- -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+- Larry Anderson - Sysop of Silicon Realms BBS (300-2400bd) (209) 754-1363 Visit my Commodore 8-Bit web page at: http://www.goldrush.com/~foxnhare/commodore.html -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+- ###### From: tait@primeline.net (Gary Tait) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Wed, 29 Jul 98 15:31:24 GMT Organization: Bruce Municipal Telephone System Lines: 33 Message-ID: <901726229.587768@Virginia> References: <901651804@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: virginia.bmts.com X-Newsreader: News Xpress 2.0 Beta #0 Cache-Post-Path: Virginia!unknown@pm1-64.primeline.net Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!island.idirect.com!News.Toronto.iSTAR.net!News.Ottawa.iSTAR.net!news.istar.net!nr1.ottawa.istar.net!tait In article <901651804@ablelink.org>, justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) wrote: #"J. Benz" wrote: # #JB>Actually, any 5.25 disk will work this way - all you need is a paper punch t # >make your own write protect notch. Used to do this all the time with my old # >Atari system, which only had a 1-sided drive - just punch a hole on the edge # >the jacket in the right place, and you have twice the storage for the same p # >(hey, floppies were expensive then!). # >Careful not to cut the notch too deep and nick the edge of the media, though # #I suppose, although I've heard doubts about that... I read in a few #places that single-sided floppy disks have a slightly different #magentic media. I don't know how true this is, or maybe a better #question how different the two are, but I still format some of my old #1S2D disks to 360k (2S2D) ;) (of course, I always give those to my #little cousin to store his data... I'd never trust them on my own #stuff! haha!) # #TTYL, #Justin Frim # #justin.frim@ablelink.org # # * 1st 2.00 ~ Singl and Double sided diskd have the same media, they are just certified on one side or both. Gary Tait,VE3VBF ; Homepage http://www.primeline.net/~tait ------------------------------------------------------------------ Please note that I use the Internet as a research / entertainment tool ,and I shall not recieve Email regarding the purchase, trade ,or reccomendation of merchandise , services, or intellectual property , unless I explicitly request such materials. ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1998 22:29:58 +0200 Message-ID: From: peterk@combo.ganesha.com (Dr. Peter Kittel) Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Reply-To: peterk @ combo.ganesha.com References: <901651804@ablelink.org> X-Newsreader: rn7.bas Lines: 12 Organization: Private Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!newsfeed.ecrc.net!blackbush.xlink.net!ganesha.ganesha.com!shorter!combo.ganesha.com!peterk In article <901651804@ablelink.org> justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) writes: > >I suppose, although I've heard doubts about that... I read in a few >places that single-sided floppy disks have a slightly different >magentic media. Don't you mix this up with the difference between double density and high density disks? -- Best Regards, Dr. Peter Kittel // E-Mail: Private Site in Frankfurt, Germany \X/ peterk @ combo.ganesha.com ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers From: jasnider@iglou1.iglou.com (Pat Larkin) Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs X-Nntp-Posting-Host: iglou1 X-Nntp-Posting-User: jasnider Message-ID: Sender: news@iglou.com (News) Organization: IgLou Internet Services (1-800-436-4456) X-Newsreader: NN version 6.5.1 (NOV) References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BDCDEB.4ECB4789@danet.com> Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1998 14:42:02 GMT Lines: 29 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!btnet-peer!btnet!newsfeed.internetmci.com!192.107.41.5!iglou!iglou1!jasnider "J. Benz" writes: >Justin Frim wrote: >> There are some 5.25" floppies that can be inserted two ways, both >> correct. They were made for the old 180k single-sided drives, but >> contained a double-sided magnetic media disk inside the jacket. There >> were two sets of index holes punched in the jacket, and both sides of >> the jacket had the write protect notch cut in. The idea was you could >> just flip the disk over and get another 180k of storage! I think I >> still have one of these, but I just decided to format it to 360k and >> always insert it with the same side up each time. >Actually, any 5.25 disk will work this way - all you need is a paper punch to >make your own write protect notch. Used to do this all the time with my old >Atari system, which only had a 1-sided drive - just punch a hole on the edge of >the jacket in the right place, and you have twice the storage for the same price >(hey, floppies were expensive then!). >Careful not to cut the notch too deep and nick the edge of the media, though... Hey, remember games that came on such disks, one side carrying the Commodore-64 version, the other with the Apple ][ version? I remember thinking that was a very clever idea! -- Pat Larkin Amiga Society of Kentuckiana Louisville Kentucky USA 74246 [period] 1077 [shift-2] compuserve [period] com -- ###### From: Tom Seddon Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1998 17:22:28 +0100 Organization: None whatsoever Message-ID: References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BE8756.E180603B@goldrush.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: sunholme.demon.co.uk X-NNTP-Posting-Host: sunholme.demon.co.uk:193.237.138.67 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 901996925 nnrp-11:18715 NO-IDENT sunholme.demon.co.uk:193.237.138.67 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Newsreader: Turnpike (32) Version 3.05 Lines: 16 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!news.demon.co.uk!demon!sunholme.demon.co.uk!tom Larry Anderson wrote this on Tue, 28 Jul 1998: >Heck on the Apple, Atari and Commodore the disks were soft sectored and didn't >need the index hole at all, all you needed to do was notch the other side, >format the back and instant 'flippy' (as opposed to a single-sided floppy) I How did they get to sector 0 then? (Serious question...) Surely all 5.25" disks need at least one index hole to indicate the location of a particular sector. Hard sectored disks have lots of index hole (one per sector), soft sectored disks have only one (indicating sector zero). You would *have* to cut another index hole, and on both sides as well so that the light sensor could see through it. ...or am I wrong? --Tom ###### From: hshubs@mindspring.com (Howard S Shubs) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Fri, 31 Jul 1998 20:52:43 -0500 Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 11 Message-ID: References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BDCDEB.4ECB4789@danet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: user-38lcg1u.dialup.mindspring.com X-Server-Date: 1 Aug 1998 01:51:50 GMT X-Newsreader: MT-NewsWatcher 2.4.4 X-Face: "S"r{U%bs].&Ud}Pc~~~0a]M:t5l>>EN\1Faw10M9NK1Xq59wo7-"s0S+[{etQorO /Nf-Ci"i9v'MT!R8)J]N[4|2&x1r^Iq&{SB"6dknr0=+6UFb.>+{zMn_1=rw&/V+"d@* ZS5\LoW_ Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!news-raspail.gip.net!news-dc.gip.net!news-peer.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!firehose.mindspring.com!hshubs In article , jasnider@iglou1.iglou.com (Pat Larkin) wrote: >Hey, remember games that came on such disks, one side carrying the >Commodore-64 version, the other with the Apple ][ version? I remember games which came on one side of the disk, and you "saved game" on the flip side. -- Howard S Shubs hshubs@bix.com The Denim Adept hshubs@mindspring.com ###### From: hshubs@mindspring.com (Howard S Shubs) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sat, 01 Aug 1998 17:52:32 -0500 Organization: MindSpring Enterprises Lines: 10 Message-ID: References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BE8756.E180603B@goldrush.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: user-38lcge7.dialup.mindspring.com X-Server-Date: 1 Aug 1998 22:51:32 GMT X-Newsreader: MT-NewsWatcher 2.4.4 X-Face: "S"r{U%bs].&Ud}Pc~~~0a]M:t5l>>EN\1Faw10M9NK1Xq59wo7-"s0S+[{etQorO /Nf-Ci"i9v'MT!R8)J]N[4|2&x1r^Iq&{SB"6dknr0=+6UFb.>+{zMn_1=rw&/V+"d@* ZS5\LoW_ Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!europa.clark.net!4.1.16.34!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!firehose.mindspring.com!hshubs In article , Tom Seddon wrote: >...or am I wrong? You're wrong. Sorry. Worked fine. -- Howard S Shubs hshubs@bix.com The Denim Adept hshubs@mindspring.com ###### From: richard@stardate.bc.ca (Richard Sanders) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 1 Aug 1998 21:51:07 GMT Organization: Rapidnet Technologies Internet Lines: 38 Message-ID: <6q02kb$34s$1@news.rapidnet.net> References: <901651804@ablelink.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: wlp44.rapidnet.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset=US-ASCII X-Newsreader: WinVN 0.99.9 (Released Version) (x86 32bit) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!btnet-peer!btnet!newsfeed.direct.ca!news.bctel.net!news.rapidnet.net!not-for-mail In article <901651804@ablelink.org>, justin.frim@ablelink.org says... > >"J. Benz" wrote: > >JB>Actually, any 5.25 disk will work this way - all you need is a paper punch t > >make your own write protect notch. Used to do this all the time with my old > >Atari system, which only had a 1-sided drive - just punch a hole on the edge > >the jacket in the right place, and you have twice the storage for the same p > >(hey, floppies were expensive then!). > >Careful not to cut the notch too deep and nick the edge of the media, though > >I suppose, although I've heard doubts about that... I read in a few >places that single-sided floppy disks have a slightly different >magentic media. I don't know how true this is, or maybe a better >question how different the two are, but I still format some of my old >1S2D disks to 360k (2S2D) ;) (of course, I always give those to my >little cousin to store his data... I'd never trust them on my own >stuff! haha!) The read/write head on a single sided disk drive could be on the top or bottom of the disk. This varied form manufacturer to manufacturer. This means that a single sided floppy was realy double sided but you were led to believe that using single sided disks in a double sided drive was a no no by the floppy makers. (sell more product) A single sided floppy drive has a read/write head one side and a felt pad on the other. The felt pad could trap abrasive material in it, so that in time media on the flip side of the disk became damaged and unreliable storage. I always used single sided floppys in my double sided drives, I never bought a double sided disk untill I got my first 1.2 meg 5 1/4. Cheers Richard ###### Path: ccw.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 02 Aug 1998 22:30:58 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 33 Message-ID: References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BE8756.E180603B@goldrush.com> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 hshubs@mindspring.com (Howard S Shubs) writes: > In article , Tom Seddon > wrote: > > >...or am I wrong? > > You're wrong. Sorry. Worked fine. It worked because C64 floppies use GCR coding opposed to the FM and MFM used in CP/M and PC systems. GCR takes 4 bits (16 combinations) and recodes them as 16 of 32 possible combinations of 5 bits. The other 16 combinations are normaly not used. For each sector beginning there exists a short burst of such "illegal" values (particularily 5*0 and then 5*1) followed directly by the sector (and track) number. The disk drive when searching for an sector simply moves the head to the right track, then it waits for an "magnetical hole" (short stretch of 0s). Then ist reads the following bytes to check for right track and for right sector. If the sector is wrong it simply waits for the next "hole". Simple, needs less hardware. And it stores 7/4 the data of FM, 7/8 of MFM. But it uses less circuits than FM and a lot less than MFM. BTW Apple ][ used the same method, that is why the 2 sided for 2 systems games floppies were possible. -- home: Neil.Franklin@ccw.ch.remove http://www.ccw.ch/Neil.Franklin/ work: franklin@arch.ethz.ch.remove http://caad.arch.ethz.ch/~franklin/ *** It's true ! I read it on Usenet and the Web ! *** ###### From: hnsngr@sirius.com (Ron Hunsinger) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sun, 02 Aug 1998 23:53:49 -0700 Organization: ErsteSoft Lines: 117 Message-ID: References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BE8756.E180603B@goldrush.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: ppp-asft07--214.sirius.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Newsreader: Yet Another NewsWatcher 2.3.1 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-fra.maz.net!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!pingflood.geo.net!newshub.sirius.com!newsfiler.sirius.com!hnsngr In article , Tom Seddon wrote: > How did they get to sector 0 then? (Serious question...) > > Surely all 5.25" disks need at least one index hole to indicate the > location of a particular sector. Hard sectored disks have lots of index > hole (one per sector), soft sectored disks have only one (indicating > sector zero). You would *have* to cut another index hole, and on both > sides as well so that the light sensor could see through it. OK, serious answer then. When you formatted a disk on the Apple II, they'd just write 16 sectors (13 sectors on the original version of the ROM) on each track, without caring where they started. Each sector consisted of a sector id: D5 AA 96 -- identifies start of sector id volume# -- one byte, encoded as two track# -- ditto sector# -- ditto parity -- (volume XOR track XOR sector), encoded as two nibbles DE AA EB -- identifies end of sector id followed by the sector data: D5 AA AD -- identifies start of sector data data -- codes for 342 nibbles, representing 256 bytes parity -- code for one nibble, the XOR of the previous 342 DE AA EB -- identifies end of sector data The data was encoded using GCR, using an 8-bit group code to represent 6 bits of data. The code consisted of the set of all 8-bit bytes that start with a 1-bit, followed by seven bits that have at least one pair of consecutive 1-bits, and at most 1 pair of consecutive 0-bits. There happen to be exactly 64 such codes, so they can represent 6 information bits each. The code is simple to describe, so a subroutine to build the code-to-nibble and nibble-to-code translation tables can be store on the ROM on the disk controller, taking up a lot less space than the tables themselves would. ("Nibble" here means 6 bits.) Notice, also, that D5 and AA do not belong in the code, since they do not have two consecutive 1-bits among the lower 7. Therefore, they will never appear within the coded nibblized data, so data will never be mistaken for a sector id mark or sector data mark. The 2-for-1 coding for volume#, track#, sector#, and parity was a simpler code: one byte with all the odd bits, another with all the even bits, each replacing the zero-bits of an AA. On input, shift the first byte left once, then AND with the second byte to recover the original value. This may use codes outside the group code, but that's OK. The group code is used only for the data. (But even this code will never contain a D5.) The hardware can recognize any code on disk that has a leading 1-bit and no more than two 0-bits in a row. Once the disk was formatted, the sector ids would never be rewritten. To read data from the disk, move the head to the proper track, and scan for a sector id. You can pull the volume#, track#, and sector# from that. If the volume# is wrong, report an error. (The user put in the wrong disk.) If the track# is wrong, reposition the heads. (They're not where you think they are.) If the sector# is wrong, wait for the next one. When you see the right volume/track/sector, wait for the next sector data mark, and pull in the data. To write data, you start by scanning for the sector id, just as if you were going to read the sector, except that once you've found the right sector, you switch the head to write mode and write the sector data, starting with the D5 AA AD. Actually, when writing either a sector id (remember, this is only done when you format the disk) or sector data, they'd always write a leading string of at least four FF bytes, timed to leave a pair of zero bits between them, to make sure the shift register would synchronize properly on input. That is, FF FF FF FF D5 AA AD would actually look like junk1111111100111111110011111111001111111100110101011010101010101101. The shift register on input assumes each code on disk begins with the first 1 that is at least 8 bit-times after the leading 1 of the previous code. I leave it as an exercise to the reader that no matter what state the shift register is in when it hits the first of those FFs, it will be in synch and correctly recognize the D5. When formatting, enough extra FFs were written before each sector id to make sure the sectors were evenly spaced around the track, even if the disk was not spinning at the expected speed. (They'd format a test track with closely-space sectors, measure the gap between the last and first sectors, and use that to calculate the proper inter-sector gap. That way, data written on a fast drive wouldn't overwrite the next sector id of a disk formatted on a slow drive.) The older 13-sector format used a different group code, having only 32 codes, so they needed to write 410 group codes, rather than 342, to represent 256 bytes of data. That's why they could only get 13 sectors. (The codes identifying sector id and sector data were also different, to make sure the disks were not interchangable without reformatting. Except that if you were clever, you could put sector 0 on track 0 twice, once in 13-sector format, and once in 16-sector format. The 16-sector format contained the code to read 13-sector disks, and the rest of the disk would be in 13-sector format. That way, the same disk would work on either kind of drive.) Either way, each sector begins wherever it begins. Index holes were not needed, ever. (In fact, there wasn't even any way to tell where the index holes were.) Getting to track zero was the interesting question, since the heads only had relative positioning, not absolute. Usually, they just rememebered which track the heads were on, and calculated how many tracks to move to get where they wanted. But at startup (and occasionally thereafter) they wouldn't know, so they'd just guess they were on track 96. Since there were only 35 tracks total, the first attempt to move to any specific track would move the heads to track 0 and keep trying to move them further, even though they've already reached the physical stop. Made a hell of a racket, but it was a sound we all learned to know and love(?). -Ron Hunsinger ###### From: John Ruschmeyer Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Mon, 03 Aug 1998 15:18:57 -0400 Organization: DMR Consulting Group Lines: 38 Message-ID: <35C60D21.5F3C@ems.att.com> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35AF576D.614D@netcom.com> <6oo0uj$lsu$1@shadow.skypoint.net> <1dcn8l6.atf4x41voc99wN@n37-4.berlin.snafu.de> Reply-To: jruschme@ems.att.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 135.68.93.* Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0 (WinNT; I) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!news2.ais.net!jamie!ais.net!uunet!in3.uu.net!newshub.netnews.att.com!news Juergen Nickelsen wrote: > George R. Gonzalez wrote: > > > Also in the Mac II's, they had little plastic covers over the unused > > floppy slots-- quite often you'd see these pushed in (they snapped in > > from the back, and not too securely) lying on the motherboard, alongside > > a diskette. > > A former cow orker -- definitely no newbie -- once tried to insert a > floppy into my SPARCstation. He realized that the machine neither had a > cover over the floppy slot nor a floppy drive, wenn his disk fell down > inside with a *clunk*. When he told me what had happened, I had to laugh > so hard I thought I'd split. Then there's the one my father-in-law did this past weekend... My father-in-law is relatively new to computers. Back in May, we gave him is second, a 486/66 built from parts of old upgrades. It was presumably enough for him to play games and use AOL to send mail. The system had an old Mitsumi LU005 CD-ROM drive and a 5.25" floppy drive. (The latter was installed since it was easier to do that than find a suitable cover for the opening in the case.) If you've never seen an old Mitsumi CD-ROM drive, you open it by pushing in on the faceplate. The entire front of the drive pops out and you flip up a cover to insert the CD. Well, Dad wanted to try his new game CD (his first) and rather than wait for help from his other daughter (who still lives home), he tried to insert it himself. Astute readers can probably guess the rest... he put it in the 5.25" floppy drive. Needless to say, he had to diassemble most of the computer to get it out. Last time I put one of those on *anyone's* system! <<>> ###### From: Sam Merritt Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers References: <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BDCDEB.4ECB4789@danet.com> User-Agent: tin/pre-1.4-980730 (UNIX) (FreeBSD/2.2.6-RELEASE (i386)) Lines: 13 Message-ID: Date: Mon, 03 Aug 1998 15:54:55 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.198.128.35 NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 03 Aug 1998 10:54:55 CDT Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!surfnet.nl!howland.erols.net!worldfeed.gte.net!nntp.giganews.com!news.giganews.com.POSTED!not-for-mail Howard S Shubs wrote: > In article , jasnider@iglou1.iglou.com (Pat Larkin: >>Hey, remember games that came on such disks, one side carrying the >>Commodore-64 version, the other with the Apple ][ version? > I remember games which came on one side of the disk, and you "saved game" > on the flip side. I remember 'Where in the world is carmen san diego' on a 5.25 that had both apple and ibm compatible versions all on one side. Sam ###### Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers From: bmarcum@iglou.com Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs X-Nntp-Posting-Host: lou-ts7-37.iglou.com X-Everything: Net-Tamer V 1.08X X-Nntp-Posting-User: [unauthenticated] Message-ID: Sender: news@iglou.com (News) Organization: IgLou Internet Services (1-800-436-4456) References: Date: Tue, 4 Aug 1998 17:43:19 GMT Lines: 13 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-fra.maz.net!newsfeed1.swip.net!swipnet!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.internetmci.com!192.107.41.5!iglou!news On 1998-08-02 Neil.Franklin@ccw.ch.remove said: >It worked because C64 floppies use GCR coding opposed to the FM and >MFM used in CP/M and PC systems. The Atari 810 and 1050 floppy drives use FM and MFM, but they don't use the index hole either. The XF551 drive uses the index hole only when formatting. I think the standard MFM floppy controller chips write a sector header identifying each sector when the disk is formatted. If that's the case, I wonder why an index pulse is required on so many systems. Net-Tamer V 1.08X - Test Drive ###### From: lisard@zetnet.co.uk Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 5 Aug 1998 18:33:11 GMT Message-ID: <6qa8h7$ns6$2@irk.zetnet.co.uk> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: man-176.dialup.zetnet.co.uk X-Trace: irk.zetnet.co.uk 902341991 24454 194.247.40.223 (5 Aug 1998 18:33:11 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: 5 Aug 1998 18:33:11 GMT X-Everything: Net-Tamer V 1.08X Lines: 11 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.icl.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!ayres.ftech.net!news.ftech.net!peer.news.zetnet.net!zetnet.co.uk!not-for-mail On 1998-08-02 Neil.Franklin@ccw.ch.remove said: :It worked because C64 floppies use GCR coding opposed to the FM and :MFM used in CP/M and PC systems. Hmm. Can you build a reliable data separator using only digital circuitry, ie. no PLL? -- Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her... ###### From: Robert Billing Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Thu, 06 Aug 1998 09:10:37 +0100 Organization: Tanglewood Message-ID: <35C964FD.4EE4C5D4@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> References: <6qa8h7$ns6$2@irk.zetnet.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: localhost.demon.co.uk X-NNTP-Posting-Host: tnglwood.demon.co.uk:158.152.132.30 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 902391415 nnrp-05:8151 NO-IDENT tnglwood.demon.co.uk:158.152.132.30 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.04 (X11; I; Linux 2.0.31 i586) Lines: 14 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!newspump.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!woodstock.news.demon.net!demon!news.demon.co.uk!demon!tnglwood.demon.co.uk!not-for-mail lisard@zetnet.co.uk wrote: > Hmm. Can you build a reliable data separator using only digital > circuitry, ie. no PLL? Yes, because in an extreme case you can simply a/d convert what comes from the head, and make a digital PLL. Quite a lot of broadcasting equipment now does this sort of trick to eliminate analogue drift. -- I am Robert Billing, Christian, inventor, traveller, cook and animal lover, I live near 0:46W 51:22N. http://www.tnglwood.demon.co.uk/ "Bother," said Pooh, "Eeyore, ready two photon torpedoes and lock phasers on the Heffalump, Piglet, meet me in transporter room three" ###### From: "bill_h (Tucson)" Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Thu, 06 Aug 1998 12:13:18 -0700 Organization: StarNet Lines: 13 Message-ID: <35CA004E.320D@azstarnet.com> References: <6qa8h7$ns6$2@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <35C964FD.4EE4C5D4@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> Reply-To: bill_h@azstarnet.com NNTP-Posting-Host: dialup13ip075.tus.azstarnet.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: polaris.azstarnet.com 902542196 4852 169.197.36.75 (8 Aug 1998 02:09:56 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@azstarnet.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 8 Aug 1998 02:09:56 GMT X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.04Gold (Win16; I) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!feeder.news.azstarnet.com!reader1.news.azstarnet.com!not-for-mail Robert Billing wrote: > Hmm. Can you build a reliable data separator using only digital > circuitry, ie. no PLL? Yes, because in an extreme case you can simply a/d convert what comes from the head, and make a digital PLL. Quite a lot of broadcasting equipment now does this sort of trick to eliminate analogue drift. Who says you can't have a DIGITAL PLL? The CMOS part, 4046 I think, had one. ###### Path: ccw.ch!usenet From: Neil Franklin Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 07 Aug 1998 22:43:06 +0200 Organization: My own Private Self Lines: 52 Message-ID: References: <6qa8h7$ns6$2@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <35C964FD.4EE4C5D4@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Robert Billing writes: > > lisard@zetnet.co.uk wrote: > > > Hmm. Can you build a reliable data separator using only digital > > circuitry, ie. no PLL? There was no clock-data separator in the 1541! To show why I will encode the data byte 00100101 write clock (250kHz): _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_- FM: 0 x 0 x 1 x 0 x 0 x 1 x 0 x 1 x MFM: 0x0 1 0x0 1 0 1 GCR: 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 1 1 1 0 and 1 are data bits, x are clock bits (=1) on disc FM has an exact 1:1 mix of data and clock to be relatively simply separated MFM has an complicated "clock between two 0s" scheme that must also be separated and is more work to do. That needs the PLL to regenerate the "broken" clock signal GCR has no clock on disk, so no separator is needed. It simply counts the time between impulses But where are the bits in GCR? Group Code Recoded! By this table: GroupCode->Recode 0000->01010, 0001->01011, 0010->10010, 0011->10011 0100->01110, 0101->01111, 0110->10110, 0111->10111 1000->01001, 1001->11001, 1010->11010, 1011->11011 1100->01101, 1101->11101, 1110->11110, 1111->10101 As you see there is never more than 2 0s next each other (the floppy will not take that) and never more than 8 1s (10 1s are used as "sync" (begin of block) signal. > Yes, because in an extreme case you can simply a/d convert what comes > from the head, and make a digital PLL. Quite a lot of broadcasting > equipment now does this sort of trick to eliminate analogue drift. But in ca 1978 when the technology used by Commodore was introduced you did not have these nice fast DSP processors. But simple time counters existed. -- home: Neil.Franklin@ccw.ch.remove http://www.ccw.ch/Neil.Franklin/ work: franklin@arch.ethz.ch.remove http://caad.arch.ethz.ch/~franklin/ *** It's true ! I read it on Usenet and the Web ! *** ###### From: jnickelsen@acm.org (Juergen Nickelsen) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Sat, 8 Aug 1998 01:19:04 +0200 Organization: [Posted via] Interactive Networx Message-ID: <1dd7o8b.88vwj5p489hmN@n37-5.berlin.snafu.de> References: <35aa4ad5.15367109@news> <35b22072.105130774@news.mindspring.com> <6ovstp$vdn$1@newsflash.concordia.ca> <6phs78$r7m@top.mitre.org> <901592383@ablelink.org> <35BE8756.E180603B@goldrush.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: n37-5.berlin.snafu.de X-Newsreader: MacSOUP 2.3 Lines: 31 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.belnet.be!news-raspail.gip.net!news-lond.gip.net!news.gsl.net!gip.net!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!newsfeed.nacamar.de!wuff.mayn.de!unlisys!news.snafu.de!jnickelsen Tom Seddon wrote: > How did they get to sector 0 then? (Serious question...) > > Surely all 5.25" disks need at least one index hole to indicate the > location of a particular sector. Hard sectored disks have lots of index > hole (one per sector), soft sectored disks have only one (indicating > sector zero). You would *have* to cut another index hole, and on both > sides as well so that the light sensor could see through it. > > ...or am I wrong? It depends... The IBM PC-compatibles did not need the index hole for regular reading or writing, but to format the disk. Consequently, the controller became badly confused when you tried to format a hard-sectored disk(*). I remember hearing that the Apple ][ did not the index hole at all. It is conceivable that some system always used the index hole. And then there was the DEC Professional 350 (a desktop computer with an LSI-11/23 CPU), which used 5.25" disks it could not format itself. You had to buy them preformatted from DEC. (The name RX-50 comes to mind in this context, although I don't know what it stands for. Perhaps the disk drive.) (*) And then there was the secretary who ordered hard-sectored 5.25" disks for the PC clones. She was told these were the wrong ones and to order soft-sectored disks. The next time she ordered hard-sectored ones *again*. No, this is not a UL -- I suffered from the resulting shortage of soft-sectored disks myself, about ten years ago. -- Juergen Nickelsen ###### From: lisard@zetnet.co.uk Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 8 Aug 1998 18:29:46 GMT Message-ID: <6qi5eq$4qc$4@irk.zetnet.co.uk> References: <35C964FD.4EE4C5D4@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> NNTP-Posting-Host: man-136.dialup.zetnet.co.uk X-Trace: irk.zetnet.co.uk 902600986 4940 194.247.40.173 (8 Aug 1998 18:29:46 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: 8 Aug 1998 18:29:46 GMT X-Everything: Net-Tamer V 1.08X Lines: 21 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-fra.maz.net!newsfeed.ecrc.net!newsfeed.nacamar.de!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!peer.news.zetnet.net!zetnet.co.uk!not-for-mail On 1998-08-06 unclebob@tnglwood.demon.co.uk said: :lisard@zetnet.co.uk wrote: :> Hmm. Can you build a reliable data separator using only digital :> circuitry, ie. no PLL? :Yes, because in an extreme case you can simply a/d convert what :comes from the head, and make a digital PLL. Quite a lot of :broadcasting equipment now does this sort of trick to eliminate :analogue drift. An interesting approach... but I was thinking more of simply using logic directly on the logic pulses coming out of the disk interface, rather than the analogue pulses coming off the head. I thought at one point of using a high resolution clock (8MHz for a standard 250kHz datastream) and seeking for level changes within pulses, and measuring gap lengths... etc. -- Communa (together) we remember... we'll see you falling you know soft spoken changes nothing to sing within her... ###### From: Robert Billing Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Mon, 10 Aug 1998 08:56:11 +0100 Organization: Tanglewood Message-ID: <35CEA79B.1C04B86A@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> References: <6qa8h7$ns6$2@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <35C964FD.4EE4C5D4@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> <35CA004E.320D@azstarnet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: localhost.demon.co.uk X-NNTP-Posting-Host: tnglwood.demon.co.uk:158.152.132.30 X-Trace: news.demon.co.uk 902735866 nnrp-11:24938 NO-IDENT tnglwood.demon.co.uk:158.152.132.30 X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.04 (X11; I; Linux 2.0.31 i586) Lines: 15 Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.internetmci.com!194.72.7.126!btnet-peer!btnet!dispose.news.demon.net!demon!news.demon.co.uk!demon!tnglwood.demon.co.uk!not-for-mail Mark Pappin wrote: > proportional to the difference in phase of its two inputs) but I doubt > its VCO can really be considered all-digital. This is true, but it would at least in theory be possible to produce a digital version of the same thing. The simplest way to do this would be with a very high frequency clock and a variable divider. -- I am Robert Billing, Christian, inventor, traveller, cook and animal lover, I live near 0:46W 51:22N. http://www.tnglwood.demon.co.uk/ "Bother," said Pooh, "Eeyore, ready two photon torpedoes and lock phasers on the Heffalump, Piglet, meet me in transporter room three" ###### From: Mark Pappin Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 10 Aug 1998 17:29:13 +1000 Organization: little Lines: 20 Message-ID: References: <6qa8h7$ns6$2@irk.zetnet.co.uk> <35C964FD.4EE4C5D4@tnglwood.demon.co.uk> <35CA004E.320D@azstarnet.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.14.100.33 X-no-archive: yes X-no-ahbou: yes X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/XEmacs 20.4 - "Emerald" Cache-Post-Path: phoenix.bushnet.qld.edu.au!unknown@phoenix.bushnet.qld.edu.au X-Cache: nntpcache 2.3.2.1 (see http://www.nntpcache.org/) Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!intgwpad.nntp.telstra.net!nsw.nnrp.telstra.net!not-for-mail "bill_h (Tucson)" writes: > Robert Billing wrote: >> Hmm. Can you build a reliable data separator using only digital >> circuitry, ie. no PLL? [snip] > Who says you can't have a DIGITAL PLL? The CMOS part, 4046 I think, > had one. Past tense? Anyway, the 4046 just uses an XOR as a phase detector (which quite neatly produces a PWM waveform with average amplitude proportional to the difference in phase of its two inputs) but I doubt its VCO can really be considered all-digital. [too long since I've gone hardware-hacking] mlp -- Mark L Pappin trombone SCUBA photography no UCE (see www.cauce.org) Oz EE BOFH, C TeX UNIX PGP ###### From: rhawkins@iastate.edu (Rick Hawkins) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: 18 Aug 1998 20:34:06 GMT Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa USA Lines: 29 Message-ID: <6rcofu$emn$1@news.iastate.edu> References: <901651804@ablelink.org> <6q02kb$34s$1@news.rapidnet.net> NNTP-Posting-Host: pv2086.vincent.iastate.edu Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news-fra1.dfn.de!news-was.dfn.de!nntp-out.monmouth.com!newspeer.monmouth.com!newsxfer.itd.umich.edu!newsrelay.iastate.edu!news.iastate.edu!rhawkins In article <6q02kb$34s$1@news.rapidnet.net>, Richard Sanders wrote: > >The read/write head on a single sided disk drive could be on the top or bottom >of the disk. This varied form manufacturer to manufacturer. This means that >a single sided floppy was realy double sided but you were led to believe that >using single sided disks in a double sided drive was a no no by the floppy >makers. (sell more product) A single sided floppy drive has a read/write head >one side and a felt pad on the other. The felt pad could trap abrasive >material in it, so that in time media on the flip side of the disk became >damaged and unreliable storage. > >I always used single sided floppys in my double sided drives, I never bought a >double sided disk untill I got my first 1.2 meg 5 1/4. Using single-sided in a double-sided drive *usually* worked. As did single-density in a double-density drive. However, for many manufacturers, a single type of disk was produced, and sold at the best grade it tested at. Unless they didn't have enough fallouts to meet demand, anything but DSDD was something that failed the DSDD test. rick -- R E HAWKINS rhawkins@iastate.edu These opinions will not be those of ISU until they pay my retainer. ###### From: AFCSC Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1998 08:19:24 -0400 Organization: Lockheed/Martin Lines: 40 Message-ID: <35DAC2CC.3B0A@magicnet.net> References: <901651804@ablelink.org> <6q02kb$34s$1@news.rapidnet.net> <6rcofu$emn$1@news.iastate.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: orlme403495.orl.lmco.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.04 (Win95; I) To: Rick Hawkins Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!denver-news-feed1.bbnplanet.com!news.bbnplanet.com!coop.net!newsfeed1.global.lmco.com!news.orl.lmco.com!news Rick Hawkins wrote: > > In article <6q02kb$34s$1@news.rapidnet.net>, > Richard Sanders wrote: > >The read/write head on a single sided disk drive could be on the top or bottom > >of the disk. This varied form manufacturer to manufacturer. This means that > >a single sided floppy was realy double sided but you were led to believe that > >using single sided disks in a double sided drive was a no no by the floppy > >makers. (sell more product) A single sided floppy drive has a read/write head > >one side and a felt pad on the other. The felt pad could trap abrasive > >material in it, so that in time media on the flip side of the disk became > >damaged and unreliable storage. > > > >I always used single sided floppys in my double sided drives, I never bought a > >double sided disk untill I got my first 1.2 meg 5 1/4. > > Using single-sided in a double-sided drive *usually* worked. As did > single-density in a double-density drive. > > However, for many manufacturers, a single type of disk was produced, and > sold at the best grade it tested at. Unless they didn't have enough > fallouts to meet demand, anything but DSDD was something that failed the > DSDD test. > > rick > -- > R E HAWKINS > rhawkins@iastate.edu > > These opinions will not be those of ISU until they pay my retainer. At least two different computer/drive manufacturers chose to use a different side of a single sided disk. I remember purchasing software that would work on the TRS80 Color Computer and either an Atari or Commodore computer. One computer read side "A" and the other computer read side "B" of the disk. All of the single sided disks that I purchased had media on both sides. I did purchase some disks (mail order) that had been recycled by WordPerfect corporation that were only coated on one side but sold as double sided. ###### From: justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: Computer Tech Support ULs Message-ID: <902878820@ablelink.org> Organization: Ability Online Support Network Lines: 35 Date: Tue, 11 Aug 1998 22:14:55 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 209.146.155.2 NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 11 Aug 1998 18:14:55 EDT Path: ccw.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news-ge.switch.ch!enews.sgi.com!news.idt.net!feed.nntp.acc.ca!tor-nx1.netcom.ca!tor-nn1-ca.POSTED!not-for-mail peterk@combo.ganesha.com (Dr. Peter Kittel) wrote: DP>In article <901651804@ablelink.org> justin.frim@ablelink.org (Justin Frim) w >> >>I suppose, although I've heard doubts about that... I read in a few >>places that single-sided floppy disks have a slightly different >>magentic media. DP>Don't you mix this up with the difference between double density and >high density disks? That too. But somewhere I heard that the media was also different between single and double sided disks. But a number of people here said it's just about the certification, and the media is really the same. And some people also said that various computers used different sides of the disk so the media had to have 2 useable sides. The problem with double density and high density disks is the media on high density disks has a much higher coercivity and so more current is required in the disk heads when writing to the disk. And when people try to format double density disks to high density, the higher magnetic field sometimes wipes out data on the adjacent tracks, and on some disks the media becomes so magnetized the smaller magnetic field of the erase head on a double density drive isn't enough to demagnetize the track. And high density disks can't be formatted to double density because the media requires a high magnetic field which the double density drive cannot provide and so nothing gets written to the disk. TTYL, Justin Frim justin.frim@ablelink.org * 1st 2.00 ~ My teddy bear says, "A good cuddle can change a grumpy day!"