Re: How to read old Apple floppies on Mac?

[removeallthisexcept-quantic@bigfoot.com (Geoffrey)]

Ted Shoemaker <nospam@newsranger.com> wrote:

> My parents had either an Apple ][e or ][+ (sorry, I forget which). On that
> machine, they generated a lot of files, which are saved on 5 1/4 inch
> floppies. Is there a way to read those files now?

Yup.

> (I don't care whether the new machine reading it is a Mac or PC; 
> whether the operating system is Mac, Windows, Linux, BeOS, or DOS.
> Can someone tell me how to do this?)

There's a couple of old (and I mean *old*) DOS utilities that could let
a PC's 5.25" drive read Apple II floppies, but as to what and where,
I've no idea.

You could also find someone with a II or IIgs (via an Apple users'
group) which has both 5.25" and the newer 3.5" drives on it and get them
to transfer them across for you.

The simplest way, though, is to use a serial interface card, and set up
a terminal program with capture ability on another computer (HyperTerm
on a Wintelbox, Z-Term on a Mac, etc). I did this when I transferred all
my text files from my aging II+ to my new Mac - I reconfigured my word
processor to "print" to the serial port (instead of the printer's
parallel card) and "printed" all of the files to the terminal program on
my Mac Plus. Worked brilliantly, even if it was a bit time consuming.


Geoffrey

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