Re: ProDOS volumes in Mac OS

[Ivan X <ivanxqz@yahoo.com>]

ProDOS support in Mac OS was handled first by the ProDOS File System
extension, which works just great, at least under 7.5.5 where I use it. The
latest version, 1.2.1, is found on the disk for the Apple IIe Card (for Mac
LC) 2.2.1 software.

ProDOS File System was then merged into PC Exchange 2.0 in 7.5. (Version 2.2
was in Mac OS 8.1.)

Finally, that was merged into File Exchange 3.0, in 8.5.

I'm guessing ProDOS volume support was less of a priority over time, so
perhaps the older extensions work better. If you don't need PC disk support,
try disabling File Exchange and using one of the older extensions in its
place, and see if things are any better. (You can use TomeViewer to extract
PC Exchange from the 7.5.3 or 8.1 update installers; ProDOS File System on
the IIe Card disk isn't in a tome and is readly copyable.)

Alternatively, disable File Exchange and/or the older extensions if present,
and use the similarly named but entirely different Apple File Exchange 7.0
application which is on the System 7.0.1 and 7.1 Tidbits disk. It will only
let you copy files to and from your ProDOS volume, but otherwise will not
integrate it into Mac OS. It does have a few benefits, such as not creating
Mac-specific files like DESKTOP or forked files which can't be read in
ProDOS 8.

The IIe Card software (for ProDOS File System) and System 7.0.1 (for Apple
File Exchange) and System 7.5.3 or 8.1 update (for PC Exchange) are
downloadable from
http://www.info.apple.com/support/oldersoftwarelist.html

> I have a number of powermacs and OS 9 never seems reliable at reading/
> writing prodos disks (well 9.2.2). I find 8.6 on my Wallstreet works
> perfectly for reading and writing Prodos disks and when i had a
> powermac 7300 with 8.6 (gone now due to lack of space) that also
> worked well. Did 9 have issues or is there a why to make that work
> properly with Prodos? I tried formatting a 1.4mb floppy on my ibook g3
> with a USB floppy and it started to format then just hang :(