Re: Media migration - archiving old computer floppies onto CDR

[Nathan Wain <nathan@caverock.net.nz>]

On Mon, 26 Oct 1998, Curtis Takaya wrote:

> Now if only there were a way to get Amiga, Commodore and Apple
> floppies over to CDR in such a way that if the floppies ever die, 
> they can be restored 
[snip]

I can't speak for apple-disks, but for Miggy ones I'd recommend 
making .DMS, .ADZ, or .LZX archives of their contents, (depending 
on whether they're protected, NDOS, or DOS disks, respectfully.)  

What I then do is sit a PC next to the Miggy and via a serial 
cable (using TWIN express from Aminet), copy them over.  I then 
write from the PC onto CD-ROM.  

Actually it's a bit more complex for me, since I have to take the 
PC into work, (but it's a laptop, thankfully), transfer to an 
External Hard-Drive, then to our CD-writing machine.  If you have 
a SCSI controller or JAZ drive on the Miggy, life is a lot easier.  

The serial-transfers with TWIN actually work fast enough, since 
they're just a little bit faster than the time a Miggy takes to 
create the next disk-image.  

With the c64 (or 128/Vic20/Pet), there's a program called PRLink 
which can transfer files/diskimages to a PC or Amiga, (probably 
other platforms too), via the parallel port.  It works very nicely 
once set up.  The 8bit machine just runs as a file-server, and 
the higher machine reads or writes whatever you ask it to.  

But with the wealth of software already available on arnold, 
(usually unprotected, trained, one-filed, and compressed better 
than the original.)  I'm happy to let many of the c64 disks 
bit-rot, and just re-write anything if the need arises.  

I can't remember where PRLink came from.  Anyone else know much 
about it?  

Nathan.  

PS:  
Of course, getting a catweasel controller for your PC or Amiga 
would allow you to read all of the disks directly on that machine.  
You should probably check it out.  (Sorry I don't have the site 
on me...  currently halfway through cleaning up the drive to write 
another CD-ROM.)