Re: Partitioning Zip Disks -- Possible?

[dempson@actrix.gen.nz (David Empson)]

Paul Creager <wily@svpal.svpal.org> wrote:

> Captain Harlock (Z5D31@ttacs3.ttu.edu) wrote:
> : > So using IBM formatted zip disks would be the thing to try most likely.
> : Okay, I'll try it. Thanks for the info.
> 
> Yes, you're better off using IBM formatted Zip disks because they lack
> that special Mac partition, which apparently is hard to remove with a II.

You can simply repartition the disk to get rid of the odd Mac partition.

IBM Zips are unreadable (except probably with Peter Watson's MS-DOS
utilities) - you must repartition them to do anything.

> I'm in the market for a Zip drive myself.  I know they come in SCSI and
> parallel models (for IBMs).  My question is, is the disk that ships in the
> SCSI version already formatted for Mac or IBM?  I want to avoid those Mac
> disks, including the one supplied with the unit.

The ZIP Tools disk is formatted for both the Mac and PC.  The software
patches it when you first access it to remove the "foreign" format files
and make all the space available for your own system.  I'm not sure what
will happen if the first use of Zip Tools is on an Apple II.  My guess
is that it will see the Mac partitioning information and ignore the PC
stuff.

-- 
David Empson
dempson@actrix.gen.nz
Snail mail: P.O. Box 27-103, Wellington, New Zealand