need old computer help

khd · Nov 3, 2006

I'd put the old HD in a newer machine with a FDD as a slave with a new clean master drive already formated FAT32 and then boot the machine with a boot FDD and then move the files you want to the new HDD then take the new HDD and put it in as a slave in another new machine with a bootable HDD. Boot the machine with the OS (XP) and grab the files. Doesn't always work but I have been successfull getting old stuff to new machines that way.

Kevin

GaryE · Nov 3, 2006

Soundguy said:
I have some old 'legacy' computers laying around the office, tucked in corners. Many with usefull data or programs on them that get used every 1-2 years. old stuff.. mainly 'dos' related.. stuff that won't run under windows.

Soundguy,

If it is mainly old dos stuff, check out DR DOS. I think it will do what you need... And you can't beat the price.

Unofficial DR-DOS Resources

Gary

Soundguy · Nov 3, 2006

I resurected the old system, and am backing up some files to a 2nd HDD right now. I may try to see if I can get 'Guest' to run on that old computer. 'Guest' is a 1-time zip driver to let a computer with a parallel port, running dos, access a zip 100 or zip 250. If that works.. I'll dump all my files to zip, where i can then migrate them to any of my computers.

Thanks for the tips guys.

( I used to have DR dos.. will have to see if I still have the -dusty- box laying around somewhere ).

As a testiment to the old stuff.. I have/did use old DoubleDos as a multitasker for a while.. then went to Desqview as a multitasker. I gotta say... desqview was wayyyyy smoother than win.3.x as a multitasker.

Soundguy

California · Nov 3, 2006

Back in the old days - I used an early dos version Laplink (purported to be shareware) for that sort of project. It can be 'pushed' onto the no-diskette pc with a null modem cable. As I recall it doesn't care about drive overlays etc, it just accepts the device driver as a real device.

I think dos Laplink still worked with Win95, so it might work with later os's as well. You could probably still download early Laplink from some shareware site and running it serial should work for a one time, slow, data transfer. I'll bet you still have a null modem cable around there somewhere.

The parallel laplink cable is better for production data transfer since it is faster. I set up several generations of laptops for the office using parallel Laplink, cloning a master into a twin, then using both as masters to populate two more etc.

Soundguy · Nov 4, 2006

Well, using some software from the western digital archive ( old software 0 I got a new drive overlay driver, and some diagnostics software and i am back in business.

( yes I do have a nul modem cable!.. and have made one out of 3 coathangers before... )

I also have a copy of an old rs232 serial port network... easynet or something like that.. blistering fast.. even worked on the old 8250 serial uarts the original 8088's had... neat old software.. it actually had a driver that formatted the serial port to make it run like netbios.. etc..

I still have a pair of old thomas conrad arcnet cards.. again.. blistering fast 2mb transfers!

I think I will try to play around and get iomega 'guest' working on that pc, and if it does.. just make a backup 250megs at a time.. etc. With each 1gig drive only half full.. I'm only looking at scraping up 4 zip disks... I should have plenty laying around here..
( I used to have an old bernouli drive.. 20 meg or so on this machine... ahh the good old days... back when you could throw a perstore controller on an rll drive and get x2 the capacity.. or use an rll controller on a mfm drive and get extra capacity.... I still got lots of that stuff laying around... old 8 bit scsi host adapters, and 5.25 form factor scsi drives.. etc.. )
Soundguy

Soundguy

MossRoad · Nov 4, 2006

I can't believe you don't have an old NIC to throw in that PC and just do the file transfer over the network.

California · Nov 4, 2006

MossRoad said:
I can't believe you don't have an old NIC to throw in that PC and just do the file transfer over the network.

Nothing was that easy in that generation. Adding a nic would just freeze it with an interrupt conflict. Next problem would be that Dos 6.22 didn't have networking. I think it would have to already be running Win 3.1 at the earliest, for that to work without hours of trial and error setup.

Jagmandave · Nov 4, 2006

You guys are speaking greek to most of us............

Glad you found a solution, Soundguy.

hudr · Nov 4, 2006

Soundguy, remember LANtastic? It even came w/ a NIC in the box to take care of any compay issues. That software ran many a business around here before Win95 and a lot even after that.
A quick Google shows you can even still buy it from Spartacom!

MossRoad · Nov 4, 2006

California said:
Nothing was that easy in that generation. Adding a nic would just freeze it with an interrupt conflict. Next problem would be that Dos 6.22 didn't have networking. I think it would have to already be running Win 3.1 at the earliest, for that to work without hours of trial and error setup.

Dos 6.22 had networking. I'm still running a few Dos 6.22 boxes with networking. They take in serial data from a satellite, sort them by keywords and stick them in a shared folder on a server running Windows 2000.