DOS Games Discussion

A while ago I bought a device that emulates a floppy drive but uses a usb stick for storage - apparently developed for embroidery or CNC machines that used floppy disks. At the time I had a hard time finding one in the US, and most were from somewhere in Europe - all were pricy.

Today, I noticed there were a bunch on ebay for 'only' $40! I haven't priced around, but that is a lot better than when I researched them a year or two ago.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=usb+floppy+emulator

(What I really want is to put one in a PC XT I've got, but I'm not sure if it would work as well as the one I have in a Pentium based dos box - I recall hearing normal 3.5 floppy drives didn't work. If that is right, I assume a 3.5 emulator will have trouble as well. Won't know until I try, though!)

Several of the (older) emulator devices compared:
http://jimwarholic.com/2009/04/fdd-flop ... lators.php

Quadko wrote:(What I really want is to put one in a PC XT I've got, but I'm not sure if it would work as well as the one I have in a Pentium based dos box - I recall hearing normal 3.5 floppy drives didn't work. If that is right, I assume a 3.5 emulator will have trouble as well. Won't know until I try, though!)

What? Why wouldn't they work? If they have a floppy connector they work.
Period. Of course they must be enabled in TeH BIOS

As for your "USB stick as a floppy disk with floppy emulator" thos things work fine.
Same remark : you need a floppy connector on the MOBO for them things.

Good to hear! I just recall reading that AT+ all floppies worked fine, but original pc & xt couldn't handle 3.5" or high density drives. Of course, that could all just fall under the fine print of BIOS, there!

But quotes like "The AT was the first PC to support high-capacity (1.2M) floppy drives" on PC museum sites gave me caution. I guess I won't worry about it and just try to track down or build the motherboard edge connector -> modern floppy connector cable and just give it a try.

I was reading someone's success story hooking a drive to the xt's external floppy port, but I can't find the link today. That also gave me more hope to find a result.

Found the link:
http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum ... -on-a-5160

At the very least I can get a 3.5" drive working, it looks like, I'm just not sure if the emulator will cooperate with the old controller card or if it will insist on being a high density drive and thus unsupported. I can but try!
( http://static02.mediaite.com/geekosyste ... o-not.jpeg )

http://www.ebay.com/sch/sis.html?_nkw=U ... +5150+Bios

LOL, seems I could be rich if I ever sell what's in my ol'boxes ....