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From: tempest@wet.UUCP (Ken Lui)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: SE question
Message-ID: <670@wet.UUCP>
Date: 14 Oct 89 18:20:07 GMT
References: <50037@<1989Oct2> <8400174@m.cs.uiuc.edu> <1989Oct12.231203.15676@NCoast.ORG>
Reply-To: tempest@wet.UUCP (Ken Lui)
Organization: Wetware Diversions, San Francisco
Lines: 25

In article <1989Oct12.231203.15676@NCoast.ORG> allbery@ncoast.ORG (Brandon S. Allbery) writes:
...
>(Why do Macs use variable speed drives?  Because 400K floppies are that much
>nicer than 360K floppies (SS/DD), and 800K better than 720K (DS/DD).  (Do
...

It's interesting that you brought this subject up because a
friend of mine has an IBM PC, and is using a program that
reformats DS/DD disks to 800K and (either 1.2Mb diskettes --> 1.44Mb
or 1.44Mb diskettes --> 1.6Mb).  So, it's possible to get the
extra capacity with just fixed-speed drives.  Given this
situation, is there a program or is it possible to patch the
MacOS to give us increased storage capacity?

BTW, that program is only needed to format the diskette, and once
formatted, any drive can read it.  I always thought this variable
drive speed was nice--400K on SS 3.5s and 800K on DS 3.5s--until
I learned that the Amiga gets 880K on DS 3.5s.

Ken
-- 
_____________________________________________________________________________
     Kenneth K.F. Lui	   |  UUCP:	...{ucsfcca|claris}!wet!tempest
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