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From: jlong@uhunix1.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (John Long)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.introduction
Subject: Re: Reading IBM disks in an Amiga Drive?
Message-ID: <12929@uhccux.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu>
Date: 9 May 91 02:21:57 GMT
Article-I.D.: uhccux.12929
References: <1991Apr15.205242.1@acad2.alaska.edu> <8790@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu>
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In article <8790@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> zerkle@iris.ucdavis.edu (Dan Zerkle) writes:
>In article <1991Apr15.205242.1@acad2.alaska.edu> axpmw@acad2.alaska.edu writes:
>>Stupid question - but I thought I read somewhere that there was
>>a program that would read an ibm disk (ascii datafiles) from a
>>normal amiga disk drive.
>
>There are two.  One, called MessyDos is free.  You'll find it on a
>Fred Fish disk.  It malfunctions under 2.0, however.  The other,
>called Cross Dos, is not free.  You can buy it at your nearest Amiga
>Dealer or via mail order.  It does work under 2.0.  Both of these
>systems turn your Amiga drive into an MS-DOS drive.  You can use the
>drive to do anything to an MS-DOS disk that you can do to an AmigaDos
>disk.
>
>           Dan Zerkle  zerkle@iris.eecs.ucdavis.edu  (916) 754-0240
>           Amiga...  Because life is too short for boring computers.

Good question indeed. After looking at the docs for both products, I down-
loaded a demo of crossdos for free. CrossDos appeared to be the easiest
to install, and it was *fairly* easy to install on my 2000. The way it is
set up now, drive df0: can also be called di0:  When a msdos disk is in,
you call it di0: and when an amiga disk is in, you call it df0: 

It is transpearent compatible with all directory requesters I've used. In
the demo version, you can read, but not write, which is a good demo strategy,
imho. If you attempt to write, you get a "disk protected" alert box from
the o.s. Good error handling, that. If you put an amiga disk into the drive,
and say 'dir di0:' you will get an alert saying 'not a dos disk' and vice-
versa if you go 'dir df0:' with a msdos disk in the drive. Good.

For me, it's exactly what I need. I do an ftp download to our local vax, next
I send via zmodem to a mac being used as a terminal on the vax at 19,200 baud.
Then I use 'apple file exchange' go from the mac to a msdos disk. And from
there to the Amiga. The disk is formatted for msdos but never touches a msdos 
machine! A round-about way I admit, but it works. (The amiga is located some-
where else, so I can't plug it into the vax. Shucks.

Also, because of the way the different disk formats are, the 'dir' command
is notably faster on an msdos disk.

I don't have the ftp location handy, but I could find it if you can't find
it yourself.

Aloha,
-LongJohn