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From: burton@fortune.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.micro.cpm
Subject: Re: A good deal on Shugart model 800 8-i - (nf)
Message-ID: <2338@fortune.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 23-Jan-84 15:06:27 EST
Article-I.D.: fortune.2338
Posted: Mon Jan 23 15:06:27 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 27-Jan-84 06:13:28 EST
Sender: notes@fortune.UUCP
Organization: Fortune Systems, Redwood City, CA
Lines: 33

#R:sri-arpa:-1574700:fortune:25500004:000:1365
fortune!burton    Jan 23 09:29:00 1984


It's always nice to hear good things about the products of the company you
came from.  I'm glad to hear that Dave's experiences were so good.

The reason that 8" floppies, particularly single-sided ones are available so
cheap is that most OEM's have gone to 8" double-sided drives (for capacity) or to
5 1/4" drives for compactness.  That's the good news.

The bad news is that not all 8" floppies are created alike.  Forget, I don't
what anyone says, about those  el-cheapo Siemens.  The company withdrew from
the business, and spare parts, etc., should be hard to come by.  

If you buy Shugart single-sided drives, get only the LSI board versions. 
Look for a "MLC" silver sticker on the chassis, and it should say 5 or 6.
For Shugart double-sided drives (SA 850), get MLC 12 or greater.

CDC and Qume 8" drives would also be good buys.  The others, it depends upon
spare parts, availability of manuals, etc.  Not all other manufacturers 
are Shugart-compatible.  Beware of Memorex, Pertec, and PerSci in this regard.  

At swap meets, I've seen stacks of very, very used 8" drives.  Very tired
looking.  Not worth the effort, unless you know how to do head alignment or
change a spindle motor.

  Philip Burton,  Fortune Systems,  
  Redwood City,   CA  94065	  
			- - -
{allegra,[decvax!decwrl,ucbvax]!amd70,cbosgd,harpo,hpda,ihnp4,sri-unix}
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