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Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!feg
From: feg@clyde.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: format under 3.2
Message-ID: <15583@clyde.ATT.COM>
Date: Thu, 22-Oct-87 14:21:23 EDT
Article-I.D.: clyde.15583
Posted: Thu Oct 22 14:21:23 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 24-Oct-87 19:38:23 EDT
References: <394@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> <3180@bellcore.bellcore.com>
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Whippany, NJ
Lines: 31
Summary: Huh?

In article <3180@bellcore.bellcore.com>, tr@wind.bellcore.com (tom reingold) writes:
> In article <394@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> martin@iris.ucdavis.edu (Bruce K. Martin Jr.) writes:
> $ Can someone explaine why if a disk is formatted under MS-DOS 3.2, it
> $ can be read under 3.2 or older, but if a disk is formatted, say under
> $ 3.0 or 2.x, it (sometimes) cannot be read under 3.2.
>.................. 
>
> IBM's version 3.2 refuses to read a disk if that disk's signature contains
> a signature other than "IBM".
> 
> You can use debug to modify the signature on the disk.  But the
> easier way is to boot under a version preceding 3.2, copying the
> files onto your hard disk, going back to 3.2 and reformatting the
> disk and copying the files onto the disk again.

If this is the easier way, I wonder what you would call difficult?  But
I must admit, I have trouble understanding what you are explaining here.
Perhaps when you refer to "disk" you are not always talking about the
same disk?  If merely changing the name of the producer of the ms-dos
is the object, look for this name from the 4th to the 10th byte from
the beginning of the boot sector of any disk. Debug is the way to go.

The name is not the only reason one system will refuse to read another
system's disk.  Some ms-dos have the boot record at a different address
on the disk than others do, and certain programs, not finding the
boot record will abort.  The Leading Edge Model M ms-dos 2.11 and its
twin the Sperry HT (ms-dos 2.11) have this problem.  I don't know
about any other Sperry HT ms-dos versions, but their ver 3.2 has
corrected this situation and is now like the rest of the world.

Forrest Gehrke