Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!gatech!rutgers!uwvax!umn-d-ub!umn-cs!mmm!ems!viper!john
From: john@viper.Lynx.MN.Org (John Stanley)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: How compatible are MS-DOS and TOS disks, REALLY?
Message-ID: <596@viper.Lynx.MN.Org>
Date: 8 Feb 88 11:02:42 GMT
References: <8802051651.AA00683@decwrl.dec.com>
Reply-To: john@viper.UUCP (John Stanley)
Organization: DynaSoft Systems
Lines: 41

In article <8802051651.AA00683@decwrl.dec.com> 
goldstein@aim.dec.com (fred, k1io@FN42jk, +1 617 486 7388) writes:
 >Weird stuff.
 >
 >Okay, I've read it a thousand times.  MS-DOS disks are formatted like 
 >TOS disks, the only difference being the MS-DOS boot sector.  So I
 >can exchange files freely, right?  Well, usually, but sometimes it
 >gets very, very strange.

  I've been doing it regularly for quite some time with no trouble.
No, people are -not- pulling your leg or trying to sell you something,
it -does- work...!

 >[description of problem deleted]
 >
 >It sounds like I have to restrict my floppies to being written only
 >by one or the other OS.  I can format on MS-DOS and read/write
 >on Atari, but if I want to write under MS-DOS I can't write to the
 >same disk with the Atari.  Boo hiss.  Anybody understand what's
 >really going on?  thanx.
 >    fred

  Sounds to me like you got a disk error.  Ever hear of one of those?
Wierd things happen even when you work on one machine, it doesn't have
to mean that machine's incompatable (in some misterious way) with
itself....  It could also mean that one of the drives, the one on your
ST or the one on your PC (or -both-) are out of allignment, need
cleaning, or are in the midst of head failure.  Could also be the
disk.  Even though I regularly buy single sided Sony 3.5" disks and
format them double sided with no problem, of maybe 5 disks that have
failed (out of ~400) two of them were double sided.  It happens...

  In short, try it again...  Maybe with a different ST drive.  Maybe
after you have your PC and ST drives both checked out by a good shop.

It can be done...

--- 
John Stanley (john@viper.UUCP)
Software Consultant - DynaSoft Systems
UUCP: ...{amdahl,ihnp4,rutgers}!meccts!viper!john