Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!ukc!acorn!moncam!emmo
From: emmo@moncam.co.uk (Dave Emmerson)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: can I put four floppies in an AT clone
Summary: Careful..
Message-ID: <339@marvin.moncam.co.uk>
Date: 2 Jan 90 19:51:37 GMT
References: <GOLDSTN.89362204630@MAINE.BITNET+
Organization: Monotype ADG, Cambridge, UK
Lines: 27

In article <GOLDSTN.89362204630@MAINE.BITNET+, GOLDSTN@MAINE.BITNET (Michael E. Goldstein) writes:
+ Is there a way to have three or four floppy drives
+ in my 12mhz AT clone.  
+ [deleted]
+ Would 360K floppies written from the 1.2 meg drive be
+ read and writable on a standard 360K drive in another
+ PC?

It is possible, but only with the right set of boards. Don't ask me which
ones, it's a while since I did it.

You'll have some problems with moving disks between high density and
standard (double) density drives. DD disks can be read on HD drives, but
writing as 360K on the HD drive sometimes produces disks which can't be
read reliably (if at all in some cases) on a DD drive. Few DD drives can
successfully format HD disks even as 360K. Best to use the right disk in
the right drive, which was what you wanted to do anyway.

If your machine is like mine, and checks the floppy types every time you
boot, you could try using a couple of two pole changeover switches to
selectively enable/disable any combination. I've done that here at work,
but you'll need your own local hardware guru, there are too many variables
to give a general methodology on the net - sorry, I would if I could.

If you really want to do it, be prepared for some late nights.

Dave E.