[mdlug] Interesting information about Windows "7"

[Paul]

Raymond McLaughlin <driveray at ameritech.net>, on Fri Jan 25, 2008 [12:10:04 AM] said:
> Aaron Kulkis wrote:
> 
> > When's the last time you saw an RLL drive or an MFM drive?
> > 
> > Do you even know what one looks like?
> > 
> > [Hint, they're both have a 5-1/4 x 3-drive-bays tall
> > form factor, and they're as heavy as bowling balls]
> 
> If I recall, my old 8088 had a MFM drive that was only 1 to 1 1/2 drive
> bays tall. It made all kinds of cool "bee bleep" sounds while working,
> and you were supposed to run a special program to park the read-write
> heads prior to moving the unit.

	Hi;

	The nomenative unit is not in 'drive bays', whatever
that is. 5 1/4" drives were either full height, or half height.
(barring any weird mutants I dont have any examples of)
(same for floppy drives) 3 1/2" drives originally came in a
height approximately equal to half height, and then slimmed down.
(since they would initially have only been constrained by a
5 1/4' half height bay with an adapter.)
	A 5 1/4" full height drive could be suprisingly light,
essentially being a mostly empty box of aluminum, the heaviest
being something like an rz58, one of the last drives in that
form factor, with 8 platters inside.
	Not sure what started this thread, but I have mfm, rll,
and scsi drives of this large form factor and the cards to control them
that I have made work under linux-- just because;)

Paul
set at pobox.com