.

The price is just ridiculous.

Right now i'm pretty happy with the chinese one.

Even though it only supports 1.44 format, as stated, i found when i backed up my 5.25 360k, 5.25 1.2MB and 3.5 720k that it seems to work with other formats as well. I used HD-COPY. So far, the floppy emulator has not gone crazy with HD-COPY re-writing emulated floppies as other formats.

Very handy.

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Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

The price is just ridiculous.

The intended buyer is a mechanical workshop with old CNC-machines that use floppy drives for program storage and transfer?

If your hardware is worth 100000 euro and not 100 euro the price seem like a bargain 😉

Ok guys I have some more time and trying to get my head around the supplied software.

I can't read the commands, but figured out that you can:

- Open a folder to show the contents of each folder
- Extract a floppy as an image file

What I really would like to know is how to:

- Load an image file and put it onto the USB
- Is there a way to backup everything?

I made images of the screens, maybe someone can read them?

Ok So I used the 1.31t version from the link earlier in this post. Don't know why your still using the Chinese version unless it doesn't work on your drive? (I have the 2 digit version)
The toolbar is quite different but hopefully it'll give you a start. I've had to put the screenshots in a word document as I cant post pics at the moment.

Incidentally this last screen is a cutdown version of the 1.23 download from the same site. Which is the program I use day to day. It uses the same screen layout just with an advanced tab to access individual disks and is a self contained exe that doesn’t need installing. It seems to still have the ability to write image files but I’ve never tested this. I don't use the full blown 1.31t version, its overkill for what I need.

I cant remember if I was ever able to create a boot disk from using "write an image file". I seem to remember I ended up just booting from a physical floppy with the correct OS and then just going sys A:\ B:\
So I just did a quick test using 1.31t of write an image file which shows up on the virtual drive, export image file which created an img file then write an image file again to a different virtual drive. I'm guessing this is your Q and W options on your 1st screenshot)
All seems to work but the 486 with the physical drive isn't set up so cant properly test

I thought Bulk save may be a Bulk export option to backup a usb, but is just seems to be like a commit changes to many disk images at once

Export image works beautifully, but importing throws a "access denied" error.

I'll check out your version.

EDIT: Ok that tool doesn't work with mine...

I already have three 3 digit floppies, so I'm going to stick with them. Currently I use the asian utility to extract image files. And I can use WinImage to write them back in case the USB fails. Not ideal, but could be worse...

Hey figured it out!

I was always formatting the USB sticks with the drive (holding down the buttons when powered on). But now I tried the software (your version) and followed the instructions from that German site.

It created 100 images on my Sandisk (which wouldn't format through the buttons pressed). I then right clicked on each image > write image and pointed it to my stored images. Did this for image 00 to 14 and it works like a charm 😀

My USB Floppy so far:

ahelet wrote:

This floppy emulator have a software update function, every this type floppy emulator with older software can be upgraded to new […]
Show full quote

This floppy emulator have a software update function,
every this type floppy emulator with older software can be upgraded to new version,
today we have added some other formats as well.
New version can maintain all this floppy formats:

160KB 5" double 512data 8sector 40trk 1side MFM
180KB 5" double 512data 9sector 40trk 1side MFM
320KB 5" double 512data 8sector 40trk 2side MFM
360KB 5" double 512data 9sector 40trk 2side MFM
720KB 3" double 512data 9sector 80trk 2side MFM
1,2MB 5" double 512data 15sector 80trk 2side MFM
1,44MB 3" high 512data 18sector 80trk 2side MFM

in future planned add more formats, also functions if nessesary.

For the price that emulator costs, i would rather get the Hxc. If in the future you offer a good LCD display and support for at least 1000 floppies on one USB stick/SD Card and a reasonable price tag you could grab all of the retro computing market for yourselves.

Missed your update Mau1wurf, glad I could at least point you in the right direction after all the help you've given me and others.
..and that's about all I could as all I learnt in German at school was how to say pencil, which after many visits to Germany, Austria, Switzerland has never come up once, Wasted youth.

Your a bit more floppy mad then me though! I've only got a Dos and a 98 boot disk permanently on my stick. I mostly use it (or real disks) for a quick file transfers when the networks playing up. Nothing I really want to keep.
what's the benefit of keeping it as a floppy image?

chinny22 wrote:

what's the benefit of keeping it as a floppy image?

Backup really. If my USB with all the floppies dies it's a real pain.

With the images I just need to right click a few times and have a new restored one. It's a good enough solution for me 😀 Images also work with bootdisks and hold the LABEL information, which some disks look for, like Creative Sound Blaster disks.

The benefit of floppies is not having to shut down the machine, remove the CF card or notebook HDD, out it in the desktop, load software, remove it and put it back in the retro computer.

The USB floppy is also really reliable. Not a single read error or any issue unlike with real floppy drives and disks. It was shocking. I've been told that the new floppy drives are simply garbage and that was when I looked for other options.

Something I want to look at it sourcing a USB floppy adapter so I don't have to use a motherboard with floppy header (they are getting rare and really limit your choices). I have a USB FDD and it works quite well. You can write floppy images just as if it was connected to a header.

Totally with you on the reliability. I still have a real FDD in just about all my PC's and 2 USB external FDD drives myself as people are giving them away free these days but if I'm using a floppy its casue I'm trying to do a quick file transfer or using as a boot disk and getting Error reading from drive A is the last thing I want to see.

I was more interested why you keep disk images at all. All my dos drivers I've since created a zip file of the folder complete with autoexec and config.sys which I can just extract and bypass the install routine and any OS checks it may do. But doesn't sound like you have network running so yeh can see a reliable sneekernet been pretty important.

You know you can open a disk by right clicking on it in the software right? Windows just treats it like a 1.44 USB stick so you wont be able to boot from it but it works well enough for file transfers between a PC with USB and the FDD emulator.

Anything without a header I'm happy to boot from USB/CD Got a couple of kick around P4's that have both FDD header and USB bootable if I need a transfer machine I guess

Oh, well I really like using the original installers from tie to time 😀

Once installed, I use my own BAT files for whatever sound card I happen to use, like SBPRO.BAT or AWE64.BAT. The entire CF cards gets backed up regularly.

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ahelet wrote:

The Hxc is old retro generation batch converter type floppy emulator and is not comparable with this new generation batch conver […]
Show full quote

The Hxc is old retro generation batch converter type floppy emulator and is not comparable with this new generation batch converter and configuration file free floppy emulator.
Here is no batch converter needed and no configuration file needed , Please do not confuse with Hxc.
Here is floppy emulator in 32 mhz and it working 30% faster than 40mhz batch converter type.

http://www.floppydrive.eu

So, you work there then.

Which means you could probably explain what is up with this lame nonsense shown below ?
Placeholder, sure... but doesn't quite invoke any trust from potential buyers 😵
Or am I missing something very important here ?
http://www.floppydrive.eu/about-store

Just watched your review video Mau1wurf977. Bought it seconds later. Anything like this for CD/DVD Images?

rodimus80 wrote:

Just watched your review video Mau1wurf977. Bought it seconds later. Anything like this for CD/DVD Images?

Now that would be awesome 😀 Haven't seen anything yet.

ahelet wrote:

The Hxc is old retro generation batch converter type floppy emulator and is not comparable with this new generation batch conver […]
Show full quote

The Hxc is old retro generation batch converter type floppy emulator and is not comparable with this new generation batch converter and configuration file free floppy emulator.
Here is no batch converter needed and no configuration file needed , Please do not confuse with Hxc.
Here is floppy emulator in 32 mhz and it working 30% faster than 40mhz batch converter type.

http://www.floppydrive.eu

What was the part you did not understand:

If in the future you offer a good LCD display and support for at least 1000 floppies on one USB stick/SD Card and a reasonable price tag you could grab all of the retro computing market for yourselves.

As is, your product still needs a few improvements to become interesting for the retro market, at least on the IBM PC and compatibles side. Because the Hxc may be older tech, but is far more useful than your product.

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