You can use emulator of old PC and old PC operating system to install software and convert your song. All you need is USB floppy drive to read your diskettes.

Thanks Babasha
I was told by the writer of the software that converts old Ensoniq files -- the only software that will do this, the following:
"You would need access to an old IBM-PC compatible computer with an internal floppy disk drive for the conversion process. Additionally, that PC would have to be running either MS-DOS or a very old version of Windows such as Windows 98 SE. USB floppy disk drives do not allow reading non MS-DOS disk formats which is why you need the internal floppy disk drive."
So, I think the antique PC is still necessary.

There might be someone who reads these forums who's close enough to help... but we really need to know where you are?
(I'm in Canada - but I've corresponded with Vogons from all over the world)

What do you have for a PC - in particular i'm wondering it it's old enough to have a floppy controller with an internal connector for it.
If that's the case, you might only need to find a floppy drive and cable.

This is not entirely unlike problems people have running my ImageDisk tool on "modern" PCs.
ImageDisk has to run under DOS with an internal floppy because it accesses it directly (not through the OS) and in somewhat non-standard ways.

So what I've done for those people is made a stand-alone PC-DOS boot diskette which has a RamDisk (for working storage), limited USB drive & network support (to get images on/off).

Someone without a DOS PC can boot this disk (they do have to have a floppy - which is pretty much guaranteed with ImageDisk as it's purpose is archiving and restoring floppy disks), run ImageDisk make images then put them on USB drives of transfer them to another system over the network.

I could probably set you up with something similar - as long as you can get a floppy drive on your system.

Thanks DaveDDS. i have a Mac from this century, that will not compute these floppies, no matter what’s attached. The ensoniq software man tells me that I need an “IBM compatible PC running DOS or early Windows with its own, onboard floppy drive,” and running his software which was originally written for a machine like this. So that is what I’m looking for. I don’t need it long—once it’s up and running with his software installed, I can convert the sysex dumps on the floppies to midi files which then I transport to my imac somehow. Again, I am not a techie —at all. I live in Seattle. I’ve checked rePC for the hardware to no avail. Ideally, I need a person relatively nearby with this kind of computer whose willing to let me load software on his computer that was written when Lawrence Welk was still on the air. Tall order I think. 😵‍💫

SillyMe wrote on 2026-07-08, 17:41:

Thanks DaveDDS. i have a Mac from this century, that will not compute these floppies, no matter what’s attached. The ensoniq software man tells me that I need an “IBM compatible PC running DOS or early Windows with its own, onboard floppy drive,” and running his software which was originally written for a machine like this. So that is what I’m looking for. I don’t need it long—once it’s up and running with his software installed, I can convert the sysex dumps on the floppies to midi files which then I transport to my imac somehow. Again, I am not a techie —at all. I live in Seattle. I’ve checked rePC for the hardware to no avail. Ideally, I need a person relatively nearby with this kind of computer whose willing to let me load software on his computer that was written when Lawrence Welk was still on the air. Tall order I think. 😵‍💫

Rats - a MAC is completely different diskette standards and as far as I know ... can't be made to read standard IBM/MFM format diskettes.

I'm pretty sure I have everything you might need - and I'd help if I could ... but I'm nowhere near you. I'm in Ottawa, Ontario Canada!

Some slightly good news if you find someone nearby with a compatible platform (ie: older hardware)

Depending on how huge this ENSONIC software is, and how much has to be done to "install" it (hopefully it's like most DOS software and you "just run" it)
You might not need someone with DOS (or early windows) and you wouldn't have to "load" software onto their system.

You know it's going to have a floppy disk, so theoretically you could ignore their installed OS, boot DOS from a floppy with a large enough
RamDisk to give working space, and read the disks that way.

If you can tell me where to get the "ENSONIC" software, I can see if I can get it to work that way, and if so, send you a boot floppy image & some tools to write it to an actual disk - you would put those on a USB "stick" and when you find someone with compatible hardware, get them to write the image using their system, then boot the created floppy and "go nuts".

(must be someone in Seattle who follows Vogons - and just might have a "VOS" (Very Old System) they use to run their VOG`ons` (Very Old Games) 😀

Wouldn't need to be a super vintage system, floppy interface can be found on Core 2, even some LGA1155. They would be screaming fast for DOS and that might cause issues with some software though

Matth79 wrote on 2026-07-08, 22:11:

Wouldn't need to be a super vintage system, floppy interface can be found on Core 2, even some LGA1155. They would be screaming fast for DOS and that might cause issues with some software though

Agreed, I've got several "newer" systems with floppy drives (and some that only support 1 drive in hardware - B: select not brought out) - but you never know what other improvements might mess it up (speed certainly is a concern)

I'd go back as far as I reasonably could - but sounds like anything PC with a floppy is going to be "the one" in this case, at least for the first try.

The maker of the Ensoniq conversion software is Gary Giebler -- his website is https://www.giebler.com/. I emailed him recently and hi responded quickly and kindly. His website is pretty much gobbledegook for me being an absolute dolt around this stuff, but for seasoned people in this realm there may be sense in it. I've seen some PCs that might fit the bill on EBay, but that's a big step for now for me, $$. I might be willing to bite that bullet though if I was reasonably confident that it would all work. Today I went back to count how many disks I have (8), and discovered that I bought software a pretty long while ago from Giebler (I'd forgotten) I have that disk available to send out to anyone who's willing to do a little first hand sleuthing on their old PC. I'm not sure if it's all the software needed here, but it might be a start. I really appreciate the time you've given on this.

What model is the imac? You should be able to run some type of virtualization software on it that will run DOS or Windows.

uSB floppies even still work with Windows 11..

Then, for non MS-DOS / FAT formatted floppies, you can use a Greaseweazle with an internal floppy drive which will make it into a USB floppy that can read whatever format you need it to read / write provided you have the correct type floppy drive.

Edited for weird extra characters in between words.

Reading odd formats requires getting up close and personal with the floppy controller, USB drives are too abstracted, virtualizers are too abstracted

Have you even looked up the Greaseweazle? It was made exactly for this purpose.

Edit:
Use a Greaseweazle to backup the disk(s) to image(s).

The you can use software from this company to read those disk images or even directly from the disks if I am looking at it properly.
https://www.chickensys.com/software/index.html

I wonder if DOSBox coupled with a versatile USB floppy (like a TEAC FD-05PUB; often rebadged for Lenovo or Dell) would allow you to just insert the disk and run Geibler's Alesis Diskette Manager to read the contents. If that works, you could do it on pretty much any PC you can get your hands on.

I understand that the website says it has to be an internal drive, not USB, but it is also possible that they have simply not tried this particular method using DOSBox. If they are expecting the program to be run in DOS, then it makes sense that they would advise against using a USB drive. Having DOSBox mount your USB floppy as A: drive is very different from plugging a USB floppy drive into a computer and expecting straight MS-DOS to know what to do with it.

Those TEAC drives are excellent. I have a bunch of them and they read 720K disks just fine in Windows 10. If Geibler's software is intended to do the heavy lifting and knows what to do with the data on those disks, it is possible that this drive will just do what it is told and read the data.

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2026-07-12, 02:07:

I wonder if DOSBox coupled with a versatile USB floppy (like a TEAC FD-05PUB; often rebadged for Lenovo or Dell) would allow ...

I'd be surprised if it could ... from whaat I've been able to determine (just from reading this conversation). the software talks directly to the PCs Nec765 FDC hardware.

This is what ImageDisk does, which won't work with anything else. I've used/played with DosBo a lot - and as far as I've seen, it doesn't emulate the 765 - it provides floppy services from BIOS
(which is enough for DOS and most software which does direct sector accessing)

Even if a Virtual machine tried to emulate the 765 at hardware level, I don't think it would correctly emulate to the level where unusual/non-standard operations could work (on a USB drive which has completely different lowest level capabilities), or with accurate enough timing to be usable.