6386 <-> 3B1 floppy compatibility?

[Bill Kennedy]

In article <1051 at woton.UUCP> riddle at woton.UUCP (Prentiss Riddle ) writes:
>We have just gotten a 6386 on 31-day trial from AT&T and have lots of
>questions.  Here's one:
>
>Does anyone know whether it is possible to write a floppy on a UNIX PC
>and read it on a 6386 WSG, or vice-versa?  I've already determined by
>experiment that the mountable floppy formats are incompatible.  What
>about cpio floppies, etc? 

Not entirely kosher, but it will work.  If you can locate a copy of the
cpiopc [sic] for the PC 6300 PLUS you can use the `x' option, from TFM

x   Use UNIX PC floppy disk format (8 sector per track, 48tpi density
    320K bytes total capacity).  Special starting track conversions are
    done to be compatible with UNIX PC floppy formats.

I have done it successfully on a PC 6300 PLUS, dozens of times for UNIX PC's
with never a hitch.  It is most helpful if you use a 360K drive if you are
going to re-use the diskette.  Alternatively, format the diskette on the 3B1
before writing it with the 6386 1.2Mb drive.

The $64K question is where do you get a copy of cpiopc?  It isn't in the
6386 distribution and TFM is silent about it.  Perhaps the Hot Line could
provide a copy for you, the PLUS appears to have lost its cadaver status
with them, surely they could give you cpiopc.  I can guarantee that cpiopc
will work under 386 UNIX without modification, guess what file was the first
one into the 386 with cpio :-)
-- 
Bill Kennedy  usenet      {rutgers,ihnp4!killer,cbosgd}!ssbn!bill
              internet    bill at ssbn.WLK.COM