Retreive data from c1993 Compaq Lite 4/33c hard drive

[szegedin]

Hi all - referred to this board by a member of ArsTechnica - I cross-posted this there:

I have an ancient laptop from the 1990s -- A Compaq Lite 4/33c which traveled with me to the ends of the Earth. The machine is running MS-DOS / Windows 3.1 and has the following hard drive: Seagate st9235ag (ATA) Here is the manual: https://www.seagate.com/support/disc/manuals/ata/9235pmb.pdf

The machine boots up and operates in Windows just fine, but I'm trying to figure out how to get the data off, in the absence of any USB or anything. It has a floppy disk drive that does not work (broken belt); I tried another floppy drive in that port but it was not recognized.

I removed this hard drive and plugged it into a USB interface on my new laptop, but the disk is not recognized, neither by Windows 10 or XP nor Ubuntu 18. It shows up in Windows disk management as 'not initialized.' It fails to initialize with "incorrect function" Changing jumpers on the drive did not seem to have an effect.

Can anyone help me figure out what would be necessary to get this drive recognized? It has 100 megabytes of ancient data of some value to me. In the absence of a working floppy drive, I think I have exhausted hardware options for getting data off with something like a serial to USB adapter, because I can't get Terminal or Kermit on there.

If it's possible to get the drive recognized that would be a big help. Cheers.

 

[GiGaBiTe]

Early ATA drives usually don't work on modern hardware and operating systems. You'll need an older system running an older OS like Windows 98 in order to be able to mount the drive.

Another option would be to use interlnk/intersvr.exe and a null modem cable, which makes a crude network between two MS-DOS machines. But this relies on you having the software on the machine already.

http://www.pcxt-micro.com/dos-interlink.html

Many of us have what are called "tweener" systems, which are old systems running old software that can be used to facilitate the transfer of data from more modern systems that have no support for the target systems we're working on. In a case like yours, you really need a tweener system to be able to mount the drive and move the data off. Windows 98 and systems of the time period are old enough to support early ATA drives and new enough to support more modern standards like USB that can be used to move large amounts of data around.

 

[jafir]

We used to use devices like this that convert 44 pin laptop drives to 40 pin desktop drives, back in the days before USB adapters:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07ZGHZJMM/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_2955J9CBF3759YX8FKRD

Then you can plug it into an older desktop computer with a real ide port.

 

[szegedin]

Early ATA drives usually don't work on modern hardware and operating systems. You'll need an older system running an older OS like Windows 98 in order to be able to mount the drive.

Many of us have what are called "tweener" systems, which are old systems running old software that can be used to facilitate the transfer of data from more modern systems that have no support for the target systems we're working on. In a case like yours, you really need a tweener system to be able to mount the drive and move the data off. Windows 98 and systems of the time period are old enough to support early ATA drives and new enough to support more modern standards like USB that can be used to move large amounts of data around.

Thanks much for the reply -- that's probably what I'll do then. If there's any known older version of Ubuntu that would work, that would certainly be easier. The disk spins up with the USB adapter. So is this strictly a matter of the OS?

 

[T-R-A]

If there's any known older version of Ubuntu that would work, that would certainly be easier. The disk spins up with the USB adapter. So is this strictly a matter of the OS?

Stick with a DOS/Win9X based retrieval method. You'll have far fewer problems that way. As GiGaBiTe mentions, a "tweener" system is the best way. Mine is a Win2K/Win98/DOS triple-boot with a 200MHz CPU and both 3.5/5.25 floppies, USB (1.1) and a DVD-burner. Thus when I want to salvage info from older systems, it's pretty straightforward---copy from source and save to DVD. Not fast but gets the job done.

 

[Timo W.]

I have one of these, too.

Why not just get the floppy drive working again? When I got mine, the belt was slipping as well. I boiled it for some minutes in hot water and that made it work again. Of course, buying a new one is the better option, but just for getting the data out of the system, it's not needed.

 

[szegedin]

Stick with a DOS/Win9X based retrieval method. You'll have far fewer problems that way. As GiGaBiTe mentions, a "tweener" system is the best way. Mine is a Win2K/Win98/DOS triple-boot with a 200MHz CPU and both 3.5/5.25 floppies, USB (1.1) and a DVD-burner. Thus when I want to salvage info from older systems, it's pretty straightforward---copy from source and save to DVD. Not fast but gets the job done.

Sounds like a plan. I'll keep an eye out on craigslist for one of these old machines. This stuff has been on there for 25 years, can wait a little while.

I have one of these, too.

Why not just get the floppy drive working again? When I got mine, the belt was slipping as well. I boiled it for some minutes in hot water and that made it work again. Of course, buying a new one is the better option, but just for getting the data out of the system, it's not needed.

Neat trick. My floppy drive belt had turned to sticky goo. I actually yesterday "installed" a rubber band in there and gave it a try. It spun up but didn't recognize the disk or successfully format one -- maybe not spinning at the right speed. I might get in there again and futz with it some more.

 

[GeoffB17]

Another possibility might be LapLink, but this needs the old laptop to have a parallel port, and you could do with another oldish DOS machine also with a pll port. Once the two machines are linked, if you run LapLink on one of them there should be a facility to transfer the software (single prog, or maybe just a stub of it) from the OK machine to the problem one, and once the connection is complete then you can copy whatever.

Geoff

 

[GiGaBiTe]

I have one of these, too.

Why not just get the floppy drive working again? When I got mine, the belt was slipping as well. I boiled it for some minutes in hot water and that made it work again. Of course, buying a new one is the better option, but just for getting the data out of the system, it's not needed.

I've printed out belts on my 3D printer using TPU and they sometimes work. Using the spiral vase mode and one other option I can't remember the name of to make it so end points of layers are spread around so they all don't start and end in the same place to create a weak point.

Sounds like a plan. I'll keep an eye out on craigslist for one of these old machines. This stuff has been on there for 25 years, can wait a little while.

I have a Pentium 4 system available if you wanted it. I don't want much for it, but shipping would be a bit of an expense. I could strip it down to just the motherboard/CPU/RAM to reduce shipping if you wanted to find a case/power supply locally.

 

[brad162]

I've printed out belts on my 3D printer using TPU and they sometimes work. Using the spiral vase mode and one other option I can't remember the name of to make it so end points of layers are spread around so they all don't start and end in the same place to create a weak point.



I have a Pentium 4 system available if you wanted it. I don't want much for it, but shipping would be a bit of an expense. I could strip it down to just the motherboard/CPU/RAM to reduce shipping if you wanted to find a case/power supply locally.

I just pulled data from an old 386 machine

I just got an old PCMCIA NIC and uploaded the files in Zip format to my Windows 10 machine via FTP, it required me getting WFW311 on it with a TCP stack.. so that may not be overly realistic for you, but using FTP on my Windows 10 box has served me well for old PCs and Macs back to the Plus.

I now just have a dedicated 2TB drive in my desktop with all the old software and just transfer it that way. Let’s me keep “one less” machine around, and it’s easy to manipulate the file collection on the main desktop itself that way.

 

[GiGaBiTe]

Why are you quoting me? Your data recovery method is irrelevant to this discussion. The OP has a laptop with no networking software and no way to get networking software on the laptop due to a broken floppy drive.

I really question how you get FTP on a Mac Plus without using exceedingly rare and/or expensive addons. I guess it'd be possible using another "tweener" machine via serial Appletalk in a master/slave configuration, but that'd be painfully slow.

Moving the hard drive to another machine is the cheapest and most straightforward method to recover the data from it.

 

[Timo W.]

I've printed out belts on my 3D printer using TPU and they sometimes work. Using the spiral vase mode and one other option I can't remember the name of to make it so end points of layers are spread around so they all don't start and end in the same place to create a weak point.

Any long-term experience with such printed ones? While my 3D printer can't print TPU, it would be nice to know if such belts are only a temporary solution or work long enough to be a serious consideration.

 

[szegedin]

I just pulled data from an old 386 machine

I just got an old PCMCIA NIC and uploaded the files in Zip format to my Windows 10 machine via FTP, it required me getting WFW311 on it with a TCP stack.. so that may not be overly realistic for you, but using FTP on my Windows 10 box has served me well for old PCs and Macs back to the Plus.

I now just have a dedicated 2TB drive in my desktop with all the old software and just transfer it that way. Let’s me keep “one less” machine around, and it’s easy to manipulate the file collection on the main desktop itself that way.

You know what -- although I can't get any software on to the machine -- I just realized that it does have an FTP app installed -- "WS_FTP" I vaguely remember using it back in the day for updating a website, but it's there anyway. I don't know the first thing about using FTP; is it straightforward to just set up an FTP server on the other machine and run a phone line between them and send stuff that way? I had been thinking of trying to find a dial-up service and pack everything into a couple zip files as you said.

 

[GiGaBiTe]

I can say that they work in the short term if you get the length correct, but I've not done any long term testing with them.

Are you sure your printer can't print TPU? Most any printer with a heated bed can print it, you don't need a direct drive setup. The trick to printing it is you have to print it very slow, usually much slower than the lowest preset print speeds. I've had good luck printing it at 30mm/sec on my crappy Tevo Tarantula.

 

[Timo W.]

Yes, I'm sure. I'd have to replace the feeder to print TPU. The current feeder is not suitable, as it has too much open space for TPU to get stuck.

 

[GiGaBiTe]

You know what -- although I can't get any software on to the machine -- I just realized that it does have an FTP app installed -- "WS_FTP" I vaguely remember using it back in the day for updating a website, but it's there anyway. I don't know the first thing about using FTP; is it straightforward to just set up an FTP server on the other machine and run a phone line between them and send stuff that way? I had been thinking of trying to find a dial-up service and pack everything into a couple zip files as you said.

FTP requires a TCP/IP or PPP connection between two machines, it cannot be used by itself since it relies on an OSI layer 4 transport protocol to work.

Connecting two modems together directly between two machines won't work because there's no "real" phone line. You'd need a phone line emulator. You might be able to use a terminal program via this method, but you'd have to set the connection up manually with modem commands. I don't remember if Windows 3.1 came with a terminal program or not. If it does, it'd also need to have a way to transfer binary files, and the receiving end to be able to receive those files. I have seen a few people talking about connecting two hardware modems and being able to do this, but I'm not sure if soft modems would also work.

If you have a dialup service and can dial an ISP then you could move files around. I think there are still a few dialup ISPs around to serve rural parts of the states.

 

[brad162]

Why are you quoting me? Your data recovery method is irrelevant to this discussion. The OP has a laptop with no networking software and no way to get networking software on the laptop due to a broken floppy drive.

I really question how you get FTP on a Mac Plus without using exceedingly rare and/or expensive addons. I guess it'd be possible using another "tweener" machine via serial Appletalk in a master/slave configuration, but that'd be painfully slow.

Moving the hard drive to another machine is the cheapest and most straightforward method to recover the data from it.

MacPlus? I have an old SCSI Ethernet adapter I got for $10 at a swap some years ago. It works well "enough" to get the files on/off..

also, as far as quoting "you" I was on a mobile phone and just clicked the wrong post.. that's all

You know what -- although I can't get any software on to the machine -- I just realized that it does have an FTP app installed -- "WS_FTP" I vaguely remember using it back in the day for updating a website, but it's there anyway. I don't know the first thing about using FTP; is it straightforward to just set up an FTP server on the other machine and run a phone line between them and send stuff that way? I had been thinking of trying to find a dial-up service and pack everything into a couple zip files as you said.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/2-5-Inch-I...452721?hash=item343c07f0b1:g:JZ8AAOSw6QRgIkFC

Have you tried something like that? I've got an old IBM ThinkPad running Windows 3.1, and an old Micro USB enclosure I got off eBay some time ago.. but I can still read/write that FAT16 drive with my Windows 10 machine and Mac just fine. There should be no reason Windows 10 cannot read it, unless you're using Drivespace or some other compression.

 

[Timo W.]

Have you tried something like that? I've got an old IBM ThinkPad running Windows 3.1, and an old Micro USB enclosure I got off eBay some time ago.. but I can still read/write that FAT16 drive with my Windows 10 machine and Mac just fine. There should be no reason Windows 10 cannot read it, unless you're using Drivespace or some other compression.

You can not use USB adapters for IDE drives that support CHS only. For a hard disk to work with an USB adapter, it needs to support LBA. It's completely irrelevant which adapter you use, it's not going to work for such old drives.

To get the data from that hard disk, a PC with a real IDE port is needed.

 

[T-R-A]

You can not use USB adapters for IDE drives that support CHS only. For a hard disk to work with an USB adapter, it needs to support LBA. It's completely irrelevant which adapter you use, it's not going to work for such old drives.

To get the data from that hard disk, a PC with a real IDE port is needed.

Yep. Most USB to IDE drive adapters don't interpret the CHS geometry properly, and even if the drive were somehow "recognized", there's a high likelihood that the incorrect interpretation of CHS would cause data to become corrupt on either the read or write. If you're using something to retrieve data from an old IDE drive, it'd be best to connect the drive directly to the IDE port on another machine and setup the drive geometry to exactly what it was in the old machine and make sure LBA is not being used.

 

[szegedin]

You can not use USB adapters for IDE drives that support CHS only. For a hard disk to work with an USB adapter, it needs to support LBA. It's completely irrelevant which adapter you use, it's not going to work for such old drives.

To get the data from that hard disk, a PC with a real IDE port is needed.

Okay thanks, that sounds like the beginning of the answer I have been fishing for all along in two threads. I don't mind buying what adapter I need to get access to the disk, I just want to know exactly what the difference in the drive is so I can identify the problem. If I bought everything everyone suggested I still wouldn't have it. It seems I would need both a laptop IDE to larger IDE adapter (if that doesn't cause a problem) and a mobo and OS that are sure to support CHS, which nobody knows exactly which those are.