File transfers

[davio2shoes]

I have a number of old commodore 128 floppy disks filled with files I wrote on their word processor around 15 years ago. Im looking to find anyway or any person who could somehow get these files off these floppy and onto paper, emails, windows computer files, ANYTHING, lol.
Shoer of finding a commodore 128 which I have no space for does anyone have any ideas?

 

[Zeela]

I have a number of old commodore 128 floppy disks filled with files I wrote on their word processor around 15 years ago. Im looking to find anyway or any person who could somehow get these files off these floppy and onto paper, emails, windows computer files, ANYTHING, lol.
Shoer of finding a commodore 128 which I have no space for does anyone have any ideas?

First a question...

Do you remember what word processor you used?

I have the means to transfer the files from floppies to whatever modern media you want. But I'm located in Sweden, and I suspect you're not. Maybe there is someone closer to you here that can help.

But as a "Plan-B" you have the option of mailing me the floppies and I'll do the transfer.

If you want to do it yourself, then you'll need a Commodore disk drive, a special cable (XE1541 or XM1541), PC running DOS or Windows XP and some software, either StarCommander or OpenCBM depending on your OS of choice.

That's the setups I'm using.

// Z

 

[carlsson]

Worth pointing out here is that if the floppies were used with a C128, there is a slight chance they were written with a 1571 drive. It means you'd need a 1571 drive to read them back. The X-series cables Zeela mention work just as well with a 1571 as a 1541 drive, if you have access to one. Basically that is the only and simplest solution, and won't require a working C128, only a working drive. All other solutions I can think of would involve the computer itself somehow.

 

[Bungo Pony]

Copying the floppes onto the PC is the easy part if you have the cable and the floppy drive. As mentioned previously, it depends on what format the files were written if you want to move them to a .txt or a .doc file. The Star Commander will allow you to display file contents, and I believe sequential files are completely readable with this method, which makes it easy to transfer the data to a more modern format.

The only thing is the files can be a bit messy due to formatting inserted by the word processing software. I've got a couple of screenshots on my blog showing this:

http://classicalgasemissions.blogspot.com/2008/02/another-journal-going-public.html

 

[Trixter]

if the floppies were used with a C128, there is a slight chance they were written with a 1571 drive. It means you'd need a 1571 drive to read them back.

Why is that?

 

[carlsson]

Because the 1571 is double sided while the 1541 is only single sided. In C64 mode it usually doesn't matter, but in C128 mode disks default to double sided mode if the drive can handle it, I believe.

You can flip a single sided disk over, but reading the back side is the reverse of reading the second side of a double sided disk.