Trying to access MacWrite ll document

Yes, we are only talking about 3.5" floppy disks here. I read DS.DD as DSDD or 2DD. That is, double-sided double density disks. The 1 MB is probably a DOS absolute maximum value (normally, 720K PC-formatted). Formatted for Mac these diskettes would be 800K. Could 3M be the manufacturer?

>1 MB is probably a DOS absolute maximum value

No, but an unformatted value.

http://support.apple.com/kb/TA31266

Jan

If I remember correctly some installer floppies used various techniques to get more on them than normal. At the time there were various posts about this. Even so I would expect a 3.5 MB installer to be spread over 2 or 3 floppies unless this is the decompressed size in which case it would probably go onto one floppy.

Hi Neville,

At least according to an eBay item, it appears as if MacWrite II consisted of three 800K floppies. One seems to be a reference disk, a second help, and a third one probably the program.

Jan

There was no 3.5 MB floppy for the Mac. He was just mistaken referring to a 3.5" floppy drive, as 3.5 MB.

Of course, the history of the 3.5" floppy on the Mac was the singled sided 400K for the Mac 128K, then the double sided 800K for the Mac Plus and then the 1.4 MB SuperDrive HD floppy released with the Mac SE/30 (and some upgraded SE's).

Kennect was able to get 2.4 MB on a 1.4 MB HD floppy with its Drive 2400 and the Rapport hardware dongle (and driver software).

I do not recall anyone who was able to get a greater amount on a Mac compatible floppy.

Other devices were released to the market that had greater capacity; such as the Zip Drive, the Iomega Bernoulli removeable hard drive cartridge, the Iomega Jaz drive, CD-RW and more..

springboardB wrote:

Neville, thank you for your offer. I will take you up on it, if I can't find someone a little closer (I'm in CA), as I need to get this little project done in the next 2 weeks - gift.

Where in CA?

You may want to find someone with a Beige G3 desktop. Those have compatible floppy drives.

http://www.apple.com/usergroups/ is a good resource to start. If they have DataViz Maclinkplus that often can convert MacWrite to Microsoft Word.

Appleworks sometimes has the right translators for MacWrite II as well. Now I don't have a Beige G3, but I do have Maclinkplus.

I have several Beige G3 desktops - one in permanent use as a server - http://meon.zero.eu.org

It has OS 9.2.2 but not Word.

My G4 Towers have Word.

I have other old Macs including:

1. Colour Classic
2. 7600
3. iMac DV
4. iBook

Most have the software last used on them but batteries probably need replacing.

I have a lot of old software installers and backups but they are badly stored and hence it may not be easy to find particular items.

Hi!

Did you ever get these documents off the 3.5" 800K disks? If not, and if you still need them, please contact me and I will help you with them. www.TechMeBack.com

Thanks!