The wait is over! a copy of NS 1.0a is on ebay right now!

http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300160919690&ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:CA:1123
It looks like it has never seen use! Even comes with a wrapped blank disk too.

(http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300160919690&ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:CA:1123)

:( Outbid.

Quote from: "pentium":( Outbid.

I was not me this time. I have original copies of 1.0a and 2.0 on OD.

tiger_barbie

Quote from: "tiger_barbie"

Quote from: "pentium":( Outbid.

I was not me this time. I have original copies of 1.0a and 2.0 on OD.

tiger_barbie

But you were outbid by another forum member (not me btw).

tiger_barbie is it possible you could do a dd copy of those OD's, as I have never seen a 1.0 version of NS.


Chef

me too, I'd like to see both the 1.x and 2.x

I would also like those...

Quote from: "nextchef"
tiger_barbie is it possible you could do a dd copy of those OD's, as I have never seen a 1.0 version of NS.

Chef

No problem, but I need to find a working OD. Any volunteers?

tiger_barbie

I used to have .8 and .9 but I sold them to a fellow in Japan

WHAT!!!!  Did u make a dd copy?

Pre- 1.0 copies existed?
Why would you get rid of such gems?

I didn't realize anyone was looking for these.

I've got 0.9, 1.0, 1.0a, and 2.0 on OD.  I actually have a bunch of copies of 1.0a, but I'm reluctant to get rid of any until I get a reliably working drive to image them with (in case any of them don't work).

Quote from: "pergamon"
I've got 0.9, 1.0, 1.0a, and 2.0 on OD.  I actually have a bunch of copies of 1.0a, but I'm reluctant to get rid of any until I get a reliably working drive to image them with (in case any of them don't work).

I have those and, I think, 0.8 as well from the Businessland firesale.  I haven't run an '030 cube in a long time so I don't know if I can read the media but a backup in the cloud might be a good idea.

if anyone interested selling early real media, I am here ...

Quote from: "pergamon"
I've got 0.9, 1.0, 1.0a, and 2.0 on OD.  I actually have a bunch of copies of 1.0a, but I'm reluctant to get rid of any until I get a reliably working drive to image them with (in case any of them don't work).

Are there any magneto optical drives, i.e. Sony, etc., that can read original NeXT (Canon) formatted ODs?

-- josé k.

Nobody knows.
I have been trying to figure this out but it seems that every time the needed parts surface I don't have the money.

Quote from: "tiger_barbie"

Quote from: "nextchef"
tiger_barbie is it possible you could do a dd copy of those OD's, as I have never seen a 1.0 version of NS.

Chef

No problem, but I need to find a working OD. Any volunteers?

tiger_barbie

With some good help from friends, I'm hopefully close to knowing whether my Cube's OD works.  At that point, I'll be happy to help anyone with data transfer, etc.  :idea:

i have 0.8a, 0.9, 1.0, 1.0a, 2.0, 2.1 on OD (some with duplicates) that i've been trying to image for a year now but can't get access to a working OD to do so. i bought one cube a year ago on condition that it would have a working OD. it didn't, the seller has agreed to replace the OD (he still has several apparently), but we got stuck at the point on how to identify a working OD. he doesn't have any media to try them out and i don't have any i'll let out of my sight ... i've suggested driving down to him in person with my media to try them out but have received no reply. i'm hopefully buying two more cubes at the moment on the same conditions that the ODs are working but this time i'm testing the ODs first ...

the trouble with pre-3.0 versions is not everyone write-protected their media in those days and, since storage space was scarce and expensive, it has to be assumed some people worked off and stored their files on original media.

so, is anyone interested in imaging all the copies of pre-3.0 NextSteps we all own, publishing the MD5 checksums, and, if they disagree, trying to combine the images to recover the original content somehow?

one thing to be careful when imaging old media: it's key to make several images and compare them. i often find with things like old floppies, and even new CDs (not just music but also data CDs) that if you image them several times, they don't always read equal (and, what's worse, they do so silently).

i have a fair bit of home-made software for recovering flaky old media, e.g. automatically retrying sectors which read badly, computing byte-wise and bit-wise majorities, comparing several supposedly equal images and presenting the result of the comparison in useful ways.

Tomaz,

Too bad you are not in the USA - we could help each other out.  I am going thru exactly the same trouble you're experiencing and it is quite discouraging.

I have just spent an afternoon testing, cleaning, and going thru a stack of MO drives. Thus far six out of six are not working. Some cause kernel panics, while others timeout and cause the OS to hang.

Bummer!

-- josé k.

Quote from: "tomaz"
so, is anyone interested in imaging all the copies of pre-3.0 NextSteps we all own, publishing the MD5 checksums, and, if they disagree, trying to combine the images to recover the original content somehow?

Yes. Can you please start a new thread in the NeXT Work Logs section?

Thanks,

-- josé k.

I can't promise much, but I do have a sealed OD drive in Miami, that I plan to get next time I'm down there (less than a month from now)....

I have a copy of 2.1 on a hard disk, and I think 2 OD's of *something*... beats me, as the OD in my cube doesnt seem to work.

anyways I've never done anything with the sealed one.... I was waiting for the day that I get something of intrest on OD...

Of course if I do break the seal on the OD, then it will just break shortly thereafter as they OD's seem inherently flawed.

Such a shame, they really were ahead of their time.

Quote from: "neozeed"

I can't promise much, but I do have a sealed OD drive in Miami, that I plan to get next time I'm down there (less than a month from now)....

Dude!

I am barely 1 hour north of Miami. Please PM me, and I'll give you my cell number so you can call me when you come down.

I'll even bring the beer and Cuban sandwiches...

Stay in touch,

-- josé k.

Quote from: "neozeed"I can't promise much, but I do have a sealed OD drive in Miami, that I plan to get next time I'm down there (less than a month from now)....

...

Of course if I do break the seal on the OD, then it will just break shortly thereafter as they OD's seem inherently flawed.

Yes, unfortunately, sealed drive does not mean working drive.  Ron Fronberg used to sell sealed drives, and would offer to either send it sealed or open it up and test to make sure you were getting a good drive - and then proceed to open up other new ones if that one didn't work, until he found a working one.  He stopped, because so many (maybe most?) didn't work anymore, even freshly unsealed.  (OK, technically the drive might have worked up until the point at which it was tested - heh "HeisenOD").

So it wasn't just dust, it wasn't just fans installed backwards - the things just suck!

I just recalled that I do have one drive that works about half the time - now, if I can find that in my pile of 30-odd drives, I'll get cracking on this.  I'm still unpacking my NeXT collection into my new house (where the NeXT stuff gets its own room, instead of being the "decor" of my bedroom).

I bet some of them can be repaired, we just need to find someone who can do it.  If anyone can, there's certainly a ton of broken drives out there to use for spare parts...

can't you use the OD drives that are all over ebay? the ones by canon or whatever. i see them for sale on ebay all day long every day it seems.

Quote from: "helf"can't you use the OD drives that are all over ebay? the ones by canon or whatever. i see them for sale on ebay all day long every day it seems.

You will most likely need a genuine Canon ODU, either a standalone unit or one taken from a Canofile system, as from what I remember the Canon disk format was unique.  There is a thread concerning optical disks for the NeXT drives that talks about this in more detail.

I currently see none available on ebay, except possibly for a Canofile system for sale in Spain.

oh :]

Quote from: "pergamon"
Yes, unfortunately, sealed drive does not mean working drive.  Ron Fronberg used to sell sealed drives, and would offer to either send it sealed or open it up and test to make sure you were getting a good drive - and then proceed to open up other new ones if that one didn't work, until he found a working one.  He stopped, because so many (maybe most?) didn't work anymore, even freshly unsealed.  (OK, technically the drive might have worked up until the point at which it was tested - heh "HeisenOD").

I had three sealed "brand new" :-) drives from Ron, that doesn't work. BTW, would it work if someone do a sector copy of an OD and burn that straight to a CD-ROM? How can the content from an OD archived to another media that works like the OD? (usable for installing ect.)

You know I saw that there are 2 companies that speicalize in recovering data from the old Canon MO disks...

I wonder if they could provide a dd'd image of a NeXT disk.

Does anyone know the Canon replacement part of a MO drive?

Quote from: "neozeed"Does anyone know the Canon replacement part of a MO drive?

AFAIK, none exists, at least for the drives that went into the Canofile systems.  At my previous job we used to do conversions of documents off of Canofile disks and systems, and towards the end we had a hell of a time finding replacement drives.  For a while you could get them from Canon, then you could only find old stock that authorized Canofile repair shops still had, then we started scavenging any system we could find in the used market for their drives.  The funny thing was that we had a couple of drives that just hummed along and never gave us problems even after converting hundreds of disks.  Others would read a few disks and then die, and some would never accurately read a complete disk.  It was a real crapshoot, as it can be when dealing with used equipment.

Unfortunately the company got out of that business in 2000, and all the drives were apparently shipped off with some other surplus hardware to a reclamation company a few years later.  Had I known the possibility of it being useful I would have "secured" one before my departure, but at the time I did not see the need for one.  :cry:

FWIW. I have a few cubes with Canon L10130 drives in them. These machines all came from a university.

Quote from: "gtnicol"FWIW. I have a few cubes with Canon L10130 drives in them. These machines all came from a university.

Gavin,

did you ever get a response from the forums about these drives?

http://www.classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctech/2006-March/058242.html

-- josé k.

Is there a Canon part number anywhere on the original NeXT MO drives?  Possibly something on the inside for those that have taken one apart?  Just curious since I have never seen one in person.

Chef

QuoteFWIW. I have a few cubes with Canon L10130 drives in them. These machines all came from a university.

Do they work?

I'm not sure they work... I haven't had time to try them out.

Quote from: "nextchef"Is there a Canon part number anywhere on the original NeXT MO drives?  Possibly something on the inside for those that have taken one apart?  Just curious since I have never seen one in person.

Chef

There are no Cannon part numbers inside. If anyone can provide server space I can send pictures of a disassembled drive.

-- josé k.

I can't remember what I did to it, but I had a cube that had been massivly damaged (I think they did it on purpose too...)..

The board had been smashed, and a bunch of chips ripped off with pliars I'm assuming, as a few of the pins were still on the board...

Anyways the MO drive had been DRILLED...  If I still have it, I won't feel the slightest bit bad about disecting that one.

I have already disected one - just need someone to host the pictures.

-- josé k.

Quote from: "korneluk"I have already disected one - just need someone to host the pictures.

-- josé k.

Put them on Flickr.  There's a NeXT group there too.

http://www.flickr.com/