Panasonic LS-240 Superdisk drive. 32MB on a standard floppy disk The original LS-120 Superdisk drive (reviewed here), which could read, write and format 120MB disks using its optical tracking technology, was a minor success, overshadowed in its heyday by Iomega's Zip. Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Imation SuperDisk USB 120mb Drive PC or Mac Macintosh at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!
![]()
Home | Deals | Tech Specs | Articles | Groups | Software | Support | @LowEndMac
The Low End Mac Mailbag
Dan Knight - 2007.07.18
Fill Apple's Gaping Hole Yourself
Adam copied me an email he sent to Tommy Thomas in response toThe Gaping Hole in Apple's DesktopLine.
Hello My Friend,
While I do agree with you to some extent, I believe that this ismore hype than a outright necessity, and here's why. Apple is allabout being simple, from their actual products and services, totheir lineup. Until the minisplashed onto the scene, Apple's product matrix was a clean littlequadrant - Consumer Portable, Consumer Desktop, ProfessionalPortable, Professional Desktop. Very nice indeed.
While the argument can be made for a 'pro-sumer' machine, as youhave rather nicely, it doesn't fit in with the general groups intowhich most people fall. One group of people is those who buy amachine, never upgrade it, and buy a new one a few years down theroad. The people don't really care about processor speed, dedicatedgraphics, etc., and only ever upgrade the RAM and/or hard drivewhen a tech-savvy 'a.k.a. geek' friend/family member comes alongand suggests such. The other group mainly consists of those whomake their livelihood on raw processing power and the ability tostore massive amounts of data on their computer.
Then there are people like you and I (those tech savvy, geeky,individuals), whose livelihood does not necessarily depend superfast computers, but like being able to tinker with, upgrade, andextend the useful lives of our computers. We can't justify the costand/or power of a Mac Pro, yet theconsumer machines leave us wanting a little bit more, hence we feelour needs are not being catered to. However, in the grand scheme ofthings I do believe we are in the minority. Despite this, ourrather unique position provides a caveat....
From this point on, things get confidential! Although Apple doesnot give us the machine we so desire, their switch to Intel hasfinally given us an advantage, one which I am positive those in thecompany surely realized. Since Apple did not give me what I wanted,I finally decided to just do it myself!
I had an old B&W tower that hadrecently passed to the great computer repository in the sky. Itreally was too old to spend the money needed to repair it, so I wasresigned to the fact of taking the old gal to the dump. It was justas I was putting her in the back of our Grand Wagoneer when thewhole idea dawned on me. I went online that night, ordered all theparts I needed through PriceWatch vendors, as well as asecondhand copy Intel-Tiger off of eBay. A week later, after somecreative sawzaw surgery and a little BIOS/EIF tomfoolery, I hadmyself a sleeper B&W Mactel, and my goodness is she fast! She'ssporting a 2.4 GHz 'Conroe' Core 2 Duo, 2 GB of RAM, 128 MBgraphics, and a 160 GB, 7200 rpm drive, all totaled everything camein at a little more than $600!
Granted, I don't get a warranty or tech support, and I realizesome people may have ethical/legal issues doing something likethis, but I am of the mindset that I purchase the license, so I candarn well install it on whatever machine I so choose.
My point of all this is this - those who feel left out byApple's product line are the very same people capable of doing thisvery same thing. Now I realize you can't go online and suggest thatpeople do this, but they can still do this nonetheless! After alittle bit of money, work, and ingenuity, I was able to transform aonce glorious machine into a brand new one. Best yet, if Mr. Jobswere to ever come to my home (a stretch of the imagination, Iknow), he would be none the wiser!
Best wishes and have a wonderful weekend!
Adam
Adam,
Thanks for writing. Yes, we're aware that there'squite an underground in hacking stock PCs to run Mac OS X.This is especially popular in niches Apple has ignored - tabletcomputers, ultralight notebooks, and midrange desktops. As far asI'm concerned, once you've paid for a licensed copy of the OS, it'syours to use as you please - and that goes equally for runningVista Home in a virtualized environment.
What Tommy and a lot of us are looking for is afull-fledged Apple solution, not a cobbled together system. We wantsomething that works out of the box, no geeky hacking necessary.And we believe that there is a real market for such a product.
As long as Apple ignores these market segments,there will be a legitimate reason for people to hack OS X andget it running on an ultralight Sony VAIO, a Toshiba tablet PC, ora desktop they've put together for their own use.
Dan
Using Zip Drives to Move Data Between Old Macsand New
Aleta Watson writes:
I've move data using Zip disks, with a SCSI Zip drive on myolder computers, and a USB Zip drive on my newer computers. I haveaccumulated lots of hardware (since using Macs in 1985), so I haveboth SCSI and USB Zip drives. Zip disks work well for the amount ofdata transferred from older computers.
Aleta,
Thanks for the suggestion. I used to use Zipsconstantly in the old days and even have my own SCSI and USB Zipdrive - but it never occurred to me!
Dan
Re: Moving Data from an Old PowerBook to a NewMac
Chris Eastland follows up on to Moving Data from an Old PowerBook to a NewMac:
Thanks Dan,
What kind of a Mac might act as the 'intermediate' here?
I will probably go with Zip, as I have a few kicking around.Finding the drive is the hard part - eBay? Also, would a 100 MB Zipconnect with my PowerBook? I would most likely need a vintage one,right?
Finally, on a related note, I have a bunch of floppies that wereoriginally IBM 1.44 MB. I used them, in the late nineties, with oneof the original Sony Mavica floppy drive digital cameras:
<http://chriseastland.blogspot.com/2007/07/two-self-portraits-on-train.html>
Now, when I use a SmartDisk USB floppy drive to view the pics,it not only takes ages for them to load, but also some of thepictures are completely dead. I pray that this is a problem withthe reader and not the data. Any ideas as to what may begoing on here? I am told by the SmartDisk website that the driverequires no additional software: plug and play.
It seems insane that 99 percent of the files are eternallyruined.
Any ideas?
Thanks for your time Dan.
Chris,
An 'intermediate' Mac could be a Mac IIcx or IIciwith a NuBus ethernet card - very cheap when you can find them,although you will need a keyboard, mouse, and monitor as well.
eBay may be a good source for a SCSI Zip drive touse with your PowerBook (avoid the combination parallel port/SCSIZip drive, as many Mac users have reported problems with them), aswell as the special SCSI cable or adapter to connect to thePowerBook's unique SCSI port (unique to PowerBooks, that is). Youmight also try our Swap List.
I'm not familiar with the old floppy Mavica, butmy understanding is that it uses standard DOS format floppies. Ifthe disks are unreadable in the SuperDisk, try them in anothercomputer. If that fails, the images are probably history.
Dan
Newer Imation SuperDisks Workwith OS X
Cory Tobin writes:
Dan, I think you misunderstood Randy's email.
I'm currently frankensteining a bunch of my old Macs right now(reliving my days of yore, now all I need are my 2400 baud modemand my Hermes BBS back up and in business, har) and have beenmoving data from my Power Mac G5 to my Power Mac 7600, Quadra 650, and Mac IIci I'm toying with. Above we'veestablished he's going 800K DD floppy -> CD.
Now you were correct in saying the DD drive in the original SEwon't recognize the high density ones. But all 1.44 meg floppydrives are backwards compatible with the double density 800K disks.If I remember correctly, they are not compatible with thesingle sided 400k floppies from the pre-Plus days. Also, the DDfloppies don't have the high density hole punched on the otherside, so that's how the parents' Power Mac will (actually the onlyway) it'll recognize its size. If someone mistakingly punched theHD hole into the 800K floppy, then Randy would need to coverit up.
![]()
My 7600 with its original 1996 high density floppy drive willjoyfully read my double sided disks (and even write images to them,I just floppy'd the 800K version of System 7.0.0). In fact, it wasthe easier way for me to move the data to my IIci, which of courselacks a CD drive and me lacking any usable external SCSI storage (Ineed a Centronics-style terminator to use my Jaz drive, currentlydon't have one). My first instinct was to burn a CD, which I did.Problem is, Toast 8 isn't the happiest at making HFS standardvolumes depending on the files you have in the disc you're making(it scans each file and gets pissy on some, not sure if it'sUniCode translation issues or what, I had to many files to dealwith using process of elimination). The way around that was longerand specific, using Compact Pro to make self extracting archives.Reason being, I noticed that some of my uncompressed items and evensome compressed StuffIt archives were getting their resource forksstripped even using the proper file system (HFS Standard) in Toast.I'm running 7.6.1 on the 7600 (surprisingly it works perfectly finewith a Sonnet 375 MHz G3 upgrade with System 7.6.1, though Ihaven't popped in the cache software yet) so I cannot read HFSExtended/Plus volumes.
But while I was dealing with all that, I was using my ImationUSB SuperDisk to put segmented self-extracting Compact Proarchives of my goodies onto floppy. But wait, you say those Imationdrives won't work under OS X? Actually, I thought the samewith the first one I got from eBay. Turns out the earlier ones, thebig fat Imation drives that look like clear and Bondi blue DiskImages (Finder-style ones) are apparently natively parallel whilethe provided cable (that big funky looking thing) is theparallel->USB adapter/cable combination. That's the main (andprobably only) reason there were even OS 8/9 drivers made for it.It's not a true USB Mass Storage (heh, mass storage, on a floppy ;)device - not even a true USB device - so the driver is actually forthe cable/adapter and, unfortunately, Imation never made anOS X driver and it will not function under OS X (well,Tiger for me). That's with the power supply plugged in, even. Sowhere am I going with this? Well, another eBay auction I happenedupon included yet another Imation SuperDisk drive, yippee. I wantedthe software, so I bid and won.
Turns out the Imation drive supplied was the newer, slimmermodel that was natively USB. Cable integrated, no driversneeded. How do I know? I've been using it for over a month with myPower Mac G5, plugged into the front USB 2.0 port, and moving my68k and old PPC goodies to and fro. Thanks partially to Spotlight,mounting and unmounting of the USB floppies (which are consideredregular removable media, not floppy disks, by Mac OS X) takesmuch much longer than usual. Usually 10 seconds or more until aninserted disk (800K or 1.44 meg) appears in the Finder. Much longerthan that to eject, sometimes including a message about the volumestill being in use (Spotlight) and unable to be ejected. A secondeject does it, but still about 10 or more seconds until it's trulyunmounted and safe to eject without the USB Disconnect message.
Yeah, that was a lot, but this really should help lotsa folks.I'm rebuilding my collection of Classic Mac software (mostly thegames but also utilities and HyperCard junk), and I've practicallygot all the necessary compression and imaging software if peopleneed (I mean I even found a copy of DART 1.5.3, remember that?First compressed disk images!), feel free to utilize me as aresource. The Classic Mac shall never die; these machines willprobably outlast my PM G5 and PM G3. Their old SCSI drives havealready outlived the SCSI and IDE drives I had in the G3 that's nowa SATA beast. Actually, it seems disk I/O is the main bottleneck onthe 100 MHz bus machines. It runs 10.4.10 like a dream with a gigof RAM and is no longer a total slow poke like it used to be (underthe same conditions, but running off the ATA/33 bus).
For splits and grins, the three 'happy' machines right noware:
With a standard extension set, the Quadra boots fully from theHappy Mac to the Finder in about four seconds. The IIci, even withthe double-reboot due to the Radius Rocket, still boots faster thanmy Power Mac G5 (which is booting from a RAID 0 off of a PCI card).What a difference time makes; networking and communication havereally bloated our operating systems, don't ya think?
Last tidbit, After Dark isstill my all-time favorite screen saver. Nostalgic modules of yore!That's all for now, hope the info helps, Dan. Oh yeah, and forwardall old Mac gear ya don't want to me ;)
-C
Cory,
Thanks for writing. Randy was reporting twoproblems - being unable to read 800K floppies with his USB floppydrive and the Mac SE no recognizing high-density floppies in its800K drive, offering to reformat them, and then formatting themusing the 800K format that his USB floppy can't read.
His parents' Power Mac should be able to read the800K floppies, but if they are created on high-density disks, heneeds to cover the HD hole or the Power Mac will not recognize themand will want to format them - just like the SE.
The other half of the problem is that vintage Macsand modern Macs don't share any ports. In the old days we had SCSIfor drives, ADB for mice and keyboards, Apple Serial for printersand LocalTalk. Today we have FireWire and USB for drives, USB formice and keyboards and printers, and ethernet for networking. Byusing an intermediate Mac with a HD floppy drive, Randy can copyhis files from an 800K disk that the USB floppy drive can't read toa 1.4M disk that it can.
Sounds like you have some nice computer systems upand running.
Dan
Networking Power Mac 9.1 and 9.2 Machines
Ken Freeman writes:
How can I network the two together?
Where can I find the old AppleTalk connector?
Also, where can I find a power cord for the Apple AirPort BaseStation (circular base with power, USB, ethernet ports)?
On an iBook G4 that starts having classic start up issues, is itsafe to reinstall 9.2 from the original disc on the iBook that hasall my applications and data? I have nearly 30 Gigs of stuff onthis 40 gig hard drive, and my classic start up now hangs up andfreezes.
I was told to remove the System Folder reinstall 9.2, andreboot. Is that safe for my other files?
Keep the Focus on whose you are,
Ken Freeman
Ken,
Any Mac running OS 9.1 or 9.2 should have ethernetas a standard feature, so there should be no need for the muchslower AppleTalk connectors. First generation Power Macs has anAAUI port on the back - marked <··> - andrequire an AAUI-to-ethernet adapter. You should be able to findboth on our Swap List, which mightalso be able to help you with the power cord for the AirPort BaseStation.
I would recommend against removing your SystemFolder completely, as there are probably some preferences, fonts,and other things you'll want to keep. Instead, open the SystemFolder and delete Finder and System, then run the installer. Youonly want to completely delete the System Folder if it doesn't workafter that.
Dan
Join us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or Google+, or subscribe to our RSS news feed
Dan Knight has been publishing LowEnd Mac since April 1997. Mailbag columns come from email responses to his Mac Musings, Mac Daniel, Online Tech Journal, and other columns on the site.
Today's Links
Recent Content
Low End Mac is an independent publication and has not been authorized,sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. Opinions expressed arethose of their authors and may not reflect the opinion of CobwebPublishing. Advice is presented in good faith, but what works for onemay not work for all.
Entire Low End Mac website copyright ©1997-2016 by Cobweb Publishing, Inc. unless otherwise noted. Allrights reserved. Low End Mac, LowEndMac, and lowendmac.com aretrademarks of Cobweb Publishing Inc. Apple, the Apple logo, Macintosh,iPad, iPhone, iMac, iPod, MacBook, Mac Pro, and AirPort are registered trademarks of AppleInc. Additional company and product names may be trademarks orregistered trademarks and are hereby acknowledged. Please report errors to . LINKS: We allow and encourage links toany public page as long as the linked page does not appear within aframe that prevents bookmarking it. Email may be published at our discretion unless marked 'not forpublication'; email addresses will not be published without permission,and we will encrypt them in hopes of avoiding spammers. Letters may beedited for length, context, and to match house style. PRIVACY: We don't collect personalinformation unless you explicitly provide it, and we don't share theinformation we have with others. For more details, see our Terms of Use.
Follow Low End Mac on Twitter
Join Low End Mac on Facebook Favorite Sites
MacSurfer
Cult of Mac Shrine of Apple MacInTouch MyAppleMenu InfoMac The Mac Observer Accelerate Your Mac RetroMacCast The Vintage Mac Museum Deal Brothers DealMac Mac2Sell Mac Driver Museum JAG's House System 6 Heaven System 7 Today the pickle's Low-End Mac FAQ Affiliates
Amazon.com
The iTunes Store PC Connection Express Macgo Blu-ray Player Parallels Desktop for Mac eBay Advertise
All of our advertising is handled by BackBeatMedia. For price quotes and advertising information,please contact at BackBeat Media(646-546-5194). This number is for advertising only.
Hi,I have just bought an Imation SuperDisk Drive LS120 (SD-USB-M), originally a Mac drive, on eBay since I have an old LS120 disk I need to access, but when I plug it on- my Surface Book 2 with Windows 10 version 1803 build 17134.165 it won't recognize it. On my device manager, it shows up as an ' unknown USB device' with a problem. If I double click it the following message comes up: 'device descriptor request failed.' - an older Lenovo G70 running Windows 8, the device shows up on Device Manager as an ATAPI USB storage device with a problem.
If I double-click on the device, it says: 'This device cannot start (code 10).' On the Lenovo, I tried to force install the driver for Imation - SuperDisk LS120 - authenticated, and -not, and for a minute or two it shows the device in the list of USB devices in Device Manager. Still, the device remains invisible in the file browser and after a bit it in the device manager it shows again the same problem 'This device cannot start (code 10).' Is there a way to make it work or do I have to find Mac to connect it to?Thanks.:). Imation Announces Agreement with McAfee on Encrypted USB DevicesImation Corp., a global scalable storage and data security company, announced that McAfee will transition its Encrypted USB device business to Imation, a McAfee partner and the McAfee Encrypted USB devices’ OEM manufacturer and supplier. Imation will sell these USB devices and the related USB management software extension for McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator (McAfee ePO), and will provide support for new Encrypted USB customers.Imation’s comprehensive portfolio of data security solutions helps organizations deliver secure mobility for their workforces. The portfolio features encrypted USB products that are FIPS 140-2 validated1, and includes high capacity, small form factor USB flash drives as well as encrypted external hard disk drives.Imation offers an extensive line of secure USB drives, many fully manageable by McAfee ePolicy Orchestrator software.
This enables organizations to enforce security policies for encrypted USB devices. Government departments and corporate enterprises can secure their mobile workforces’ USB data, while maintaining the highest data security standards, and regulatory and compliance requirements.Imation is also a Sales Teaming Partner for Authentication and Portable Computing Solutions in the McAfee Security Innovation Alliance (SIA).“McAfee and Imation now provide the best solutions for customers who require secure mobile storage, authentication and portable computing solutions,” said Ed Barry, vice president of the Security Innovation Alliance, McAfee. “With its industry leadership and decades of experience in data protection, the Imation team has the technology, resources and expertise to ensure that Encrypted USB customers continue to have products that meet the highest standards, best-in-class device management solutions, and technical support.”“We are very pleased that McAfee has entrusted our team to support its customers’ continuing needs for secure mobile storage,” said Lawrence Reusing, general manager of Imation’s Mobile Security unit. Imation Launches New 2-in-1 Micro USB Flash DriveImation Corp., a global data storage and information security company, today launched the new Imation 2-in-1 Micro USB Flash Drive for Android devices. With both a standard and a micro USB connector, the plug-n-play drive conveniently connects directly to compatible mobile devices and computers to provide additional storage space. The new products were unveiled at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas and will be on display at Imation's booth in the Venetian Titian ballrooms 2201A-2201B on January 7 - 10, 2014.' The new Imation 2-in-1 Micro USB Flash Drive provides consumers with something extremely valuable: additional storage space, no batteries or internet required,' said Toshi Hokari, executive director, product management and marketing, Imation.
'Whether it's used to transfer photos or videos to a computer or another Android device, or to easily view content on the go, the 2-in-1 Micro USB Flash Drive solves a major headache mobile device users often experience-running out of storage space at critical times.' Developed for convenience and efficiency, the Imation 2-in-1 Micro USB Flash Drive has a rugged swivel-and-slide capless design created to carry additional photos, videos and files without worrying about damage or lost caps. Compatible with most Android devices, the drive also allows users to transfer or view content without the need for a computer.The Imation 2-in-1 Micro USB Flash Drive will be available in the U.S. In Q1 2014 in 16 GB, 32 GB and 64 GB capacities for the manufacturer's suggested retail price (MSRP) of $29.99 (16 GB), $39.99 (32 GB) and $64.99 (64 GB).
![]() Comments are closed.
|
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
February 2023
Categories |