Where Can I Get an Old Serial Floppy Drive?

[urbecrisch]

Does anyone know where I can get a 3.5" 1.44MB SERIAL FLOPPY DISK DRIVE?

I'm trying to get an old touchscreen with CPU to work for a bartop and I recently replaced the HD.  The problem is that I need to boot an OS onto the HD but the only way is from a floppy serial port on the motherboard.

Does anyone have one of these lying around or knows somebody or someplace where I can get one?  I'm willing to pay for it of course.  It's the only thing preventing me from getting this bartop running.

Help!

[Angry_Radish]

I may have some in a bin at work left over from some older dell laptops, PM me and I can let you know in the morning

[urbecrisch]

PM sent Angry.  BTW, I'm a fellow Cheesehead!

[paigeoliver]

That isn't the ONLY way, you can also stick the drive in another machine do a basic dos install on it (like the format C: /sys command from an old windows boot disk), and also copy the operating system install files onto the hard drive, then boot into DOS and install.

I did the exact same thing with the same sort of computer you are describing.

[urbecrisch]

That isn't the ONLY way, you can also stick the drive in another machine do a basic dos install on it (like the format C: /sys command from an old windows boot disk), and also copy the operating system install files onto the hard drive, then boot into DOS and install.

Paige, was kind of monitor/system did you work on?

[Wade]

Does anyone know where I can get a 3.5" 1.44MB SERIAL FLOPPY DISK DRIVE?

I'm trying to get an old touchscreen with CPU to work for a bartop and I recently replaced the HD.  The problem is that I need to boot an OS onto the HD but the only way is from a floppy serial port on the motherboard.

Does anyone have one of these lying around or knows somebody or someplace where I can get one?  I'm willing to pay for it of course.  It's the only thing preventing me from getting this bartop running.

Help!

I don't think there's a such thing as an RS-232 serial floppy drive that would work without special drivers.  So in other words, I don't think it will solve your problem, even if you could find a serial floppy drive.

Wade

[urbecrisch]

The reason it may work out is that when I access the BIOS, the CPU screen shows the A:\ drive is 1.44MB floppy so it seems it would be ready to go if I had one to try.  It's at least worth the effort

[Thenasty]

I dunno if this is the same guy about this machine.....in other post before.

If so, why not just connect a CD-ROM and a HARD (MASTER/SLAVE) and BOOT of the CD-ROM with Win98 or DOS 7.1 ? Goto BIOS to setup boot priority.


Also, is there a ISA/PCI SLOT available ? If so, why not get a IDE CONTROLLER and use the NORMAL FLOPPY DRIVE with it ? Disable in BIOS the built in controller.


All the years I been doing PC repairs/work/building, I never came across a SERIAL External Floppy DRIVE that connects to RS-232 port. Except for LAPTOPS.

Here are some USB ones

http://www.become.com/shop?q=1.44mb+external+usb+floppy+disk+drive

[paigeoliver]

I have seen that in the bios of countless systems that never came with floppy drives. Including the similar system I had, my last floppiless notebook and my current tablet PC.

I don't recall the brand name of the system I worked with, but it had a 14" touchscreen and the system was sort of a brick without external drives, all the components were laptop ones. I had two of them, one had the screen and keyboard on a pole with the brick in the base and the other had all the same components (minus the pole) in a suitcase with foam inserts (both were Pentium 166 era hardware running Win 95). I had picked them up at a pawnshop for $150 each and they brought me about $700 each when I resold them on ebay (this was a LONG time ago).

 The basic dos install and copy the win-98 (or 95) install files onto the hard drive is MUCH easier than trying to find the accessory floppy drive that may have been available with that system (but probably wasn't serial, the complete lack of serial floppy drives on ebay says a lot about that).

You will probably still need to pick up a 2.5" to 3.5" adaptor to copy your files, but it will be way easier (and cheaper) than trying to deal with an external floppy.

The reason it may work out is that when I access the BIOS, the CPU screen shows the A:\ drive is 1.44MB floppy so it seems it would be ready to go if I had one to try.  It's at least worth the effort

[urbecrisch]

I dunno if this is the same guy about this machine.....in other post before.

I think that would be me

If so, why not just connect a CD-ROM and a HARD (MASTER/SLAVE) and BOOT of the CD-ROM with Win98 or DOS 7.1 ? Goto BIOS to setup boot priority.

The reason I cannot use a USB CDROM is because the BIOS does not offer a BOOT from USB.  Only A,C, CDROM (but only connection is through parallel port but I cannot load any CDROM drivers), and a few others.

Also, is there a ISA/PCI SLOT available ? If so, why not get a IDE CONTROLLER and use the NORMAL FLOPPY DRIVE with it ? Disable in BIOS the built in controller.

The PIC below shows the available PCI slot (white) and the 2 AGP slots (black)?  Not sure if I'm right about this but what your telling me is I can buy a PCI card which will allow me to plug in my floppy or CDROM via IDE?  Don't I need a driver to allow this PCI card to work?

[urbecrisch]

You will probably still need to pick up a 2.5" to 3.5" adaptor to copy your files, but it will be way easier (and cheaper) than trying to deal with an external floppy.

I have a 2.5" to 3.5" adapter and have tried to boot install files but  Idid not have any success cause the spare PC I was trying to use could only BOOT an OS from a RESTORE CD so I gave up on doing that.  I know there's got to be a way to get this thing up and running but I'm not quite sure what to do since I am a complete NOOB regarding BOOTING OS's and reformating HD's, and don't even get me started on DOS   I'm not going to give up, I just need a nice somewhat simple way to do this.  Thanks for working with me on this project.  If only the MB had a floppy IDE port this would be a breeze!

[paigeoliver]

If that thing has a PCI slot than a PCI ide card will just plug in and function, and you should be able to boot from drives attached to it.

I dunno if this is the same guy about this machine.....in other post before.

I think that would be me

If so, why not just connect a CD-ROM and a HARD (MASTER/SLAVE) and BOOT of the CD-ROM with Win98 or DOS 7.1 ? Goto BIOS to setup boot priority.

The reason I cannot use a USB CDROM is because the BIOS does not offer a BOOT from USB.  Only A,C, CDROM (but only connection is through parallel port but I cannot load any CDROM drivers), and a few others.

Also, is there a ISA/PCI SLOT available ? If so, why not get a IDE CONTROLLER and use the NORMAL FLOPPY DRIVE with it ? Disable in BIOS the built in controller.

The PIC below shows the available PCI slot (white) and the 2 AGP slots (black)?  Not sure if I'm right about this but what your telling me is I can buy a PCI card which will allow me to plug in my floppy or CDROM via IDE?  Don't I need a driver to allow this PCI card to work?

[urbecrisch]

If that thing has a PCI slot than a PCI ide card will just plug in and function, and you should be able to boot from drives attached to it.

This could just possibly be the solution I'm looking for.  Strange that I wouldn't need to install drivers for the PCI card. 

Would this only work with a PCI IDE card or would a PCI USB card work as well? 

[Thenasty]

what is that ribbon ? Is that where the HD is connected ? If so, why not connect a cd-rom (maybe you need to change the ribbon for 2 connectctors) to like I said.

I did not mean USB CD-ROM, I meant above..

[david656]

"The PIC below shows the available PCI slot (white) and the 2 AGP slots (black)?"  the black slots are ISA you can easily get IDE controllers .. well im sure i got a few ISA ones enyway in the garage....

[paigeoliver]

You won't be able to boot from a PCI USB card on any hardware that didn't support USB in the bios (and even then it still might not work). That is UNLESS there is an exotic USB card out there that translates to IDE natively.

But, your easy routes (once again), are to install dos on the hard drive from another system (boot from a win 98 boot floppy or install cd, format (drive): /sys and then copy the cabs folder and setup.exe over onto the hard drive. Or, to stick an IDE controller card in one of the expansion slots.

Since you apparently already have a 2.5" to 3.5" adaptor then the DOS install is the easier route.

If that thing has a PCI slot than a PCI ide card will just plug in and function, and you should be able to boot from drives attached to it.

This could just possibly be the solution I'm looking for.  Strange that I wouldn't need to install drivers for the PCI card. 

Would this only work with a PCI IDE card or would a PCI USB card work as well? 

[urbecrisch]

what is that ribbon ? Is that where the HD is connected ? If so, why not connect a cd-rom (maybe you need to change the ribbon for 2 connectctors) to like I said.

Correct, this is the HD IDE cable; however, remember the HD is a laptop style and not a regular desktop size and I'm not sure where I can get a dual 2.5" IDE cable. 

[paigeoliver]

As long as you actually have that drive adaptor just ask around to your computer savvy friends until you find one of them that can do the dos install thing I described. It will work, quickly and easily and without buying anything.

If you were here I could do it in a few minutes.

[urbecrisch]

But, your easy routes (once again), are to install dos on the hard drive from another system (boot from a win 98 boot floppy or install cd, format (drive): /sys and then copy the cabs folder and setup.exe over onto the hard drive. Or, to stick an IDE controller card in one of the expansion slots.

Once again this is difficult cause the extra PC I would use is only able to BOOT from the restore 98 CD.

I think first I will try to get a cable from david656 to plug into the ISA slots.  if that doesn't work or falls through I will get another PC to try your method Paige.

Also, I noticed on the BIOS menu I'm able to boot from SCSI.  Are there any SCSI IDE ports available.  The fact that it recognizes SCSI may be another option, right?

[urbecrisch]

As long as you actually have that drive adaptor just ask around to your computer savvy friends until you find one of them that can do the dos install thing I described. It will work, quickly and easily and without buying anything.

If you were here I could do it in a few minutes.

Is there any way you could write a DOS tutorial for a Dummy and I can give it a shot.  Will this method work with a Restore WIN 98 CD or do I need a fresh WIN 98 CD?

I have floppies for WIN NT 4.0 I can try too.  That could be another option if the restore CD will not work.  What do you think?

[paigeoliver]

A restore CD probably won't do it (depends on the exact restore CD, but most won't do it). NT 4 won't do it either. A real win 98 cd will do it though. If that restore CD happens to have a folder called "cabs" and a setup.exe file for windows 98 then yes it can be useful. (Also note that many windows 98 machines have these files on the hard drive under C:/windows/options/cabs

Easiest method, this requires the least actual dos action.

Put the hard drive into another system already running windows 98. We will assume it will be drive E: (although it might come up as D: or something else). Format it under windows first. Then open a DOS prompt (under the start menu select run and type command).

Once that is up type format E: /sys
If the drive isn't E then use what ever letter the drive is.

Then go ahead and close that DOS window. With windows create a folder on your drive called "cabs", don't bury it in multiple folders, just stick it right in there.

Inside the cabs folder copy over the complete contents of the "cabs" folder from the win98 cd (or from the windows/options/cabs folder). Then check and see if it has a setup.exe, if it doesn't then find that and copy it in there as well.

Then stick the drive back in the computer you want to use it on. It will then boot to a dos prompt. At the dos prompt you will type the following

cd cabs
setup.exe

And then windows 98 setup will begin.

If you don't have a win 98 CD or system to work with then get on the phone right now and call all your friends and nearby relatives until you can produce one. They are not hard to find at all.

If you are working from a NON-Win98 system then do the following.

Put the hard drive in the system first and figure out which drive letter it is (I will still use E: as the example), format it from the operating system as Fat32. Then create and copy over those cab files and setup.exe like I told you.

Then boot the computer from the Win98 CD to dos (all of them can do it).

At the DOS prompt type the following

Format E: /sys

Then move the hard drive back over to the other computer and follow the instructions above to get the windows install going.

[urbecrisch]

Just found a CD with WIN 2K on it.  I'll give that a try before trying the 98 CD.  Just follow the NON-WIN 98 instructions first, right?  Thanks again for the tutorial. 

[paigeoliver]

I am not sure if you can actually install windows 2000 from dos.

Just found a CD with WIN 2K on it.  I'll give that a try before trying the 98 CD.  Just follow the NON-WIN 98 instructions first, right?  Thanks again for the tutorial. 

[david656]

windows 2000 is like XP its NTFS based and will not install from dos you are correct.

if you need anything like that ISA   IDE controller i have never personally used it got given a box of them but would be happy to post it off if your in the UK

(sorry if im digging up a old thread)