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Flux images of Authorization Floppies

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d97:
Hi all - I’m not really sure if this post will be of interest but, on the off-chance that it might be, I figure it couldn’t hurt to post.

I recently picked up a greaseweazle and started using it to archive authorization floppies for some of the software that I have kicking around.

I’m really new to this idea - although, from what I understand, it has been around a while - and  if I’m understanding things semi-properly, the greaseweazle reads a disk’s magnetic flux information and then writes it to an image file.  The resulting image file can then be written back to a floppy making - again, if I understand things - a perfect copy. 

I had a couple of unused authorization disks kicking around.  One was for Emagic’s ZAP (not the most useful of utilities these days) and the other was for Digidesign’s Masterlist v1.2.  (I actually cracked the shrinkwrap on this one).

The greaseweazle will write to .hfe, .img and .scp file types.  From what I’ve seen, the .scp file type takes a 1.4 meg disk and creates a whopping 70+ meg image of it.  As of now I haven’t experimented with anything other than the .scp format.

So, I made images of both disks and then wrote them to a generic floppy.  I authorized a computer using the floppy and then brought the same disk back to the greaseweazle and re-wrote the original image to the disk.  I was able to successfully use it to authorize another computer. 

I’m not sure if there are other tools that allow us to do this and, really, most of the stuff that we want to use is available anyway but, it was an interesting process to go through.

If you’re not familiar with the project, the greaseweazle is open source and I think it was made by the same person who created flashfloppy .  The units seem to be available from around $25 to $35.  It’s a command line interface but it’s pretty straightforward to use.  You can find the source and builds on github.

I’ve attached zipped and stuffed versions of the two disks that I’ve made and, if I make any more, I’ll attach them as well.  I actually think the .zip versions will be more useful if you want to play around with this because it requires a modern computer to hook up the hardware.

My feeling is that this is not really going to be of much use - especially because it requires a specialized piece of hardware to write the disk images - but I found the process interesting and figured it couldn’t hurt to post.

Since the zipped / stuffed files are around 20 megs each, I'll split the attachments into multiple posts.  I'll start with masterlist.

D.

d97:
Here's the .sit file

d97:
Here's the .zip file

smilesdavis:
you are a god. everyone should be doing this for all vintage audio floppies before the last one dies. i will buy a grezewezle and join in.

d97:
Actually, it's not that much of a process.   :D

Once the stuff is hooked up (I have a greaseweazle v4), it goes pretty quick.  My only (probably pointless) worry is that something will be lost in the file decompression process.

I'm pretty sure that I only have a couple more authorization floppies but wish I could find some of the old MOTU disks.  Mine are long gone.

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