How to retrieve data from MFM hard drive?

[MeepsterNotchy]

I recently acquired a 3.5in. MFM hard drive for $2, which I tested and seems to work, but have no way to retrieve any data off it. I know Linux is my only option to see the disk. Are there any IDE, SATA, or USB adapters for MFM? Or a USB to ISA?

 

[USAFRet]

I recently acquired a 3.5in. MFM hard drive for $2, which I tested and seems to work, but have no way to retrieve any data off it. I know Linux is my only option to see the disk. Are there any IDE, SATA, or USB adapters for MFM? Or a USB to ISA?

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack the "Good Idea Fairy" in the head.

What could possibly be on a 25 year old drive, that wasn't yours, that warrants spending any time or money on it?

The Good Idea Fairy said "ooo...a hard drive for $2. Buy it!"
2 weeks from now, the Useless Crap Fairy will be looking for screwdrivers to take it apart and salvage the fridge magnets from it.

 

[mbarnes86]

Hi

What do you mean by mfm?

Is it one of those from the 1980's. .
Where the controller is a card which sits in a isa slot rather than the latter IDE (integrated drive electronics) hard disks

What is the make and model of hard disk?

If you have tested it l presume you have a IBM PC AT or PC 386 or equivalent with isa slots and controller card

You would only need a version of Linux if the disk was used in a unix, xenix or linux system

Otherwise PC DOS or MSDOS 3.0 or latter would do if it was formatted in FAT

Regards
Mike Barnes

 

[ex_bubblehead]

Are you absolutely certain that it's MFM? Going back that far MFM/RLL drives were either full height 5.25" or 8" boat anchors. The control, data and power connectors were wider than 3.5" alone. I didn't see anything 3.5" until IDE was introduced, though there were some SCSI drives in that form factor. Either way you're not likely to get anything useful off of a drive of that vintage.

 

[darky26]

I recently acquired a 3.5in. MFM hard drive for $2, which I tested and seems to work, but have no way to retrieve any data off it. I know Linux is my only option to see the disk. Are there any IDE, SATA, or USB adapters for MFM? Or a USB to ISA?

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack the "Good Idea Fairy" in the head.

What could possibly be on a 25 year old drive, that wasn't yours, that warrants spending any time or money on it?

The Good Idea Fairy said "ooo...a hard drive for $2. Buy it!"
2 weeks from now, the Useless Crap Fairy will be looking for screwdrivers to take it apart and salvage the fridge magnets from it.

😀

 

[CountMike]

Ha, my first HDD, 10MB MFM drive working of adapter on Atari 1040ST.

 

[MeepsterNotchy]

I recently acquired a 3.5in. MFM hard drive for $2, which I tested and seems to work, but have no way to retrieve any data off it. I know Linux is my only option to see the disk. Are there any IDE, SATA, or USB adapters for MFM? Or a USB to ISA?

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack the "Good Idea Fairy" in the head.

What could possibly be on a 25 year old drive, that wasn't yours, that warrants spending any time or money on it?

The Good Idea Fairy said "ooo...a hard drive for $2. Buy it!"
2 weeks from now, the Useless Crap Fairy will be looking for screwdrivers to take it apart and salvage the fridge magnets from it.

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack you in the head for telling someone how to manage their finances.

 

[USAFRet]

I recently acquired a 3.5in. MFM hard drive for $2, which I tested and seems to work, but have no way to retrieve any data off it. I know Linux is my only option to see the disk. Are there any IDE, SATA, or USB adapters for MFM? Or a USB to ISA?

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack the "Good Idea Fairy" in the head.

What could possibly be on a 25 year old drive, that wasn't yours, that warrants spending any time or money on it?

The Good Idea Fairy said "ooo...a hard drive for $2. Buy it!"
2 weeks from now, the Useless Crap Fairy will be looking for screwdrivers to take it apart and salvage the fridge magnets from it.

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack you in the head for telling someone how to manage their finances.

$2 is not 'managing finances'. That's not even pocket change. A candy bar.
$0, $2, $20...a 25 year old MFM drive (10-20MB?), that you have no personal connection with, is simply a waste of time.

Now...if this were your dads old drive and you absolutely needed to get something off of it...OK, maybe.
But some random thing you found at a garage sale? The UCF is asking what you actually want/need this for. Why bother? Why spend the time?

But apparently, you've 'tested it and it seems to work'. How did you test it?

 

[MeepsterNotchy]

I recently acquired a 3.5in. MFM hard drive for $2, which I tested and seems to work, but have no way to retrieve any data off it. I know Linux is my only option to see the disk. Are there any IDE, SATA, or USB adapters for MFM? Or a USB to ISA?

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack the "Good Idea Fairy" in the head.

What could possibly be on a 25 year old drive, that wasn't yours, that warrants spending any time or money on it?

The Good Idea Fairy said "ooo...a hard drive for $2. Buy it!"
2 weeks from now, the Useless Crap Fairy will be looking for screwdrivers to take it apart and salvage the fridge magnets from it.

This is when the "Useless Crap Fairy" needs to smack you in the head for telling someone how to manage their finances.

$2 is not 'managing finances'. That's not even pocket change. A candy bar.
$0, $2, $20...a 25 year old MFM drive (10-20MB?), that you have no personal connection with, is simply a waste of time.

Now...if this were your dads old drive and you absolutely needed to get something off of it...OK, maybe.
But some random thing you found at a garage sale? The UCF is asking what you actually want/need this for. Why bother? Why spend the time?

But apparently, you've 'tested it and it seems to work'. How did you test it?

By "seem" I mean it spins up, and completes its seek test without any odd noises.

 

[CountMike]

I don't think MFM interface cards ever made it to PCI, last ones I have ever seen were ISO 16.

 

[Pat_the_Cat]

Dealing with legacy hard drive data, you have 2 options;-

1) Go for a Unix supported controller and use Unix retrieval tools.

2) Use a DOS version of Spinrite. Which isn't easy to find nowadays, but is THE best tool for getting data off a damaged / partially readable drive. It takes hours or days, but it works.

Your nightmare really begins if the drive partitions contain non-FAT filesystems. Best bet for that would be a working Amiga with a working CBM Bridgeboad. Which is going to cost you a helluva lot more than $2.