This article wasn't what it was intended to be! The final version of the original was about to be spell checked in ClarisWorks when I got the dreaded sad Mac icon and musical tones. The first stage of things was denial as I left things switched off hoping it was just a temporary glitch, but it wasn't.

A quick phone call to Mr. Haines gave me some ideas and procedures were followed to try and find the problem.

I removed the special video card and cache card - still no go.

I swapped SIMMs around to see if the error number would change - nope it don't.

Then, in a flash of inspiration, I disconnected the HD. Success!! It asked me for a boot disk. I got out my emergency disk and all, (cut down), systems were go. Luckily, lurking in store was a spare smaller HD, so that was pressed into service. It turned out that the software on it had problems so, using the boot floppy, it was formatted from scratch.

The moral of the story is that important software & items should be backed up somewhere!!

(Ed: But everybody, including me, only does this AFTER they have been hit the first time.)

I started to install enough software to get me back online and collect my emails but, as life would have it, ...

Virgin Net had had problems the previous night, but they were sorted out early next morning. By using one of my alternate ISPs it'd been obvious that Virgin was offline. On the night of my problem only the email side of things was affected and it wasn't until late the next day that I managed to get my email box cleared.

There's no moral here - just the coincidence of their HD problems!

More on my Surftime fiasco. A letter came from 'them' saying that their machines were infallible and that, in that case, I'm sure I'd feel happy about paying the bill. Phoning up enquiries I got the woman to read out the notes on my file.

'Can you stop laughing sir?'

The chap had pointed out that when I tried to access Surftime my Mac & modem was faulty and I'd got the settings wrong. Let's see. I can access no less than 6 ISPs, using data provided in the same format as BT's, with 100% success rate. My BT data checked by BT's tech help line. Gosh the problem must be some magical data BT don't tell people then!

At present, various emails have gone unanswered and even snail mail to the chap has been ignored ....

On the whole, throughout the affair, the tone has been one of "RESISTANCE IS USELESS" .

Alternate ISP's & phone providers have been a subject close to my heart after the Surftime fiasco, so here are my two favourites.

ONETEL , http://www.onetel.net.uk, 0800 634 1844, 0800 634 1831

Onetel provides internet access 24/7 at 1p/min and has free tech help, along with cheap rates for international voice/fax calls. If I've got to go online during the day these are the people I choose.

( I've got 4 * £2 call credit vouchers for Onetel here to pass out to friends & family -drop me your snail mail and the first four out of hat will get them -U.K. only )

EUROBELL , http://www.eurobell.com

At weekends they're 0.75p/min, ( BT=0.8p/min with best discounts), with flat rate for U.K. calls (0.85p/min). For voice calls they send you a dial-up box, to put inline with your phone, to access their network. On the Internet sign up CD, which is pure PC, the URL for the sign up page can be found easily, so no worries for fellow Mac users there. Tech help is free if you use the dial-up box to ring them .

Both these companies lease time from BT it seems, which sort of implies that if they can both make a living from offering cheap calls aren't BT's normal rates a bit steep?

(Ed: I read somewhere that the cost to BT of any duration local call was recovered after somewhere between 3 and 4 minutes. Any additional cost for longer durations is pure profit!)

It seems when I go through the newsgroups that Dual Density disks are proving hard to find.

Floppy 5.25'' disks came in two flavours, DD & High Density. (Single Density did exist but has long since vanished). Commodore disk drives will only work with DD disks. The High Density disks just won't format in them. This is due to the magnetic oxide coating on the surface of the disk requiring a higher magnetic flux from the write head that Commodore didn't bargain on having to provide.

It's a source of hot debate whether to notch or not. That is, to cut a second write enable notch on a floppy so as to allow it to be 'flipped'. The argument against it points out that dust particles trapped inside the inner sleeve can be pulled out of place and dumped elsewhere on the disk and into the disk drive.

(Personal opinion = I'm not keen on it really.)

Commodore disk drives can use any DD disk, whether it's single sided or double sided (flippable), and as most people only have single sided drives the direction of travel of the other side isn't important. However, we people with double sided drives, (8250 & 1571), have to turn our drives into single sided to read them properly by running a bit of BASIC.

10 open15,8,15
20 print#15,"m-w"chr$(172)chr$(16)chr$(1)chr$(1)
30 print#15,"m-w"chr$(195)chr$(16)chr$(1)chr$(0)
40 close15

When I'm using an external C64 with snapshot cartridge and the C128's internal 1571 there are times when it just uses it as a 1541 drive.

To enable it as a 1571 the command, with the DOS wedge enabled, is:
>u0>m1

To flip back to 1541 the command is:
>u0>m0

The 8 bit world lost another of its dedicated followers during the first week in September. Ted Cawkwell passed away and will be missed by those of us who knew his work in running the Einstein magazine .

In the Commodore scene a certain person managed to get his new daughter named after an assembler language package for CBM/PET's & C64(?).

At least one person reads this section don't they Mr Walker ;->

For those of us who recall the far off days of 405 lines and Fireball XL5:
http://spacecity.tripod.com
This has lots of links, including some to sound samples, (variable quality sad to say).

At the time quite a few of us preferred 'Space Patrol' by Roberta Leigh - not the live action 50's USA TV show BTW!.

INKJET CASH FLOW?

The provision of cheaper supplies for my printing needs has been a thread that has occurred from time to time in these hallowed pages.

http://www.choicestationery.co.uk, 0800 074 9300, has bargain prices on Epson compatible cartridges with very fast turn around times for orders. Same day dispatch on receipt of postal orders .

Items about using a cheap VGA monitor with a Mac IIci, (when I redo things from scratch ), and fitting a new hard drive to a Mac IIci, (when it's actually done ).

P.S. My address book, (both snail & e), wasn't back up (:-<) so if you don't hear from me forgive me as I've got to redo things from scratch in that department as well!