[Info-vax] MicrovaxStation 3100 CDROM

[Dave Barter]

On Thursday, June 2, 2022 at 3:19:25 AM UTC+1, cmhe... at gmail.com wrote:
> On 6/1/22 10:13 AM, Dave Barter wrote: 
> > I have a 3100 unit that I need to load software onto. At the moment it only has VMS 7.1 and a TK50 tape drive. I don't have access to another drive. Maybe a dumb question, but can I purchase a cheap external SCSI CDROM drive and use this to move files across? The 3100 has a SCSI connector at the back, it's probably DEC proprietary but I'm hoping there is a connector out there that might work.
> I'd suggest using a SCSI2SD, which you can easily configure as multiple 
> devices. One (or more) of these can be an emulated CD-ROM with a DEC 
> RRD40 identifier string and 512-byte block size, which will enable you 
> to boot from it. 
> 
> Another option would be to use SIMH to emulate an InfoServer with one or 
> more emulated CD-ROM drives attached, put it on the same network, and 
> then access the drives over the network. That would also let you back up 
> your 3100 to storage on the emulated InfoServer and therefore to a more 
> modern system. (And you could even then emulate your 3100 if you want.) 
> 
> -- Chris

SCSI2SD looks a great option. This may be a daft question but how do I format and write to the filesystem on the SD card from Mac/PC, do I need an emulator to do this?