• Updated 2023-07-12: Hello, Guest! Welcome back, and be sure to check out this follow-up post about our outage a week or so ago.

Found some Lisa diskettes

ScutBoy

Well-known member
I would want them if no one else does. Let me know a price and/or shipping and we'll see if we can make a deal.

 

Gorgonops

Moderator
Staff member
Based on the stamped labels on the diagnostic floppies I wonder if those were included with a machine sold through Sun Remarketing.

 

hyperneogeo

Well-known member
No idea, but they are from my dad's floppy disk pile. He had a LISA as a work computer a long time ago and they bought them when they were new. 

 

Gorgonops

Moderator
Staff member
I thought LISA disks were more like 5.25 disks with two cutouts.
Disks for the Lisa 1 fit that description, but essentially all Lisa 1s were upgraded to Lisa 2s, which used the same 400k floppy as the Macintosh. (And then later most Lisas that didn't end up in a landfill were converted to clumsy Macintosh compatibles; software for that purpose is what was on the OP's disks.)

Anyway, the proper name for those failed Lisa 1 disks is "Fileware", but they're more commonly called " Twiggy disks". And yes, those would definitely be collector's items.

 
Last edited by a moderator:

68kMacx86

Well-known member
Disks for the Lisa 1 fit that description, but essentially all Lisa 1s were upgraded to Lisa 2s, which used the same 400k floppy as the Macintosh. (And then later most Lisas that didn't end up in a landfill were converted to clumsy Macintosh compatibles; software for that purpose is what was on the OP's disks.)

Anyway, the proper name for those failed Lisa 1 disks is "Fileware", but they're more commonly called " Twiggy disks". And yes, those would definitely be collector's items.
I guess a Fileware or Twiggy Disk Lisa is what I picture when someone says Apple Lisa.  I had actually forgotten about the lisa 2.  Why someone would trade in a Twiggy Disk Lisa for a common 3.5 inch format is beyond me.  Electronically ejecting 5.25 Drives are extremely uncommon in the history of computing, I can think of two:  IBM's PS/2 line had some high end drives that electronically ejected, and of course, "Fileware".  Such a name.  

"Make sure you save your AppleWorks documents on your Fileware disks, children.  And before you quit your software, make sure you log out of netware, so that Jim the computer guy can come by and upgrade the firmware for the hardware you are using."

 

Gorgonops

Moderator
Staff member
Why someone would trade in a Twiggy Disk Lisa for a common 3.5 inch format is beyond me.
Because the Sony drives actually worked. Twiggy was a disastrously ill-conceived and badly engineered failure, a monument to the worst of Apple's worst "Not Invented Here" tendencies.

 

PB145B

Well-known member
Because the Sony drives actually worked. Twiggy was a disastrously ill-conceived and badly engineered failure, a monument to the worst of Apple's worst "Not Invented Here" tendencies.
Exactly. People weren’t thinking about “collectibility” with these in 1984. They were thinking about reliability and functionality.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Top