Converting Old Brother WP Files to Word

[sc211]

I got an old Brother WP-75 word processor from back around 1990, on which I wrote a lot before getting a computer and going to Word. (3.5" disks, 720 kb, about 150 double-spaced pages on each.)

The problem is, those files aren't IBM compatible and need to be converted into Word by someone else.

The only one I've found is a company called Pivar, who will do it for $45 per disk for the first 7 disks, and $27 for any beyond that. And I have over 40 disks, chock-full. Which runs over a grand.

Does anyone know of any other way to convert these files?

Printing the pages out won't work because not only is the printer busted on it, but it would take too long to print (3 min a page), scan, and try to convert with OCR.

Thanks.

www.pivar.com/ (http://www.pivar.com/)

[evanaharris]

can you save them as ASCII files? That is, basic .txt files, then transfer them over? Because that'd be the simplest format that I can think of (and Word will definitely open .txt files, at which point you can save them as .doc files and go from there). You'd lose all your text formatting, italics and underlines and whatnot, but that might not be TOO severe, and you'd get your files without paying $45 per disk.

[Man with twohanded sword]

>You'd lose all your text formatting, italics and
>underlines and whatnot,

Not if you make cunning use of yoru find/replace, and tag your formats with text like this [XXXITALICS_STARTXXX].....[XXXITALICS_ENDXXX]
This involves pushing find/replace to its limits...

BTW: see
groups-beta.google.com/gr...4494e95089 (http://groups-beta.google.com/group/corelsupport.wordperfect8suite-wordperfect/browse_thread/thread/2e094162f3f72cad/29dbc24494e95089?q=Converting+Old+Brother+WP+Files +to+Word&_done=%2Fgroups%3Fq%3DConverting+Old+Brother+WP+Fi les+to+Word%26&_doneTitle=Back+to+Search&&d#29dbc24494e95089)

[sc211]

I'd love to do that, but when I pop the disks in my computer, I can't see anything on them. My computer simply asks me if I want to format them. Meaning they're not formatted to IBM, but to something else. I can read them on the Brother, but it doesn't let you choose in what form you save them.

[Writing Again]

When I googled "Brother WP-75 word processor" I found a guy selling one for $100 "in excellent condition" which tells me second hand usable ones are out there.

The chances are Brother made a model that is both retro compatible with the WP-75 and compatible with windows: Find out which one that is and you might be able to pick it up used for $200 or less -- The price of four discs from Pivar and you are in business.

[Man with twohanded sword]

Writing Again is a genius!

[Medievalist]

The problem would be with the format of the discs; they use a non standard disk format, so that computers will see them as blank.

Rather than convert them, I'd urge you to print them out out, and scan in the hard copy, yourself.

The format of the files doesn't matter so much as that the disks be readable.

[Jamesaritchie]

I had this problem some years ago, but the Brother word processor allowed me to save the files as text, and my computer had no problem reading those. Formatting was lost, but that was a simple fix.

I had to print out a 400 page novel on one of those things, and at three minutes a page, it took forever. I junked the thing immediately thereafter.

[SRHowen]

I had the same WP, and on my last computer it wouldn't read the disks. (Windows ME) I didn't toss the disks even though I had already done the print, but not scanned the work into the new computer yet--an old novel I had written and just wanted to save it--in case. (in case of what who knows)

Recently I decided to go through the billion disks I have and toss or format those I don't need or use.

My new computer (Windows XP and Word Perfect) read the disks no trouble.

What OS do you use? It may be the problem, and I would think, if it is that you could find a friend with XP to convert them for you.

Shawn

[Jamesaritchie]

My new computer (Windows XP and Word Perfect) read the disks no trouble.

Maybe WordPerfect is the key? I read the disks on a W98 machine, but I used WordPerfect to do it.

[SRHowen]

hmm, could be.

Shawn

[sc211]

Well, I got XP, and it doesn't do the trick.

Also, I went to Brother's site to find out which models can read these disks, but as always, the big corporate site sucked - wouldn't even let me search for word processors.

In the end I found what I needed here:

answers.google.com/answer...w?id=50632 (http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=50632)

Luxsoft's site summed it up best:

It is only the more recent Brother Word Processors models which can produce PC compatible .WPT or ASCII files eg

LW Models LW35 plus LW200 and upwards
PN models 8500 & up

Models with a WP prefix eg WP-1 and early LW's eg LW-1, 20 & 100 are not compatible with any currently known computer system so, sorry, discs from these CANNOT BE CONVERTED.

The earliest of those LW models came out in '93, and mine came out in '89, so it looks like I'm SOL. :\ Thanks for the advice, though. When Big Brother ain't listening anymore, it meant a lot that you guys were there to help.

[sc211]

About printing them, I did think to go that route, but I figure it'll take me 375 hrs to print them (even if they still make those ribbons) and then it'll be another 100 hrs to scan. Also, I'm not familiar with OCR or how to paste it all back together.

So I guess I'll just cram as much as I can onto each disk and keep saving up for Pivar. (I called them a few years ago, and they were quite sure they were the only ones who could do it.)

Of course, the week after I do that, some kid in a basement will create a program to do it and distribute it free on the net.

[mr mistook]

Don't toss those disks just yet. Hackers and freeware authors are always inventing clever little apps that can handle just these types of problems.

This is probably a fairly common problem, so odds are, some programmer is out there fiddling around at home finding the solution as we speak.

It might already be out there. Search for terms like "brother emulators" and on that tack. or "brother wp conversion software"

What you're essentially looking for is a small application (probably freeware) that you install on your PC. When you run it, your computer "emulates" the old Brother WP, and would be able to read the old disks of your A-drive and convert them to ASCII or .TXT.

I don't know if such an app exists right now, but it's TOTALLY possible, and sooner or later, somebody will do it.

[Writing Again]

Models with a WP prefix eg WP-1 and early LW's eg LW-1, 20 & 100 are not compatible with any currently known computer system so, sorry, discs from these CANNOT BE CONVERTED.

That just so totally sucks and makes me want to never buy Brother products again -- And I'm writing to tell them so.

[sc211]

Well, those WP models were pretty old, and they did fix it by '93... But yeah, tell 'em I said it sucks, too.

About the program to install on your computer, I did ask Pivar if there was one I could buy, and the guy laughed at me. Said, "We've been working on these for years." Meaning no way they were going to give out their gravy train.

Maybe I can find a disgruntled employee of theirs...

Anyway, I did send an e-mail to Brother asking if the old LW models can read my disks, so we'll see.

[Jules Hall]

Here's a suggestion which may or may not produce usable results.

Go to here: www.cygwin.com (http://www.cygwin.com) and install the software available on that page (a basic installation with the just the defaults should suffice). It will install a few unix-like tools on your computer, some of which are helpful when working with disks whose format is not recognised by the OS.

Once you've got that installed, you should be able to run the shell installed and type this:

dd if=/dev/fd0 of=/cygdrive/c/diskimage.bin

Be very careful how you type this. Incorrect characters could cause you to erase your disk rather than copying it, or possibly even destroy data on your hard disk. The 'if' stands for 'input file' and is what you're copying _from_, 'of' is 'output file' and is what you're copying _to_. Make sure you have them the right way round (I've erased more than one disk by getting this wrong).

This will make a copy of the data on the disk in a file in your C:\ directory. For a 720K disk, it should say '1440+0 records in, 1440+0 records out' or something similar when it is finished. If the number of records is lower, there's probably a bad sector on the disk. If it's zero, the disk is probably formatted in a very strange way that PC hardware can't read (there were a few devices that used to use a different encoding scheme, but they were few and far between).

You can then do 'strings /cygdrive/c/diskimage.bin > /cygdrive/c/diskimage.txt', which will create a text file that hopefully contains the text out of all your documents on the disk.

Depending on the format used by the word processor you may find chunks out of order, you may see chunks that had been deleted and there may be multiple copies of the same data. This is because none of the software you're using understands the format of the disks, it is just capable of doing simple but useful things without needing to understand the format.

[Jamesaritchie]

Models with a WP prefix eg WP-1 and early LW's eg LW-1, 20 & 100 are not compatible with any currently known computer system so, sorry, discs from these CANNOT BE CONVERTED.

This may be the problem. I bought my Brother in '94 or '95. Sounds like the only thing you can do is find a model of the Brother that can convert the files for you. I still see them around on occasion. Our local Goodwill had one for fifteen bucks a few months back.

[sc211]

Jules - on that set-up, before you download, for Text type, do I choose DOS or Unix? Thanks.