Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

If you want to ask questions about how the machine works, peculiar details, the differences between models, here it is !
How to program the oric hardware (VIA, FDC, ...) is also welcome.
User avatar
Dbug
Site Admin
Posts: 4444
Joined: Fri Jan 06, 2006 10:00 pm
Location: Oslo, Norway
Contact:

Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by Dbug »

The other day when I was testing my SpeechSynthesizer, I had to compile on my pc, copy to the SD card, unplug the SD card, plug it in the cumulus, reset the Oric, check it worked, remove the SD card, plug it back in the PC, ... rince and repeat.

I was wondering if anyone had experience with these SD Cards that have embedded wifi controllers, and if that would work with a Cumulus or HxC floppy emulator?

EDIT: The Toshiba FlashAir seems to support the possibility to be mounted as a network drive and to upload, if it's compatible with the Cumulus that would be a timesaver.
A video of the card in action by a guy doing 3D Printing:
User avatar
iss
Wing Commander
Posts: 1641
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2010 5:43 pm
Location: Bulgaria
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by iss »

This is very interesting device indeed! I bought a cheap one and after month will give feedback how it works with cumulus :).
If it works this will be not only timesaver for developers (and for lazy users ;)) but also will preserve the SD card connector which in cumulus is very fragile part!
ezshare.jpg
It's only adapter (i.e. additionally needs micro SD card but I have lot around here). Let see how it will perform...
User avatar
NekoNoNiaow
Flight Lieutenant
Posts: 272
Joined: Sun Jan 15, 2006 10:08 pm
Location: Montreal, Canadia

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by NekoNoNiaow »

Having to swap storage media between PC and retro kitten can be quite a pain point indeed.

As an alternative to WiFi SD Cards, there is also the option of adapting existing WiFi cards to the Oric.
Chinnivision has reviewed one such card for the Amstrad CPC and I must say it looks really practical to be able to load WiFi content off of the PC directly from the Amstrad.

(I have been meaning to buy one that works on a db25 serial port to use it on my Amiga. ;) )

User avatar
ibisum
Wing Commander
Posts: 1645
Joined: Fri Apr 03, 2009 8:56 am
Location: Vienna, Austria
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by ibisum »

I'm about to invest in a few Wifi adapters for use in my collection - going to start with the CPC6128 since it'll do CP/M and give me a .. relatively .. interesting telnet terminal to use. Then I'll add one to a ZX Spectrum, a few other things .. and if we get it worked out, eventually, Oric. But maybe on Oric it'd be interesting to consider the means by which wifi could be added to the Twilighte/Orix configuration ..

Trouble is, I'm still unsure about which Wifi approach to take - so thanks for this video, its been timely for me! :)
User avatar
Chema
Game master
Posts: 3014
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2006 10:55 am
Location: Gijón, SPAIN
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by Chema »

I am quite sure I posted about people using the ESP 8266 (https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESP8266) chip to add wifi to 8-bit systems. The chip includes a full implementation of a TCP/IP stack and you control it using SPI. The only issue was that it needed a serial port on the host computer, which should also be added for the Oric to work with it.

But back to the topic... has anybody tested the Wifi SD card with Cumulus?
User avatar
ibisum
Wing Commander
Posts: 1645
Joined: Fri Apr 03, 2009 8:56 am
Location: Vienna, Austria
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by ibisum »

I've done a lot of work with the ESP8266 (see http://magicshifter.net/) and know its quirks quite well - the difficult part is in adding the required circuitry to an Oric to make comms with the ESP8266 efficient and stable...
User avatar
Dbug
Site Admin
Posts: 4444
Joined: Fri Jan 06, 2006 10:00 pm
Location: Oslo, Norway
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by Dbug »

I got myself a Toshiba FlashAir "Wireless LAN" (W-04, SDHC, 16GB) and all I get from the Cumulus is "SD Card I/O Error!" when trying to access it.

The card is formated in FAT 32, so I'm not quite sure what the issue is, I did not get to test the wifi part because it could not even get the files access part working. Could that maybe an issue with power usage?
User avatar
iss
Wing Commander
Posts: 1641
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2010 5:43 pm
Location: Bulgaria
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by iss »

@Dbug, I don't think that the power is an issue but this one in file fat32.c:

Code: Select all

	if (sectors_per_cluster < 16)
		return 0;
Can you check this parameter in your card?

Else I'm still waiting for my WiFi card (actually only WiFi card-adapter), when it comes I'll give feedback how it works.
User avatar
Dbug
Site Admin
Posts: 4444
Joined: Fri Jan 06, 2006 10:00 pm
Location: Oslo, Norway
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by Dbug »

Can you check this parameter in your card?
Do you know of an easy way to check that (on Windows) ?
User avatar
iss
Wing Commander
Posts: 1641
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2010 5:43 pm
Location: Bulgaria
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by iss »

Dbug wrote: Sun Apr 07, 2019 3:22 pm
Can you check this parameter in your card?
Do you know of an easy way to check that (on Windows) ?
Eh, the good ol' DOS-times ..... "chkdsk X:" is your friend: :)
When formatting select for Allocation unit size a value >= 8192.
spc.png
User avatar
Dbug
Site Admin
Posts: 4444
Joined: Fri Jan 06, 2006 10:00 pm
Location: Oslo, Norway
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by Dbug »

Damn, I forgot about chkdsk... gosh.

Code: Select all

The type of the file system is FAT32.
(...)
   15,618,048 KB total disk space.
           96 KB in 3 hidden files.
          128 KB in 4 folders.
       13,696 KB in 12 files.
   15,604,096 KB are available.

       32,768 bytes in each allocation unit.
      488,064 total allocation units on disk.
      487,628 allocation units available on disk.
guess I need to reformat it, now the question is, would reformatting the card cause problems with the Eyefi part...
User avatar
iss
Wing Commander
Posts: 1641
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2010 5:43 pm
Location: Bulgaria
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by iss »

32,768 bytes in each allocation unit.
This looks OK. About formatting here ... - probably it will not break the thing.
User avatar
Chema
Game master
Posts: 3014
Joined: Tue Jan 17, 2006 10:55 am
Location: Gijón, SPAIN
Contact:

Re: Cumulus with Wifi/SD Card?

Post by Chema »

I remember I had to use a special formatting tool to make a card work. Something related to the structure (MBR being present or something along that line). In the Cumulus firmware thread there is some info...

Found it: viewtopic.php?f=9&t=1035&hilit=cumulus+ ... =75#p11999
Post Reply