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Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 8:31 pm
by omelette
Chema wrote: ↑Thu Dec 05, 2019 9:02 am
Glad you fixed that Microdisc!
By the way, do you have any means of writing 3" disks from disk images (dsk)? I know there is a way of connecting a 3" unit to a PC, but it seems nobody has such a setup nowadays.
Thanks. I'm fairly sure the way I did it in the past was using my Atari falcon, which reads PC-formatted disks, although it's almost certainly my Atari ST I use to write the disk image, as I've got a cable to attach an external floppy for that. It's ages since I did it - whenever Sedoric 3 was made available - so details are hazy. I might fire it up and see what I did. I do know that I managed to get Sedoric 3 onto a 3" anyway!
Never knew that double-sided 3" disks were produced, both of mine are SS.
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Thu Dec 05, 2019 10:43 pm
by iss
Chema wrote: ↑Thu Dec 05, 2019 2:49 pm
Yeah, this seems to get more and more difficult as time goes by
Well, no way of making a copy of Blake's 7 or any demo disk created with FloppyBuilder, as they don't have any DOS format. Maybe it is time to start thinking again on a low-level diskcopy tool. I am quite sure we discussed that some time ago.
I really wanted someone to test the game on a double-sided 3" disk drive. Did I ever mentioned that the Jasmin compatible boot loader, which worked perfectly under emulation, completely failed on real hardware? But it took almost a year to find someone with the equipment to test. And there is no way to debug that, unless I steal the unit from the owner
The 3" drives/diskettes are looking somehow beautiful for me and I'll not retire them soon, and I always enjoy the sound they make
.
About the low-level copy program - my
CopyPlus can do it! It's unfinished because I wish to integrate formatting functionality too which was difficult to debug ... 'til 10 day ago when
@christian (aka assinie) committed read/write track implementation for Oricutron(!) - it works well so I can finish the copy program (relatively) soon.
And the "crème de la crème" - I have working read sector routine for
Jasmin and Microdisc ready to be integrated in FloppyBuilder, once it's done writing should be easier...
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Fri Dec 06, 2019 12:51 am
by Symoon
iss wrote: ↑Thu Dec 05, 2019 10:43 pmAbout the low-level copy program - my
CopyPlus can do it! It's unfinished because I wish to integrate formatting functionality too which was difficult to debug ... 'til 10 day ago when
@christian (aka assinie) committed read/write track implementation for Oricutron(!) - it works well so I can finish the copy program (relatively) soon.
Don't forget
what we discussed earlier: track reading is bugged on real hardware. It will work fine with emulators but send you random bytes with hardware, inserted or replacing existing data.
That's why the 100% PC version was sexy: using another FDC which was not bugged. It worked fine for a while, but here again, I had painful experiences in the past few years: hardware tends to become faulty.
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Fri Dec 06, 2019 10:19 am
by Chema
iss wrote: ↑Thu Dec 05, 2019 10:43 pm
And the "crème de la crème" - I have working read sector routine for
Jasmin and Microdisc ready to be integrated in FloppyBuilder, once it's done writing should be easier...
Oh, that is interesting. I am eager to see the difference with the ones used in Blake's7, as they worked in Jasmin and Mictodisc too, but only on emulators. I remember you sent me a dsk for my friend to test in its Jasmin, and it also failed to boot, by the way.
So I am intrigued about the difference in real hardware.
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Fri Dec 06, 2019 8:40 pm
by Dbug
One important thing to remember is that 3" floppies have max 42 tracks, if you want to make a 3" version of Blake's, Space 1999, or the demos, they should be regenerated to use 4x tracks, not 8x, else the drive will really not like it.
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2019 7:02 pm
by Steve M
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Sat Dec 07, 2019 7:03 pm
by Steve M
- power s mod004.jpg (662.03 KiB) Viewed 8601 times
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Sun Dec 08, 2019 6:52 pm
by mikeb
Steve M wrote: ↑Sat Dec 07, 2019 7:03 pm
power s mod004.jpg
This one didn't work (forum bug) -- I hope nothing important is on page 4
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Tue Dec 10, 2019 1:01 am
by Steve M
Fixed, I hope.
There's another version of this modification which fits a 74LS125 in the IC11 space. I left that version as it stops the Oric working without the disk drive IIRC.
I have an external add-on that fits a chip between the expansion port and the disk interface leaving the Oric intact.
(I think it's the same 125 chip, but I'll need to check. )
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Tue Dec 10, 2019 9:52 am
by Chema
Steve M wrote: ↑Sat Dec 07, 2019 7:03 pm
power s mod004.jpg
Has anybody done this and confirmed it works to avoid problems with external peripherals?
This is the first time I see this mod....
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2019 7:47 pm
by NightBird
Hi
Remember you have also this mod to improve Phi2, in compatibility with ROM/EPROMs: please read CEO-MAG no 288, april 2014, pp. 8-13.
Enjoy!
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2019 9:47 pm
by Steve M
Chema wrote: ↑Tue Dec 10, 2019 9:52 am
Has anybody done this and confirmed it works to avoid problems with external peripherals?
This is the first time I see this mod....
The power supply mod works. I'm not sure how altering the Oric works with other things. The mod I have is with the 125 chip and that Oric wouldn't work on its own, last time I tried it - it needed to be connected to the disk drive.(I'm not sure if that makes sense?)
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2019 9:50 pm
by Steve M
Here's the other version.
I would focus on the power supply mod and use an alternative to improve data lines.
- timing mod001.jpg (1.36 MiB) Viewed 8539 times
- timing mod002.jpg (1.14 MiB) Viewed 8539 times
- timing mod003.jpg (1.17 MiB) Viewed 8539 times
Re: Atmos/Microdisk - ghost in the machine!?!?!?
Posted: Wed Dec 11, 2019 9:52 pm
by Steve M
- timing mod004.jpg (1.31 MiB) Viewed 8539 times
- timing mod005.jpg (1.28 MiB) Viewed 8539 times
- timing mod006.jpg (1.03 MiB) Viewed 8539 times