How many Atari 815 are there?

[+pboland]

And of course the 1015 VHS interface

All joking aside, I seem to remember a VHS interface device for backing up the Atari ST line of computers. I don't think it was made by atari however. I remember see the panphet with a bunch of old ST stuff I had a few years back.

[+orpheuswaking]

Yeah it's a real product just not an atari product! ( I think it was Alpha Microsystems )

[TwiliteZoner]

No doubt a very rare piece of Atari history, but I personally find the Atari 409 reel to reel tape drive to be a tad rarer.

Is that a joke or are you being serious? At this point it really wouldn't surprise me to find out something like that exists.

 

Tempest

 

Sorry couldn't resist after seeing wood_jl's post. Come to think of it though you do have a point about not being surprised about some of the stuff that is unearthed.

[TwiliteZoner]

Yeah it's a real product just not an atari product! ( I think it was Alpha Microsystems )

 

Pretty sure there was a cartridge from SEYMOR/RADIX that would let you backup your hard drive to vhs.

 

 

EDIT: Here it is below.

 

http://www.aracnet.com/~atari/st_hard.htm

 

DVT VCR Hard Drive Backup System from Seymor/Radix. Use this to Backup your

Hard Drive onto your VCR through your Cartridge Port. Comes with Cartridge

Interface, Disk, Cable, Manual & Box...............................$25.00 U$D.

Edited August 1, 2011 by TwiliteZoner

[fibrewire]

Don't forget the Corvus Mirror that sloopy has in his possession

[+bf2k+]

 

Sorry couldn't resist after seeing wood_jl's post. Come to think of it though you do have a point about not being surprised about some of the stuff that is unearthed.

 

 

Or Photoshopped as the case may be...

[TwiliteZoner]

What about that ultra rare 8-track player?

 

That also gave the 800 Fairchild Channel F compatibility.

[svenski]

Yeah it's a real product just not an atari product! ( I think it was Alpha Microsystems )

 

Pretty sure there was a cartridge from SEYMOR/RADIX that would let you backup your hard drive to vhs.

 

 

EDIT: Here it is below.

 

http://www.aracnet.c...ari/st_hard.htm

 

DVT VCR Hard Drive Backup System from Seymor/Radix. Use this to Backup your

Hard Drive onto your VCR through your Cartridge Port. Comes with Cartridge

Interface, Disk, Cable, Manual & Box...............................$25.00 U$D.

 

I have one somewhere for the Amiga. I remember a UK company was selling it with a version for the ST. Don't think we actually sold any though, hence why I ended up with one. Never used it,

[Tempest]

I had the disk for the ST version of the VCR backup but not the actual unit. I got it in a lot I got off of craigs list last year.

 

Tempest

[carmel_andrews]

I find it interesting that Atari would demo a disk drive before demo'ing their computers (as what happened to the 815, which allegedy was shown before the 400/800 was shown)

 

Interesting also that Percom picked up on the idea of the 815, hence why Atari/Percom came to an agreement on Disk Drive compatability....shame that atari broke it with the 1050, although all or most of the 1050's mod's or upgrades do conform to the Atari/Percom standards

[Bryan]

The 1050 was crippled to avoid putting a small amount of additional memory in the unit. It has 256 bytes total, which cannot hold a DD sector and provide any variable/stack space. It would be a cool programming hack if someone could make it transfer 256 byte sectors without any additional hardware. You would have the A,X,Y registers, the stack pointer, and maybe the ability to misuse a couple 6532 registers for temporary storage. You could use RAM space except when the buffer is 100% full.

[mellis]

 

 

LOL - so close.

[Rybags]

Just chuck a RIOT and TIA in there. Hey presto, memory requirements met and you can play 2600 games as well.

[Bryan]

Just chuck a RIOT and TIA in there. Hey presto, memory requirements met and you can play 2600 games as well.

It's already got one RIOT (6532) so doubling up on the SRAM IC's would be cheaper. All it's missing from the 2600 is the TIA.

 

(The US Doubler is just a ROM and some potted RAM)

Edited August 2, 2011 by Bryan

[fibrewire]

And of course the 1015 VHS interface

You jest, but on the back of the Corvus Disk System there is a VCR interface that can automatically control the Panasonic NV-8200 for nightly or hourly backups.

I own this one, and it's free to someone that already owns the Corvus Mirror Card.

 

[carmel_andrews]

Does that mean that the 1050 can only hold 1 sector in advance (since standard atari sectors are only 128bytes in length)

 

I am surprised that atari didn't try to outdo these companies doing the 1050 mods/upgrades by doing an official equivalent to these mod's/upgrades but without the enhanced copying ability (like the copying abilities found in happy/SA/SA2 etc)

 

It would have made for a better 1050 (i.e more memory and a hardware sector editor or built in dos)

[Rybags]

What would have been interesting is a PBI 1050 mod.

 

Send commands over the PBI, then have the drive present the data on the bus at whatever rate the host is able to read/acknowledge it (of course have it backed by full-track buffering).

 

But now that kinda thing is past it's use-by date and would likely cost as much or more as an IDE Plus 2.

[Bryan]

Does that mean that the 1050 can only hold 1 sector in advance (since standard atari sectors are only 128bytes in length)

Yes. The 1050 actually has more RAM than it needs for 128-byte sectors, but not quite enough for 256-byte sectors.

 

I am surprised that atari didn't try to outdo these companies doing the 1050 mods/upgrades by doing an official equivalent to these mod's/upgrades but without the enhanced copying ability (like the copying abilities found in happy/SA/SA2 etc)

The last thing Atari wanted was people opening up their drives. Remember, Atari's stance was that you only needed to know how to plug in a cartridge or SIO cable.

[Bryan]

What would have been interesting is a PBI 1050 mod.

 

Send commands over the PBI, then have the drive present the data on the bus at whatever rate the host is able to read/acknowledge it (of course have it backed by full-track buffering).

 

But now that kinda thing is past it's use-by date and would likely cost as much or more as an IDE Plus 2.

That's pretty much what you get with the Black Box/Floppy Board combination, and the 1450XLD method. It would have been cool if Atari had come out with a fast floppy PBI box, but I guess the biggest problem is compatibility with existing software. It would have been nice to at least put a fast serial mode in the 1050 that new software could have used (along with true DD).

[+kheller2]

What would have been interesting is a PBI 1050 mod.

 

Send commands over the PBI, then have the drive present the data on the bus at whatever rate the host is able to read/acknowledge it (of course have it backed by full-track buffering).

 

But now that kinda thing is past it's use-by date and would likely cost as much or more as an IDE Plus 2.

 

 

Giggle... there is/was a 1050 PBI mod. It isn't pretty. It doesn't actually use the bus though... more of a direct PIO to PIO device if I recall. There were a lot of patches to the OS and to the 1050 firmware to make it work.

 

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/118968-parallel-atari-1050-to-800xl-interfacing-system/

 

I spent quite some time with another engineer rebuilding this from Bob's notes in the early 90s.

Edited August 11, 2011 by kheller2

[+bob1200xl]

Yes... sorry about that.

 

Not much to be gained from a parallel interface to a real floppy at this point in time. There is just too much latency in the disk rotation and seek time. High speed SIO and fast format skew runs almost as fast as the best PIO. No matter what, you have to wait 200ms for the disk to rotate/read one track.

 

I'd like to make a floppy to CF card copier in a 1050 as a stand-alone device. Insert a floppy and it gets ripped over to the next available partition on the CF card. Do as many disks as you need and then plug your CF card into the PBI of your system. I just need some way to write a label for the disk on track 720 or such.

 

Bob

 

 

 

What would have been interesting is a PBI 1050 mod.

 

Send commands over the PBI, then have the drive present the data on the bus at whatever rate the host is able to read/acknowledge it (of course have it backed by full-track buffering).

 

But now that kinda thing is past it's use-by date and would likely cost as much or more as an IDE Plus 2.

 

 

Giggle... there is/was a 1050 PBI mod. It isn't pretty. It doesn't actually use the bus though... more of a direct PIO to PIO device if I recall. There were a lot of patches to the OS and to the 1050 firmware to make it work.

 

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/118968-parallel-atari-1050-to-800xl-interfacing-system/

 

I spent quite some time with another engineer rebuilding this from Bob's notes in the early 90s.

[ijor]

The 1050 was crippled to avoid putting a small amount of additional memory in the unit. It has 256 bytes total, which cannot hold a DD sector and provide any variable/stack space. It would be a cool programming hack if someone could make it transfer 256 byte sectors without any additional hardware. You would have the A,X,Y registers, the stack pointer, and maybe the ability to misuse a couple 6532 registers for temporary storage. You could use RAM space except when the buffer is 100% full.

 

Didn't Hias mentioned once that somebody (from Germany?) implemented something like that? Hias?

[fibrewire]

Well, at least there is this one

[sloopy]

Well, at least there is this one

 

hmmm... nice score, does it work? where ya get it?

 

 

sloopy.

[fibrewire]

hmmm... nice score, does it work? where ya get it?

hmmm... Thanks!, Only top drive, it came in the mail