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High Density disk drive in Atari 1040STe ?


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I have 1 Epson SMD-340 and 3 Epson SMD-300 high density disk drives. I know that the SMD-340 will work as a HD disk drive, but, will the SMD-300 also work as an HD disk drive in an Atari 1040STe computer? Since I am replacing my TOS roms, I figured I might as well replace the 720k disk drive with a high density disk drive.

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I am installing TOS 2.06 and I will jumper the Atari 1040STe motherboard for a high density disk drive. Can any of you provide a picture of the jumper setting on the back of your Epson high density disk drive. Thanks. Oh, my floppy disk controller chip is revision 02-02.

Edited by TheAtariKing
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Only Mega STE has necessary chips for HD floppy . All other ST, STE machines need 16 MHz circuit + logic to switch to 8 Mhz when DD disk is inserted.

In other words Ajax chip and TOS 2.06 are not enough. Search little about topic - there are diverse threads about, and some circuit schematics. Probably will find someone who offers boards for sale.

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Only Mega STE has necessary chips for HD floppy . All other ST, STE machines need 16 MHz circuit + logic to switch to 8 Mhz when DD disk is inserted.

In other words Ajax chip and TOS 2.06 are not enough. Search little about topic - there are diverse threads about, and some circuit schematics. Probably will find someone who offers boards for sale.

According to the installation procedures that comes with the TOS 2.06 roms, the Atari 1040STe already has the circuitry on the motherboard to handle high density disk drives. You just have to have a revision 02-02 floppy disk controller chip plugged in (which most 1040STe computers do) and you have to solder the E6 jumper pad. You also have to replace the 720k disk drive with a high density disk drive. The Epson SMD-340 is a direct replacement for the 720k Epson drive, just swap the face plate and eject button.

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I am installing TOS 2.06 and I will jumper the Atari 1040STe motherboard for a high density disk drive. Can any of you provide a picture of the jumper setting on the back of your Epson high density disk drive. Thanks. Oh, my floppy disk controller chip is revision 02-02.

Here you go. Read this thread over at Atari-forum

 

http://atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=24202&p=220398&hilit=high+density#p220303

Edited by Official Ninja
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Then I guess the installation procedures that comes with the TOS 2.06 roms is wrong. What exactely does jumper pads E6 do? The other 3 jumpers close to the roms are for the different types of chips used. An Ajax chip is not needed if your floppy disk controller chip is revision 02-02.

 

I do plan to use a Gotek drive instead of the disk drive. Just waiting for someone to release the firmware so I can reflash the Gotek drives. So, if a Gotek drive will work at the standard 720k disk format after reflashing the firmware, then I am not worried about high density. I use a Gotek drive in my Amiga 500 Tower and I really like it. Never had any problems. I can even boot up my custom Workbench 1.3 and my productivity software. I use an 880k disk drive as DF1 when I need to work with actual disks. I plan to do the same thing with this Atari 1040STe computer.

Edited by TheAtariKing
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Then I guess the installation procedures that comes with the TOS 2.06 roms is wrong. What exactely does jumper pads E6 do? The other 3 jumpers close to the roms are for the different types of chips used. An Ajax chip is not needed if your floppy disk controller chip is revision 02-02.

 

I do plan to use a Gotek drive instead of the disk drive. Just waiting for someone to release the firmware so I can reflash the Gotek drives. So, if a Gotek drive will work at the standard 720k disk format after reflashing the firmware, then I am not worried about high density. I use a Gotek drive in my Amiga 500 Tower and I really like it. Never had any problems. I can even boot up my custom Workbench 1.3 and my productivity software. I use an 880k disk drive as DF1 when I need to work with actual disks. I plan to do the same thing with this Atari 1040STe computer.

I don't know about documentation that comes with 2.06.... If I remember right though, 2.06 was made for the Mega STe. With the Mega STe you can add a HD drive if you have the proper chip. No other modifications need to be done. In both of my Mega STe I do not set the jumper. I just use a PRG in the auto folder that enables the OS to have HD formatting available.

Edited by Official Ninja
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TOS 2.06 was only in Mega STE machines. Better said, in later ones, since first ones were with TOS 2.05 - like mine, and with DD floppy drive. In Mega STE is really enough to replace drive and set switch. No 1040 STE was equipped with TOS 2.05/6 - they were with TOS 1.06 and 1.62 only. More important is that in 1040 STE no HD floppy circuit.

So, please cut this unnecessary discussion and order HD circuit from exxosuk ..

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TOS 2.06 was only in Mega STE machines. Better said, in later ones, since first ones were with TOS 2.05 - like mine, and with DD floppy drive. In Mega STE is really enough to replace drive and set switch. No 1040 STE was equipped with TOS 2.05/6 - they were with TOS 1.06 and 1.62 only. More important is that in 1040 STE no HD floppy circuit.

So, please cut this unnecessary discussion and order HD circuit from exxosuk ..

No, I will not order the HD circuit from exxosuk. I will just have to wait for the firmware to be released for the Gotek USB floppy drive. I buy these drives for less than $19 (free shipping). I have already installed a Gotek drive in an external Atari disk drive case. It looks very nice. In the mean time, I will follow the instructions that came with TOS 2.06 and install an Epson SMD-340 high density disk drive and solder the E6 jumper pads. I think that the E6 jumper hooks up the floppy disk controller chip's clock pin to the 16 MHz clock on the 1040 STe motherboard. I am not sure about this, so I will follow the trace using my multimeter. If this is not the case, then I will have to feed the 16 MHz clock to the chip with a wire. I will only be using high density disks on this Atari 1040STe. So, I am not worried about the 720k read / write function or the 7 MHz clock going to the floppy controller chip. I mean, why would I want to mess with 720k disks when both my Atari 1040STe and my classic Pentium 3 pc reads and writes 1.44 mb disks?

 

I have two high density disk drives in my classic Pentium III pc that I built years ago. It still looks brand new, even after all these years of heavy use (I build very high quality computers). I use Winblows 98SE on this pc. I can stick an Atari ST disk in one drive and copy the contents over to a 1.44 MB disk. Since all Atari ST computers with TOS 1.4 or later can read and write pc format disks, there is no problem.

 

It's like those stupid people that still mess around with 8-bit computers, when we have 16/32 bit computers. I just do not get it. I mean, when I bought my Atari ST computer back in 1985 I never looked back at the Commodore 64 or any of the other 8-bit computers of the time. Who in their right mind would?! In the same way, if your Atari ST computer can read and write high density disks, why mess with 720k disks? As the Goblins in World of Warcraft say "GET REAL".

Edited by TheAtariKing
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It's like those stupid people that still mess around with 8-bit computers, when we have 16/32 bit computers. I just do not get it. I mean, when I bought my Atari ST computer back in 1985 I never looked back at the Commodore 64 or any of the other 8-bit computers of the time. Who in their right mind would?! In the same way, if your Atari ST computer can read and write high density disks, why mess with 720k disks? As the Goblins in World of Warcraft say "GET REAL".

 

Other than archiving old software and data I avoid using floppy disks at all- I only use solid state media. I would have no use for an HD floppy drive. I wouldn't call someone who still uses floppy disks stupid though. These 80s/90s 8/16/32 bit computers are a hobby for all of us- there's nothing 'stupid' about someone else's hobby just because you don't share it.

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that is exactly right. I have my atari 1200xl and my atari XEGM, and i still play those all the time. so atariking, if people who still use 8-bits are stupid, then why in a world of 128bit and 64bit are you still using your 16/32bit? and I can bet you are not typing in these responses with your atari (since you mentioned warcraft). maybe you are the one to GET REAL and not bash someone's hobby.

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that is exactly right. I have my atari 1200xl and my atari XEGM, and i still play those all the time. so atariking, if people who still use 8-bits are stupid, then why in a world of 128bit and 64bit are you still using your 16/32bit? and I can bet you are not typing in these responses with your atari (since you mentioned warcraft). maybe you are the one to GET REAL and not bash someone's hobby.

I can understand why people still use the Atari ST and Amiga computers, because their graphics and sound was way ahead of their time and are still great today. But, 8 bit graphics and mono sound, I got tired and bored of that in 1983. Why do you think I sold all of my 8 bit computer stuff and used the money to buy the parts to build an IBM clone? It is because the IBM had much better graphics and at higher resolution. Then when the Atari 520ST was released I traded my new IBM clone for an Atari ST computer system. I never looked back at that 8 bit crap.

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I agree 100% with what galax just said. Why don't you read and research what we are doing with our "crap" computers? I always considered the ST line to be "crap", and, people like you prove my point in that "crap" people (who obviously don't know any better) like to use and promote "crap."

 

Go take your "crap" somewhere else.

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So you are calling the systems that 90% of this website is devoted to 'crap'? And you wonder why you get banned from forums?

Then I guess I joined the wrong forum. I do not worry about "getting banned from forums". I can always start my own forum. Most of you that join forums are followers or "sheep". I on the other hand am a leader or a "wolf". Why do you think I started working for myself? It is because I found out if you work for someone else you are a loser, no matter what fancy title they give you. THINK about it, the rich people that run and control this planet work for themselves.

 

The only person here that is a winner or a "wolf" is the person that started and owns this forum. The rest of you are losers or "sheep". BYE.

Edited by TheAtariKing
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Why do you think I started working for myself?

 

Is that your highly successful Craigslist computer repair business, or one of the "Divisions" of your Retrogeek computing empire? I think "unemployed" or "retired" would be more accurate.

 

One more thing, most of you are too stupid to answer simple questions. What clued me in on this is when some of you responded to my posts with RF modulator crap when I was talking about RGB. I guess I will just have to figure things out myself, I always do.

 

It was you who misunderstood; you asked "How do I change my STe from PAL to NTSC ?", which implies changing the composite and/or RF out to NTSC. You actually only wanted to change the RGB out to 60Hz by default, which is a different question. PAL is usually 50Hz, and NTSC is usually 60Hz, but not always. Both PAL and NTSC STs can output in both 50Hz and 60Hz. You clearly still don't understand the distinction.

Edited by galax
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The only person here that is a winner or a "wolf" is the person that started and owns this forum. The rest of you are losers or "sheep". BYE.

By that logic (which doesn't seem to be your strong suit), that would also make you a loser or a sheep! Congratulations on getting banned from yet another forum.

 

..Al

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