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ALibPC and Lothark's 10502pc/sio2pc-USB


dimfil

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Perhaps the author of the software knows, and the Facebook page you already linked would be the place to find him.

Yes, finally I will do that.

It's just that I trust all you people much and I appreciate all the knowledge that you share along the time, so I believe that confirmation of someone here is a great source.

Maybe none of the users here has already bought such an adapter from Lotharek so, yes, the author of the software is the only one to confirm.

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Possibly it's the other way around: many users have the adapter but few have used the software under discussion.

Yes, that could be the case too.

But, ALibPC is quite an easy way to work with real floppies on a PC and it can work along with AspeQT so I thought a lot of users would have already tried that...

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Yes, that could be the case too.

But, ALibPC is quite an easy way to work with real floppies on a PC and it can work along with AspeQT so I thought a lot of users would have already tried that...

 

I agree with flashjazzcat. Many have Lotharek's device.

 

On the software side, I just discovered ALibPC in this thread.

I don't think it is widely used (I can be wrong of course) compared to RespeQt/AspeQt.

Because, i don't see what is the purpose of having a tool like this.

I mean, if you use it to create ATR files from your floppy, why not use RespeQt to do that. And it will do much more.

So ALibPC appears to me as a subset of RespeQt. But again, I can be wrong, having not used ALibPC.

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But, ALibPC is quite an easy way to work with real floppies on a PC and it can work along with AspeQT so I thought a lot of users would have already tried that...

Well, the author is banned from this forum, so you can infer any number of things from that fact regarding the software's widespread use or lack thereof.

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I agree with flashjazzcat. Many have Lotharek's device.

 

On the software side, I just discovered ALibPC in this thread.

I don't think it is widely used (I can be wrong of course) compared to RespeQt/AspeQt.

Because, i don't see what is the purpose of having a tool like this.

I mean, if you use it to create ATR files from your floppy, why not use RespeQt to do that. And it will do much more.

So ALibPC appears to me as a subset of RespeQt. But again, I can be wrong, having not used ALibPC.

 

 

Well, It's just that someone can use the 10502pc device and create real floppies from atr directly on PC. No big deal, I can already do it using RespeQT and 1050 directly on Atari, but I was just wondering...

 

 

Well, the author is banned from this forum, so you can infer any number of things from that fact regarding the software's widespread use or lack thereof.

 

 

I didn't know that... I apologise... The thread can be closed then as I don't want cause any misunderstandings here...

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I can't comment on ALibPC but as I added support for Lotharek's dual SIO2PC/1050-2-PC USB interface a couple of months ago my guess is ALibPC probably needs some changes.

 

By default Lotharek's dual interface works in SIO2PC mode with command on CTS, so can work with pretty much any SIO2PC software.

 

To switch the interface to 1050-2-PC mode you need to flip one of the FTDI chip's GPIO pins, usually talking directly to it via libftdi/libusb (or the proprietary ftdi libraries). On other interfaces, like that Atarimax RS232, this was a bit easier as you just needed to toggle the (IIRC) DTR line.

 

In 1050-2-PC mode the interface is a bit awkward as it has the polarity of the command line inverted compared to all other 1050-2-PC interfaces. No big deal, but a bit annoying.

 

One of the largest obstacles with this interface though is that it doesn't provide +5V on the 5V/ready SIO line (it doesn't even have a connector for that on the SIO plug!). This took me quite some time to find out as I was wondering why I didn't get any response back from my 1050 - the 1050 will just act dead if the +5V/ready line isn't driven to +5V. So you need to manually provide +5V on the SIO line, eg by connecting a powered-up Atari to the SIO chain or by modifying the interface.

 

I mailed with Lotharek regarding that a couple of months ago, seems the interface was only tested with XF551 drives which don't need the +5V line to be driven. Haven't heard back from him since then so I'm nut sure if this has been fixed in newer versions of the interface.

 

Other than these issues I got the interface operating nicely in 1050-2-PC mode with AtariSIO/atarixfer.

 

so long,

 

Hias

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This is also why you notice I resist recommending the device, his always get a lot of questions... I either build my own, or buy the AtariMax offerings. Though what really got my goat in conversation was, it 'works' with the XF, but... it isn't fast enough in speed transition to use standard XF High speed mode... I wish he would redesign/ re-program this thing. I also wish he would use full conductor count sio cables... but that's another story... He also shouldn't be charging VAT to non EU countries.... but it is what it is...

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I am new to the atari 8bit scene, and as I live in Greece I found Lotharek as one of the rare sources for hardware located in Europe.

Of course in the future I will probably find others too, but at the moment his products are the first to find while searching.

The customs for imports from America continent is a little complicated situation and though I find a lot to buy, I hesitate to do it.

To be honest, up to now I am satisfied from what I have already bought from him. Ultimate 1Mb, Side2 and sio2sd are excellent devices...

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  • 2 months later...

I've been using the Atarimax sio2pc rs232 version with ape and prosystem as well as respect on an ancient HP forever.. I use his usb version for the speed and the fact one instance of ape is used and I put all images in... then it serves one machine on the usb device and one on the serial device. so long as you don't access the drive at the same time there are no issues... I've often used the BB, MIO, and SDX to reassign the drives so they appear as d1:, d2: on 4 different computer 12-12 34-12 56-12 78-12 but moslty I use one rs232 and one usb and serve 4 drive on 2 computer. first 4 are what they are and second 4 (5-8 get re assigned as 1-4 for the second computers use..

Edited by _The Doctor__
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I've been using the Atarimax sio2pc rs232 version with ape and prosystem as well as respect on an ancient HP forever.. I use his usb version for the speed and the fact one instance of ape is used and I put all images in... then it serves one machine on the usb device and one on the serial device. so long as you don't access the drive at the same time there are no issues... I've often used the BB, MIO, and SDX to reassign the drives so they appear as d1:, d2: on 4 different computer 12-12 34-12 56-12 78-12 but moslty I use one rs232 and one usb and serve 4 drive on 2 computer. first 4 are what they are and second 4 (5-8 get re assigned as 1-4 for the second computers use..

Yep, I've been using my DIY 1050/SIO2PC RS232 for almost twenty years. On mine I have the old 2-chip version with separate RS232 I/O ports and have SIO2PC and 10502PC both connected to the SIO chain at the same time. Actually the interface has been built-in to my 1050 for some time with ports on the backside and connected directly to SIO on the inside, so no SIO ports are used.

 

Anywho, it works with all software I've tried and with all combinations of drives and other external devices. I currently have D1:-D4: set up for use as either SIO2PC or floppy drives, along with Dropcheck's SSDX cart with MyIDE II attached, using APT partitions and FJC's driver, with D:5+ on MyIDE. I could go on and on with the rest of my upgraded and modified system and my 1050/SIO2PC works perfectly with it all, and has had +5v to through SIO or now directly from the 1050 mobo, from day one.

 

Something is wrong in the design of the SIO interface if it doesn't if there are issues with it working with other things, from my experience...I have no doubt it would work with AlibPC if the software has RS232 support, I've just never heard of it before this thread, or don't recall hearing about it anyway (I use 95% APE/Prosystem, 5% AspeQT, 0% any other software).

Edited by Gunstar
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