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ParanoidLittleMan

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Posts posted by ParanoidLittleMan

  2. Posted

    Yeah, Win tends to write some not polite things on disks, Flash cards, which are not useful under some other OS, and you can not prevent it. Even if delete it in Windows self (best with Total Commander, set to see hidden/system files) it will create them soon again. Writes even in MBR if don't like what sees there.

    Best thing what we can do is to filter them out on Atari, so they don't cause errors, problems. That's called LFN filtering - long filename filtering, and is present in my driver SW, iTOS . TOS is just not ready to work with special fields of LFN.

    And so far I saw only up to 2 System Volume Information or SYSTEM~1 (or other number at end)  as 8.3 filename  folders . . There are couple short index files inside. So, it does not take much place.

    Other solution is to go with Linux, maybe some fruit 🙂

    Well, maybe is worth to make some Atari PRG what cleans it off, so at least it will be not present until next Win 10 attachment .

     

    • Like 1

  4. Posted

    17 hours ago, Randy said:

    Anyone have any luck running Peter's file?  Won't run on my Mega STe on floppy or SD card...

    I don't think that it is matter of luck. You open that ZIP, and see one DIR named WALLS. As said, it must go in root of one of partitions.

    I tested it on C, D and even H, which is GEMDOS logical drive in my Steem emulator. It works in all those cases.

    If you copy/unpack not in root, will not work, because it is programmed so.

    Now questions: your config, where you unpacked/copied it ?  With what SW ?

     

    • Like 1

  7. Posted · Edited by ParanoidLittleMan
    more info

    Yeah, better at 16 MHz, but not all time 25 fps - probably depends from complexity of current scene - with less cars on screen it is better.

    I can do frame by frame walk thru video with SM Player - then it is best visible.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHU4yrlHn_Y

    And here is hard disk adapt: LOTUSSTE.ZIP

    Can make state saves - just pause game before doing it to prevent graph glitches (blitter state is not saved).

    P.S. that walk thru works with YouTube too - pause with space, then . for 1 frame ahead (or , for 1 frame back).

    • Like 2

  10. Posted

    There are instructions at atarimania (link above), and same is included in ST image file DL-able there.  No word about character selection, renaming. It says that is installable on hard disk, but no details. I made ZIP with DIR named WALL, what included all files from floppy version - only that exec is depacked for faster start of game (and to see some file names there) - as said it needs to be copied/depacked in root of some partition on hard disk. Takes about 1100 KB space on disk.

    WALLSIL.ZIP

     

    • Like 3

  11. Posted

    14 hours ago, Chri O. said:

    Oh well I figured I asked so it looks like I'm missing the high 8 data lines for a full IDE interface 😟

    Traditional CF cards use the Parallel ATA (IDE) (PATA) interface.

     

    I am aware of this project just don't want to mess with my beloved Atari ST/e internal Hardware and ICD AdSpeed ST/e accelerator.

    It's not about 'traditional CF card' - Sandisk fits all 'traditional' standards for CF cards, and little more. On ACSI port much more is missing than high 8 data lines to work as IDE interface.  Myself actually did 16-8 bit conversion back in 1993:

    http://zx48.8bitchip.info/idehard.htm

    But that goes on CPU bus, what is pretty much IDE compatible on some level on all home computers of 80-es.

    Then, when Compact Flash cards arrived it was way simper:  http://zx48.8bitchip.info/zxcf.htm

    And 8-bit mode is still possible with CF cards, but only in PIO mode, not in DMA (except Sandisk), and that's one of the reasons why no ACSI-IDE adapter made.

    How much would cost mentioned combination  ACSI-SCSI (that means some old ICD adapter, I guess) and SCSI-IDE adapter ?

  12. Posted · Edited by ParanoidLittleMan
    +i

    http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-st-walls-of-illusion_33080.html

    Registered v. 

    Instead Image Runner maybe Virtual Floppy in driver ..

    Actually, I just checked, it can work from hard drive - just copy DIR WALLS with all it's content to root of one partition, and file WALL1_VV.PRG, W in it too - then can start with it, and will work . WP0 and WP1 seem as player save files, so no need to copy them.

    • Like 1

  13. Posted

    OK, so we can assume that this HAMA and other cheap similar ones use no RGB signals, only composite - and that self results in not so good pic quality, especially med. res. And of course no little better S-Video processing too.

    If it says PAL is supported then should do some decent 50-60 Hz conversion.  Maybe problem appears only with ST, which has no exactly standard PAL video - it is not interlaced - and that's pretty common problem, even with some TVs which support PAL natively. So, I would say that jerky screen was rather because it. 

    And one thing more: is sound supported too ?

     

  15. Posted

    As name says it is for CF or full name: Compact Flash cards. Nowhere says ACSI 2 IDE .  Page title is acsicfs - s is for schematic.

    While CF cards can work in IDE mode, and that mode is used, mostly in DMA mode (for speed) it can not work even with all CF cards, only with Sandisk ones (and they did not pay to me to say this) . ACSI port is 8-bit, while IDE has 16 data lines, so no, no PATA, IDE, CD/DVD drives - all it works only in 16-bit IDE mode.  Plus, older ones might not work in DMA mode too.

     

    This is IDE adapter good for ST, STE: http://atari.8bitchip.info/aidesch.htm

    Hmm, almost 30 years old project.

     

    And to add, there were some writes on Atari forums about going in designing of ACSI-IDE adapter for STs, around 2008 - from Jookie and Techie Alyson. But nothing from that happened. I guess the reasons were complexity of it and that SD cards started to be more spread and cheaper, so what was designed was for them.  And it's not 8-16 bit conversion what would be hardest part of ACSI2IDE, but whole protocol, commands are very different. SD cards use protocol similar to SCSI.

     

    Hmmm ... if you like complicated solutions maybe this can work:  ACSI2SCSI adapter, then SCSI2IDE adapter 🙂

     

     

  16. Posted

    People like simple explanations, yes or no answers (or black or white), but things are in most cases gray, something between, and there are many factors which need to be considered if want really to use it best possible. Plus, things around change, so what was best choice for most decades ago is now far from it.

    I saw some really shallow 'opinions' many times, and there are sites which just keep them. Plus, SW sellers (as sellers generally) don't care for facts, they just want to present it as best possible - so if that SW can max 32 MB partition C, that's because 'more is not possible with Atari ST'.

     

  17. Posted

    Nice overview, thanx for it.

    Btw. it was me who made that edited boot TOS image (16 KB) - so it can work in Steem - which refused it without usual TOS header, so I added it.

     

    I guess that they just sold it with UK or even US version in Germany before Nov. 20 1985. US version is not big problem without modulator, color encoder, and those early machines were without it.

     

    • Like 1

  19. Posted

    Let's just see some TOS version release dates:

    Boot 1.00 - Nov. 20 1985 (16 KB only, needs disk with TOS).

    US, UK complete 1.00  (192 KB) - Nov. 20 1985  - ???

    De 1.00  Febr. 6 1986

    Fr  1.00  April 24 1986

    This values are well visible in TOS header (with Hex viewer for instance) . 

    What confuses is same date for boot ROM as full 1.00 . Hmm - it looks that it is some edited boot ROM, found other one, where no date since no TOS header too. Actual date of boot ROM should be end of 1984, begin of 1985 (first couple months max) . So, it took plenty of time to move from boot ROM to full 1.00 - 11 months.  And little more for other lang. versions.  This reminds me on what Landon Dyer wrote that they had only 2 weeks to squeeze 1.00, so it fit in given 192 KB space ? What they did other time ? Finalized AES, Desktop and other things, I guess.

     

    Surely 520 ST with only boot ROM was not good for plenty of SW, actually after 1987 for 99% of it. But sometimes computer just finishes in closet, nobody using it, or even is aware about . Downgrade could happen for instance when full TOS ROMs broke, or owner broke (financially) - and sold them.

  20. Posted

    Modern ones create TOS/DOS compatible partitions, so data transfer with some modern computer - PC, MAC, OS-Linux, Win., MacOS is very simple. And that old driver with Conner was probably limited to max capacity of some 512 MB - no LBA mode, what can much larger capacities.

    Myself had  2.5 inch 80 MB Conner, some WD and IBM IDE drives in early 90-es, partitions of 32 MB were fine with them. Today can buy for 10-30x less money 500x bigger and funny, about 500x smaller storage - bigger is capacity, smaller is physical size, weight .

    • Like 1

  21. Posted

    I saw during last couple decades, and even in last months over and over again some simply wrong assumptions, claims related with Atari ST, TOS mass storage, hard disks or now rather Flash card based media. So, will write here some facts, some ideas why wrong claims became spread, explanations ...

     

    "Max size of first partition (C) is 32 MB, or by some even only 16 MB."

    TOS has same size limit for all partitions C-P . And if someone don't know it yet:  512 MB by TOS 1.04-4.02 . 256 MB by TOS 1.00 and 1.02 .

    Why this misinfo. ? Because some (probably most of early hard disk drivers) had such limits. And the reason for limit was not TOS, but way how those (autoboot) drivers loaded self - loading is not possible as regular file load, since that can happen from hard disk only when hard disk driver is operational, so load of usually some 10-40 KB code must be done with code in MBR, where space is limited - only some 390 bytes. And that needs to load possibly fragmented file HDDRIVER.SYS from root of C . Well, that's just very hard. So, they needed to limit size of partition C to save some bytes in MBR, so that code fit there.

    Why to care about fragmentation at all ? I guess because possible updates, which go on then not empty C . So, that can happen.

    But ... there is better solution, what costs only some + 10-20 KB -  add  so much to first version of HDRIVER.SYS, and ask users in manual that copy/install it as first on C - then will be not fragmented for sure. And possibly longer  updated versions will fit in that extended space, so will be not fragmented.

    Here to say, that I used completely different place for that SYS, where no fragmentation can happen, and code is very short. Update too - in time.

    Surely, in early years of ST 32 MB partition did not sound bad on drives of 80-160 MB capacity. Today is different, especially when there is SW what needs to be on C .

     

    "It is good to have less partitions of larger sizes instead more of smaller sizes"

    Yeah, some think that more partitions use more RAM, cause slower work. But truth is exactly opposite. Plus, disk space usage is more efficient with smaller partitions.

    So, first count of partitions does not affect speed. May need very little more RAM (like +250 bytes more), but that depends on driver SW. What needs more RAM is actually larger partition size - if only 1 is such, driver must set larger so called BCB buffers. And that's 10-s of KB-es . Still not so bad.  But, larger buffers mean slower work. Especially with TOS-es so called large logical sectors.

    Probably most interesting is efficiency of space usage. I will not go here in deep details of FAT16, cluster sizes ... Who is interested can look online about - several  of sites, pages deal with it.  Shortly: FAT16 means max 2 POW 16 allocation units in 1 partition - 65534 (2 less actually) . And 1 file, 1 DIR will allocate min 1 unit, or if is longer by only 1 byte 2 units, and so on ... In practice it means that if file is 133 bytes, it will take 16 KB on TOS partition of 260 MB. Because allocation unit (cluster) size is 16 KB then.  Wait ... cluster size on partition above 256 MB should be 8 KB, not 16 - because 512MB/65536 is 8 KB. True, but unfortunately TOS partitions have actually 15-bit FAT and not 16. In other words, max cluster count is 32766.  In case of TOS 1.00-1.02 it is 16382 only - even less efficient (and reason for smaller max part. size). 

    In real usage all above means that used space on disk can be much more than sum of file sizes on it. In case of lot of short files much more - like 30% .

    With smaller partitions that will be less. So, advice to people with smaller capacity medias: more partitions of smaller size, and put those with lot of short files on smaller partitions.

    Everyone can check is it correct what I wrote here:  in Desktop select hard disk icon (like C-P) , then File, Show Info .  There is "Bytes used:" line - and that's misleading, wrong - that's actually sum of sizes of all files. But DIR-s use 'bytes' on drive too - create new folder and will see that value of 'Bytes used' remained same. And value can be odd - unlike real used space . 

    There is easy way to see really used space - write down what is shown as "Bytes available" when partitions (or floppy) is empty. Then check that value after added files, DIRectories (with possible content) in partition or floppy . Subtract it from initial (when it is empty) value, and will see that it is more or much more than "Bytes used" value.  That diff. is the slack.  Smaller when partition is smaller. This is not just some 'be economic at all cost'  🙂 talk - not everyone has so large Flash cards or hard  disks, and even speed is little better with less slack.

     

     

     

    • Like 5

  22. Posted

    Doing format just to change disk label is lame. Plus disk format in Desktop is limited.

    I made diverse disk utils: http://atari.8bitchip.info/floimgd.php

    Lower are Atari programs. With DISKIMAG can give new label in seconds, and program gives some useful info about floppy disk. Just click on drive, type in new label and click on that field.

    Below it is floppy formatting PRG what can much more than Desktop's one. Then some copy SW ..

  23. Posted

    On 2/27/2021 at 9:56 PM, Paul Westphal said:

    What is the fastest theoretical read speed of the drive?

    You mean SD card on Atari - generally, or via this adapter ?

    Generally, pick max speed of Atari  ACSI/DMA port is 2 MB/sec . With real files it is about 1.8-1.9 MB/sec.

    As I see, ACSI2SD can max some 280 KB/sec .

    That's why some - for  instance Xenon 2 with audio track fails - needs better speed.

     

    • Like 1

  24. Posted

    9 hours ago, TGB1718 said:

    I managed to finish building one of these, but so far been unable to get it to see the SD card partitions, I've

    tried the evaluation version of HHDriver and PPHDUTIL to try before I buy, but neither could see the cards, I

    tried 2 different SanDisk SD Cards, first I partitioned and formatted under Windows, no joy, then I copied a

    disk image linked on this site, this also failed, I formatted the second card under Windows, still no joy.

     

    I created the partitions 32Mb for C and the others 500Mb, this is an STE with TOS 2.06UK.

    When I try the install or scan hard drives, the activity LED blinks on the device, but says "Write Failed"

     

    Any other drivers or ideas I could try 

    It's not driver SW problem for sure. And you can not create with Windows or any other OS partitions good for this.

    Get image with demo version of driver and games, and write to SD card properly (not as file copy):

    https://www.mediafire.com/file/77nh2flbsc4wqia/6PartGm.rar/file

    If that works not, most likely adapter can not work with those SD cards.

     

  25. Posted

    Today I decided to buy new 32 GB SD card, mostly for SW development - for iTOS, what can handle up to 30 max 1 GB partitions - and that pretty well fills usual 32 GB card, because real capacity is usually 5-10 % less. And expected to not pay more than 15 Euros. Was in 2 shops, and in both offered me, after I said that want not fast SD card, rather cheaper - so offered same Kingston card, with printed 100 MB/s - that should be 100 Mega  bytes (lower case b is for bit). And yes, card is surely faster than 100 Mbit/sec - in my USB reader. Bought one without adapter for regular sized SD devices, like UltraSatan because have 2 of them, and that was under 12 Euros (note, Hungary is not place where prices are much good for customers).  Wondering how fast are other cards, when this is slowest ?

    So, it appeared that UltraSatan just can not work with this card - I write this as warning for potential buyers. Exact marking is: SDCS2/32GBSP .

    Good that I did not buy normal sized card - just  took out from camera older 32 GB micro SD what worked with UltraSatan - 32 GB Micro SD HC I  Taiwan - don't see brand on card, and don't remember - huh, my first case that brand one is not so good as non-brand - well, just because in this case slower is what is good 😄 And new card works fine in couple years old camera. Problem solved. But what will be couple years from now ? Maybe need to redesign UltraSatan and other SD card using  adapters ? It's all happened already (quote from BSG) with CF cards .

    To add, very similar 64 GB card, Kingston, micro SD, what bough last summer works with UltraSatan.

     

    • Like 1
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