TGB1718

I downloaded the ROM from Lotherek site, but it's the older version with the coloured letttering, so I tried the flash which now shows the newer U1M (the older one didn't have FDISK). Created a VHD, created a 100M APT partition, then used FDISK to make 3 x32Mb partitions and labeled them as D3,D4 & D5 Disabled those SIO drives so as not to conflict with the HD partitions. Ran FORMAT, but it said no device for drives c and d. The SIDE Loader saw the 3 32M partitions I decided a full restart, on doing this I was back to the old U1M even though I saved it before closing. I noticed that the OS was defaulting to High Speed OS, I changed this to Stock OS and now nothing works, it just goes to the self test screen, can't get back into the U1M bios, so it looks like I'll have to remove all the devices and try find a newer U1M ROM somewhere and start all over again 😪 EDIT: removed the U1M ROM and used the Flashed configuration, and it booted fine, ranf FDISK and noticed the drive names were missing, I must have forgotten to save it after naming them. Renamed, saved, exit FDISk, ran FORMAT and hey presto , all find, I can now see the drives The only thing I can't seem to do is get into the U1M BIOS nor the Side 2 Bios

thanks, will give it a go

I have enabled U1M and Side 2 under Altirra, when I boot it asks me to flash the U1M which I did and it seemed to work fine. I have 2 problems, 1. how do you save the now 'flashed' U1M, as the next time I ran Altirra it wanted the ROM flashing again. 2. how to you emulate a CF card in the Side 2, I tried adding new hardware, but all it offered was a hard drive, I did this, but it still said it needed a CF card. I looked through the Altirra manual and while there are very good technical descriptions on how they work, I couldn't find answers to these to questions Help please

Jumper block PSW Standard setting: 1 = open, 2 = closed, 3 = closed, 4 = open Meaning: = Connects jumper 1/2 to ground. You can probably use this to set the autofeed signal to ground for the printer. = Treatment of signal autofeed on Centronics interface (pin 14) = Treatment signal (NC / GND) on Centronics interface (pin 16 + 33). These two pins 16 and 33 are either not used on the standard Centronics interface or on ground. = Treatment of signal select-in on Centronics interface (pin 36). The signal select-in is by default set to low by jumper 3 and is separated from the centronics interface by open jumper 4. Dss means that the printer cannot be deactivated by the computer. Warning: Jumper 1 + 2 or 3 + 4 must probably not be inserted at the same time. Otherwise the corresponding signal output on the computer could be short-circuited to ground and damaged. Conclusion: leave it at the standard setting! DIP switch DSW Standard setting: 1 = off, 2 = on, 3-6 = off, 7 = on, 8 = off Meaning: Unclear, everything is read out from the port module TMP8155P-2. error pattern Printer does not print, the printer says that the printer is offline. Online LED is on. Solution: The busy signal is not switched by the printer. Replace the 74LS38 on the interface daughter board, pin 8 generates the busy signal. If that doesn't help: The 74LS38 is controlled by the Toshiba TMP8155P-2 IO / RAM module.

I've always thought that the only real disadvantage that Atari built into their machines was the choice of attaching peripheral devices i.e. SIO, on the face of it daisy chain devices have what you want, but this meant they had to be intelligent (apart from cassette) which inevitably put the price up, so much so that people couldn't afford the much needed disk drives and printers. With a lot of people having access to printers, not being able to connect them to their Atari was a big negative. For me I built a parallel port interface that pluged into ports 3 & 4 on my 800 and wrote a driver that resided in Page 6 which allowed me to use any Centronics Printer. Later I built a parallel and serial interface for my 130XE, again as the price of an 850 interface was so much to buy. I only managed to buy my first 1050 when they started reducing prices when sales were dropping. In spite of all that, I chose the Atari 800 and later 130XE over the much inferior competition and don't reget it one bit, I still use it every day and get so much pleasure. I have 2 ST's also, but hardly use those any more.

Whats on Pin 1 ? Looking at the circuit, the strange part is the 33 ohm resistor across the input/output terminals of the 7805 and it may well be that until a certain load is applied to the circuit then the voltage at pin 3 may be unstable. The only way to test this would be to put a "lowish" (5 to 10 ohms 10 Watt) resistor across pins 5 and 3. (if you have one, don't touch it when its on, it will be very hot) This will load the circuit depending on the resistor used to 0.5A to 1A which should be more than enough to test the PSU.

One reason I always make my own cables, plugs and suitable cables are cheap on ebay, then at least you know what you've got. Recently made an S-Video cable and it works a treat

just a thought, have you another cable to try, buzz and screen noise can be caused by inadequate screening in the cable, maybe have a look and make sure the ground joints are good.

I know I had it and played it, but it could have been the 2600 version, I bought my 800 in 1982 and still have it, but I don't have the cartridge, nor the 2600, so I must assume I had the 2600 version.

I forgot about that option, I started initailly years ago with SIO2PC, as said that means having at least a laptop hanging off your 800XL, when I started using my Atari's again many years later the first one I went for was Respqt running on a cheap Raspberry Pi, some people say they can get it to work on a Pi Zero, but I found it a bit hit and miss, any Raspberry Pi better that a Pi Zero will be more than capable

1/4 W is fine, very low current circuit

Welcome to the wonderful world of Atari. Worth having a look at getting an Sdrive-Max as it emulates a floppy drive (and more), you copy floppy images (.atr files) onto a Micro-SD card and mount them using the Sdrive touch screen. Obviously first you need a screen/monitor, unless you have an old TV with a UHF tuner the cable you have is no good, it does not connect monitors, for that you need an S-video (best picture) or Composite video cable. As @Rybags says you will need to add a connection to the monitor socket in the 800XL (can't help on that as I don't own one, but lots of info on this forum on how to do it)

@576XE thanks, not seen that one before, looks interesting

@therealbountybob thanks for the info, I downloaded the version you suggested and the disk contents are very different to the one I have. However I still can't quite get things to work. I created some player data, managed to save it, the conversion didn't work, but that might just be me, however the real problem is I can't seem to load any data, not mine not the demo's on the disk. I press ESC, select load, type in the filename, it goes to disk, then nothing appears in the grid. I have tried many times, but can't figure it out. Any clues on how to load data would be really appreciated.

Just tried it out, very nice, I like the joystick response with is quick and acurate Well done and thanks