Bikerbob Posted April 2, 2019 Share Posted April 2, 2019 This may not be that trivial at all. I have been studying for a little bit Indus' Track-Buffering (bF) feature under DOS-XL and it seems, by all means, to go FAR beyond mere track-buffering. In fact, it seems more like a precise, sophisticated SECTOR-LEVEL cache, capable of leaving the mechanical-side of the drive VOID and NULL of any actual physical activity during repeated and seemingly random access of files, directory area, etc. It is very, very nice to see it in full action! :-) Are you able to dump that working ROM hack 1.2x so that I can add it to my Indus Rom collection? I would not mind burning one and trying it out. James Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nezgar Posted April 2, 2019 Share Posted April 2, 2019 Are you able to dump that working ROM hack 1.2x so that I can add it to my Indus Rom collection? I would not mind burning one and trying it out. The Indus "1.2X" ROM I dumped from BEST electronics has CRC32 E31B3C51, which matches the "INDUSunk.rom" in the ZIP attached to Post #9 of this thread. I scanned the papers that came with my 2732 EPROM from BEST in Post #67 of this thread. What's still a mystery is the "1.3X" mentioned in the papers. Still worthwhile for any GT owners to check their ROM against the known ones out there!! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bikerbob Posted April 5, 2019 Share Posted April 5, 2019 ok, well then I most likely had that in my drive at one point.. I have tried all the ones in this thread. I am currently running the last one that MM made.. and its working great.. James Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xrbrevin Posted April 5, 2019 Share Posted April 5, 2019 i just burned the modded firmware onto a 2732 EPROM and my Indus is working v.nicely thanks for you work Mr Martian! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toddtmw Posted August 16, 2019 Share Posted August 16, 2019 On 4/5/2019 at 10:22 AM, xrbrevin said: i just burned the modded firmware onto a 2732 EPROM and my Indus is working v.nicely thanks for you work Mr Martian! I’m having trouble finding 2732 EPROMs. Is there something else I can use instead? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xrbrevin Posted August 16, 2019 Share Posted August 16, 2019 18 minutes ago, toddtmw said: I’m having trouble finding 2732 EPROMs. Is there something else I can use instead? search for "M2732A" on ebay. i use "ST" brand. theyre available cheap from china 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nezgar Posted August 16, 2019 Share Posted August 16, 2019 If you're using a TL866 programmer, make sure of the "A" - that means it can be programmed at 21V, which is the max of the older TL866 programmers. Without the A it might need 25V to program. Maybe more of an issue with 2532's though. Apparently the newer TL866 II has a max programming voltage of 18V, so maybe can't be used to program 2732's anymore... Although the supported IC list still has them listed, hmmm. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle22 Posted August 17, 2019 Share Posted August 17, 2019 20 of them for $15.49 + $2.30 shipping. Cheap. https://www.ebay.com/itm/20PCS-M2732A-2F1-M2732A-EPROMs-ST-CDIP24-NEW/171627459513?_trkparms=ispr%3D1&hash=item27f5cb33b9:g:cbkAAOSwwTlUp2MV&enc=AQAEAAAB4BPxNw%2BVj6nta7CKEs3N0qXt5cNNpFnz1gzSfVflS4waPY2VzwKzkW7QelIKymhBQqis0zH1%2B3%2FaCtmZ33%2BdUai%2FcE6IvZCnXLGFgm6rGwAyapChLOyURaxBsQ69U%2FBy96Xm6Kn0Q7kXI1y2Kk28KViu7USTVUt%2BVqtN%2FbkNiEuzmctQTVEUS7mOTfZxoysQLH6kluF594pTrcx0lPXvVGIUqjbR0dq1EXBRWG%2Fz%2Bfdba%2FXyjKDby9MgUHvjQJG0iiCMiAZ2chnfUEMYte88bEMmiFfliiSlivuMTpaeVZbPzgheWA6j8umxP78fiGUrndGafyzwVttKq0%2BWVYWswvI%2FsLsqNa2%2Fx%2BM7YSogv0GzPtc9YtbYN%2Bdzf8knF9bZXCyR4CEwydfR9o6u%2FFphfYIze%2F%2BQ2De%2FD%2FASE%2F5joSOif6SuQSjuqMJ1k87vp56BN5pEhG3NPyOBPNZXQdWIYzQSg00pt7q7BGeK7IqmYTTnrG8tFsaNOvg8Sig9qy0MQA4CfTu2cb9DJMo9RNYRf9ktiJsa9RhUb579SkoxpBhrw8h%2FLlita26uNps1VfHNQCc7HwSelYoFniNt%2BlssWorvFMGf9CfUNuy0Vvdx9qXz8px1huj1Tsmv6gYNwRj4vw%3D%3D&checksum=1716274595130560c98085664aaaae678b56a26d27d5 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nezgar Posted August 17, 2019 Share Posted August 17, 2019 Whoa... Ebay URL shortening tip - only /itm/ and the item # are needed. Everything else can be deleted, like this: https://www.ebay.com/itm/171627459513 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toddtmw Posted August 17, 2019 Share Posted August 17, 2019 Okay. Thanks. Also, this thread has a lot of INDUS rom images listed. The one from post 67 has these: indus14.rom INDUS12.rom INDUSunk.rom The latest @MrMartian one is: Indus_gt_12.bin What is the "best" ROM to go with if I have the 64K upgrade card? Thank you all for your help! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sup8pdct Posted August 18, 2019 Share Posted August 18, 2019 14 hours ago, toddtmw said: Okay. Thanks. Also, this thread has a lot of INDUS rom images listed. The one from post 67 has these: indus14.rom INDUS12.rom INDUSunk.rom The latest @MrMartian one is: Indus_gt_12.bin What is the "best" ROM to go with if I have the 64K upgrade card? Thank you all for your help! Dont use 1.4 rom. it isn't actually 1.4 latest rom is 1.2 Use dos xl with indus software on it. It uploades the trackbuffering and high speed code to the indus. Latest SDX may do that too. James 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Faicuai Posted August 18, 2019 Share Posted August 18, 2019 (edited) 13 hours ago, sup8pdct said: Dont use 1.4 rom. it isn't actually 1.4 latest rom is 1.2 Use dos xl with indus software on it. It uploades the trackbuffering and high speed code to the indus. Latest SDX may do that too. James For the sake of complete clarity: If using DOS-XL high-speed code for Indus-GT, use ONLY DOS XL edition with "SUPER SYNCHROMESH". Make SURE the "SUPER" word is there. ROM 1.2 (whether original release, or "tuned" release with shorter seek & stand-by times, and button-audio feedback suppression) will be NEEDED. Once "SuperSynchroMesh" code is loaded, you will experience a pronounced increase on read-speeds (up to 4,000 bytes / sec on Double Density), and clearly slower writes (around 1 KB/sec). No idea why. If you have RAMCHARGER installed on your Indus-GT, loading "SuperSynchroMesh" will ALSO: enable advanced track-buffering (which is more of a sophisticated multi-track, sector-cache). The letters "bF" will shown on led-display, upon disk standby / head parking. Read speeds (buffered) will reach 4,500 Bytes/sec from buffered content (the highest you will reach from any piece of SW reading from an Indus-GT, and clearly higher than anything you will pull from SDX out of the Indus, which will not exceed 3,700 Bytes/sec, in any case). You will be able to issue "dir" commands and load random files with ABSOLUTELY no physical disk-spin, whatsoever. Best overall [read + write] speeds will be achieved by: Loading SuperSynchroMesh with DOS-XL. Formatting disk with "INITDBL" command (JUST format, NO system). Booting SDX and issuing format, with settings: DOUBLE-DENSITY, SDX-mode, ULTRA-speed, Optimize=0N, and ONLY WRITING DIRECTORY (no physical format, as we want SuperSynchroMesh's sector interleave, which SDX will handle well!) Verify results with RWTEST utility. NOTE: track buffering WILL NOT be supported by SDX, even when loaded first from SuperSynchroMesh. That's the down side, unfortunately. Enjoy! Edited August 18, 2019 by Faicuai 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwilbar Posted January 10, 2020 Share Posted January 10, 2020 I recently worked on my Indus GT. I found it had Indus 1.1 on it. I decided to go with the MrMartian firmware. While it worked fine, I did find one game incompatibility.... Super Bunny. With the Indus 1.1 and the tweaked (timeout/etc) Indus 1.2 ROMs load the game fine, the MrMartian firmware does not, and the game locks up. Oddly, I wonder if the game has multiple protections, as I don't think it gets to the weak sector check before it hangs. Due to that and that I primarily use my equipment for the old games, I am now currently running the 1.2 tweaked vs the MrMartian firmware. Has anyone else run into issues with games with his firmware ? Maybe I got super 'lucky' and found the only one :-). Maybe @MrMartian has an idea of why ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toddtmw Posted May 29, 2020 Share Posted May 29, 2020 I upgraded mine to the @MrMartian 1.2.05 version. It works great! Formatted double-density ultra speed and it just flies without even loading anything else (I put the sram charger in there too...) BITD, I got a RANA and then later got an Indus. the Indus was always my favorite. I liked it so much better than the Rana in all regards. (The Rana was ALWAYS drive 2!) Now that I've looked inside both of them, (As well 810's, 1050's and XF551's) I'm really impressed with the way the Indus is designed and laid out. You can move the drive mech out of the way for other repairs by simply removing a single ribbon cable. Much more elegant than any of the other designs. The only thing I don't like about the Indus (after looking at it inside and after using it) was that stupid drive cover/door. I never closed it because it was always just in the way. Even when it was open, it was dumb and made stacking drives problematic. It's engineered cheaply compared to the rest of the drive. Everything about it feels like a mistake. So many times I was tempted to just open the drive and remove it. I almost did it when I was working on this one just now, but nostalgia made me keep it on there. I'm also impressed (and a little worried) that it doesn't have any vent holes on the top. Did these overheat BITD? Thanks to a great community for making things like this available and supporting people that are learning to use these tools! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwilbar Posted May 29, 2020 Share Posted May 29, 2020 On 1/10/2020 at 4:33 PM, cwilbar said: I recently worked on my Indus GT. I found it had Indus 1.1 on it. I decided to go with the MrMartian firmware. While it worked fine, I did find one game incompatibility.... Super Bunny. With the Indus 1.1 and the tweaked (timeout/etc) Indus 1.2 ROMs load the game fine, the MrMartian firmware does not, and the game locks up. Oddly, I wonder if the game has multiple protections, as I don't think it gets to the weak sector check before it hangs. Due to that and that I primarily use my equipment for the old games, I am now currently running the 1.2 tweaked vs the MrMartian firmware. Has anyone else run into issues with games with his firmware ? Maybe I got super 'lucky' and found the only one :-). Maybe @MrMartian has an idea of why ? Curious if anyone ever tried Super Bunny with the MrMartian firmware and duplicated my results ? @MrMartian... do you have any idea with the changes in your firmware what might be causing that game to fail ? I've loaded this fine on all my drives except my Indus when I have the MrMartian firmware in it. It is quite strange.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nezgar Posted May 29, 2020 Share Posted May 29, 2020 Anyone know what types of physical protections are on the Super Bunny disk? There is an ATX of it from the Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative collection, but I'm not up to speed on how to inspect its details. Running it through ATR Image Explorer, no protections immediately jump out at me... 720 sectors present suggest maybe timing based protection, or this tool doesn't show other subtleties like physical sector order, CRC errors, data/deleted address marks, etc... ; Image has 720 128 byte sectors - Single Density VTOC/Directory sectors may provide a hint... Was Kent Simo(n?) known for a particular protection type? ; Volume Table of Contents (back) ; Sector 360 0000 FF 00 00 00 00 FF FE EF FF EF EF FF FF FF FF FF ................ 0010 FF FF FE FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF ................ 0020 FF FF FF EF FF FF FF EE FF FF FF EF FF FF FF FF ................ 0030 FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF EF FF FF EF FF ................ 0040 FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FE FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF ................ 0050 FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FE EF ................ 0060 FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FE 50 52 4F 54 45 43 ..........PROTEC 0070 54 45 44 20 42 59 20 4B 45 4E 54 20 53 49 4D 4F TED BY KENT SIMO ; Directory (back) ; Sector 361 0000 60 00 00 00 00 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 20 `.............. 0010 60 00 00 00 00 A0 20 53 55 50 45 52 20 20 A0 20 `..... SUPER . 0020 60 00 00 00 00 A0 20 42 55 4E 4E 59 20 20 A0 20 `..... BUNNY . 0030 60 00 00 00 00 A0 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 20 A0 20 `..... . 0040 60 00 00 00 00 A0 20 20 31 39 38 34 20 20 A0 20 `..... 1984 . 0050 60 00 00 00 00 A0 44 61 74 61 6D 6F 73 74 A0 20 `.....Datamost. 0060 60 00 00 00 00 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 A0 20 `.............. 0070 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwilbar Posted October 8, 2020 Share Posted October 8, 2020 Long overdue response to @Nezgar... Superbunny uses a weak sector? .... there is a sector that reads back differently each time it is read. I actually duplicated the disk with an 810 Archiver years ago.... I would set the index hole on the target diskette, write the track with the random sector, then I believe I had a piece of paper where I made multiple lines based on a division of 360 degrees by the sector count with extra lines in between. I would then run a small alnico magnet from the desk center to the outside along one of those lines. I'd then read the track back in Archiver until I found the right sector and didn't damage the header/etc. I then duplicated the remainder of the disk. It worked great ! So, I'm unsure why @MrMartian's ROM on Indus GT doesn't load this game.... I don't know if would break the loading of all games with weak sectors, or if it is something to Superbunny (maybe the MrMartian firmware returns a different status back ? and the Superbunny protection checks that in addition to the random data ?) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Nezgar Posted October 8, 2020 Share Posted October 8, 2020 Well, I guess the easiest first step is to test this with an ATX + full drive emulation with the different ROMs in Altirra to see if it can be easily reproduced. If so, someone who knows what they're doing in the debug side might be able to spot the reason... (Not me lol) I'm still curious if anyone who knows how to inspect the ATX data can confirm what the specific protection used is... Probably something as simple as a slight difference in timing, or the specific status code returned compared to a stock 810/1050 or original Indus GT ROM... I might see if I can give it a whirl. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwilbar Posted October 8, 2020 Share Posted October 8, 2020 it has the weak sector.... it could employ a timing protection as well. Beyond the weak sector, I don't recall there being anything else from back in the day when I backed it up using Archiver and an alnico magnet ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jacques Posted December 14, 2021 Share Posted December 14, 2021 (edited) Hi Guys, I guess new firmware with Ultraspeed support that would make use of RAM/SRAM charger for buffering didn't ever happen? @MrMartian, please? Edited December 14, 2021 by Jacques Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
macsonny Posted April 1, 2023 Share Posted April 1, 2023 Just burn a 27C32 EPROM with the 1.2.05 firmware. I have to say it seems to be the best firmware so far based on initial "feel". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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