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Options for getting 3 1/2 inch drives, clock carts, other stuff.


Allan

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Are there any options today for getting stuff like 3 1/2 inch drives or a clock cart for Spartdos X for the 8-bits? I know there are a number of hard drive solutions for the 8-bits available but being able to use a 3 1/2 floppy would be very useful today as well.

 

Plus since Sunmark no longer makes the clock cart this is a needed thing also, especially now with the new Spartados X.

 

Are these two things available anywhere that I might have missed?

 

Allan

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Are there any options today for getting stuff like 3 1/2 inch drives or a clock cart for Spartdos X for the 8-bits? I know there are a number of hard drive solutions for the 8-bits available but being able to use a 3 1/2 floppy would be very useful today as well.

 

Plus since Sunmark no longer makes the clock cart this is a needed thing also, especially now with the new Spartados X.

 

Are these two things available anywhere that I might have missed?

 

Allan

 

One option for the 3.5 drive is to get a XF551 and mod it. There are instructions and kits around to do this. tho this is only for 720K

2nd option would be to get a parrallel interface device that supports 3.5 drives. One such device is the BlackBox with floppy board.

This will support 1.4 meg 3.5 drives.

With USB stick and SD card interfaces avilable now, why would you want one?

How easy is it to get 3.5 floppies today?

 

cannot help with the RTC tho i do believe some people in Europe have done something with a SDX, RTC combo that is internal.

 

James

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...

How easy is it to get 3.5 floppies today?

...

 

I have the 3.5 XF551 and those 720k floppies are pretty hard to find, but I haven't really looked for them - I once found a large box of them (a hundred or so) that were thrown out in a dumpster so I surely have all I'll ever need.

 

I have found that reading and writing to this 3.5 drive is painfully slow. I wonder if I need another driver or something?

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Are there any options today for getting stuff like 3 1/2 inch drives or a clock cart for Spartdos X for the 8-bits? I know there are a number of hard drive solutions for the 8-bits available but being able to use a 3 1/2 floppy would be very useful today as well.

 

Plus since Sunmark no longer makes the clock cart this is a needed thing also, especially now with the new Spartados X.

 

Are these two things available anywhere that I might have missed?

 

Allan

 

One option for the 3.5 drive is to get a XF551 and mod it. There are instructions and kits around to do this. tho this is only for 720K

2nd option would be to get a parrallel interface device that supports 3.5 drives. One such device is the BlackBox with floppy board.

This will support 1.4 meg 3.5 drives.

With USB stick and SD card interfaces avilable now, why would you want one?

How easy is it to get 3.5 floppies today?

 

cannot help with the RTC tho i do believe some people in Europe have done something with a SDX, RTC combo that is internal.

 

James

Is the Blackbox still available?

 

What is the USB stick?

 

Who is making the SD card interfaces? I saw the website but nothing about buying one.

 

Thanks for the responses.

 

Allan

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What is the USB stick?

 

There's an interface for USB storage called the SIO2USB which allows you to store disk images on a USB memory stick and mount them as one of 3 drives. It also has a RTC built in. Here is the website: SIO2USB

 

I've got one and it's really cool. I use it pretty much every time I boot my 800XL.

Edited by spookt
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Who is making the SD card interfaces? I saw the website but nothing about buying one.

You. ;)

So nobody. I can solder non surface-mounted stuff but that's it. That is way beyond me. Hopefully somebody will at least produce the boards otherwise I don't see this being used much except by a handfull of people. That would be a shame because it looks so great and looks like they put a lot of time into designing it..

 

Allan

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One option for the 3.5 drive is to get a XF551 and mod it. There are instructions and kits around to do this. tho this is only for 720K

2nd option would be to get a parrallel interface device that supports 3.5 drives.

 

Does anyone have those instructions or a link to where they might be?

 

I would be interested in picking up an XF551 if I knew how to mod it to support a 3.5inch drive.

 

Thanks

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The 3.5 should read and write as fast as the old 5 1/4, at least. What upgrade did you use?

 

Bob

 

 

 

...

How easy is it to get 3.5 floppies today?

...

 

I have the 3.5 XF551 and those 720k floppies are pretty hard to find, but I haven't really looked for them - I once found a large box of them (a hundred or so) that were thrown out in a dumpster so I surely have all I'll ever need.

 

I have found that reading and writing to this 3.5 drive is painfully slow. I wonder if I need another driver or something?

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720K diskettes are still easy to find and they last a lot longer than 5.25s. I have been using 3.5s for 20 years on my Atari and can count all their problems on one hand. The 5.25s have had lots of problems - mostly from jacket/disk friction and clamping issues.

 

I format most of my 3.5 disks as DOS 2.0 in DD (180K). Works great! (doesn't help me find stuff any easier though...) And, of course, you can format up to 720K, if you like, but I find CF cards better suited for big disks like those.

 

It is pretty much a matter of changing the ROM and connecting a 3.5 drive. I hooked mine up externally so I can switch select either 3.5 or 5.25 as the boot drive. You should use a 720K drive, although a 1.44 works if you are careful. (don't mount any 1.44 disks)

 

Unless you make some kind of adaptor, you have to replace the drive connector on the XF551 m/b. This can be a problem because the m/b is of very poor quality.

 

Here is a picture of the setup. The two drives on the lower shelf are both run from the XF551 and selected, one at a time, by the switch on the 3.5 drive. The 1050 on the upper left is D2: and the XF551 on the upper right is D3:. D3: is an XF551 with the 5.25 mechanism replaced by a 3.5.

 

Bob

 

post-14708-1228494299_thumb.jpg

 

One option for the 3.5 drive is to get a XF551 and mod it. There are instructions and kits around to do this. tho this is only for 720K

2nd option would be to get a parrallel interface device that supports 3.5 drives.

 

Does anyone have those instructions or a link to where they might be?

 

I would be interested in picking up an XF551 if I knew how to mod it to support a 3.5inch drive.

 

Thanks

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That's a nice conversion on the top right. I think I might try this with my busted XF551. I was going to replace the broken mech with another 5.25 mech but I had trouble finding one which was suitable. Are 720K 3.5 drives easier to find? What did the ST use ? I have a broken ST kicking around which has become a donor machine. Can I use the drive from there ?

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Who is making the SD card interfaces? I saw the website but nothing about buying one.

Pigula was building these SIO2SD devices, you might want to PM him here and see if he still is. These days with all the options available there really isn't much point in using real drives other than nostalgia. :)

 

http://sio2sd.gucio.pl/index_en.html

 

post-5887-1228497275_thumb.jpg

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Who is making the SD card interfaces? I saw the website but nothing about buying one.

You. ;)

So nobody. I can solder non surface-mounted stuff but that's it. That is way beyond me. Hopefully somebody will at least produce the boards otherwise I don't see this being used much except by a handfull of people. That would be a shame because it looks so great and looks like they put a lot of time into designing it..

 

Allan

 

You might want to talk to Beetle about the SDrive... I suck at soldering but using the schematic in the SDrive download you can actually put this together on perf board...

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Who is making the SD card interfaces? I saw the website but nothing about buying one.

You. ;)

So nobody. I can solder non surface-mounted stuff but that's it. That is way beyond me. Hopefully somebody will at least produce the boards otherwise I don't see this being used much except by a handfull of people. That would be a shame because it looks so great and looks like they put a lot of time into designing it..

 

Allan

 

You might want to talk to Beetle about the SDrive... I suck at soldering but using the schematic in the SDrive download you can actually put this together on perf board...

 

That's the part I stink at. It tends to look like spagetti to me. Is he producing the board? From what I've seen of the board it doesn't seem to complicated but I've never done made a circuit on a perf board from a schematic. Maybe it's time to give it a shot.

 

Allan

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Yes, that's my only Atari printer. (I could go dig out an Epson or Okidata dot-matrix if I had to - haven't needed one in many years, though)

 

What kind of problems are you having? Just text should work with no tweaking. The thing I like about this model is that I can set parameters from the front panel, unlike many of the cheap printers that are made for windows. Have you checked what you are set up for from the panel?

 

I don't have a 'driver' for it. I just imbed control characters in whatever program I am using/writing. Somewhere is an AtariWriter driver for it that lets me print two column justified print but I haven't used that for quite some time. I do print checks on it - landscape, Arial in Basic.

 

Hey Bob1200xl,

I see you have a HP Laserjet 4mp. Do you print stuff out from your Atari? Do you have a printer driver for it? I have a Laserjet 4P and am having no luck getting text to print correctly from it.

 

Allan

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Yes, an ST drive should work. It is 720K.

 

Bob

 

 

That's a nice conversion on the top right. I think I might try this with my busted XF551. I was going to replace the broken mech with another 5.25 mech but I had trouble finding one which was suitable. Are 720K 3.5 drives easier to find? What did the ST use ? I have a broken ST kicking around which has become a donor machine. Can I use the drive from there ?
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Yes, that's my only Atari printer. (I could go dig out an Epson or Okidata dot-matrix if I had to - haven't needed one in many years, though)

 

What kind of problems are you having? Just text should work with no tweaking. The thing I like about this model is that I can set parameters from the front panel, unlike many of the cheap printers that are made for windows. Have you checked what you are set up for from the panel?

It's printing one line only. I'm not sure what to set exactly. I have it for parallel port. Automatic feed. Any other suggestions? I am just trying to print a text file from spartados x with a 'copy doc.txt prn:'.

 

The Atari seems happy with it but the printer just prints one line and ejects it.

 

Allan

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What interface are you using? I have a P:R connection that is set to translate the Atari EOL to an IBM CR/LF. If you don't do this, the whole file prints on one line.

 

There is a jumper inside the P:R connection for this.

 

Bob

 

 

Yes, that's my only Atari printer. (I could go dig out an Epson or Okidata dot-matrix if I had to - haven't needed one in many years, though)

 

What kind of problems are you having? Just text should work with no tweaking. The thing I like about this model is that I can set parameters from the front panel, unlike many of the cheap printers that are made for windows. Have you checked what you are set up for from the panel?

It's printing one line only. I'm not sure what to set exactly. I have it for parallel port. Automatic feed. Any other suggestions? I am just trying to print a text file from spartados x with a 'copy doc.txt prn:'.

 

The Atari seems happy with it but the printer just prints one line and ejects it.

 

Allan

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The 3.5 should read and write as fast as the old 5 1/4, at least. What upgrade did you use?

 

Bob

 

I didn't do it - don't know who did. I bought it on eBay I think. It has U6 socketed and a 28C64E prom in there - but no other markings.

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That's the part I stink at. It tends to look like spagetti to me. Is he producing the board? From what I've seen of the board it doesn't seem to complicated but I've never done made a circuit on a perf board from a schematic. Maybe it's time to give it a shot.

 

Allan

IMHO there's only one SMD part on the part list - the SD slot. And it looks easy enough to solder it even for me... and that means something! :)

There actually is someone who had them produced but I don't want to make him angry by saying his name, hehe. All the PCBs are reserved, anyway. If there will be another batch I can let you know (but it may not be a good idea as I've previously sent some PCBs abroad only to learn that the buyers changed their minds and "archived" them. :roll: Not worth dealing with the evil post office, I'd say....

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I'm using a Supra MPP-1150. That might be my problem. I'll try hooking the printer up to my Atari 850 interface and try that. Hopefully I have the right cable for it since the parallel interface is different on the 850.

 

Allan

 

What interface are you using? I have a P:R connection that is set to translate the Atari EOL to an IBM CR/LF. If you don't do this, the whole file prints on one line.

 

There is a jumper inside the P:R connection for this.

 

Bob

 

 

Yes, that's my only Atari printer. (I could go dig out an Epson or Okidata dot-matrix if I had to - haven't needed one in many years, though)

 

What kind of problems are you having? Just text should work with no tweaking. The thing I like about this model is that I can set parameters from the front panel, unlike many of the cheap printers that are made for windows. Have you checked what you are set up for from the panel?

It's printing one line only. I'm not sure what to set exactly. I have it for parallel port. Automatic feed. Any other suggestions? I am just trying to print a text file from spartados x with a 'copy doc.txt prn:'.

 

The Atari seems happy with it but the printer just prints one line and ejects it.

 

Allan

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There are utilities that convert files from ATASCII to ASCII CR/LF - you could try them, also.

 

Bob

 

 

 

I'm using a Supra MPP-1150. That might be my problem. I'll try hooking the printer up to my Atari 850 interface and try that. Hopefully I have the right cable for it since the parallel interface is different on the 850.

 

Allan

 

What interface are you using? I have a P:R connection that is set to translate the Atari EOL to an IBM CR/LF. If you don't do this, the whole file prints on one line.

 

There is a jumper inside the P:R connection for this.

 

Bob

 

 

Yes, that's my only Atari printer. (I could go dig out an Epson or Okidata dot-matrix if I had to - haven't needed one in many years, though)

 

What kind of problems are you having? Just text should work with no tweaking. The thing I like about this model is that I can set parameters from the front panel, unlike many of the cheap printers that are made for windows. Have you checked what you are set up for from the panel?

It's printing one line only. I'm not sure what to set exactly. I have it for parallel port. Automatic feed. Any other suggestions? I am just trying to print a text file from spartados x with a 'copy doc.txt prn:'.

 

The Atari seems happy with it but the printer just prints one line and ejects it.

 

Allan

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Sounds broke to me... Do you have another XF551 that you can swap parts with? Put the original ROM and drive in? You may just have bad SIO connectors.

 

Bob

 

 

The 3.5 should read and write as fast as the old 5 1/4, at least. What upgrade did you use?

 

Bob

 

I didn't do it - don't know who did. I bought it on eBay I think. It has U6 socketed and a 28C64E prom in there - but no other markings.

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