U1MB Image Repository

[Kyle22]

Fellow Atarians,

 

Let's Start a topic to collect all the Ultimate1MB images that we have created. We can use the imaging tools to pick and choose the components of the images, and create new ones.

 

I made an image that contains:

 

System: XEGS (I wired my 1200XL sockets to be XEGS compatible), SuperMON (HTT), OmniView XE, MyIDE OS.

 

SpartaDOS (w/MyIDE driver)

 

BASIC slots: BASIC (Ver.C), Assembler/Editor, Frogger, PacMan

 

XEGS Games: Missile Command, Star Raiders, Centipede, Asteroids.

 

I still can't get Star Raiders and Asteroids to work. They *DO* work in Altirra for some reason...

 

My U1MB uses the new 39SF040 chip, and trub has kindly provided me with a flasher that works with it.

 

I do *NOT* have any other flash ROM chips for my U1MB, so, I can not say if this flasher will work on others.

 

Anyway, My image is included. I hope it is useful to others, and I also hope that others will upload their images here for all of us to use.

 

I will let everyone know when I have successfully installed the Internal MyIDE with this inside my 1200XL. I am about 90% certain it will work.

 

 

-Kyle

 

U1MFlash.atr

Edited November 6, 2013 by Kyle22

[phoenixdownita]

Any chance you can share the flasher?

 

My U1MB is due to arrive in 2 or 3 weeks and if it has the new flash chip I would need it too.

Given I have a MyIde 2 (external though) what MyIDE OS do you have in the image? I've been told RE would work better for MyIDE2, but in your case probably you put RI, am I right?

[Kyle22]

Hi Phoenix,

 

I have already shared trub's flasher program. It's in the ATR above. I think I have MyIDE 4.8I in it. Now, please be aware that I have never used the MyIDE OS with my setup, because, I use SDX with MYIDE.SYS.

 

I have the MyIDE ROM in case I would need it. I don't know if I will. I typically use MyIDE only in SDX., But, using the OS, it is usable in other ways, I just don't normally use them. I hope that makes sense to you.

 

 

Everything is APT partitioned using FJC's excellent FDISK program. (My) MyIDE is set up as a 256MB drive using 512 byte sectors partitioned into 8 drives. 1-7 are 65535 sectors of 512 bytes each, and the last one (8 is 40958 sectors. I use this in my external MyIDE+Flash Cart from AtariMax.

 

I wrote the original SDX driver for MyIDE using Bob W's code as a guide, but, I couldn't get the Part.Table right. FJC was kind enough to finish the project, and that's where we are now.

 

I have wired my 1200XL to have both ROM sockets in parallel, and XEGS compatible. That is ONE 32K (27256) EPROM containing OS, BASIC, and Missile Command in one chip.

 

I plan on installing MyIDE (Internal) in the other socket. If I can make this work, and I am 90%+ certain of this, I believe it will be the best 1200XL ever.

 

To use this on your MyIDE external, you will have a SpartaDOS-X register problem. You MUST disable the Internal SDX to use the cart. This will work, you can see the 1MB RAM, but, I have never gotten the clock to work properly in that configuration.

 

If you have a Atarimax MyIDE cart, and want SDX on it, please let me know, and I will send you an ATR image to flash it. (It may take me a little time to find it.)

 

The MyIDE is VERY fast w/ SDX. You can even run movies from it. If I remember correctly, is it 70+K/sec.

 

I need to repair a trace or two that I bungled up trying to solder a new pin header on (my) MyIDE board. My eyes aren't as good as they were some years ago. Once I fix it, I will let you know how it works. One thing for sure, you MUST remove the ROM chip on the MyIDE internal. That's why I included it in the U1MB image, although, I will probably never use it because of the included SDX driver.

 

I hope some of this makes sense... I am not too good at explaining things sometimes.

 

It all depends on what you want to do with it... If you want to boot up disk images, then go with the MyIDE OS, and partition your drive into lots of image space. If you want to have large drives under SDX, use ANY OS, and the SDX driver.

 

Hopefully you can understand my scatter-brain ramblings.

 

Good luck

 

-K

Edited November 6, 2013 by Kyle22

[Roydea6]

Kyle,

I just checked your ROM and it seems that you are not using any of the PBI roms made up by Flashjazzcat. Although it probably wouldn't be needed to boot MYIDE AtariMax IDE cartridge. Anything I would post here would be Side 1 or Side 2 related which works best with the PBI rom by fjc...

[flashjazzcat]

Well, I guess for anyone not using SIDE1 or SIDE2 with U1MB, the PBI ROMs are irrelevant (doubly so if MyIDE is being used). If you have U1MB, obviously the optimal way of attaining proper hard disk functionality is to buy a SIDE and use the PBI ROM, but I suppose there's no law against using the soft-driver with MyIDE. Unfortunately there'll never be an APT PBI ROM for the MyIDE cart since the MyIDE registers are at the wrong address (or perhaps I should say an incompatible address).

[hueyjones70]

Planning to install a U1MB in a 1200XL. I would like to have Omniview 80, and 130XE as two of the OSes available. Anyone have an idea for a "GOT TO HAVE" OS.

[SS]

Planning to install a U1MB in a 1200XL. I would like to have Omniview 80, and 130XE as two of the OSes available. Anyone have an idea for a "GOT TO HAVE" OS.

If I were putting an U1MB into a 1200XL, I would definitely want the stock 1200XL OS as one of my options.

 

In my own U1MB 800XL, right now I have the stock XL/XE Rev.3, OSa, OSb, and Mr. Atari's MyBIOS. I tend to change them around from time to time but I am liking these four options for the time being.

[+DrVenkman]

If I were putting an U1MB into a 1200XL, I would definitely want the stock 1200XL OS as one of my options.

 

I did that briefly but aside from the novelty of the rainbow Atari logo, there's not much to recommend it. In my 1200XL, I've got OS B (padded out to 16K to fit of course), an XL OS, an XE OS, and an XEGS OS. I've also got a jumper on my U1MB board to enable XEGS mode so I can use the XEGS game slots.

 

Interesting, there are a handful of OS B titles that don't actually run on a 16K version of OS B - MURDER ON THE ZINDERNUF, for instance. But I digress ...

[Dmitry]

how much trouble to create an image? Idont have a windows machine or I would try it.  I can only use uflash. The uflash utility seems to envision that you only want to replace one basic with another. It has no facility to delete an image. I want them deleted.  My original flash had two empty slots.  that helped my flKy machine because I could select an empty slot.  can anyonr share an image with two empty basic slots?  or preferably all four empty?  it is going to cost me close to 300 dollars to have my u1mb removed.  if I could try it one last time without basic slots that is something I would like to try.   thanks 

[Roydea6]

11 minutes ago, Dmitry said:

if I could try it one last time without basic slots that is something I would like to try.   thanks 

I believe that if you create an 8k nul file named basic.rom and flash it all 4 slots it should empty the 4 slots.

an 8k file with all zeros or hex FF should do it.

 

[flashjazzcat]

1 hour ago, Dmitry said:

it is going to cost me close to 300 dollars to have my u1mb removed

You should have the machine fixed. Empty BASIC slots are a completely cock-eyed solution to the problem.

[+DrVenkman]

5 hours ago, Dmitry said:

it is going to cost me close to 300 dollars to have my u1mb removed

Gah, why? If you’re talking about a 1200XL, you have two options, neither of which are difficult and only one of which that requires any soldering. First, turn the machine, functionally, into an 800XL by removing the U1MB physically and simply putting in an XL OS and MMU. That’s it. You don’t even need to remove the jumper wires, just tuck them out of the way. Second, reconfigure the board by swapping a few jumpers on the boards and reinstalling your original 1200XL OS ROMs and MMU. With a desoldering gun or even a solder sucker, that takes about 15 minutes, including opening the case.

[Dmitry]

7 hours ago, flashjazzcat said:

You should have the machine fixed. Empty BASIC slots are a completely cock-eyed solution to the problem.

Agreed, I am having it fixed eventually.  But, it is also a 3 month calendar delay to having it fixed.  So, looking for short term relief.

[Dmitry]

3 hours ago, DrVenkman said:

Gah, why? If you’re talking about a 1200XL, you have two options, neither of which are difficult and only one of which that requires any soldering. First, turn the machine, functionally, into an 800XL by removing the U1MB physically and simply putting in an XL OS and MMU. That’s it. You don’t even need to remove the jumper wires, just tuck them out of the way. Second, reconfigure the board by swapping a few jumpers on the boards and reinstalling your original 1200XL OS ROMs and MMU. With a desoldering gun or even a solder sucker, that takes about 15 minutes, including opening the case.

I can see you point, but as a practical matter that is what it costs.  Tech time is about $60 to $80 an hour, depending upon the person.    I am having a 1mb upgrade removed, and a traditional upgrade in it's place. So add that traditional rambo xl to the cost.   So I need, a traditional ram upgrade, flashed XL OS, MMU some jumpers changed.  That plus it will take 3 months and the technicians are free to ask for more.  

 

For the most part, I do trust all the Atari folks I've dealt with - but I've also been ripped off big time and cannot forget that experience either. ---p.s. that isn't throwing shade on this most excellent install. I"m talking about a project I invested in years ago.  No, this Atari 1200xl was installed to perfection, I love it - it's just that we didn't know about the compatibility problems. Perfectly understandable, and I didn't even notice for four years, but now with daily development, its so not fun to have problems...ugh

 

This fix will be $300 - as a practical matter, I cannot find any less expensive options, I priced it out with four different technicians.

Edited December 21, 2020 by Dmitry

[Dmitry]

9 hours ago, Roydea6 said:

I believe that if you create an 8k nul file named basic.rom and flash it all 4 slots it should empty the 4 slots.

an 8k file with all zeros or hex FF should do it.

 

Thank, I'll give it a try.

 

If I mess up flashing this thing, no biggy, it's gonna be removed anyway....but I'd like to try anything to get this thing sorta-workign a bit better...

 

 

[Dmitry]

FYI, I think this is an interesting topic too, the cost of being "soldering challenged" in this hobby.   My dad had the soldering skills, it skipped a generation unfortunately.

 

To remove a u1mb, but still have traditional memory that the device was installed to supply in the first place:

 

Shipping to technician:  $40

Return shipping:   $40

Traditional Rambo upgrade, unpopulated:  $40

Charge for 256k of ram:  $60

Time: 2 x $60/hr.  : $120

 

This leaves out details like replacement roms/mmu

 

$300

 

This was a generic price, used to represent various quotes, no particular operation. I talked to four different vendors.

The details are different, one shop quotes $80/hr.  Many will only do part of the work, not all of it.

Like one guy would do some of the work, but won't touch rom replacement.

[+Stephen]

Wow - I sure as hell have been undercharging by at least a factor of 5 for work I do!

[flashjazzcat]

My God. They weren't joking when they said I'm not charging enough.

 

Were you in the UK, I would look at the machine on a no-fix, no-fee basis and offer a free diagnosis of the problem. On the assumption the U1MB issues could be rectified, it would cost you about 20 per cent of that including domestic shipping.

 

There should be no need for such destructive and costy repairs if someone familiar with the hardware will take a look at it.

 

Edited December 21, 2020 by flashjazzcat

[Dmitry]

2 hours ago, flashjazzcat said:

My God. They weren't joking when they said I'm not charging enough.

 

Were you in the UK, I would look at the machine on a no-fix, no-fee basis and offer a free diagnosis of the problem. On the assumption the U1MB issues could be rectified, it would cost you about 20 per cent of that including domestic shipping.

 

There should be no need for such destructive and costly repairs if someone familiar with the hardware will take a look at it.

 

@flashjazzcat I love your videos, btw, I probably said that before.    Yes, if I were in the UK, I know one guy that would get all my work, lol

 

But anyway, its always like this for something.  I am a cyclist, I do all my own cycling repairs, and yet most of my friends take their bikes in once a year for a 'tune-up' --a working bike they go to the shop once a year and pay the shop $120.  

 

To me it sounds like my friends once a year spend $120 for absolutely nothing because, what the heck is a tune-up - the guy eyeballed the bike, maybe adjusted the brakes.  But they do it, they like doing it.  Hmmm, maybe Atari techs need to offer a once year tune up service, for working machines, omg....I'm terrible.

 

OK, well I've got a couple Atari's on order, once they arrive, I'll get this 1200xl fixed.  At the moment the 1200xl is the only working machine (such as it is).  

[chevymad]

If it's that much, would it be easier or cheaper to leave your machine alone and buy one upgraded the way you want? Or even trade yours for one with the upgrades you want?

[+mytek]

Sounds like it's time to learn how to solder  .