Atari 320XE / IDE plus 2.0

[Guest]

I recently bought a 320xe upgrade which works nicely, but now looking to see what can be done with it as regards true expansion.

i also have an IDE plus 2.0 Rev C (with 20gb IDE laptop drive ready to be hooked up)

questions:

1. how to i configure the IDE plus so the atari can boot from it via the 320xe?

2. what files do i need to do this?

3. where can i get them?

4. where on hard drive do i locate atari program files?

5. will atr/xex files run from this?

cheers for any help

[flashjazzcat]

SDX ROM containing partitioning software here:

 

http://www.atari8.co.uk/apt/downloads/idea_apt_bios_v.0.3.zip

 

Stand-alone version here:

 

http://www.atari8.co.uk/apt/downloads/APT_Toolkit_Rev5.zip

 

Set-up manual here:

 

http://www.atari8.co.uk/apt/docs/APT%20Software%20Manual%202nd%20Edition.pdf

 

Config screen reference guide:

 

http://drac030.krap.pl/ide-plus-config-screen-reference.pdf

Edited November 8, 2014 by flashjazzcat

[Guest]

thanks for this - there's a lot to it, expect it won't go too smoothly - atari stuff never does

[+Larry]

Nice choices on the hardware!

 

What dos do you plan to use? If you are just starting out, you might want to try an Atari-type dos with the traditional menu There is only one Atari-style dos that supports a HD, and that is MyDos 4.x, of which 4.55 Beta 3 or Beta 4 are the best.

 

Unless you are planning on using a lot of partitions on your HD, you might want to look at Drac030's original FDISK2 partitioning software.

 

If you just poke around here, you will find about everything including the Utility Disk which has both SDX and MyDos versions:

 

http://drac030.krap.pl/en-main.php

 

-Larry

[flashjazzcat]

Unless you are planning on using a lot of partitions on your HD, you might want to look at Drac030's original FDISK2 partitioning software.

 

If you just poke around here, you will find about everything including the Utility Disk which has both SDX and MyDos versions:

Worth mentioning that the original FDISK2 - while still perfectly usable - uses a deprecated partition table scheme incompatible with all the other APT devices. You can create a small number of partitions with the APT version of FDISK, and of course it's also compatible with MyDOS and SpartaDOS (there are MyDOS and SpartaDOS ATRs in the archive).

[Guest]

biggest problem i'm finding is getting the

APT_Tools_MyDOS.atr

and

APT_Tools_SDFS.atr

images to disc. the APE/Prosystem software will allow me to format as DS/DS (on happy 1050 - flipping the disc over)

but when i try to write either image - it times out after sector 40 - no matter how quickly i flip disc over.

don't think ape/prosystem can properly handle 360k ds/dd disk writing

anyone know how? or better still any other tool/util that will do this?

 

thanks

[flashjazzcat]

Flipping the disk won't work: these ATRs would have to be written to an XF551 DS/DD disk (not two separate 180KB volumes).

 

If you have the Altirra emulator, you could open the ATR in Tools->Disk Explorer and drag the files out to the desktop. Then you could stick them in an imaged folder in APE and copy them over to an already formatted floppy.

 

Just let me know if you need the raw files (i.e. not in a disk image): I should probably include them in the archive anyway.

 

EDIT: here they are.

 

APT.zip

Edited November 9, 2014 by flashjazzcat

[kogden]

Hey FJC, the IDEPlus firmware with the APT utils baked into the SDX image is available from your site isn't it?

 

biggest problem i'm finding is getting the

APT_Tools_MyDOS.atr

and

APT_Tools_SDFS.atr

images to disc. the APE/Prosystem software will allow me to format as DS/DS (on happy 1050 - flipping the disc over)

but when i try to write either image - it times out after sector 40 - no matter how quickly i flip disc over.

don't think ape/prosystem can properly handle 360k ds/dd disk writing

anyone know how? or better still any other tool/util that will do this?

 

thanks

 

I think you're going about it the wrong way.... I would use APE to boot those images, prep an HDD, and then copy the utils to the HDD -OR- reflash IDEPlus using firmware update ATR from FJC's site.

 

Not many people have a 360K-capable floppy drive on their 8-bits. The one Atari-branded drive that supported it was a cheaply built piece of crap, the XF551.

[flashjazzcat]

Hey FJC, the IDEPlus firmware with the APT utils baked into the SDX image is available from your site isn't it?

Not to confuse the firmware (PBI BIOS) with the SpartaDOS X ROM which contains the partitioning tools on CAR: (the link for which is in post 2), the firmware is here:

 

http://drac030.krap.pl/en-kmkjz-pliki.php

 

Not many people have a 360K-capable floppy drive on their 8-bits. The one Atari-branded drive that supported it was a cheaply built piece of crap, the XF551.

Had mine for twenty-five years and it's still going strong. Love it.

Edited November 9, 2014 by flashjazzcat

[Guest]

thanks guys, if i get this thing working, will probably be back for more advice

[Roydea6]

Flipping the disk won't work: these ATRs would have to be written to an XF551 DS/DD disk (not two separate 180KB volumes).

 

If you have the Altirra emulator, you could open the ATR in Tools->Disk Explorer and drag the files out to the desktop. Then you could stick them in an imaged folder in APE and copy them over to an already formatted floppy.

 

Just let me know if you need the raw files (i.e. not in a disk image): I should probably include them in the archive anyway.

 

EDIT: here they are.

 

APT.zip

Hi Jon

I noticed that this APT archive doesn't include the uflash_1.2_test1 version. So my question is : Has anything further been done with the test 1 uflash or should I quit using it??

[flashjazzcat]

I noticed that this APT archive doesn't include the uflash_1.2_test1 version. So my question is : Has anything further been done with the test 1 uflash or should I quit using it??

I didn't see the point of including test stuff on a disk full of completed software (uflash_1.2_test1 being available from the uFlash page). No further development has been undertaken. As to whether you should continue to use it: that kind of depends on whether you find it useful. The program's original purpose was to flash Incognito and Ultimate 1MB, but I added experimental MaxFlash and SIDE support to the test version because I needed a convenient way to flash those devices (same reason uFlash was written in the first place, in fact). I've had great feedback on v1.0, but very limited feedback on 1.2. It was going to be a one-fits-all flashing solution, but it'll never be able to handle things like "The Cart". So: does anyone actually want to see more development undertaken? It makes no sense for me to invest large amounts of time developing what is becoming a very complex application if only a handful of people will have any use for it. And of course there's a faction who maintain that stand-alone flashers are the way forward. I'd certainly like to finish it when I get time - if there's a demand. Is there?

[Guest]

hi guys, thanks for the assistance. made some real progress last night.

Couldn't get the thing to be recognised, then noticed an old thread that stated 800xl requires external power supply.

 

So i hooked the thing up to 130xe - and hey presto - success.

Ok am about to try and reconfigure it again - because i think i set too many partitions.

 

1] As it's a 20gb hard drive - so do number of partitions matter? is there a correlation between partitions and virtual drives?

of can i mount 1 partition and still have 16 virtual drives?

 

2] secondly, is there a working GUI that can be loaded to HDD to boot directly to?

 

3] will the 320XE still work when connected thus

Atari << IDEplus << 320XE

as it's not possible to connect properly

as Atari << 320xe << IDEplus

 

thanks again

Edited November 11, 2014 by Guest