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ATR-8000 and 3.5 720k floppy?


Wally1

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hi all,

 

i am the proud new owner of an ATR-8000

 

i want to connect and boot with a 3.5 floppy drive - 720k.

 

will this do the trick:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/200395647249?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

and with this cable:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/121197429758?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

 

i sure hope so

 

thx

 

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Or you can use an ST Drive (SF-314), here's how to connect it:

(this also shows 2 switches to use an ST Drive as Drive-B, Plus a Side Select option to use the back side of 720k floppies only formatted as 360k...

 

 

          34                       10      2
           o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o      S1
             |                     |              o--+
             +-Side Select-+       +-Drive Select-o  |                  14 Pin DIN Cable
                           |                      o  |
 10       11    +-------+  |   10       11        |  | 10  8 14  9 11    10o  U  o11
  o o o o o     |       |  |    o o o o o         |  |  o  o  o  o  o    8o 12 13 o9
   o o o o 5----+    S2 |  |     o o o o 5--------+  |    4 12  13 5    6o  o   o  o7
  o o o o-o---+      o--)--+    o o o o-o--+         |    o  o  o  o     4o   o   o5
  6 2 1 3 7   |   +--o  |       6 2 1 3 7  |         |  6  2  1  3  7     2o 14  o3y 4
    +---------)---+  o  +-------+----------)---------+  o  o  o  o  o         o
              |      |                     |                                  1
              +------+---------------------+->>-Gnd
14 Pin DIN Function           Standard 34 Pin                                 ATR8000 34 Pin
 1  RD     Read Data          30 /RDATA Read Data                             30 Read Data
 2  SIDE0  Side 0 select      32 /SIDE1 0=Head Select                         32 Side Select
 3  GND    Ground                                                                Ground
 4  INDEX  Index Pulse         8 /Index 0=Index                                8 Index
 5  SEL0   Drive 0 Select     14 /DRVSB Drive Select 0                        10 Drive 1 Select
 6  SEL1   Drive 1 Select     12 /DRVSB Drive Select 1                        12 Drive 2 Select
 7  GND    Ground                                                                Ground
 8  MOTOR  Motor ON           10 /MOTEA 0=Motor Enable Drive 0                16 Motor ON
 9  DIR    Direction In       18 /DIR 0=Direction Select                      18 Direction Select
10  STEP   Step               20 /Step 0=Head Step                            20 Step
11  WD     Write Data         22 /WDATA Write Data                            22 Write Data
12  WG     Write Gate         24 /WGATE Floppy Write Enable, 0=Write Gate     24 Write Gate
13  TRK00  Track 00 Detect    26 /TRK00 0=Track 00                            26 Track 00
14  WP     Write Protect      28 /WPT 0=Write Protect                         28 Write Protect
                              16 /MOTEB 0=Motor Enable Drive 1                14 Drive 3 Select
                              34 /DSKCHG 1=Disk Change/0=Ready                 6 Drive 4 Select
                               2 /REDWC Density Select 1=Low/0=High
 
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The drive may work if you can jumper it as drive 0 instead of 1. It has a lesser chance of working as drive 1, which would be seen by the ATR (and the Atari) as B: or D2:

 

Having said that, I don't remember if you can have drives on the ATR that don't start with 0. In other words, a 1050 or similar as D1:, and the ATR drive(s) as D2: (D3: D4:...)

 

The cable is definitely wrong. You need a straight thru NON TWIST cable for the drives. 34 pin edge connectors (or pin sockets for 3.5") the whole way around.

 

The ATR is very flexible, if you have the proper drives and cabling. You can even use 1.2M 5.25 HD drives, and the ATR (and SpartaDOS) will consider them to be 77 track DSDD 8" drives.

 

Here is the manual for the ATR-8000: http://www.ftp.pigwa.net/stuff/collections/SIO2SD_DVD/Instrukcje/ATR8000/atr8000.pdf

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No. you will need to find a cable without the twist in the middle.

It may be possible to remove the twist by pulling off the small plastic parts that cover the cable, carefully remove the twist part and put it back.

It is easy enough to roll your own tho. just need the right tool to crimp the cable on to the connector. I have used a vice in the past, pliers, my body weight and door jams..

 

James

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The twist in the cable simply changes the drive ID so that you can plug two drives on the cable that are both set the same, yet one will be seen as drive 0, and the other as drive 1. Let me drag out an old reference book for the detail...

 

Okay, this was something IBM did as a modification to the Shugart SA400 interface. Anyway the twist cable is designed to work with IBM style floppy interfaces, not 100% Shugart complient ones. Two floppies can have their drive select both set to DS1 (drive B), and the drive connected after the twist will be seen as DS0 (drive A).

 

The ATR8000 is likely Shugart standard rather than the IBM way (which more or less became a new standard). So you should be able to use a twist cable, so long as you only use the plug prior to the twist, and set the drive as DS0 (A:).

Edited by fujidude
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there is a fold in the cable between 2nd and 3rd connector which i suspect hides the twist. the part you want is from the 3rd connector from left to the right hand end. If you get that cable, get a sharp knife and cut the cable flush with the 3rd connector from the left on the left hand side. Knife MUST be sharp.. That way, you wont use the twist part and not have unused ends that could cause problems due to stray capacitance

 

James.

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If I can remember my ATR-8000 days I had to make my own cables.

 

1) they must be 34 pin ribbon cable

2) the ATR side has to be a card edge connector, not pins

3) no twist between drives 1-4 (yes, you can have four drives)

4) I think the last drive needs a resister terminal block (on drive PCB).

 

a 1.2MB 5.25 can be formatted as a 8" 77 track on MYDOS giving it ~1MB of space.

the ATR-8000 writes 360K DSDD like industry standards, so it is not compatible with a DSDD XF551.

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You can get pin to card edge adapters (or at least you could). Think I may still have one or two in a drawer.

 

Okay I do but they are not what would be needed here. Mine are femail pin to male card edge.

Edited by fujidude
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I have literally got that exact cable, the exact one in my Weee-Waste bin right now, right this second!!! I suspected it was faulty but I now think it was actually a duff 1.44MB drive I had bought off ebay. Maybe I will hang on to it after all!

 

If I hadn't just mortgaged my soul to buy the "Ultimate1mb" and all its fascinating pals from old Lotharek I would be scouring the different ebays trying to find an ATR-8000. I really want one now... I think it would satisfy all my immoral floppy-drive urges in one go...

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And, since the Indus-GT and the ATR-8000 both have Z80's, I wonder how difficult it would be to transplant the Indus high speed code from SDX into the ATR... The lack of high speed SIO is the only thing that puts me off about the ATR.

 

They're both bit-bangers, so it's all done by cycle counting. No UART programming involved. A person would need well commented source code and memory / I/O maps for both devices side by side.

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As a matter of interest I got the cable attached to what was then a brand-spanking new Pentium 100 PC in November 1995. I bought the thing from a nearby private computer store for what I later discovered was an obscenely inflated price over the cost of parts and even a fair labour charge... Teach me to buy local, idiot that I was (arguably am)!!! Actually, to be fair it did just that as I have always bought components and put them together myself ever since. Anyway this is relevant because as I say it was a small, local PC shop that catered mostly to business customers - which partially explains the massive mark-up I suffered. I dare say it was just a cable they themselves had kicking around from the early-nineties if not prior still. Quite possibly from exactly the same time the ATR-8000 was first available; certainly from the period where it's type of floppy drive were common enough to be given special plugs on the IO cables. I have never really understood those edge-connectors before seeing your post earlier Wally1 - so many thanks for it! I'm glad I read it before the thing was taken to the tip.

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I have literally got that exact cable, the exact one in my Weee-Waste bin right now, right this second!!! I suspected it was faulty but I now think it was actually a duff 1.44MB drive I had bought off ebay. Maybe I will hang on to it after all!

 

If I hadn't just mortgaged my soul to buy the "Ultimate1mb" and all its fascinating pals from old Lotharek I would be scouring the different ebays trying to find an ATR-8000. I really want one now... I think it would satisfy all my immoral floppy-drive urges in one go...

 

Or how about a Blackbox with floppy board? Fast as heck too since it goes through the PBI.

Edited by fujidude
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hi all,

 

i am the proud new owner of an ATR-8000

 

i want to connect and boot with a 3.5 floppy drive - 720k.

 

will this do the trick:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/200395647249?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

and with this cable:

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/121197429758?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

 

i sure hope so

 

thx

No, don't get that drive. As stated in the description it has no power connector, they are routed through the 34 pin cable. This leads me to believe it is a Tandy type drive although I think there was more then one manufacturer that did it that way. Completely incompatible with an ATR8000 anyway.

 

Editorial comment that is not meant to reflect on you: 720k floppies are stupid expensive.

 

The cable will work, just not real conveniently. See how the last two connectors have a twist? Just cut them off and use what is left to plug into the ATR8000 and your 720k. Worse case is you may have to pull one of the connectors off and put it on the other side i.e. go from

===

===

xx=

xx=

===

===

to

xx===

xx===

xx=

xx=

===

===

 

x=> air, had to put them in to make the spacing right.

 

Get what I am saying? The end that would normally plug into the motherboard/fd controller, you plug into your drive. The card edge connector that you would normally plug into a 5.25" drive, you plug into the back of the ATR8000.

 

IMHO, you would be better off making sure the drive you buy has the jumpers people are talking about on the drive. It isn't a show stopper if it doesn't, just make it a bit more difficult if you want to boot from the drive. Standard IBM type drives are sometimes soldered in place to look like the second drive.

Edited by ricortes
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Do you have a regular SIO drive? That is certainly the easiest way to get this going.

 

If you want a 720K, drive do you have any issue with using a 1.44? I'm sure you would find zero difference in usage, so long as you are using 720K disks. I have an ATR 8000 and quite a few 720K and 1.44 drives and cables. If you would be interested in getting a "turnkey" system that works, send me a PM. I even have bunches of 720K disks.

 

-Larry

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The drive may work if you can jumper it as drive 0 instead of 1. It has a lesser chance of working as drive 1, which would be seen by the ATR (and the Atari) as B: or D2:

 

Having said that, I don't remember if you can have drives on the ATR that don't start with 0. In other words, a 1050 or similar as D1:, and the ATR drive(s) as D2: (D3: D4:...)

 

The cable is definitely wrong. You need a straight thru NON TWIST cable for the drives. 34 pin edge connectors (or pin sockets for 3.5") the whole way around.

 

The ATR is very flexible, if you have the proper drives and cabling. You can even use 1.2M 5.25 HD drives, and the ATR (and SpartaDOS) will consider them to be 77 track DSDD 8" drives.

 

Here is the manual for the ATR-8000: http://www.ftp.pigwa.net/stuff/collections/SIO2SD_DVD/Instrukcje/ATR8000/atr8000.pdf

 

Thank for the manual. I just bought one from eBay and it has not arrived yet.

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