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How-to advice on archiving boxes of disks?


jmccorm

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Many years ago, I ended up with a collection of disks from one or more Atari enthusiasts. I'm kind of wondering how to preserve them. Do I look to preserve only something that isn't a well-known commercial piece of software? Do I skip Magazine programs? Do I just look to archive anything that is unusual or exceptional? And how do I end up naming these disks?

 

So here are nine disks that I really didn't know what was on them (besides not being commercially produced disks). Should I have even bothered? How do I name or identify the disks? Any tips on the whole process of taking boxes of disks and archiving them?

 

This seems like a lot of effort. Maybe there is something on here that might interest someone, but it seems kind of ... meh?

 

RANDOM DISKS:

Demos, Game - AtariArt, LuvPower, Trivia (Some Basic).ATR

Misc - Halley Calculator, Twogun, Flash PIC (Some Basic).ATR

Misc Games - Morse Code Test - Starbase 13 - Saucer Launch - Space Mines - Gruibs (Basic).ATR

Misc Utils - Assorted Epson Demos (Basic).ATR

The Horrible Secret of Erotica-X (Basic).ATR

Util, Print, Source - Print Shop Screen Magic File Conversion, Action Source Code .ATR

Xmas - Jingle Disk.ATR

Xmas, Util - Snowtree, MicroDos XL Creator.ATR

Xmas, WIP - Miscellaneous (Basic).ATR

 

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Today's batch of disks. Some things are familiar, but a few aren't.

I have no idea what the SCREENDM.001 and SCREENDM.002 were supposed to be. Some sort of disk images?

 

Wurds was a better Scrabble game than I expected.

 

RANDOM DISKS:

Demo - Swan Demo (No Basic).ATR

Game - Cytron Masters.ATR

Games - Aquatron (400 and 800, Super Bruce Lee, Krazy Kopter (No Basic).ATR

Games - Countermeasure, Final Legacy, Triton3D, Cohen's Towers (No Basic).ATR

Games - Wurds Basic.ATR

Mixed - Incoming, Starfighter, WeAreTheWorld AMS, Santa PIC No Basic.ATR

Simulation - King (Basic).ATR

Unknown - ScreenDM 001 and 002.ATR

 

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attachicon.gifMisc - Halley Calculator, Twogun, Flash PIC (Some Basic).ATR

Flash PIC is actually an ams music file. I have added the AMS.COM file and renamed FLASH.PIC to FLASH.AMS so the ams.com programs will play it. I don't recognize the tune. After ams program is started OPTION key to find ams files.

 

Thank you for the file identification, compact AMS player, and instructions! FLASH song is "What a Feeling" from Flashdance.

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I thought there was a greyscale flashdance picture that went with the ams song. maybe that's why it's labeled incorrectly as the set is separated and picture is lost?

super bruce lee will need a compare performed on it.

Edited by _The Doctor__
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More vintage disks archived in.

 

RANDOM DISKS:

Game Util (Basic) - BLACKJACK PROOFRDx.ATR

Games (Basic) - Blackjack Casino EscapeEpsilon Lumberjack Hookey.ATR

Amodem 75 A BASIC and 850.ATR

 

FIRST SET OF QUESTIONS:

Last week I discovered a recently acquired public domain disk that was not family friendly.

Answers to all questions are appreciated, even if they overlap:

  • Are these typically uploaded to the forum without causing any ill-will?
  • What is the best way to handle any shared archival responsibility?
  • Do those answers change based upon the degree of family unfriendliness?

SECOND SET OF QUESTIONS:

  • Did anyone figure out what the SCREENDM was?
  • I want to think that DM was yet another disk archiving format?

I appreciated the feedback that some of the content has been deemed as useful archive material.

I also appreciate that we're all helping each other.

 

Thanks,

jmccorm

 

EDIT: Removed duplicate files.

EDIT: Replaced an easily misunderstood reference only to "it" with "any shared archival responsibility".

Edited by jmccorm
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@jmccorn:

SECOND SET OF QUESTIONS:
•Did anyone figure out what the SCREENDM was?
•I want to think that DM was yet another disk archiving format?

ScreenDM.001 & .002 are both basic programs that are some sort of screen dump programs.

**SCREEN DUMP ****
*BY JERRY WHITE &*
*FERNANDO HERREA *
* ANTIC MAGAZINE *
* JANUARY, 1984 *
******************

G: device program and driver not on Disk listing.

001 is a graphics dump to printer.

002 is a graphics dump to screen.

Edited by rdea6
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Last week I discovered a recently acquired public domain disk that was not family friendly.

Answers to all questions are appreciated, even if they overlap:

  • Are these typically uploaded to the forum without causing any ill-will?
  • What is the best way to handle any shared archival responsibility?
  • Do those answers change based upon the degree of family unfriendliness?
Was this the "The Horrible Secret of Erotica-X (Basic).ATR" disk? I wasn't able to get that one to do anything. Although, admittedly, I only put about 3 or 4 minutes of attention into it before moving on.

 

As for "not family friendly" question, I don't think that you really need to worry as long as you label the offending program as such in your post. Artwork's "Strip Poker" comes up in discussion from time to time and no one seems to have any issue with it other than slight amusement (and perhaps a bit of adolescent nostalgia).

Edited by SS
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Was this the "The Horrible Secret of Erotica-X (Basic).ATR" disk? I wasn't able to get that one to do anything. Although, admittedly, I only put about 3 or 4 minutes of attention into it before moving on.

 

As for "not family friendly" question, I don't think that you really need to worry as long as you label the offending program as such in your post. Artwork's "Strip Poker" comes up in discussion from time to time and no one seems to have any issue with it other than slight amusement (and perhaps a bit of adolescent nostalgia).

 

Agreed. And if you're worried about this tame (by 21st century/high-bandwidth stuff), be careful if you ever start digging through the Holmes and TOSEC archives. There's a lot of 1980's-version-of-"tittilating" stuff lurking in the demos.

 

​Nerds will be nerds, even prior to the public internet.

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Was this the "The Horrible Secret of Erotica-X (Basic).ATR" disk? I wasn't able to get that one to do anything. Although, admittedly, I only put about 3 or 4 minutes of attention into it before moving on.

 

I don't think I'm the one to ask. You might want one of the other jmccorm users? I will try very much to answer.

 

Were you not able to start the program?

 

If so, please provide the forum with a strong glimmer of what is (or is not) happening. One of several experts will almost certainly appear and mansplain the situation to all, incorporating their bespoke solution, tailored to your individual needs! (It is a service we will be selling later this year.)

 

Or was it that you were not able to quickly reach a level of content which sustained your attention?

 

If so, once the program begins, you may then remove the title's matching pair of Erotic-Sensitive Sunglasses. If you weren't using the original pair of Erotica-X lenses, you may match with glasses from a similar title. Do not confuse with the Peril-Sensitive Sunglasses or Microscopic Space Fleet from other vendors. Avoid gels or creams.

 

If that does not address the performance failure, you might explore one of the freely available titillatory accelerators.

Finally, if successful, please take plenty of screenshots.

 

Your pal,

the jmccorm [always the same userid, but user #3 currently has the hotseat; please do not tell Albert]

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For Gemstone Warrior, AtariMania said "May not be 100%" and "Missing original disk image".

I found the disk in my archive. Sadly, it seems to have at least one bad sector. I do not know if it was intended as copy protection or not. This is not a working copy but contain data which can be used to fix another copy.

 

THIS IS NOT A WORKING COPY BUT MIGHT BE USED TO CREATE A REPAIRED ARCHIVE:

Gemstone Warrior (No Basic).ATR

 

Do not download this disk for your personal enjoyment. All jmccorm users agree: you will not enjoy.

It is verboten! If you accidentally download and enjoy, self-reporting is not required at this time.

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For Gemstone Warrior, AtariMania said "May not be 100%" and "Missing original disk image".

 

There is a working protected image in Farb's ATX torrent. Atarimania lists many dumps as missing which are contained in the torrent.

You can also check the related database http://a8preservation.com/ to see if a specific dump is available.

 

Btw.: If the bad sector is not inside needed data your dump will work fine - unless it is used on a real disk drive. It might even work with track-buffering drives.

The copy protection is based on a specific track alignment and expects very short and consistent delays between adjacent tracks. Since emulated disk drives do not have to wait for the spinning disk or the stepper motor they have no delay at all.

Edited by DjayBee
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Another day, another couple of disks have been archived. The first disk seems a mix of loose pictures, sounds, games, utils. Some filenames might suggest a chance of content which may have been considered titillating at the time? The second disk looks like a couple of Avalon-Hill military strategy games.

 

Disks for Loading. Disks for Archiving. Disks for Atari. Disks for Users.

DOUBLE DENSITY Mixed (Some Basic) AMS, PICs, Game, Util.ATR

SINGLE DENSITY Military Sim Games (Basic) - Panzer-JADG, Panzerun.ATR

 

Please report any problems. Please report any totally awesome experiences.

Please report this or any other disks if inappropriate for AtariAge to distribute.

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I'm onto the next desktop disk holder. I haven't hit a bad sector on any of these disks, which has made for a very refreshing change.

 

The back of the holder was filled with 31 disks of a brand that I hadn't seen before: Quill? Each disk had a "fresh" blank label on it. I had hoped that someone was lazy and that these were download disks with a jackpot of unlabeled miscellaneous programs. I sampled five, and they were all unformatted. Too bad, but at least I've got a fresh set of disks that I can safely use for my own purposes.

 

To date, I've been skipping any commercially published disks (both original and copied) where I'm pretty sure that someone would have already archived them online. MULE? Skip! Goonies? Skip! Zork? (Checks version.) SKIP! Also skipping personal documents, financial software data disks, etc. As I go through these, I'm so proud to see that my fellow collectors actually purchased so much of their software back in the day.

 

In the front of this next disk holder, I've got an original subLOGIC Flight Simulator II disk and a Scenery Disk (Chicago, LA, Seattle, New York). SKIP! After that were two disks with some nicely printed homemade labels. First one says Flight Simulator II Front: Game, Back: Scenery. (Seems like a backup copy. SKIP!) The next disk was more puzzling. It was DIY double-sided, no write-protect tabs, and is labeled "Flight Simulator II Mode Library Disk". Let me know if it is worth the effort of archiving and uploading.

 

The rest of the case contains four otherwise empty DOS disks, and seven disks labeled with freeware BASIC programs. I remember that at least two of you have been requesting BASIC programs, and it looks like we've got quite a few that are spread throughout those remaining disks. Also, it looks I wasn't the only one in my area who constructed the Cheap Talk Voice Synthesizer back in the day. (A voice-synthesis chip, I believe from Radio Shack, is connected to the Atari in parallel through an interface with two of the joystick ports, either 1&2 or 3&4. I'm pretty sure I threw mine away a decade or two ago.) There are a couple of mid-sized programs for it and a handful of smaller demo programs.

 

After that, the next disk holder looks like someone's collection of terminal programs, and a commercial word processor called Cut & Paste from that famous productivity software company that we all know and love... Electronic Arts?! Does it need archiving? After that, I'll be hunting down more disks. I'm still trying to locate my own personal 100 to 200 or so disks from back in the day. So far, only one of the disks that I've uploaded so far were part of my own original collection. icon_tears.gif

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~150 more disks located, still none of my own. Some random highlights:

  • A number of commercial disks that I'm not familiar with and will archive if unknown / missing / unusual.
  • Are people still looking for Bank Street Writer? I've got three disks of it, but they don't say much more about what they are.
  • Some commercial Spelling disks from 1984 (disk sides are labeled for grades 3,4,5,6,7,8) from American Educational Computer, Inc.
  • A Party Quiz Game that I never heard of but I think we'll be trying it out.
  • A USAAF game and scenario disk. That's United State Army... Air Force? Huh? AtariMania has v1.1, but I've got v1.0 it seems.
  • Some interesting "technology" (with some serious air quotes around that word) documents from a group that was once big in the 80s.
  • That G: Autorun.sys disk which rdea6 mentioned earlier
  • Basic disks. BASIC Disks. BASIC DISKS! So many BASIC Disks everywhere!
  • A handful of ATR8000 disks... minus the ATR8000. :(

More to come!

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Don't dismiss the known commercial stuff entirely. For instance, CBS Software's Success with Math - Decimals - Addition and Subtraction and Multiplication and Division are still missing, aslo some of the Control Data programs we were referring to in another thread... Many other examples.

 

Flight Simulator II Mode Library Disk

 

Not sure what this is. As a side note and as far as I know, the Flight Simulator II scenery disks still missing entirely are 5, 8, 9, 10 and 12.

 

The rest of the case contains four otherwise empty DOS disks, and seven disks labeled with freeware BASIC programs. I remember that at least two of you have been requesting BASIC programs, and it looks like we've got quite a few that are spread throughout those remaining disks. Also, it looks I wasn't the only one in my area who constructed the Cheap Talk Voice Synthesizer back in the day. (A voice-synthesis chip, I believe from Radio Shack, is connected to the Atari in parallel through an interface with two of the joystick ports, either 1&2 or 3&4. I'm pretty sure I threw mine away a decade or two ago.) There are a couple of mid-sized programs for it and a handful of smaller demo programs.​

 

Useful for sure, you never know what's in there.

 

Are people still looking for Bank Street Writer? I've got three disks of it, but they don't say much more about what they are.

 

Isn't it usually two disks? There's also a very rare Instructional Version still MIA.

 

Some commercial Spelling disks from 1984 from American Educational Computer, Inc.

 

Definitely: 2, 3, 5, 6 and 8 are missing :)

 

A USAAF game and scenario disk. That's United State Army... Air Force? Huh? AtariMania has v1.1, but I've got v1.0 it seems.​

 

Needed, I think.

 

Basic disks. BASIC Disks. BASIC DISKS! So many BASIC Disks everywhere!​

 

Ditto, you never know what's inside.

 

--

Atari Frog

http://www.atarimania.com

Edited by www.atarimania.com
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  • Are people still looking for Bank Street Writer? I've got three disks of it, but they don't say much more about what they are.
  • A Party Quiz Game that I never heard of but I think we'll be trying it out.
  • A USAAF game and scenario disk. That's United State Army... Air Force? Huh? AtariMania has v1.1, but I've got v1.0 it seems.

 

Original copies of Bank Street Writer and USAAF 1.0 are missing.

I stitched together replicas from cracked copies I found (see attachments) which I could compare against dumps of your disks for verification.

 

Do you have additional disks with questions for the Party Quiz?

Bank Street Writer (1982)(Broderbund Software)(US).atx.zip

U.S.A.A.F. (1985)(SSI)(US).atx.zip

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