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SDrive-MAX ATX support


Farb

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1 hour ago, tajvdz said:

with control-L you can display long file names but the option doesn't stay like that. after a reboot it is gone. is it possible to set it permanent?

 

If you press Control-W, the change is written into the config file and it is permanent. 
 

I suggest @Mr Robot’s excellent website on everything to do with Sdrive Max. I consider it my online manual. 
 

https://atari8bit.net/everything-sdrive-max

 

I believe I am crediting the correct person. If I am not, my sincere apologies. 
 

Bob C

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On 1/29/2020 at 2:04 PM, Mclaneinc said:

My question is this, the SD-Max is a drive emulator but has anyone thought of expanding on the principle and making it a multi drive type emulator, as in emulating a Happy, an Archiver etc as optional drive types. Now I accept there may be pitfalls about the happy code ownership but by the way there's other happy stuff about it can't be a huge problem.

 

Excuse my lack of knowledge but is this even viable, is there enough storage to flash the chip with?

 

Obviously it needs the coding as well but Altirra has pretty much fully emulated the hardware and is the source is free to use (I think).

This would be difficult, because the 32K flash is nearly full, and the intention of SDrive-MAX is KISS(keep it small and simple).

 

16 hours ago, MADRAFi said:

Is there any one who is actively working on the firmware development?

I would suggest redesigning the interface so it could present long filenames on the file list.

Without it usability is very poor. I know that this device is not very fast but is there a possibility to implement screen scrolling when previewing list of itmes?

Especially when you do have a sd card with all the games or demos that was made :)

This is not possible, because we have no screen buffer, and must draw each pixel manually. Otherwise this would be very slow on this interface with 16MHz, and we cannot make the font too small, because one should be able to select filenames with fingers.

 

 

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3 minutes ago, kbr said:

This is not possible, because we have no screen buffer, and must draw each pixel manually. Otherwise this would be very slow on this interface with 16MHz, and we cannot make the font too small, because one should be able to select filenames with fingers.

What about redesign of buttons layout?

put them on the bottom? and make more space horizontally so longer filenames are present?

Use icons instead of words, reduce number of buttons? I would say Last and Top are not required.

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When I have something to post, I'll post it. Other priorities (mostly personal) are keeping me from getting to finish some of the projects I'm currently involved in.

 

I did make one of these and test it, it didn't work but I haven had time to look at what I screwed up and fix it

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hey Team,

I have made a few of these and had a bunch of 2.4" screens that came in a lot.  I managed to find the right firmware to use to get them working.

What i have found is that on a cold boot the Atari does not see the drive and i have to do a quick power cycle of the machine to get it to recognize.

i suspect it is something to do with the sdcard not initializing fast enough on boot up.

My system is a Pal 130XE and I am getting power from the SIO port.  Wondering if there is any hack that can be done to the uno to get it to initialize faster is that is what the problem is.

Thanks

 

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1 hour ago, mamejay said:

and I am getting power from the SIO port.

That’s the problem - the Atari boots up faster than the Arduino gets up and running. You either need to alter your device for external power and have it running before the Atari boots, or do some kind of mod to your Atari that lets you cold boot without a power cycle. 

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14 hours ago, DrVenkman said:

That’s the problem - the Atari boots up faster than the Arduino gets up and running. You either need to alter your device for external power and have it running before the Atari boots, or do some kind of mod to your Atari that lets you cold boot without a power cycle. 

I was advised here to move away from powering externally.  Strange that I have one 2.8" screen and that works perfectly.  just seems to be the 2.4" screen.  Could it be something to do with the LCD and SDcard hardware on it?  i might just reformat the sdcard and see if that makes any difference.  Could be the sdcard being a ms too slow

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  • 3 weeks later...

Sorry for being little lazy, but reading 42 pages can take some time...

 

Is there any reason why 140KB ATX discs won't run on my SDrive Max? These are mostly polish games, like Robbo etc. http://ftp.pigwa.net/stuff/collections/Atari 8bit Preserved Software 2020-01-25/Robbo (1989)(L.K. Avalon)(PL)[disk].zip

All other stuff loads normally: 90KB discs, cas, atr's.

Of course, I have tried many OS, turn on/off basic, setup SDM as 1050 etc. All I get is BOOT ERROR at first sector each time.

My machine is 65XE with Ultimate 1MB. I use 1.2c firmware on SDM. Can it be fixed in SDM firmware maybe?

Edited by michomis
forgot to ask question
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8 hours ago, michomis said:

Sorry for being little lazy, but reading 42 pages can take some time...

 

Is there any reason why 140KB ATX discs won't run on my SDrive Max? These are mostly polish games, like Robbo etc. http://ftp.pigwa.net/stuff/collections/Atari 8bit Preserved Software 2020-01-25/Robbo (1989)(L.K. Avalon)(PL)[disk].zip

All other stuff loads normally: 90KB discs, cas, atr's.

Of course, I have tried many OS, turn on/off basic, setup SDM as 1050 etc. All I get is BOOT ERROR at first sector each time.

My machine is 65XE with Ultimate 1MB. I use 1.2c firmware on SDM. Can it be fixed in SDM firmware maybe?

Bad file, I have had very few atr's not work. But have had plenty of atx files not work. Try to find it in a atr.

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3 hours ago, Umberto said:

Bad file, I have had very few atr's not work. But have had plenty of atx files not work. Try to find it in a atr.

Well, all of these "bad" files work fine on Altirra.

All of "bad" files are 140KB, so my assumption is that firmware do not support 140KB ATX files.

And, I like to run "original" disk images on my Atari, and most ATR are cracked files. This is main reason I have built SDrive Max, as for ATRs, I use mostly SIO2SD.

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I think you would need to contact @kbr

 

The Github page is here:

https://github.com/kbr-net/sdrive-max
 

I think your diagnosis is correct. However, I do not know how easy it would be to work with those ATX files. 
 

I don’t know if LK Avalon created disks in a non-standard format. On the ST, I know you could format disks to a greater number of tracks and sectors. Though I only have an 8-bit now, I’m assuming you can do something similar to the ST. 
 

I have had good luck with ATX files on my SDM, but this might explain the problems I have had with some files. 
 

Bob C

Edited by darwinmac
Grammar
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On 3/10/2020 at 4:37 AM, michomis said:

All of "bad" files are 140KB, so my assumption is that firmware do not support 140KB ATX files.

 

Most ATX files that are ~140K, including that Robbo polish title, are images of enhanced density disks. Seems that the current firmware has some issues or limitations with enhanced density ATX images

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@ijor - Thanks for that response. Obviously, you know how the ATX format works. 
 

Looking at the beginning of this thread, @Farb was the person to add ATX support to the Sdrive Max. While it would be nice if enhanced density ATX files were supported, I have looked at ATX support as a nice to have feature. 
 

For me, the main points are the touchscreen (easier to switch multi-disk programs than with my old SIO2SD) and the great 3D printed cases available for it. 
 

With that said, it would be nice if this could be fixed. 
 

Bob C

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Do these titles work on any real disk drives?

 

If not then its no real fault of the SD MAX, Altirra as we know depending on what if you use software emulation or device emulation will or will not boot certain disks while in software they will run.

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35 minutes ago, Mclaneinc said:

Do these titles work on any real disk drives?

 

But how would one check it? I have no possibilities to copy ATX on real drive. Originals of these games (ex. from Retronics) load normally from real fdd, and images from what I know, are made exactly like them, with bad sectors etc.

Fact that these "bad" ATX files load through SIO2USB, is enough for me to consider something is wrong with SDM or SDM firmware.

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Obviously others with different drives can check the titles out, I'm just interested if they will load from real drives. The point being if they do load from real drives then the SD MAX needs tweaking, the fact they load by SIO2USB is down to IF the software is checking drive emulation 100% or like software mode in Altirra, it allows some abnormalities through and just is very good general emulation.

 

Obviously we all would like the SD MAX to be as open to all formats but there's only so much flash space on the item so I suppose there could be problems with some emulation requests.

 

I'm, clearly not the programmer..

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