64HDD Q.

[+davidcalgary29]

A kindly soul gave me a complete 64HDD system for my C64, but I'm having trouble loading most .D64 and .T64 games from the hard drive; they simply won't run (the screen freezes, and the computer then crashes). My knowledge of the C64 is nil; do I need to download additional software to run these types of images directly on my computer?

[Jasoco]

I wish you had specified Commodore in the thread title. I thought this was about the Nintendo 64DD.

 

Thanks for getting my hopes up.

[Ze_ro]

I can't remember if it was 64HDD or server64 that I used to do this a few years back... and I never really tried to load many d64 or t64 images, so what I have to say here might be completely off-base:

 

For d64 files, do they ALL fail? Or just certain ones? How exactly are you loading them? Are you just doing "LOAD"ULTIMA1.D64",8,1" Because if so, that's almost certainly not how you're supposed to do it. From what I remember, you actually have to send some drive command (ie, OPEN 15,8,15: PRINT#15,"BLAH": CLOSE 15... I can't remember what PRINT# command you have to use to do this though... look for a 64HDD manual or something for the right command) that tells 64HDD to actually attach the d64 image as a normal disk drive, and then you should be able to use it properly.

 

As for t64 files, I'm really not sure how 64HDD does this, since they're tape images, and we're talking about a disk drive interface... I imagine you'd have to send 64HDD a drive command similar to above for it to actually attach the image before you access it.

 

--Zero

[+davidcalgary29]

I can't remember if it was 64HDD or server64 that I used to do this a few years back... and I never really tried to load many d64 or t64 images, so what I have to say here might be completely off-base:

 

For d64 files, do they ALL fail? Or just certain ones? How exactly are you loading them? Are you just doing "LOAD"ULTIMA1.D64",8,1" Because if so, that's almost certainly not how you're supposed to do it. From what I remember, you actually have to send some drive command (ie, OPEN 15,8,15: PRINT#15,"BLAH": CLOSE 15... I can't remember what PRINT# command you have to use to do this though... look for a 64HDD manual or something for the right command) that tells 64HDD to actually attach the d64 image as a normal disk drive, and then you should be able to use it properly.

 

As for t64 files, I'm really not sure how 64HDD does this, since they're tape images, and we're talking about a disk drive interface... I imagine you'd have to send 64HDD a drive command similar to above for it to actually attach the image before you access it.

 

--Zero

 

I'm having mixed success with .d64 files. "Gauntlet" won't load, but "Uridium" will; I've been able to play "Gyruss", but not "The Bard's Tale". I've just been loading the PRG files with typical command of

 

LOAD "PROG ",11,1

 

with 11 being the HDD system.

 

Perhaps some of these files are PAL games.

[Ze_ro]

LOAD "PROG",11,1

 

Ah, okay... I think I see the problem here... I'm sorry if this sounds condescending, but I'm not sure how much you know about the C64, so here's the scoop:

 

On the C-64, a number of devices are assigned device numbers. Traditionally, printers are assigned 4-7 (I think 1-3 include the tape drive, screen, keyboard and user port, but I might be mistaken), and disk drives are assigned 8-11, meaning you can have up to 4 disk drives attached, which will be sequentially numbered 8, 9, 10, and 11. Your 64HDD is apparently set up to act as device 11 (which is probably the best choice... that's what I used to do). The problem here though, is that "stupid" programs aren't smart enough to know which drive they were loaded from, and just default to loading from device 8. The vast majority of people only had one drive at the time, and anyone with two would just load from drive 8 anyways. Any program that doesn't need to load any extra files from the disk, and .prg files shouldn't have any troubles with a 64HDD set up as device 11... but if you happen to try to load any of these "stupid" programs, they'll attempt to look for their data on device 8 instead, and fail.

 

Unfortunately, the only way to get them to work would be to reconfigure 64HDD to act as device 8... but that can be inconvenient if you actually have a regular disk drive that you want to connect, since changing a 1541's device number involves opening up the drive.

 

--Zero

[shep]

I wish you had specified Commodore in the thread title. I thought this was about the Nintendo 64DD.  

 

Thanks for getting my hopes up.

 

ditto :wink:

[Ze_ro]

Bah, 64HDD is much more useful than the 64DD ever would have been.

 

--Zero

[+davidcalgary29]

Bah, 64HDD is much more useful than the 64DD ever would have been.

 

--Zero

 

And it's an awful lot of fun to fool around with. Thanks for the help!