HxC Floppy Drive Emulator

Hello,

I wondered if anyone knows if it is possible to use the floppy drive emulator with the Acorn/BBC A3000 Archimedes.

The A3000 does have a 34 pin floppy drive which I believe is pin compatible with PC floppies. Indeed there is at least one PC emulator that runs on the machine which boots DOS from a PC floppy.

Any help/advice would be very much appreciated.


Regards

MickH

Yes this should problably works.
Can you try to dump a disk with the HxC Floppy emulator software?
Is there a particular file image format used with the Acorn / BBC A3000 ?

Thank you for the reply - it is very much appreciated.

I have tried creating a custom image of 2 sides, 80 tracks, 5 (1024 byte) sectors which is the standard 800K Archimedes format.

I found a jumper setting that recognised the floppy drive and allowed me to format it.

However, when formatting is complete and verification starts, each sector is bad.

So I presume it is only the RPM, bitrate or GAP3 settings that need to be changed?

I only just got the device today so I probably need to experiment a bit. I intend to use it with my Amigas and STs too so even if it doesn't work I won't be too dissapointed. It's just that transferring stuff to/from Archimedes is not easy and this seems to be a really nice and easy way to do it.

The usual Archimedes image format used by emulators is ADF. I'm not sure if that is compatible with the Amiga ADF format however.

If/when I manage to solve the problem I will post the soluntion.

Thanks again and any further info will be gratefully received.


Regards


MickH

Well it definitely DOES work. I am not sure how you get Archimedes images onto it - or even if you can without modified software (seems to think they are Amiga images which do not seem to be compatible) but I can get it working in the way I wanted - simply as a blank floppy image I can read/write to.

The jumper needs to be in the upper right corner connecting the centre right pin with the upper right pin (A3000 can only EVER have ONE floppy drive )

Next I created a RAW image: Track type MFM, 80 tracks, 5 sectors per track, 1024 sector size, 0 sector ID start, 300 RPM, 250000 bitrate, 50 GAP3, 1 interleave, 0 skew.

When I booted, it accepted it but it didn't work (directory error). Maybe one or more of those settings could be better?

Anyway, when using the Archimedes to format that image, it works perfectly and verifies too. Now I can read/write files to it with no problem. So it does do everything I wanted it to.

I hope this is helpful for other Archimedes users (maybe even 8-bit BBC users too?)

I might look at getting the Archimedes ADF's to work and write any necessary software to do the conversion that will probably be necessary if/when I get the time.

Again, if I do I will post it here.

Ok so this is a good news .
Actually when you load an .ADF file, software use the Amiga track encoder (totaly imcompatible with the standard track encoding).
So now i have to make a difference between Acorn ADF and Amiga ADF. The only way to do this is compare the file size.
Not a big deal . I will realease a beta version with this soon.

Question : all ADF file have the same size, or the size file can differs ?

I got mail form customer that confirms HxC works with Archimedes

_________________
..... Atari Roxxx !!!

Sadly, although most are 800K, it seems that they can be pretty much any size.

Thank you for your reply. If I could use the adf's it would be fantastic!

I'm extremely happy with the emulator already and I have not even connected it to any of my STs or Amigas yet.

can you send me a " dir *.adf " listing ?. i want to check all possible file size.

I have a text file with the adf directory info and tried to attach it but .txt file attachments are seemingly not allowed.

I've tried several different file extensions but none were allowed.

Please let me know how you would like me to get this file to you.

Thanks

Mick

Beta version with the Acorn ADF support:
http://hxc2001.free.fr/floppy_drive_emu ... t_beta.zip
to be tested!

I have tested several Archimedes adf images without success.

I emailed some information and would be happy to help further.

Can you send me the working hfe image ?

Yes no problem.

Will send working image and also the RAW image that the working image was created from (although the raw image did not work, after formatting on the Archimedes, it worked without any problem as stated previously).

Hi all. I have also been trying without success to get an image recognised on my Archimedes 3020. I use my HXC without any problems on my Amiga's, and Amstrad 6128 and was hopeful of using it with my Archie.
I have updated my Bootloader and Firmware to the most up to date versions, and have also used the most up to date software for converting the ADFs which advertises support for the Acorn format. The Jumper settings are on ID0, Drive A.
The Archie boots normally with the HXC connected and reacts as if it is a normal drive, however, after I load a converted ADF onto the HXC and then try and access it, I get a Drive empty error.
Are there still issues with converting the Acorn Archimedes ADF's? Or am I missing a step somewhere along the line?