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Farb

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Posts posted by Farb

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted

    5 hours ago, mikic said:

    Noticed entry "Kampfgruppe v1.2 (1985)(SSI)(US)[disk]" is not a compete ATX set (has an ATX and an ATR). I think I had submitted a full ATX set a couple of years ago, but maybe I missed this one. I had a couple of dozen Atari 800/400 boxed titles in my mostly PC IBM collection that Pete Rittwage, from the C64 Preservation Society, imaged and preserved from the original disks. It's attached for inclusion in your collection.

    Thanks for pointing this out. In the past, we only included ATRs in the collection for unprotected disks. Now that ATX is a more commonly supported format, I have been slowly replacing the ATRs with ATXs where possible. From the dumps that Pete submitted to us, Kampfgruppe, Panzer Grenadier and Computer Quarterback Teams Disk 1985 still had ATRs. I've updated the first two in the database but we don't have a good ATX for the latter due to disk corruption. I've also updated the database with you as the contributor for Pete's dumps. Thanks again for your contribution!

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted · Edited by Farb

    6 hours ago, SoulBuster said:

    So I need to ask how you want it:

    1. In a separate thread?

    2. Scans to PDF all pages or individual JPGs per page?

    3. Archive it all or just fill in what is missing based on the website? Or, Should I compare disk images and include ones that are different?  Is there software to do this?

    4. If the disk is not copy protected, are ATRs good enough?

    5. Do you want the documentation/scans and the disk images in the same zip file or separate?

    6. Is there anything I did not ask about?

    Thanks for your work in doing this.

     

    2. It is ideal to have the raw image scans at a minimum. A cleaned PDF is certainly nice to have as well so we can put it on the website.

    3. What is missing from the website is our highest priority. Also, no need to upload dumps that are identical to dumps that are flagged as "preserved" on the site. I have created a command-line utility that can compare disk images. Here are the latest version for Windows and Mac. Just keep in mind that ATX and ATR cannot be compared directly.

    4. Flux dump is preferred so we retain all the low level information that is lost in an ATR. This can be helpful when comparing and/or repairing dumps.

    5. Same ZIP is fine.

    6. It is helpful to keep the disk dump and media scan/photo (preferably without disk sleeve) together so it is clear what physical media the dump came from. It is also helpful to know what packaging the media was from if you know this since there were multiple releases of many titles.

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted · Edited by Farb

    On 4/1/2021 at 5:37 PM, Mclaneinc said:

    The torrent one seems flaky, I got it boot once under Altirra but then it started throwing up load errors on other tries..Your one works fine.

    Interestingly, the torrent CAS works fine on real hardware (checked by @Fred_M converting the CAS to WAV and recording to a real cassette) and on the Atari800 emulator. So it seems like we're looking at an Altirra-specific issue.

     

    @Atarigrub has identified some differences in the baud rate and gap between data blocks across the different dumps which seem to account for the differences in behavior between our CAS and Zarxx's. We are still trying to determine what would make for the most accurate CAS file.

    • Like 1

    .pro to .ATX?

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted

    Well, it depends what you mean by "easy" ?

     

    The PRO file format does not contain all the necessary information to properly represent a disk. The ATX file format, on the other hand, does contain that information. So, to convert a PRO to an ATX, the missing information has to be created by making educated guesses about what the original disk layout looked like. Sometimes theses guesses are easy to make and sometimes they are close to impossible.

     

    Version 0.5.0 of my a8diskutil utility (among other things) has a convert function that can read a PRO file and create an ATX. You run it via:

     

    a8diskutil convert foo.pro foo.atx     (Mac / Linux)

    a8diskutil.exe convert foo.pro foo.atx (Windows)

     

    So it is easy to convert PRO files using this utility but the resulting ATX may not work reliably for disks that had more advanced protection. a8diskutil makes a best effort to create a working ATX but there's only so much it can do. Keep that in mind while playing with it.

     

    Here is the latest version for different platforms (Mac version is the first link):

     

    http://www.a8preservation.com/downloads/a8diskutil-darwin-amd64-0.5.0.zip
    http://www.a8preservation.com/downloads/a8diskutil-win-amd64-0.5.0.zip
    http://www.a8preservation.com/downloads/a8diskutil-win-i386-0.5.0.zip
    http://www.a8preservation.com/downloads/a8diskutil-linux-amd64-0.5.0.zip

    • Like 4
    • Thanks 3

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted · Edited by Farb

    Thanks for the ATX files.

     

    Caverns of Mars isn't protected but also doesn't match any dump we have - the sector interleave is different. I am uncertain if this is a legitimate variant or a side effect of the way it was dumped.

     

    Choplifter also doesn't match any verified dump we have. The closest match is to our [a] dump but it has data differences in the first two sectors and the interleave of the protection track is different. I'm also not sure here what the cause of the difference might be.

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted · Edited by Farb

    You can certainly try that. Ultima disks are a very trivial example I would expect to work fine since they only leverage simple missing sectors.

     

    Just be aware that these old disks will vary in what kind of shape they are in and how many reads they will be able to tolerate before they begin suffering permanent data loss. So it is possible that a test boot or a test dump is the only completely good read you get. I've heard folks in the past disagree with that statement, but I've personally dumped and processed well over 1000 disks and have seen this phenomenon first hand.

     

    Update: If you try to dump them yourself, be sure to check the drive head in between each dump to check if debris has accumulated. If so, clean the head before the next dump. The build-up of head debris can easily prevent a good dump and possibly destroy the disk.

    • Like 1

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted

    16 hours ago, djmat56 said:

    Hi all. I used to contribute back in the day. In fact, I believe a lot of the tape images on the site are my uploads.

    @djmat56, it's great to hear from you! I hope you are doing well. Yes, many of the tape images in our archive are yours. Fortunately, we've been able to verify many of them over the past few years with contributions from others ?

     

    1 hour ago, djmat56 said:

    This is the list of original disks......

    Thank you for putting the list together. And thanks @toddtmw for cross-referencing the list with the preservation database ?

     

    12 minutes ago, djmat56 said:

    More than happy to dump myself with the 1050.

    As @toddtmw indicated, we often have a better chance of preserving disks if we can do a flux dump with Kryoflux or SuperCard Pro. If you would be willing to send them to me in Germany, I can dump them and return them to you. However, I understand if you don't want to incur risk or cost to send disks, so we'll take dumps made on an Atari drive as a last resort. I honestly don't know the quality of an ATX that Respeqt generates as I don't even own an Atari drive anymore ? There will be titles that simply can't be dumped accurately using such a method (not sure if any of yours fall in that category though).

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative and ATX Format Anomalies

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted

    Thanks for pointing out the problems you found. A number had already been corrected in the database and I've fixed the others that I am able to. As @ijor said, some of them are ATX files that were made a long time ago.

     

    14 hours ago, ijor said:

    We need to create a new "official" database of creators. The only ones I know so far besides my own tools are Phaerons's ones.

    $74 is the creator for my a8diskutils.

    • Like 1

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted

    6 hours ago, Shannon said:

    While I'm thinking about it.  I noticed something interesting about some of the EA disk protection.  In particular I'm thinking of the game M.U.L.E.  But I'm sure other EA games are affected by this as well.

    I recall Archon having this behavior as well.

     

    6 hours ago, Shannon said:

    So out of curiosity I tried it on Altirra under the same config ( A800 48k ) and the game loads fine.  After some reading it appears to have something to do with the Atari 800 having a floating bus or something like this?  So I guess the floating bus is not emulated in the Atari800.  Altirra has it as an "option" in the menu but it must duplicate some of the behavior of the bus with that option unchecked.

    I didn't think the floating bus had anything to do with the EA protection but I could be wrong. I know one title whose protection was affected by the A800's floating bus was Coleco's WarGames. I had contacted phaeron about it because the verified ATX worked on a real Atari but not Altirra. As I recall, the floating bus emulation was pretty CPU intensive so was off by default.

    Atari 8-bit Software Preservation Initiative

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted · Edited by Farb

    I'll assume you meant CRC "5ca7b209" as the preservation ATX. The difference between it and Atarimania's is the starting sector for each track and variations in sector positioning as we would expect from ATX files made from different dumps. The sector data, sector interleave and protection sectors are identical between the two (our criteria for considering two dumps identical). With D : acceleration turned on, the protection check appears to fail on both but it manifests itself in different ways as you have noticed. On our dump, the Altirra A8 machine crashes. On the Atarimania dump, the monsters stop moving and garbage appears at the bottom of the screen. I don't know what behavior a protection failure would manifest on a real Atari. I suspect the differences in sector position could be causing different behavior in Altirra but I have no way of knowing this for sure.

     

    Overall, it is not recommended to use D : acceleration when using protected ATX files since many protection checks rely on accurate drive timing. You will find many other examples such as this. I always leave it off and use F1 to accelerate loading if I need to which won't cause protection failures.

    a8rawconv, a new raw disk conversion utility

    in Atari 8-Bit Computers

    Posted

    15 hours ago, phaeron said:

    Are you invoking a8rawconv with track00.1.raw?

    Yes, I was using -r and pointing at track00.1.raw.

     

    15 hours ago, phaeron said:

    I don't have a flippy disk or drive to test

    Here is one you can test with: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Y6e5_Ka_l_x_5G-ickOhHLy__nvlBMAK/view?usp=sharing

    15 hours ago, phaeron said:

    Try renaming one of the files or doing a double-sided decode (-g 40,2).

    I tried the -g option but I'm still not sure how I create an ATX/ATR of side 2?

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