850 question

[Wally1]

I have an 850 interface.

 

question is, what practical purpose can I put it to?

 

ideally I would like maybe a standard 5 1/4 drive (that can read IBM) or 3.5 drive, really.

 

or maybe even a hard drive!

also I would like maybe some Lantronix-internet usage, but am at a loss as how to implement this

 

thanks

Edited December 13, 2014 by Wally1

[_The Doctor__]

850 interface gives you rs-232 ports for modems, telnet connection boxes, and other rs-232 devices... It also give you a printer port for industry standard printers.

[Wally1]

well im using an xm301 - no power supply needed so its great for modem

 

and I have a mpp printer interface so that's that

 

is there any way to hook up what I was asking

 

there is a guy here who is reverse engineering the ATR 8000

cant wait love to buy one!

[_The Doctor__]

Telnet box =Lantronics box...

Karin drive adaptor can use standard floppy mechs

[Wally1]

this Karin drive is first time ive heard of it

 

still available, no such luck with google search the pigwa site is 2012?

 

and what is a telnet box sorry stupid question

 

I actually had a dragoncart was lucky enough to receive one from Dan as a gift

 

is surfing the net possible w/a telnet box

[ricortes]

Just me, I put my 850 away years ago and don't use it except as a door stop.

 

It is not that it wasn't a magnificent piece of hardware in its day, it is just that the things it does were so valuable that they evolved and better solutions came along. For instance, BBS/telecommunications moved to the interweb.

 

You will find your equipment like your XM301 is too slow for, well anything. Even if you can find a local ISP that gives you a shell account, they won't let you connect at 300 baud. You will be stuck with phoning yourself.

 

The path you seem to want is tortuous. Easier to just make some flavor of SIO2PC and go that route. If you want to use the equipment as it is for nostalgia, I would go with the 850 and either a null modem cable or faster modem. Kind of hard to find an older modem but get at least a working 2400 baud to stand a fighting chance of connecting to something. If you want to do it with a null modem cable, there were lots of utilities back in the day for doing transfers. Lowest common denominator may be getting a copy of a BBS like AMIS or something on your clone/pc. I don't even know if they include Hyperterm past Win XP.

 

Understand that everyone here probably did exactly what you are trying to do i.e. hook system up and transfer files, just that it was so tedious and expensive we try to forget it! Much easier to take the path of least resistance.

[Wally1]

not the noobiest I hope

 

 

thanks Ricortes

 

I am trying to recapture 1983 however

 

BBS authentic!

 

and its going well

 

the xm is a fine piece of hardware that needs no power supply

and is just fun. altho my red power light on it seems not to work

 

there is a local bbs that I call frequently

 

would you happen to know about the Karin drive thing?

Edited December 13, 2014 by Wally1

[_The Doctor__]

computer to 850 to lantronix to ethernet to internet to ethernet to lantronix to bbs.....

karin maxi drive fully loaded about $70.00 and is a 130XE eci device

mailto:stryker@scene.pl

or pm here at Atari Age... tell him _The Doctor__ sent you... he may dig one up for you.

http://atariage.com/forums/user/4281-stryker/

 

The device use to blank the screen during drive access to move data as fast as possible...

[flashjazzcat]

The device use to blank the screen during drive access to move data as fast as possible...

I read somewhere that DMA was turned off to enable to A8 to keep pace with the FDD controller chip, preventing data loss. Might be wrong, though.

[thorfdbg]

I have an 850 interface.

 

question is, what practical purpose can I put it to?

You cannot use it for reading floppies, that's for sure. It's a parallel/serial interface box. I personally used mine (actually, the 850XL, which is a rebuild for the XL series from a third party vendor) to connect my printer to the computer, and to transfer data between the Atari and the PC, basically to back up my disks. Now that every disk exists "virtually" on the PC, I don't use it anymore at all.

[ricortes]

not the noobiest I hope

 

 

thanks Ricortes

 

I am trying to recapture 1983 however

 

BBS authentic!

 

and its going well

 

the xm is a fine piece of hardware that needs no power supply

and is just fun. altho my red power light on it seems not to work

 

there is a local bbs that I call frequently

 

would you happen to know about the Karin drive thing?

Sounds great!

 

I've never seen/used a Karin drive but I have seen other floppy disks drives interfaced directly to the Atari bus. Much, much faster then the serial designs like 1050 or 810. Usual caveats apply with respect to finding floppy disk drives and floppies of course.

 

The reason people are ~steering you towards options is there are still a number of bbs accessible via the net. I think it was Russ that just posted a link www.bbscorner.com

you may want to take a quick look at it to see what is going on.

 

I recall trying to download an 8k file from Itsy Bitsy BBS at 300 baud. I was only allowed 30 minutes/day connection time there. It would always time out no matter how fast I got to the download section before the transfer was complete. I went with an Avatec 1200 BAUD as soon as they were available and graduated to a Supra 2400 BAUD as soon as they became available. IMHO: 2400 BAUD is a sweet spot for Atari. Just fast enough to get files while not so fast you can't keep up with scrolling text. I think the 850 maxes out at 4800 or 9600 BAUD anyway so faster is not necessary.

 

There are some other techniques you can use too. I think APE has a built in client so you can TELNET from an Atari running telecommunication software and some of the emulators can handle it too.

Edited December 13, 2014 by ricortes

[thorfdbg]

I think the 850 maxes out at 4800 or 9600 BAUD anyway so faster is not necessary.

9600 is the maximum, which is due to the internal working of the interface box. The way how the 850 works is pretty absurd. Instead of decoding the serial stream, it just samples the incoming data and makes the sampled digital data available at the SIO port, where it will be decoded by Pokey. The limit of 9600 baud is due to the limited sampling rate of the CPU in the interface box.

[Wally1]

I should add that the XM301 can indeed be used

with the Telelink II cartridge. (somewhat of a rarity)

 

so there is very little overhead in terms of software

and it is a neat little telecom system.

 

yesterdays software with more modern hardware

can sometimes be of great efficiency.

Edited December 14, 2014 by Wally1

[ricortes]

One of its predecessors, the 1030, had a built in telecommunications program it loaded on the SIO chain just like booting a disk drive. There were a few caveats to using it, something like you couldn't have a working disk drive on the chain. It was kind of neat to just have a vanilla computer with just a 1030 plugged in and be able to connect. Down side was it only had a capture buffer and no way to save what you got other then maybe dumping it to a printer. Still have my 1030, I'll have to give it a look.