Mazzspeed Posted January 25, 2021 Author Share Posted January 25, 2021 19 hours ago, bfollowell said: OK, so I've used FDISK and setup my drive the way I want it. It's fairly basic so far. I'm not really sure why I bothered with an external partition, but since that's the way I'll eventually setup my CF on my real 1088XEL, I went ahead. Now, I want to format my APT partitions, but I can't seem to. I can see all of my partitions just fine from SDX, but when I run format, I see an n/a beside format and pressing F does nothing. I'm sure I'm forgetting something really silly, but for the life of me I can't figure out what it might be. Any ideas? Thanks! Bfollowell, are you using a real CF card/HDD? How did you get your partitions so big? Altirra won't let me make a VHD bigger than about 4500MB. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted January 25, 2021 Share Posted January 25, 2021 2 hours ago, Mazzspeed said: Aw shit! Oh well, it's a good opportunity to familiarise myself with SpartaDOS X. Thanks for taking a look. When I say 'Initialise disk', I'm referring to this: Be sure to peruse the manual if you haven't already done so. I'm sure I could improve the wording in a few places, but it explains everything in a reasonably concise fashion: https://atari8.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/APT-Software-Manual-8th-Edition.pdf 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 25, 2021 Author Share Posted January 25, 2021 20 minutes ago, flashjazzcat said: When I say 'Initialise disk', I'm referring to this: Be sure to peruse the manual if you haven't already done so. I'm sure I could improve the wording in a few places, but it explains everything in a reasonably concise fashion: https://atari8.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/APT-Software-Manual-8th-Edition.pdf I've got the manual. I drag it to another virtual workspace and keep flipping between workspaces referencing it! Sorry I'm a noob FJC, I'll keep plodding along. I'm sure you had a video where you partitioned and formatted a CF card, I may have to look for it. I think it was at the end of a 600XL build. BTW, when you went rushing for the drug cabinet you had me in tears! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted January 25, 2021 Share Posted January 25, 2021 (edited) 21 minutes ago, Mazzspeed said: I'm sure you had a video where you partitioned and formatted a CF card, I may have to look for it. There's an early attempt at this here: It seems I linked that video here as well at some point: https://atari8.co.uk/apt/toolkit/ 21 minutes ago, Mazzspeed said: BTW, when you went rushing for the drug cabinet you had me in tears! Haha. I can't even remember which video that was, unfortunately. Edited January 25, 2021 by flashjazzcat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 25, 2021 Author Share Posted January 25, 2021 (edited) 1 hour ago, flashjazzcat said: There's an early attempt at this here: It seems I linked that video here as well at some point: https://atari8.co.uk/apt/toolkit/ Haha. I can't even remember which video that was, unfortunately. Cheers for that video FJC, I know the basics, but I needed some explanation as an overview - That video helped heaps. Now I even understand how FAT partitions work regarding VHD files and I was able to copy the Homesoft Collection to my virtual fat partition to use under the SIDE loader, works a treat! For some understanding as to what I'm used to, here's disk selection, partition selection and directory listing under JiffyDOS with the extended CMD-HD commands on the C64. Remember, everything on the C64 is FAT32 and even EX-FAT, this is what threw me on the A8 - But now I grasp it, it all makes perfect sense. On the C64: 1: Change to drive number 11 (my SD card HDD) using @#11 and get a partition listing: @$ means get a directory listing under JiffyDOS, @$=P adds the switch to display a listing of available partitions. NAT = A native CMD type partition (now FAT32), SYS = a system partition used by the bootloader under my SD2IEC mass storage device. @CP1 changes to partition 1 (although I'm already in partition 1 by default) 2: Get a directory listing of all files in the partition: @$=T adds the switch to get a directory listing with time stamps in short format. 3: Change from the current partition to partition two using the command @CP2 (Change Partition 2): Get a directory listing of partition two on drive 11 (hard drive) using @$=T (once again: directory listing with timestamps in short format): I think it's interesting to see how the various operating systems work. I'm fascinated by operating systems. Edited January 25, 2021 by Mazzspeed 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bfollowell Posted January 25, 2021 Share Posted January 25, 2021 2 hours ago, Mazzspeed said: Bfollowell, are you using a real CF card/HDD? How did you get your partitions so big? Altirra won't let me make a VHD bigger than about 4500MB. I'm using an SSD HD image I created from within Altirra that's 4,000MB in size. My partitions are all 32MB. Actually, I think the actual number is 31.9995MB, or 65,535 sectors, which is what you see in that screenshot. I got that from the APT Tools manual when I was playing yesterday. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 25, 2021 Author Share Posted January 25, 2021 Just now, bfollowell said: I'm using an SSD HD image I created from within Altirra that's 4,000MB in size. My partitions are all 32MB. Actually, I think the actual number is 31.9995MB, or 65,535 sectors, which is what you see in that screenshot. I got that from the APT Tools manual when I was playing yesterday. Cheers mate, thanks for the reply. After watching FJC's video's the idea of APT clicked and I've finally got everything working really well. I just need some video guidance! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bfollowell Posted January 25, 2021 Share Posted January 25, 2021 24 minutes ago, Mazzspeed said: Cheers mate, thanks for the reply. After watching FJC's video's the idea of APT clicked and I've finally got everything working really well. I just need some video guidance! Yes, I obviously still have a lot to learn on using CF media as HD partitions as well. I need to learn more about the FAT16 partition; like, how big can they be? I'm assuming they don't fall under the same 32MB restriction. If they don't, why wouldn't I just want to make the whole card a big FAT16 external partition and not mess with APT? Can we have multiple external FAT16 partitions on a large CF card? I need to go watch @flashjazzcat's FDISK video as well! All of this playing around in Altirra will have me in pretty good shape when I get ready to start setting up my real 1088XEL and working with it. Thanks guys! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 25, 2021 Author Share Posted January 25, 2021 8 minutes ago, bfollowell said: Yes, I obviously still have a lot to learn on using CF media as HD partitions as well. I need to learn more about the FAT16 partition; like, how big can they be? I'm assuming they don't fall under the same 32MB restriction. If they don't, why wouldn't I just want to make the whole card a big FAT16 external partition and not mess with APT? Can we have multiple external FAT16 partitions on a large CF card? I need to go watch @flashjazzcat's FDISK video as well! All of this playing around in Altirra will have me in pretty good shape when I get ready to start setting up my real 1088XEL and working with it. Thanks guys! Ironically enough, I was thinking the same thing regarding maximum partition sizes and even tried Googling information on the topic regarding 8bit machines. As far as I can tell, 65535 blocks is the maximum partition size, which is roughly 32MB. However I do admit I'm not 100% sure, perhaps that's just the max size the machine can report? FJC has some great in depth video's and a great dry sender of humour, recommended. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bfollowell Posted January 25, 2021 Share Posted January 25, 2021 20 minutes ago, Mazzspeed said: Ironically enough, I was thinking the same thing regarding maximum partition sizes and even tried Googling information on the topic regarding 8bit machines. As far as I can tell, 65535 blocks is the maximum partition size, which is roughly 32MB. However I do admit I'm not 100% sure, perhaps that's just the max size the machine can report? FJC has some great in depth video's and a great dry sender of humour, recommended. Yeah, I watched quite a few of his videos when I started troubleshooting and restoring machines. I've watched quite a few since then. I love his sense of humor as well; the same type of stuff I do and say and my wife says, "that's not funny!" I'm glad to learn I'm not the only one! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted January 25, 2021 Share Posted January 25, 2021 37 minutes ago, Mazzspeed said: However I do admit I'm not 100% sure, perhaps that's just the max size the machine can report? The OS DCB (disk controller block, IIRC) can deal with only a 16-bit sector value. Provision is made for 24-bit block addresses via the 'DUNUSE' byte. However, the APT drivers and even some SIO devices also support an extended DCB, called the XDCB. It's described here: https://atari8.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/APT-API-Programmers-Reference-Manual.pdf The XDCB provides 32-bit block addressing as well as a physical disk device (which is to say, bypassing all partitions and addressing the raw block storage device). SDX supports the XDCB but the native file system (SDFS) is still limited to 16-bit cluster addresses. The FATFS.SYS driver, however, can address FAT16 partitions larger than 32MB; obviously the FAT width is still 16 bits here, but since clusters are typically 4 or 8KB (or more) in size, the driver needs more than 16-bits to fully address the volume. Perhaps an SDFS revision will one day allow >32MB SDFS partitions; certainly all the low-level dependencies are already in place on the device driver side. 22 minutes ago, bfollowell said: the same type of stuff I do and say and my wife says, "that's not funny!" I'm glad to learn I'm not the only one! Same here. Usually my wife finds my throw-away stuff hilarious but remains totally unmoved by my carefully crafted jokes. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bfollowell Posted January 25, 2021 Share Posted January 25, 2021 38 minutes ago, flashjazzcat said: Same here. Usually my wife finds my throw-away stuff hilarious but remains totally unmoved by my carefully crafted jokes. Yeah, this is me. Usually it’s the second reaction though. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 26, 2021 Author Share Posted January 26, 2021 OK, how do I get this beast online? I've set up the SX-212 modem as a device complete with emulated R-Handler (whatever that is?) and downloaded ICE-T and transferred it to my HDD. The software starts fine, I can do an AT command and get a response from the modem, I try to initiate a connection, I get dialing and ringing but no answer? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_The Doctor__ Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 (edited) put a space after atdt if someone is online while you call you won't get an answer... Particles is known to crash quite a bit like a number of BBS's on that platform... go to their website and let the sysop know if the problem persists... not sure if it's hostile to other terminal types either. Edited January 26, 2021 by _The Doctor__ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 26, 2021 Author Share Posted January 26, 2021 (edited) 10 minutes ago, _The Doctor__ said: put a space after atdt if someone is online while you call you won't get an answer... Particles is known to crash quite a bit like a number of BBS's on that platform... go to their website and let the sysop know if the problem persists... not sure if it's hostile to other terminal types either. I tried it with a space, no difference. I checked and I can dial into Particles using my C64. Even if the terminal type is wrong, I should be able to negotiate a connection? Edited January 26, 2021 by Mazzspeed Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_The Doctor__ Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 (edited) check with the sysop, sometimes a BBS hangs up on non whatever they decide terminal types. also check to see they are accepting raw connections... or if they only accept typical telnet terminals and their accepted termcap types... um it says 1030 not sx212... Edited January 26, 2021 by _The Doctor__ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 26, 2021 Author Share Posted January 26, 2021 1 hour ago, _The Doctor__ said: check with the sysop, sometimes a BBS hangs up on non whatever they decide terminal types. also check to see they are accepting raw connections... or if they only accept typical telnet terminals and their accepted termcap types... um it says 1030 not sx212... I've been connecting to Particles since forever on a number of machines, I've never had the BBS refuse to negotiate a connection due to the wrong terminal type? Gibberish perhaps, but never a non answer. Regarding the 1030 vs SX-212, that's odd. It's definitely the SX-212 I have added as a peripheral, but when I go into settings it states it's a 1030. How to people connect their real A8's online? Do WiModem's or Ethernet solutions exist for the A8 line? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_The Doctor__ Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 I use dragon cart, lantronix servers, APE, real modem, fujinet and the like... altirra has it's own internet modem as well yes? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 26, 2021 Author Share Posted January 26, 2021 8 minutes ago, _The Doctor__ said: altirra has it's own internet modem as well yes? I didn't see one? [Goes clicking through menu's]. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_The Doctor__ Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 it might be referred to as a virtual modem... so connect a device with R: handler... be it an 850, MIO, BlackBox, etc etc etc, and then select virtual modem etc... and go from there... iirc Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 26, 2021 Author Share Posted January 26, 2021 (edited) 3 hours ago, _The Doctor__ said: it might be referred to as a virtual modem... so connect a device with R: handler... be it an 850, MIO, BlackBox, etc etc etc, and then select virtual modem etc... and go from there... iirc I connected an 850, once there's a RS232 port you can connect a virtual modem, which is identical to the one before, just higher speeds - Still can't negotiate a connection to anything. Might have to fire up Wireshark and see if I can monitor what's going on. I tell you what, once you get used to the keypress 'pip' on the A8 and fire up a terminal, email or browser window on your PC - It really sounds like something's missing without the pip on keypress... Edited January 26, 2021 by Mazzspeed Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phaeron Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 6 hours ago, Mazzspeed said: OK, how do I get this beast online? I've set up the SX-212 modem as a device complete with emulated R-Handler (whatever that is?) and downloaded ICE-T and transferred it to my HDD. The software starts fine, I can do an AT command and get a response from the modem, I try to initiate a connection, I get dialing and ringing but no answer? You are requesting a regular tone dial (ATDT) which means this will only attempt to connect to the preset dial address on the modem config. You need to use ATDI <hostname> <service> to do a direct Internet dial instead. Note that the hostname and port/service are separated by a space and not a colon. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 26, 2021 Author Share Posted January 26, 2021 12 minutes ago, phaeron said: You are requesting a regular tone dial (ATDT) which means this will only attempt to connect to the preset dial address on the modem config. You need to use ATDI <hostname> <service> to do a direct Internet dial instead. Note that the hostname and port/service are separated by a space and not a colon. OK. That's different to what I'm used to on the C64. Thanks for the tip, I'll try it out and report back... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mazzspeed Posted January 26, 2021 Author Share Posted January 26, 2021 Success! I have connection! However I have terminal issues, everything is printing on the same line, terminal selected is ANSI. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phaeron Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 1 hour ago, Mazzspeed said: Success! I have connection! However I have terminal issues, everything is printing on the same line, terminal selected is ANSI. Toggle the Telnet CR/LF conversion option in the modem config. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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