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How to connect a PC to an Atari to load ATR images in a method that is guaranteed to work??


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Background:

 

I have been attempting to get a boot disk, and other software, to work with the 1090XL CP/M project.  Because I am rather "grouchy" as I ask this question, I'll just list the current status.....

 

1.  I have been using respeQt

2.  aspeQt isn't running (The program appears to install but isn't found when I try to run it.  I haven't seen an explanation as to why this is.)

3.  My platform is a 4Ghz i7 running the latest version of Ubuntu Linux.  (It is very stable and seems to work fine.)

4.  The Atari has been able to successfully load MULE....but only if it is using HIAS high speed SIO.  (The stock Atari Rev B. OS SIO  will not load MULE.)

5.  I have the Atari 800XL connected to the PC via a couple USB extension cables (to get the length) and have tried two different SIO2PC adapters.

6.  The total length of the cables is well within USB limits  (the total length is around ~12 feet)

7.  The respeQt guy, on Discord, isn't sure why it's not working.

8.  respeQt tends to crash frequently

9.  My original SIO2PC adapter was a possible problem.  (This was not proven.)  But, this was an older adapter.

10.  I bought another SIO2PC adapter through ebay.

11.  This other adapter cost $20, took 8 days to arrive, sat in New Jersey through the whole weekend, etc., etc., etc.

12.  Both adapters are acting the exact same.

13.  When running CP/M, the loads are slow.

14.  CP/M write tests intermittently fail.  (Due to the CP/M BIOS code simplicity and the 6502 code simplicity I am very sure this failure is not related to either code.)

15.  The respeQt logs are of no use and the respeQt dude hasn't seen logs that look like that.

16.  The last time I had a PC connected to an Atari it was running MS-DOS with APE.  It worked perfectly.  It was clearly cobbled and hacked together.  It didn't even have a case.

17.  I don't know what happened to the APE adapter I built, I don't have an MS-DOS system running right now, I "might" be able to find a machine with a DB-9 or DB-25 connector.

18.  After going through all of this, to say that I am simply "grouchy", as I type this, is being very polite, diplomatic, kind, and untruthful.

 

So, this being 2024....

 

A.  Is there some solution that will work without my having to spend hours setting up another system, installing whatever software, and possibly seeing it fail after 10 hours of setup work?

B.  I really don't want to have to spend weeks troubleshooting this so I can have a few decent hours of software development to get a board working.

C.  I really don't care if I have to edit a freaking configuration file with vi.  I don't care if it even has a GUI.  I simply want something that works.

D.  I would prefer to not have to move my development system onto something else just to test this out.  (See A, above.)

 

Any ideas?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by reifsnyderb
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I haven't used my physical Atari in a while, and when I did, I had an old original SIO2PC cable that I bought from Nick Kennedy.  I did use a USB to RS232 adapter to get it to work.  I ran it from Linux using SIO2Linux from https://github.com/pcrow/atari_8bit_utils . It hasn't been updated in 14 years, and I have no idea if it will work at all anymore, but if you're grasping at straws, you can try it.  I'm actually quite curious as to whether it's compatible with modern SIO2PC devices.

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13 minutes ago, reifsnyderb said:

Background:

 

I have been attempting to get a boot disk, and other software, to work with the 1090XL CP/M project.  Because I am rather "grouchy" as I ask this question, I'll just list the current status.....

 

1.  I have been using respeQt

2.  aspeQt isn't running (The program appears to install but isn't found when I try to run it.  I haven't seen an explanation as to why this is.)

3.  My platform is a 4Ghz i7 running the latest version of Ubuntu Linux.  (It is very stable and seems to work fine.)

4.  The Atari has been able to successfully load MULE....but only if it is using HIAS high speed SIO.  (The stock Atari Rev B. OS SIO  will not load MULE.)

5.  I have the Atari 800XL connected to the PC via a couple USB extension cables (to get the length) and have tried two different SIO2PC adapters.

6.  The total length of the cables is well within USB limits  (the total length is around ~12 feet)

7.  The respeQt guy, on Discord, isn't sure why it's not working.

8.  respeQt tends to crash frequently

9.  My original SIO2PC adapter was a possible problem.  (This was not proven.)  But, this was an older adapter.

10.  I bought another SIO2PC adapter through ebay.

11.  This other adapter cost $20, took 8 days to arrive, sat in New Jersey through the whole weekend, etc., etc., etc.

12.  Both adapters are acting the exact same.

13.  When running CP/M, the loads are slow.

14.  CP/M write tests intermittently fail.  (Due to the CP/M BIOS code simplicity and the 6502 code simplicity I am very sure this failure is not related to either code.)

15.  The respeQt logs are of no use and the respeQt dude hasn't seen logs that look like that.

16.  The last time I had a PC connected to an Atari it was running MS-DOS with APE.  It worked perfectly.  It was clearly cobbled and hacked together.  It didn't even have a case.

17.  I don't know what happened to the APE adapter I built, I don't have an MS-DOS system running right now, I "might" be able to find a machine with a DB-9 or DB-25 connector.

18.  After going through all of this, to say that I am simply "grouchy", as I type this, is being very polite, diplomatic, kind, and untruthful.

 

So, this being 2024....

 

A.  Is there some solution that will work without my having to spend hours setting up another system, installing whatever software, and possibly seeing it fail after 10 hours of setup work?

B.  I really don't want to have to spend weeks troubleshooting this so I can have a few decent hours of software development to get a board working.

C.  I really don't care if I have to edit a freaking configuration file with vi.  I don't care if it even has a GUI.  I simply want something that works.

D.  I would prefer to not have to move my development system onto something else just to test this out.  (See A, above.)

 

Any ideas?

 

I use RespeQT r5.4_RC3 under Windows 10 x86 and it does crash sometimes. You don't say what chip your SIO2PC adapters have, and are you using hardware CTS handshaking?

 

I do believe that RespeQT runs better on older machines as the laptop I use is a Pentium Core2 so quite slow these days, but normally works quite well. Could you maybe run RespeQT in a virtual machine to make it slower?

 

The SIO2PC FTDI adapter design in the attached document shows the correct connection for hardware handshaking and is the one I built. I also tried a Prolific adapter that also had CTS but handshaking did not work correctly.

 

SIO2PC_Build_Instructions.pdf

 

Have you tried the Super Archiver or Happy emulation on the disk image that you are working with? Happy is supposed to give PC compatibility I think. Sometimes it can help, but can also crash the drive emulator as you have experienced.

 

Would a Fujinet or S-Drive Max help this situation or are you editing on the PC and thus need the ATR file to be on the PC? In which case the Fujinet would be the answer if you ran a TNFS server on your Linux PC.

 

Incidentally, I think all postal services are going the same way and I sympathise.

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Can't help you with Linux. I've been using AspeQt and RespeQt with Windows 7 (64-bit) ever since AspeQt existed. Never had any issues/crashes. My SIO2PC USB was-self built using a USB to serial (FT232R Breakout) board from SparkFun. I've also used an AtariMax SIO2PC USB with APE and Prosytem for many years on Windows 7 (64-bit). Never had any issue with that either. In both cases, I don't recall any extensive configuration sessions: basically, just load the drivers, load the software, plug up and go.

 

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Hi @reifsnyderb,

 

I am sorry you are having issues with your setup. I am not sure if this will help, but I have been watching someone on YouTube work with a similar set up that you have with CPM on the Indus GT. He mentioned something about the flow control needs to be properly set or transfers will fail.

 

https://youtu.be/nf_PBTBOx4M?si=mMx2_Lw14O69ytnn

 

Start about 12:49. He also mentions about transferring files from the Atari to a CPM disk.

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3 hours ago, pcrow said:

I haven't used my physical Atari in a while, and when I did, I had an old original SIO2PC cable that I bought from Nick Kennedy. 

I still have my original built using Nick's instructions and still use it today, what I did was buy a dual RS232 card for

my Windows11 PC and without changes it works with Respeqt. I had a few different varieties of SIO2PC via USB

and could never get any of them to work consistently

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On a Raspbery Pi (model 1B) running Linux I've used sio2bsd, atariserver and more recently Fujinet-PC (this is all with a logic level shifter board between the SIO cable and the GPIO pins).

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Thanks, everyone, for all the input and ideas.

 

I was unable to install AspeQt by running the install.  However, I was able to download and compile the sources.

 

A test with a DOS 2.5 atr file shows that it appears to be working.  I was able to copy the setup.com file to s.com then run it.  So, it appears to be reading and writing.

 

 

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that is so strange, your linux install must really be locked down tight. Wonder if doing the same with RespeQT would solve it's issues, but maybe it's best to leave it be if you have something working now, we wouldn't want it to break.

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I've used an AtariMax SIO2PC USB adapter with their APE and ProSystem softwares, as well as a homemade SIO2USB cable I made using a DTech FTDI USB to TTL Serial 5V Adapter Cable that I ordered from Amazon, link below, using respeQt. I've used these with everything from Windows 7 through Windows 11, all 64-bit versions, and never had any trouble whatsoever. I'm not a Linux user and have zero experience with it, so I can't even hazard a guess as to what your issues may be, but I can confirm that these devices and softwares work fine with "modern" systems and OSes made within the last fifteen years, at least in general. I know I've heard of others using at least some of these with Linux and Mac systems, either natively, or through a Windows emulator, so I know it can be done, but again, I have no direct experience with it.

 

DTech FTDI USB to TTL Serial 5V Adapter Cable 6 Pin 0.1 inch Pitch Female Socket Header UART IC FT232RL Chip Windows 11 10 8 7 Linux MAC OS (6ft, Black)

 

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22 hours ago, reifsnyderb said:

Thanks, everyone, for all the input and ideas.

 

I was unable to install AspeQt by running the install.  However, I was able to download and compile the sources.

 

A test with a DOS 2.5 atr file shows that it appears to be working.  I was able to copy the setup.com file to s.com then run it.  So, it appears to be reading and writing.

 

 

If you have a Pi, the binary should just work on it.

 

Are you using this one?  https://lotharek.pl/productdetail.php?id=157

 

 

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