FASTEST,EAYSIEST,CHEAPEST WAY TO TRANSFER ADF IMAGES BETWEEN PC AND AMIGA(mostly 500)

[ikonsgr]

[UPDATE] I've just received feedback for using the kit with AMIGA 500+ : Transfer times are reduced ~50% against AMIGA 500! You can copy an adf image to the disk in just 75 seconds!!
(Finally found something that ECS chipset along with kickstart 2.0 made a REAL difference from OCS kick 1.3:  I/O ports work faster! )

If you happen to have a "humble" Amiga 500 or 500+ like myself ,without any  "serious" addons (except maybe from an extra 512k ram and a 2nd  floppy...)  you would probably tempted many  times by the numerous games  that are widely availiable today, in the  form of adf images,and how  you could enjoy them on your beloved Amiga. Or  perhaps, you have some  programs or games (even saved games...)  that you'd like to transfer them as adf images and use them with winuae  or just take adf backups!
Up untill now, the options we have where:
1) Use a serial cable and some porgram like amiga explorer which is very cheap and rather easy procedure, but,unfortunately the poor 68000/7.16Mhz   of an A500 can't give you nothing faster than 19.2kbps transfer rate   e.g. at least 8 MINUTES to transfer one adf image!!!
2)Use some floppy emu with sd card.Again,this "solution" is rather   expensive (~90euro),and it doesn't give you any  noticeable speed  improvement,as the use of a fast sd card might suggest,the speed of  amiga accessing adf images on sd card, is more or less of a classic  floppy disk drive.
3)Use a CATWEASEL MK4 PLUS PCI card .Of  course this card can do much more than transfer adf files to amiga  disks, and for that, it's rather expensive too (~120euro including  postage)

Having to face this situation, i decided to try and "fill the gap"  between the cheap but slow serial transfer "solution", and the  fast but  expensive floppy emu or catweasel pci card alternative. After a lot of  searching,testing and programming, i've come up with a "solution" that ,  not only combines the cheap cost of the serial cable with MUCH more  transfer speed,but also, is SUPER easy and simple to do it!


FIRST THE "INGRIDIENTS" for the..."recipe":

1) An amiga 500 and it's psu   .Frankly you wont be needing ANYTHING else for the procedure,not even a   monitor or tv connected to your amiga !(extremely usefull if there is a   realtive big distance between your amiga and pc or if you dont have   enough space for the monitor near your pc)
2) A PC running windows (XP,VISTA,7 32bit or 64bit) equiped with a parallel port. .Dont  worry if your motherboard doesn't have any parallel port, you can find  countless  pci/pcie parallel cards on ebay, almost for nothing, (i  bought mine for less than 3euros... )
3) A special kit i make, where you can find it here:http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AMIGA-PC-A...item1c293ad68c    .For ~10pounds (including postage), you will get a special custom  made  parallel cable and 1 amiga boot disk. (bellow i give you all the   neccesary info to try and make it yourself too! )
4) Many amiga formated 3.5" disks to transfer your beloved games adf images!

Also you will need one of these: http://sdrv.ms/M6Xe6g  . Download the apropriate file according to your windows version  (adf_transfer_32 for 32bit windows and adf_transfer_64 for 64bit  windows) and uncompress it anywhere in your hard disk.

Now for the "cooking":

FOR TRANSFERING ADF IMAGES FROM THE PC TO AMIGA 500:

1) Connect amiga and pc with the cable (beware to plug the right end on each side,if you put it either way it will not work!)
2) Power on your amiga
3) Insert the boot disk of the kit, and wait untill floppy led turns off
4) Insert the first empty amiga disk.  
5) Go to the uncompressed folder and Run adf_transfer.exe. (on windows vista/7 you must "run as administrator")
6) Press "open file" button and select the adf image you want to transfer
7) Press "transfer" button.
8 )On the cli window that will appear on you screen of your pc, you watch the procedure of the transfer.For an adf image it will take about 1 minute and 50seconds!! (compare it with the at least 8minutes you need using a serial cable for the transfer using an amiga 500...)
9)After the transfer is completed,insert another empty amiga disk to your A500 drive
10)Goto step 6)

FOR TRANSFERING DISKS FROM AMIGA 500 TO ADF IMAGES ON YOUR PC:

-For 32bit version of the program ONLY: Install the special dosbox  megabuild release, found in the  uncompressed folder.USE THE DEAFULT  INSTALL DIRECTORY (otherwise  amiga->pc transfer will not work)
1) Connect amiga and pc with the cable (beware to plug the right end on each side,if you put it either way it will not work!)
2) Power on your amiga
3) Insert the boot disk of the kit, and wait untill floppy led turns   off.Press and then .Wait untill floppy led   turns off.
4) Insert the first amiga disk you want to transfer.  
5) Go to the uncompressed folder and Run adf_transfer.exe.Select  direction "AMIGA-->PC" (on windows vista/7 you must "run as  administrator")
6) Press "transfer" button.
7) After the transfer is completed,you will have a newly created adf   image in the folder of the adf_transfer programm.insert another amiga   disk you want to transfer, to your A500 drive.
8 ) Goto step 6)

The above procedures can be used on any amiga model, (500,500+,600,1200,2000 etc) but i believe, it would prove especially usefull on older 500/500+ models which lacks the Ide connector and pcmcia card slot that newer models (600,1200) has, and so they can't provide any easy and cheap alternative to access adf images or transfer files from/to a PC.Also nowadays , any addon accelerator cards,addon memmories or scsi hd's for 500/500+ models are rather expensive and difficult to find!
Finally, the speed improvement against serial transfer is MUCH bigger on amiga 500/500+ :

ON AMIGA 500: ABOUT 430% THE SPEED OF THE FASTEST SERIAL TRANSFER (max 19200bps)
ON AMIGA 500+/600:ABOUT 220% THE SPEED OF THE FASTEST SERIAL TRANSFER (max 38400bps)
ON AMIGA 1200: ABOUT 150% THE SPEED OF THE FASTEST SERIAL TRANSFER (max~56000bps)

  Using xcopy (perhaps the best disk utility on amiga) needs  about  1minute and 40 seconds to copy an entire disk,which is roughly the  same  time you need to transfer the adf image from your pc to amiga  disk,  using an amiga 500!
As you can see, the hole step procedure is so plain and simple that,if   you follow exactly the steps above, you can transfer many disks in a   row, without even having a monitor connected to your amiga!

Now, if you are more of a "do it your self" guy, you can try and make the special parallel calble yourself:

You wil need 2X 25pin D male connectors and make the cable (using a   multistrand cable with at least 10 inner cables) according to this:

    =============================================
      AMIGA SIDE |       Pins        |  PC SIDE
    ----------------------------------------------
     Data bit 0  |     2 <---> 2     | Data bit 0
     Data bit 1  |     3 <---> 3     | Data bit 1
     Data bit 2  |     4 <---> 4     | Data bit 2
     Data bit 3  |     5 <---> 5     | Data bit 3
     Data bit 4  |     6 <---> 6     | Data bit 4
     Data bit 5  |     7 <---> 7     | Data bit 5
     Data bit 6  |     8 <---> 8     | Data bit 6
     Data bit 7  |     9 <---> 9     | Data bit 7
     Busy             | 11 <---> 11    | Busy
     Paper Out|    12 <---> 1     | Strobe
     Ground   |    25 <---> 25    | Ground
    ==============================================

Also you must take the file "paradise" which is in the folder "TOAMIGA"   (inside the "adf_transfer" folder that you previous download),transfer   it to an amiga disk and execute it in wb's amiga shell.For more   information read the included paradise.doc.
I hope this new method of fast,easy and cheap adf transfer would make  many of you to get your old amiga's  out of the closets and trunks , and enjoy once again your beloved programs and games you want!


*some usefull notes:

1)Always turn off amiga and pc before connecting parallel cable.
2) On the amiga-->pc transfers you may notice that sometimes pc and   amiga can't start the connection.In that case press and   on amiga and "transfer" button on pc program.
3) I have succesfully test the kit with the program using an amiga 500  and 2 pc's:a rather old athlon xp with on board parallel port running  windows xp/7 32bit, and a modern quad core amd fx pc equiped with a   parallel port on a pci card, running windows xp/32bit and windows  7/64bit.
4) All programs that are used in the transfer proccess (including my adf_transfer gui utility) are freeware.
5) Some "teaser": Check out the attached photo of the program, "on  duty". Notice that  having transfered ~25% of the adf file to disk,the  ramaining time  expected, is less than 85seconds!!

[ikonsgr]

Well my friend,
   IF i had a big collection of home micros and wanted to see many many games on my amiga (that would require 100's of disks), then i agree that a floppy emu (or even the more expensive a katweasel pci card) would be more apropriate and surely worth the money for it! ;-)
In my case (and maybe of others too) i initilally only wanted to play some  15-20 favorite games that would require some 10's of disks (btw, you can still find very cheap new HD 3.5" disks and with a 20sec format using xcopy will be "ready to use"  ;-) ) . Now, i don't know about you, but personally, i wouldn't spend ANYTHING more than a 20euro bill (at most) to do that!
Using the kit, i made the disks in a couple of hours! After a few months,maybe i will need again to transfer some other 10-15 games,which will be very easy to do it using the same procedure!
 And to tell you the truth,I REALLY enjoy the hole procedure, having my pc and amiga connnected like this, gave me a little of this sweet old school "do it your self" hobyist feeling, that surely characterize "amiga spirit" ;-)

[ikonsgr]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and concerns about this project!
Allow me to express a couple of thoughts too:

Sure,  using Winuae or AF on a modern PC or MAC, you can run and play all the  (nowadays easily availiable on adf images) games and programs very  easily. You can even emulate amiga models that you never owned!
I  also know that many people who lived the amiga era, being in the  "proper" age (teen to late 20's) back then, are begining to have "aging"  symptoms  : They seem to have lost this "do it yourself", hobbyst attitude i told  you before, which i think is also required if you want to use the method i propose you here.Unfortunately, making a familly,the daily routine and obligations, finally  make this attitude seems a little bit of a "luxury that i dont have  anymore", for many of us.So we end up in just wanting to relive, as easy as possible, every now and then, some memmories  and "amiga magic" through emulation on our modern monster PC's or even  using a floppy emu instead of the "crappy,old,tedious" 3.5" disks....
All these are very nice and good and easy but....
IT'S NOT THE SAME!
Call me crazy,pervert or even mazochist but for me, the ONLY way to relive the ORIGINAL feeling and emotions we had some 20-25 years ago, is USING A REAL AMIGA WITH REAL 3.5" DISKS!
It's like a kind of "sacred ritual":
Power  on your amiga, hear the constant kicking  of the drive's head every  couple of seconds, "demanding" for a disk. Then you take in your hand a disk, inserting it in the drive,  hearing the characteristic locking  sound, and  then you just sit and "enjoy" the... reading "music" of the drive's  humming and grumbling!:)  Judging of my personal experience i can tell you that even the tedious disk exchange (if the game is more than a couple of disks) ,in some twisted way, can add to that "real amiga feeling"! (Of course i'm not talking about some 8,9,10,11 disk game, this would be really a NIGTHMARE if you dont have an hdd installed anyway! 2nd or 3rd floppy doesnt do any good either, because of the endless pauses and waiting times that constant disk reading required...)
Bottom line:

"Real man do it on silicon using 3.5" disks" :laugh1::rolleyes:

In the end,i truly believe that, what method someone would cosider as "best" for reliving "amiga magic" (emulation,floppy emu,cable transfer etc), has really nothing to do about money!
It's just a matter of still having this oldschool, "do it yourself", hobbist attitude or not, the essence of TRUE AMIGA SPIRIT!  

And  i know that even the oldest and more tired of us ,who maybe have lost this attitude (i'm in my late 30's  and unmarried so i supose that's why i'm still not feeling so "tired" ), will agree to that!

[ikonsgr]

If my PC had a parallel port, I'd give this a shot.
I could never get Amiga Explorer to connect.

Then why dont you try something like this?
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/170848137777?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649
Ebay has TONS of these cards, and they cost almost nothing!
This particular pci card, is the one i use on my modern pc (which of course doesnt have any parallel port onboard) and works perfect, both on windows xp and windows 7 64bit!
It's really a unique experience to watch a 1987 16bit amiga 500 and  a modern monster pc running windows 7 64bit ,siting side by side and exchanging data, like "brothers"!

[ikonsgr]

In now offer  TWO VERSIONS of  the adf transfer kit:One with the cable and amiga boot disk and one  which also includes a pci parallel card for all of you that you dont  have a pc with parallel port onboard!

[ikonsgr]

Or how about this?  http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/USB-to-PRINTER-DB25-Parallel-Port-Cable-Adapter-25-Pin-parallel-printers-/290635789061?pt=UK_Computing_USB_Cables&hash=item43ab3e3305

Well i'm not sure this would work.The paradise utility which actually make the transfers,use the parallel port at a very "low" level (uses registers and parallel port directly and not through OS) ,so it needs a REAL parallel port.
PCI parallel cards have a real IEEE 1284 parallel port chip on board, so they create a real parallel port in your pc. This is a very different thing from having a usb adapter that "mimics" a parallel port through driver's emulation! The only way this adapter could work is if it has a real 1284 chip inside it ,like the pci card!
Anyway, any of you could give it a try and tell us if it works with usb to parallel adapter too (actually i might bought one too, and try it:) )!
For the moment, pci parallel cards are VERY cheap (check the price difference of the 2 versions of the my adf transfer kit and you'll know what i mean... ) and works 100% perfect on any windows OS!

Thanks!  I've been struggling for a while  with an idea how to get .adf's onto my Amiga 500, and was sort of  resigned to having to upgrade the memory on it (enough to hold a  complete .adf file), and then getting a serial cable, a USB->serial  adapter for my PC, waiting for the slow serial transfer, etc.  Your kit  sure makes this easier though, heck, I couldn't make my own cable for  the low price you're charging, LOL.  ;-)
Just ordered it off your ebay site, looking forward to trying it out!  

I was EXACTLY at your place about 1 year ago!:laugh1:
 I first made this kit for my personal need, and then i thought, "if it helped me so much,  maybe there are many out there who might needed too"!
So, i made this presentation of the project primarily for EVERYONE to use it FREELY, by giving instructions on how to make the cable and share any extra needed software i made, for free. Of course i make and sell the kit too, for anyone that don't have time,skills  etc to make it by himself. BUT,  as you already mention, price is so low, that even if you can do it yourself, you might still want to buy it "ready made" from me!
As there are many people nowadays, who sees the amiga community as only a "big wallet" for overpriced exploitation, fortunately  there are still some, who still want to PRIMARILY offer and help the community.
And these are the ones that still have the "TRUE AMIGA SPIRIT" inside them! I want to think myself as a small contributor to this "spirit" too! :rolleyes:
Thanks for your support!

[ikonsgr]

Well, you don't need any extra memory using this transfer method with parallel port ,either!
The amiga program only buffers 4 tracks( e.g. 44kb) at a time,add another 25kb for the program itself and maybe some 10-20kb for a couple of extra commands, so i believe it's very possible this method could even work on Amiga 1000  with only 256kb!
I agree the serial transfer is cheap and easy solution especially because usb2serial adapters work just fine with laptop , but ,man, having spent MANY,MANY hours to transfer ~100disks with serial cable in the past (just imagine... ~8minutes for EVERY disk!!!:eek: ) i really CANT describe you the feeling i had, the first time i transfer an adf image to a disk using a plain 512kb A500 in just 1min and 50seconds! :hammer:

[ikonsgr]

I've just updated the adf transfer program.
I got feedback from a couple of friends that use the kit on a pc with 2  parallel ports, so i've added a list box with all the available port  addresses to choose. You can download the new version from the same place.

[ikonsgr]

Awesome, love software updates!  

BTW, I still need to leave you positive feedback on Ebay!  I got my kit a couple weeks ago and have used it successfully now to make about a dozen disks.  My first problem was (as you suggested in your response to me on Ebay) that I needed to right-click on the application and run it as administrator.  I assumed since my account is already admin that I didn't need to do that.  Once done, however, it's working great!

Also I've discovered that many of my old 3.5" disks are bad, it seems like sometimes when the utility hits a bad disk the only way to get it running again is to restart the program on my PC and reboot the Amiga.  I tried hitting various combinations of Esc and Enter, to no avail.  Don't have a monitor hooked up to my Amiga when I'm doing this (have to drag it over next to my PC), so no idea if it's prompting me with any kind of error message on the screen.  :-/

But, 20+ year old disks aside, it works great, thanks!  

I did let you feedback when you gave me yours, but for some reason ebay didn't inserted! Anyway i gave you feedback yesterday! Thanks again for your support!
Now, about the usage of the program, if you read the paradise manual you will understand why you have these small annoyances but i will try to explain it also here:
For transferring amiga disks to pc, i use a small batch file on boot disk ,which restarts the program (which of course is loaded to the ram drive) every time a disk is transferred, and if it stacks, you can press esc+enter to restart it again.So, for amiga->pc transfers, boot disk needs initially about 25-30 seconds,but after that, no rebooting is needed what ever happens!
For opposite transfers ( from pc to amiga ) i choose a different approach:i use the parameter "-stay" on amiga side of the program, in order to make multiple disk transfers in a row without even pushing a button on amiga! The "drawback" for this,is that if an error occurs (usually a bad disk as you noted) you must restart amiga with the boot disk to continue the transfers. But if you noticed, booting time for pc->amiga transfers only takes about 10seconds instead of 25-30! ;-)
Now,why i make the program function like this, you may ask? Because after many hours of usage, i noticed that program hangs or stacks (for any reason) rather often on amiga->pc transfers, so it would be rather annoying having to reboot and wait for 10 seconds every 2-3 disks!
On the other side, pc->amiga transfers is much more stable (provide that disks you are using are not bad of course) and after all, rebooting only takes ~10seconds! Of course i could make the program to behave the same like on amiga->pc transfers  but then, you should wait for boot disk to load the first time for 25-30secs instead of 10 (did i told you i'm inpatient? :-) )!
Anyway, if you know a little about amiga's batch files and read the paradise manual you can modify boot disk to make it behave as you like! Don't forget also, that paradise is very powerful, it gives you the  ability to transfer stand alone files or even hole directories instead of adf images only! For this you must use amiga shell and windows cli of course.
But i believe that 99% of people want to transfer adf images to amiga disks and try them on the "real thing", right?
That's why i make the hole procedure so simple,fast and automated that not even a monitor connected to your amiga is needed! (btw ,this is how i use the kit too no amiga monitor connected! :-) ).

[ikonsgr]

Side question, what is the possibility of making a longer cable?  Don't recall offhand the cable length limitations of a parallel port.  Do you think if I just threw a regular parallel port extension cable off newegg in-line with your adapter it would work, since the swapping of the wire pairs would already be taking place inside your custom cable?

My Amiga setup is about 20' from my PC, any closer and my PC would get jealous, LOL.  :p

There are 2 reasons for making the cable about 1.5-1,6meters long:

1) This way you insure that no problem with data transfer will occur.
2) Weight of package. If i make cable even a little longer, postage would cost ~1.5euro more.

I have made a ~2,5 meter that seems to work right, but the longer the cable the more often you might get transfer problems.
To "solve" this problem, you can use either a thicker cable (to minimize cable impedances) or even  individual screening  cable (if you can find one with at least 10 strands of course). Of course these cables are rather expensive and also much more time and effort would required to make the cable.
Anyway, you can try to use a parallel cable extension,but i cant guarantee you it would work!:rolleyes:

[ikonsgr]

Another minor update:
I received some messages from people trying to use the 64bit version of the program, complaining about an error message of "can't find dosbox-svn-daum.conf file".
This will mostly happen if the dosbox configuration file is "Read only", which usually happens when the hole adf transfer folder is "read only".
So i update the 64bit version of the program, to automatically "uncheck" the read only attribute of dosbox.conf, and eliminate this nuisance!

Also with the new versions, you can try the program on windows 8 too!

[ikonsgr]

AmigaBruno, i'm sorry to hear that you have these problems, but since you already made a lot of successful transfers, i don't think that the problems you encounter can possibly caused by  the cable or software.
After what you told us, i've update the ebay listing putting the warning note i already had  (about having both pc and amiga turned off before connecting cable) to a  much more visible place,and adding never to unplug cable when amiga is  turned on, just to be "on safe side"!
Now about the holding screws,maybe you are right that i should put them too, but i assume there was no need to put these, as in most cases, someone will have  the cable connected only when he make transfers, so  screwing/unscrewing  on both ends,every time he needs to make some transfers, (screwing only on amiga side,doesn't prevent  the possibility of unplugging on pc side, so both connectors need to be screwed),  is a rather tedious task that no one would do!
Moreover, the 25pin Dsub connector fits very tight on both amigas and pc parallel ports i've tested, so i never thought this would happen to anyone.
I really hope that parallel port is not damaged, although i believe that damage will possibly be made in the "opposite" case of yours, e.g. connecting the parallel cable while BOTH pc and amiga are turned on (although i personally, unplug/plug cable many times when only amiga is off and everything seems to works fine!).

p.s. Since you bought the kit with the pci parallel card, try to use it too, and see if it works. Drivers can be found here . The specific pci card has been tested with my pc and works perfect!

[ikonsgr]

That's very nice, but what was the cost to be able to do this? :rolleyes:
Judging from the machines you have in your signature, i guess the... "bill" was pretty large, right?

[ikonsgr]

Changing the pci slot is a good practice to solve an irq conflict on old motherboards.
Also, old bios usually offer 2 or 3 alternative settings for the on board parallel port. If i remember correctly something like 378h or 278h. The default usually is 378h, try to change this with bios and see if this resolves the conflict.

[ikonsgr]

So everything concludes to the "classic": RTFM! (Read the @#$@ manual!) :lol:
 
Anyway, as i note on the presentations of adf transfer kit (and ebay listings too), paradise utility can do MUCH more than transferring adf images. I decided to use it for adf image transfer only, as this is what most amiga users want, but most important,by doing this, i manage to automate the hole procedure to be as easy and simple as possible!
As paradise it's a very old cli utility on both amiga and pc it has some "oddities" and also ,in some cases, even the creator of paradise doesn't now how the util behaves with specific hardware configs.For example i recently found out that if you have a second floppy drive it's better to disable it because sometimes paradise seems to "hung up"! Also if i'm not mistaken somewhere in the paradise manual noted that author of the program doesn't know if it works with external drive at all!

 Reading AmigaBruno's experiences, i  sum up the following conclusions:

1) Eventually, it turns out that unplugging the cable while amiga is turned on, doesn't cause any problem to amiga's  parallel port (nevertheless ,all cables i make from early april, have the secure screws for anyone want to use them)
2) Paradise can indeed make transfers on external drives or hard disks too
3) For manual using paradise (e.g. for transferring files/directories or transfer from Amiga HD) it;s VERY important to follow exactly the order of procedures.

AmigaBruno you can correct me if i'm wrong on the above conclusions or you can add more if you want.
Also, i think it would be a great idea to present all your findings in a  "Troubleshooting/faq guide for adf transfer and paradise"  in a new thread or adding them in the first post of this thread.

I also want to thank you for sharing your experiences, as i'm sure they will be very helpful to Amiga community!