Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: Will-i-am on October 24, 2005, 05:59:15 PM
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Something I meant to ask awhile back... the scarcity of DD floppies for my tower led me to Staples where I bought a box of floppies on sale only to find that they were pre-formatted for PCs. Then I found that I could not unformat them, reformat them or otherwise make them Amiga formatted because Crossdos jumps in and treats them as PC floppies. Sooo since these bags of old Amiga disks are so beat up and unusable for the most part, what's a good way to get pre-formatted PC floppies to regroup as Amiga formatted floppies?
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Um, you can format them as Amiga disks.
Open System directory then double click the Format icon
It will list available devices (don't select the hard drive!)
Select df0: (not pc0:) then go!
Or, from cli type 'format df0: ffs noicons' - without the '
I think that's correct, it's been a while since I formatted from CLI. Is that right, guys?
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format drive df0: name MyNewAmigaFloppy ffs noicons
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I knew Thooms would know the answer!
What amazes me is that you could even FIND DD floppies!!!
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Wow - I found a load on a rubbsih tip the other day - all still in shrinkwrap!
you can format them from DOS on your peecee with:
(XP) : format a: /t:80 /n:9
I thank you.
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ummm things are a bit more complicated than I had originally thought. Now I find that the A4KD no longer recognizes ANY PC formatted disk. I've compared the system to the A2KD which does 'see' it and it looks like it's okay, except I'm comparing 3.1 OS to to 2.1 OS so I'm not sure about the various applicable files, but the same files sem to be in the same places. What am I forgetting about Crossdos? Curiously this POS Sony which gets me out into the web ALSO doesn't want to fomat a new DD floppy!! Says something is using drive A: when drive A: is obviously empty. Crap oh dear. Time to drop back ten and punt. I am begining to think using Winuae and just playing games might be more fun than trying to keep a collection of previously owned miggies running the way they should. Except I can't seem to let go of those off-white boxes. Maybe it's the genlocks, maybe it's the Toasters, but when they work I love 'em. Just wish they would reformat a PC disk when I ask them to. I'll get back to this later. Thanks for the various advices, didn't help much but the thought was there.
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What shows up on the workbench when you put the floppies in? DF0:???, DF0:BAD, or DF0:NDOS
It doesn't really matter but as long as one of the above is showing, the drive is recognizing the disk (unless you've installed something to keep unrecognizable disks from showing up on the workbench. For example, DOpus Magellan hides NDOS disks) You should still be able to format DF0: with the format command or menue item as described above.
What error message do you get when you try to use the format command from CLI?
Also remember that the A4000D has a high density drive. If the disk has the appropriate hole, AmigaOS will expect it to be high density. If you've formatted it as a double density disk with an A2000, you'll have to cover the hole with tape for the A4000 to recognize it.
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Hmmmm. I may have to think of a new nickname for this machine, something not-so-nice. Been arguing with it now for several hours, trying to find a good, undamaged PC formatted disk. Both HD and DD floppies show up on workbench as df0:??? and no icon PC0: at all. If I look at the DD floppy with Dopus it says "directory not available". From a shell I get nothin', zero, nada. System:devs/dosdrivers shows PC0: is in there. In system:L we find the crossdosfilesystem. What else am I missing? This is one of those machines I bought from a friend who got it at auction at Philips. They did some odd things to both machines, but I must have been able to read PC floppies at some point in the past because I had to move files over to the PC from the Amiga by sneakernet to get the Ami2PC program up and running. Corrupt file maybe? How do I find out? The A4K is running os 3.1. I'm going to go slowly mad if these machines don't start acting more like the Amiga I fell in love with... that cute little juggling robot, that saucy squirrel, Rocket Ranger launching toward a destiny unknown... sigh. One of the problems I'm having is the side effects of my pain meds: loss of short term memory. If I remember to write things down I forget where I put the paper! Take it from me, try not to crush your vertebrae: ten years later it just gets worse. Not whining, really just tired and frustrated. Okay, push the 'submit' button and move on...
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I use hd disks on my dd drive without problems. even can format it on the amiga side, but blocking the hole with cellotape.
On the other hand, on modern pcs with xp, you can't format to 720 or another mode among 1,44 because newer mobos don't implement these modes in their controllers.
If you have the money, go the catweasel route, you will regret it.
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@Will-i-am: could you please clarify what you actually want ? In your first post you say that you've got PC floppies which work well with CrossDOS but cannot be used as Amiga floppies. Now you say that those floppies don't work with CrossDOS which is what you want.
So what ? Do you want them to work with CrossDOS or not ? Do you want them to be formatted as Amiga floppies or not ? You can have only one. Each floppy can only be formatted either for PC (CrossDOS) or for Amiga. Not both.
If you see DF0:???? click it once and choose "format disk" from the menu. After that it is usable as Amiga floppy and not with CrossDOS.
If you see PC0:????, you can format it for PC making it unusable as Amiga disks.
If you don't see PC0:???? and this is you problem, open a shell window and enter
format drive PC0: name Empty noicons
If this command gives an error message, please quote it here. Also quote the output of the Assign command and the Info command (both entered without any arguments). And finally quote the error message which appears if you enter Dir pc0:
Bye,
Thomas
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IIRC you will not get PC0:???? on 3.1 (definitely not on 3.9)
PC0 autohides when a non-PC0 floppy is inserted.
Go into SYS:System and double click Format. You'll be able to select PC0. In the next window make sure all the boxes are unticked.
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_ThEcRoW wrote:
On the other hand, on modern pcs with xp, you can't format to 720 or another mode among 1,44 because newer mobos don't implement these modes in their controllers.
The limitation with 720Kb disks and PCs lies with Windows XP itself - these modes are still implemented by the motherboard hardware. From Windows XP, you can open a command prompt and type the following to format a 720Kb disk:
format a: /t:80 /n:9
If anyone here wants to push their PC disk controller to the max without having to buy additional hardware, it's worth taking a look at OmniFlop (http://www.shlock.co.uk/Utils/OmniFlop/OmniFlop.htm) as this will allow formatting, reading and writing of a variety of odd formats previously thought impossible to read using modern PC hardware.
If you have the money, go the catweasel route, you will regret it.
I think you may have meant that you will not regret it! In that case, I agree - if you're regularly swapping stuff between Amigas and PCs, the Catweasel makes life so much easier.
It's also worth looking at the ADF View shell extension (http://www.viksoe.dk/code/adfview.htm) for Windows XP as this'll let you manipulate the contents of standard ADF files from within the Windows XP desktop, without having to go through an emulator.
- Ali
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I have over 1000 new disks stored. Email me.
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Thomas, sorry I seem a bit confused. I wanted two things from this situation: consistancy- both machines have crossdos, as far as I can tell and only one can read pc disks. I would like to figure out how to make both of them do the same thing. I am limited by the fact that I haven't got a cross dos install in this pile of floppies scattered around the room, so set up is hard. Both machines appear to be set up the same, except for the os. Secondly- the thing that started this thread(for me anyway) was that I had tried in the past to format a disk on my amiga which turned out to be a pc formatted disk. My machine (tried) to format it as a pc disk using crossdos(apparently).When I bought a box of floppies at Staples they turned out to be all preformatted as pc disks and there was apparently no place to buy the old fashioned non-formatted DD disks. I know how to use the various ways to format an amiga disk (shell, menus etc) but each time I tried the machine would try to format it as a pc disk, and that format job didn't work out well because when it was done no machine could read the disk, including this Sony Vaio I am using as we speak. None of my machines (Amiga) can get to the internet in spite of a couple of years of trying, bringing in various hackers and geeks and dweebs and other euphamisms for knowlegeable people, including asking questions here... so the floppy is an important means of getting files from the web into my colection of amigas. Most of my amiga floppies have been used at least once, are ancient by floppy standards and several have back blocks etc. So I wanted to have a consistant supply of floppies that I could use as amiga formatted disks. Once I am able to create a networked group of machines this won't be such an issue, but for now sneakernet is my only way to move files around between the 5 amigas I own. Is that clear enough to figure out my problem? It's a stew of issues.... hope this clears things up, and hope someone can give me a solution. Thanks for your time!!
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It could be that FDD hasn't got RDY signal. CrossDOS seems to require it like NDOS games and XCOPY..
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My machine (tried) to format it as a pc disk using crossdos(apparently).
Well, it did what you told it to do. If you format the disk in drive PC0, it will become a PC disk and if you format the disk in drive DF0, it will become an Amiga disk. Funny thing is that both logical drives PC0 and DF0 point to the same physical drive.
When I bought a box of floppies at Staples they turned out to be all preformatted as pc disks and there was apparently no place to buy the old fashioned non-formatted DD disks.
As long as I can think back all new floppies were pre-formatted as PC disks. DD with 720K and HD with 1440K. As told above, it's easy to format them as Amiga disks, just use DF0 and not PC0.
both machines have crossdos, as far as I can tell and only one can read pc disks. I would like to figure out how to make both of them do the same thing. I am limited by the fact that I haven't got a cross dos install in this pile of floppies scattered around the room, so set up is hard
I doubt that you ever had a CrossDOS install disk unless you bought one for a lot of money. CrossDOS usually came with Workench and its files are spread over several disks (Workbench, Storage and Extras IIRC).
Basically you need three files:
1. Devs/DosDrivers PC0
This is a text file telling AmigaDOS which drivers to use with unit. First click its icon once and choose Icon/Information from the menu. Check if tooltypes exist. If so, write them down and then delete them. Now open the file in your favourite text editor. Check that the following lines are present:
Fileystem = L:CrossDOSFilesystem
Device = mfm.device
Unit = 0
Activate = 1 or Mount = 1
If one of them was among the tooltypes add them here. Save changes and exit the editor.
Now check that CrossDOSFileSystem is in L: and mfm.device is in Devs:.
In order to avoid confusion you should move PC0 from Devs/DosDrivers to Storage/DosDrivers and reboot. If you need PC0, you can temporarily activate it by a double click.
If it does not work, run SnoopDOS before you double click PC0.
As I told earlier, please post the ouput of Assign and Info with PC0 mounted and a floppy disk in the drive.
Edit: I started with 1. so I should continue with 2. and 3. Please assume that L:CrossDosFileSystem is 2. and Devs:mfm.device is 3. :-)
Bye,
Thomas
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Interestingly, there was a program for reading PC diskettes that allowed you to access them BOTH as DF0: AND MD0: (IIRC)
it was great and IMHO better than crossdos especially because it worked fine with KS1.3.
think its name is messydos
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I'm not sure if this has been mentioned already (I don't remember reading it).
If they are HDs then you'll need to put a bit of sellotape over the small hole on the opposite side of the label of the write protection hole.
The PCs should then be able to read it as a DD disk instead of a HD. The Amiga can usually read them because they don't have the HD sensor pin thingy. PCs do.
I know it's a simple thing, but they can easily be forgotten :-)
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orange wrote:
Interestingly, there was a program for reading PC diskettes that allowed you to access them BOTH as DF0: AND MD0: (IIRC)
it was great and IMHO better than crossdos especially because it worked fine with KS1.3.
think its name is messydos
I vaguely remember MessyDOS, but XFS (http://main.aminet.net/package.php?package=disk/misc/xfs.lha) does a better job than either that or CrossDOS, plus it works on KS1.3, 2.x and 3.x and allows long filenames on FAT-formatted disks.
- Ali