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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Software Issues and Discussion => Topic started by: BGary335 on September 28, 2007, 06:08:15 PM
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OK, I am using an A500 without a hard drive, but two floppy drives. I am trying to put ADF files on Amiga floppies. The method I've tried is to compress the ADF into an LHA, put the LHA on floppy, transfer the LHA from the PC floppy to an Amiga floppy on the Amiga side, then use LHA to extract the ADF onto another blank Amiga floppy. The problem I've run into is that every ADF file I've tried to extract this way comes out to 901KB, obvioulsy too large for a double density floppy. My question is, is there a method for getting ADF's onto floppies without a hard drive?
Any help would be appreciated!
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if u have more as 1 meg ram u can load the adf into ram
then put it on disk
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If you don't have a memory expansion, you could do it in a more cumbersome way.
Pack the ADF file with DMS (in UAE). It can be packed into two parts (see DMS helptext). Each of the DMS files stores half of the original floppy's blocks.
You can then copy the two DMS files individually onto floppies and extract them both to an Amiga floppy.
It's time consuming and boring, but it works with a vanilla A500 and 720K floppies.
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if u have a seperate floppy drive u can load the adf from there to df0:
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@amazing:
I tried that method, but the size of the ADF comes out to 901KB, which is too big for a floppy.
@madsjm:
I have the 512KB expansion card, so I suppose that would give me the necessary amount of RAM. If not, then I'll try the method you described-it may be cumbersome, but at least it'll get the job done!
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hi
i tested it for u
i readed a random disk..and put outs 901.120 kb
then i writed it back on a other floppy..
then i tested the floppy and it works
so it should work on your end too?
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o i did this on my a1200
i go try it on my a500 for u
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But ow can it write all of a 901KB file to a floppy? They only hold 834KB when formatted. I have my A500 extracting an ADF from a LHA archive at this moment. Its extracting directly to a floppy, and the process, I'm almost sure, will fail because the file is too big.
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i think adf blitzer read 82 track of what i remember
some protected games where 82 tracks too
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i readed your problem...on aminet
http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/adfblitzer
os2+ and 1mb will not be enough
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901.120/1024=880. So the 901.120 number is correct!
People forget that 1000!=1024...
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That still doesn't solve anything because my floppy ahs only 834KB of space when formatted. So even an 880KB will not fit.
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try this program http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/adf2disk11
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Posting more and more ADF to disk utilities won't change the fact that the ADF doesn't fit on the disk.
You have no choice but to put the ADF in RAM and write it back from there, or use the split DMS method above. Secret Hidden Option 3 is to use a Catweasel and write the images on a PC (but probably won't work if the disk is non-DOS).
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moto
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well as u readed adfblitzer wont run in kick 1.3
u need 2+ and more as 1mb ram
maybe when he uses a different proggie he can use 2drives?
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->amazing; I don't think you comprehend the problem that BGary has - he has the ADF file on a PC and needs to put it onto his Amiga (with no hard drive) to write to a floppy. The ADF file is bigger than the space available on a PC formatted floppy.
BGary,
You may be able to use some type of split/join or ZIP (Zipping into two parts) commands. IIRC I used to have to do this but I cannot think of the actual utilities at the moment. A search of Aminet should find something.
UPDATE: just checked, there are some relatively new split/join utilities on Aminet that are multiplatform and should do the trick - if you have enough room in RAM to rejoin them and then run the ADF program. That may be your next hurdle.
Pete :-)
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When a floppy has less than 880kb left then there are damaged sectors on the disk that were labeled unusable while formatting.
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i recommend him to buy a a1200 :P
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@amazing
Got $300US?
@everyone else
The RAM seems to be my trouble right now. Here's what's going on: on the motherboard, it says 512K/1M, so I would imagine that I have no less than 512K. Then I have a 512K expansion card, which SHOULD give me a total of 1024K. But when I try to put an ADF file in RAM it tells me that the RAM drive is full before the operation completes. I don't get it.
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Yes, the RAM drive will run out of room because the system itself is using a certain amount of memory due to processes run at bootup. I am not completely familiar with running a 1 MB machine (it has been a while) but I seem to recall that there are some tutorials out there that outline how to create a very memory light boot disk. Once you get that then you will probably have to use a command line version of the ADF-to-floppy program, as any sort of GUI interface will use memory. Hopefully some of the others may point you in the direction of where to find the info on creating the 'light' boot disk - I'm thinking it may be a simple as making a copy of the WB floppy and then editing the startup sequence and user-startup files.
Pete :-)
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Anyone know anything about what Pete is talking about?
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Forget about ADF. If you're copying disk images to 720K PC floppies, use DMS. ADF is not a compressed format, but DMS is.
If you have 1 MB ram, you should be able to compress the ADF to DMS in Windows/UAE and copy it to a 720K PC floppy. Then you copy the DMS file to RAM: on the Amiga and unpack it to DF1:
I did this a lot on my A500. And if the DMS file for some reason is bigger than 720K, you can split it like I described.
BTW: Someone mentioned the Catweasel. Catweasel MK4 can read/write non-dos formats like games, trackload demos etc.
The new drivers and image tool work great! Whatever you've heard about poor drivers and lack of support for the Catweasel in the past (I've been one of the guys complaining), it's time to give it a try! It's simply an amazing piece of hardware. :-)
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Alright, I want to try DMS. I'm not too familiar with UAE though. Can someone give me a rundown of what I need to do?
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Another option, as above, is to compress the ADF with GZip to make an ADZ file. You need to make sure the program you're using to unpack/write the ADF to disk can support this though. (I use Codetapper's diskwiz). (Diskwiz can also write zipped files, although I haven't tried it out.)
An alternative is to use AmigaExplorer and a null modem cable to transfer the files from your PC directly to the Amiga's floppy.
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I second adolescent.
The best way to transfer an ADF image from the peecee to the Amiga is Amiga Explorer, from Cloanto.
And this is a cheap program, BTW.
Look at Amiga Explorer Home Page (http://www.amigaforever.com/ae/):rtfm:
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As I've said before, I haven't a null modem cable, so that option isn't viable at this time.
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BGary335 wrote:
Alright, I want to try DMS. I'm not too familiar with UAE though. Can someone give me a rundown of what I need to do?
- Download WinUAE from http://www.winuae.net/ (http://www.winuae.net/)
- Download DMS from http://aminet.net/util/arc/dms111.run (http://aminet.net/util/arc/dms111.run)
- Download kickstart rom, kick31.zip (buy it from Cloanto or Google it)
- Make a directory somewhere on your drive (e.g. c:\dh0) and put the dms111.run file there.
- Unpack the kick31.zip to somewhere
- Start WinUAE
- Change the following options:
* ROM: Main ROM file: (open the kick31.rom you unpacked)
* Hard drives: Add Directory or Archive:
Device name: dh0
Volume label: dh0
Path: c:\dh0
Read/Write (check)
(click OK)
- Click start
- In AmigaDOS, type dms111.run
- Click F12 key
- Change the following options:
* Floppy drives: DF0: (Click the button which says ... and find your adf)
- Click Open, and then OK, and you should be back into AmigaDOS
- Type "dms read name.dms" (without the quotes), where name.dms is the name of your dms file.
- Press the Return key
- You should now have a name.dms in c:\dh0 which you can copy to a 720K floppy and unpack on the Amiga.
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BGary335 wrote:
Anyone know anything about what Pete is talking about?
The RAM disk is a portion of the memory in your Amiga. So it is made up of some of the 1024k of RAM you have installed.
If you boot your Amiga to Workbench, the things that Workbench loads (icons, the interface etc etc) will eat in to your RAM and reduce the amount available to the RAM disk.
So Pete's suggestion is to boot with as little as possible running - ideally just a CLI prompt - so that as little RAM as possible is used up, thus allowing you to use more for the RAM disk.
Using DMS might not work very well if your ADFs are copy protected or Non-DOS, as I'm not sure whether DMS can image these disks. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.
Also, AFAIK you CAN use Amiga Explorer over a NULL modem cable. It will be a bit slow, but it will work.
[EDIT]
Null Modem cable in Amiga Explorer (http://www.amigaforever.com/kb/3-105.html)
[/EDIT]
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moto
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motorollin wrote:
Using DMS might not work very well if your ADFs are copy protected or Non-DOS, as I'm not sure whether DMS can image these disks. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.
This is wrong, at least about non-dos ADFs/floppies. And ADFs are never copy protected.
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Fair enough - thanks for the correction.
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moto
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Let me clarify-I know WHAT Pete was suggesting, but I'm not sure how to go about doing that-and neither did he it seems. What I need to find out is just how to make such a boot disk.
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What version of Workbench are you using?
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moto
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long time ago I used unDMS+PC2Amiga to write adf to A500.
it was the only way.
I had to softkick KS2.04 first for pc2amiga to work.
memory was looow so unDMS had to be used instead of DMS.
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BGary,
I have been thinking about that a bit. I would copy a normal boot disk and then begin to REM out commands like ADDBUFFERS, RESIDENT and maybe try and not load workbench - you will have to do all the actions from the shell/cli. A basic workbench shouldn't have too much extra stuff on it. By not loading workbench you will probably save the most amount of RAM. Try booting without the "C:Copy >NIL: ENVARC: RAM:ENV ALL NOREQ" or similar command, but you might have to alter the assignment to this "ASSIGN >NIL: ENV: ENVARC:".
Just perform one action at a time and reboot to test that it all works fine still. You will have to copy over the ADF utility to the test workbench boot disk so you will have it when you need it.
Pete :-)
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@motorollin
I'm using 2.1
@Pete
I will try that. Thanks for your help!
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Pc2Amiga is the best way, especially if you got a lot of diskettes (games?) and its easy since you got KS2.1
All you need is a cable. Then you can use any adf program.
I remember even using pc2amiga as "virtual HDD", by installing game (RogerRabbit) onto PC, its slow but it works..
The only problem is that it doesn't work with winNT (XP, 2000)
someone here mentioned a patch that solves it..
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I'm sure that PC2Amiga is excellent, but as I've said time and again, I don't have a cble, so its not an option for me at this point.
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About madsjm's UAE dms steps...is there a particular program on Aminet that can be used to unpack DMS files on the Amiga side?
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Yes, "back in the day" mid 90s, I had a setup where I could use PC2Amiga with a parallel cable to access the PCs drives. I made an amiga native hard disk file on the PC and could save stuff to it. At that point UAE support for hard disk files was either non-existant or in very early stages, and I was really proud of myself for actually managing to boot UAE on the PC using that hard disk file that I formatted and set up from the A1200 over the parallel cable PC2Amiga link...
It was some wierd combination of using a compressed disk driver with a different device type, for a non-compressed volume file... been so long since I did it I forgot the details. I was without regular internet access at that point in time or I'd have posted the solution around, but by the time I got back online and looked around again, UAE had hardfile support.
I also managed to use the PC2Amiga setup to use and mount some Amiga CDs, but support of the formats was a bit touch and go on the PC side and some it wouldn't read, think that was down to the age of the CD Drive and lack of things like multisession support on it (Audio and data tracks on same CD) and failure of MSCDEX to handle some things.
It's my inderstanding however, that DMS files are bigger than the available space on the disk because they contain and preserve formatting information from the original disk. The disks are nominally 1MB in capacity, meaning 120K or so is sucked up in formatting information leaving a useable 880K. So just unpack it, it will fit. I guess no-one in here had the diskspare.device installed and formatted floppies to 960K. You could go that route too if you wanted I guess. Get diskspare device from aminet, decompress the image to a diskspare formatted volume, then unpack it to another disk.
I seem to remember that some magazine coverdisks had a smart implementation of ppack and DMS, where the ADF was ppacked and decompressed on the fly through the powerpacker library, and if the miggy didn't have the memory to do it in one go, it would write half the disk then ask for the DMS containing disk back, read the second half, then write 2nd half when you swapped it back in. Find an old coverdisk with several disks packed on it and look at the startup-sequence and other scripts for clues.
RW222
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Good information. Thanks RW!!
EDIT: I'm a little worried about that diskspare.device. It's quite a hefty file...I hope I have enough room on the WB disk. :-o
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Wow, RW your diskspare.device idea really worked! I was able to get an ADF onto a 960Kb floppy, and then using adf2disk I transferred it to another floppy, and that's it! However, during the adf2disk step I made a brutal mistake-I was a little tardy about getting my WB 2.1 disk out of the drive and putting a blank in, so I accidentally overwrote it. Anyone know any way of rescuing overwritten data? :-D