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

[AmigaBruno]

You're about to move beyond the ADF transfer kit at this point.  The easiest thing for you to do now is to pick up a cheap external CD drive that plugs into the SCSI port on the GVP unit, then when you need to transfer files just burn them onto CD with your PC.  

It took me about 4 months to get some kind of hard drive device like this because I haven't got all that much money at the moment and I just couldn't afford it. I bought this one a day after being beaten in a similar auction right at the end. I was determined not to be beaten again and even had to raise my bid at the end, while in the middle of watching some sci fi. At the moment I'm worried about not being able to have a social life this weekend or next, as well as paying for my broadband, cable TV and landline phone. I still need to check the figures for my budget, though. I often used to use Personal Finance Manager on my old Amigas and it may be a good idea to start using it again.

After plugging in and using my new old hard drive unit, I was shocked to find that only 10Mb of the 42Mb drive space remained! I immediately started worrying about if I could even fit the Lattice C compiler, which I think has 6 ADF files, onto the remaining space. I've recently been reading the 2 Abacus/Data Becker books about C programming and they seem to make sense to me! It looks like I should replace this hard drive or fit a second one via SCSI, but I'm not sure if it would be an external drive with its own case, an internal one fitted externally, or an internal drive which I can somehow fit internally into this unit. After this shock, I was pleasantly surprised looking at some of the RAM usage figures from one of the menus in Personal Paint, as well as looking at the figures on the menu bar of my Workbench screen. After some calculations to check everything, it seems I now have 3Mb RAM instead of the previous 1Mb RAM. This is although the eBay listing said it have no RAM fitted. The Deluxe Paint animation "Cry", now runs, but there's still a problem with the GFA BASIC "Pogo Sprites" program, which I ran once or in one session several times, while loading and running all the examples, but ever since then it's refused to run, saying the program is too long, or there's not enough RAM. It seems to me that the GFA menus have somehow changed since my first session, but I'm not sure.

To sum up, I'm not even going to bid on any external CD SCSI drives for at least a week from now, and when I do, I don't know how long it will take for me to succeed and actually get one. This is why I'd like to know how to change the Paradise default setting of saving to df0: to dh0: or if that's even possible for all the software I may try to do that with. I think I may have to change this at the PC end, but I'm not sure. I don't want to go for about another 2 weeks with my ADF transfer kit not working again! Another problem is that a shop on my doorstep has now stopped selling floppy disks. I've found 10 left over from several years ago, which I may be able to use after I check they're blank or what's on them. I hope I can find a shop that sells them, instead of having to wait for more to arrive from eBay.

[AmigaBruno]

After all I've been through not being able to do transfers for about 2 weeks, last night I got the same old error message about not being connected and retrying!!!!  This means I'm currently not able to do any more ADF transfers. :destroy:

First of all, I asked myself what had changed since the Arkanoid ADF transfer. The answer was that I fitted a GVP hard drive. Of course, I disabled it so I could boot from the Paradise floppy disk, but that wasn't enough. I then disconnected the hard drive, but that made no difference. Neither did changing the port address or using the new PCI parallel port.

My theory is that any little change can somehow reset the parallel ports connection, turning it off. This happens at the PC side, where the console messages appear, but on the Amiga side the floppy disk just says "Establishing connection..." I think I now need to explore absolutely everything to do with the Paradise software to overcome this. I hope it doesn't take me another 2 weeks. I'd appreciate any suggestions.

[AmigaBruno]

Good news! I've got the ADF transfer kit working again.

I reread the documentation and it seems that it's very important in what order you do things. I ran the Paradise software on the Amiga first and inserted a blank Amiga floppy disk before running the ADF transfer software on the PC.

I used my original parallel port with the address of 0x378. I was able to transfer the set of 4 ADF files which make up the Aztec C v5 compiler. I managed to install these onto my hard drive as well. Unfortunately, the compiler keeps generating various error messages, such as multiple input files and can't find various include files which are where the configuration file aztec.sh says they are. This means I haven't managed to produce an executable C program yet, only object files.

[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!  

[duke2k7]

Ikonsgr....

I have purchased your kit, ad followed your guide EXACTLY to the letter, but I get this:

** Error: unable to do drive I/O.
** Error: can't write
** Download failed


Any ideas? I have been VERY careful to follow your instructions carefully...

I am getting increasingly frustrated with what was called the fastest and easiest way to transfer files from PC to Amiga....

[ikonsgr]

If you followed the instructions as you said, then the error messages you get, 99.9% are caused by bad floppy disks!
Anyway, floppy disks as we all now are not a very reliable mean of storage.
Try to amiga format (with verify) a disk (so to be 100% sure that disk is ok) and use it to transfer an image.
In order to make a transfer the disk must be unformatted, amiga formatted, or an amiga disk that already have data on it and you wish to overwrite it.

Btw, if you, or anyone have any problems ,it's better to contact through ebay messages or email me directly(ikonsgr@hotmail.com) to get a much more fast reply, as
i don't get to forums too often.

[mikkel_zen]

Greetings all you fantastic Amiga people!

This is my first post and in a way an introduction.

I just dug up my old Amiga500 from my parents basement with about 500 pirated floppy discs with various games and programs. I adopted everything from my uncle when I was a child, and played countless of hours on it. Its been burried for 18 years.

But a few days ago, I brought it home with me, cleaned it inside and outside, even opened the psu and cleaned that one too. Man, it was dusty. The main reason I dug it up is that I love making electronic music, hoping to find some music programs like synths or trackers, and offcourse, try the old games. As a child I only cared about the games, not music programs, but today I'm the opposite, and guess what... I found OctaMed in the pile of discs! YEAH!

So, I hooked it up with the 520 RF-out to my girlfriends LCD tv, got a really bad picture, but MAN I was exited! I could allmost not believe it still worked! Then, as i started going through the tons of discs, almost no one works... Ahh... the pain... my heart just slowly lost its power the more discs I tried and failed... Some games started, like Ski Or Die, but it got stuck in the cool intro music with the hand planting snowboarder image. The same with First Samurai. Same with Chuck Rock, it didn't recognise the fire-button-pushing after swapping to disc two. The only game functioning was North and South. Funny game, but I was sad. The tunnel was dark.

But then, I search a bit on the internet, reading a bit on this HxC thing, allmost like a light at the end of the tunnel.

But then I read about IKONSGR!!! WOHO!!!
I THINK SEE THE LIGHT NOW!!!
Because I have to agree with ikonsgr, I still want to use floppies.

So, ikonsgr, can I now go ahead and buy this from you on ebay, download lots and lots of music programs in the shape of adf files, and then use your brilliant way of transfering them from my laptop to the Amiga500 and then write them to floppy discs from the Amiga500, pack down my computer and start making music with the standalone Amiga500!?!

Do I understand it correctly? It makes my Amiga write disks with the help of my laptop?

Note 1:
I'm not an Amiga expert. I only played the games on it as a child. If I remember it correctly, my uncle showed me only ONE key combination:
Ctrl+A(miga)+A(miga), for me to push when exiting a disc in a safe way. I never learned how to write, copy or even erase discs.

Note 2:
I don't think my laptop have a parallel port. It only have some kind of 15pin-port on the side... But what's this PCI PARALLEL PORT CARD you offer? Can I use my burt up Acer Aspire 5738Z to do the job?

My God! Now I am exited again!!!

PS. Thanks for the Amiga scart cable I just bought from you on ebay. Recieved it today. The picture is very clear now.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

I don't think my laptop have a parallel port. It only have some kind of 15pin-port on the side... But what's this PCI PARALLEL PORT CARD you offer? Can I use my burt up Acer Aspire 5738Z to do the job?

I have this kit.  It works well, however you will need a parallel port to use it.  The PCI card is exactly what it sounds like - a PCI card with a parallel port on it.  It needs to go in a normal-size PC, not a laptop.  There are USB-to-parallel-port adapters that would work on your laptop, but as I understand it are not compatible with this kit.  So first off, you'll need a PC with a parallel port (or a normal system that you can install a PCI card into), and some good floppy disks.  I cannot emphasize that enough, you'll need some good floppies (your old ones with all the errors probably won't work).  Beyond that, you'd be all set.  Click on his ebay link to purchase the product.

[Tenacious]

@ mikkel zen

I wonder if your floppy drive is on the very edge of functioning within spec (able to spin at the correct RPM, clean heads, clean microswitches).  If you clean and lube your drive, you may find many of those floppies work great.  Just a thought.

[mikkel_zen]

Thanks for the info and tips guys.

Damn! I have to get myself a new computer to do the job, that sucks.
Suddenly the HxC method is cheaper?
...If i can't find a stationary PC in my parents basement that is...

Yes, tenacious, the floppie drive is a bit unstable also. I have to try a few times, in and out, then suddenly it reads the disc, but still, I have a lot of bad discs. But yeah, I will definently take a look at some vids on maintenence on the amiga floppie drive.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Wouldn't hurt to start with this:

http://www.amazon.com/Cleaning-Kit-3-5-Floppy-Drive/dp/B000V6Y1W6/

Also somebody posted a tip on the forum a couple weeks ago about using a small dab of WD-40 to repair some issues with old disks.  Haven't tried it myself but might try searching for their post to get the details.

[smerf]

I'm using one of these.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Amiga-500-1000-2000-3000-Floppy-Simulator-w-MPDOS-Pro-/321096932559?_trksid=p2047675.l2557&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEWNX%3AIT&nma=true&si=YTYHs8bhtECmFxprwITbDOEF3mc%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc

The neat part is that its transparent to the Amiga.

UHHH!!

OK are you using the digitizer, or the pc projector, or the refrigerator, gee I am so confused.

Iggy is MorphOS really better than an Amiga.

How you doing haven't been around for a while, just wanted to give you a little BS.

smerf

[ikonsgr]

@ mikkel_zen
Well i think there is not much do add, unfortunately,in order to make transfers you need a Real parallel port, cheap usb to parallel adapters don't work. So either you need an old laptop that has a parallel port on board or find any desktop pc! :rolleyes:


Now, i was thinking, although file/directory transfer from pc to amiga can be also done, it is not an automated process like with adf images, you will need to use paradise "old fashion" way, e.g.giving commands on amiga shell and cli!
So, i was thinking of making a second alternative boot disk (i will put it inside "useful adf images" sub folder of adf transfer program folder) and a small addition to adf transfer program interface in order to enable an easy and fast way to transfer files and directories instead of adf images!
How about that?

[amiman99]

Thanks for the info and tips guys.

Damn! I have to get myself a new computer to do the job, that sucks.

You could get an old Pentium 233MHz Laptop with Win95 from 1990s, they should be almost free and they take up little space.

[ikonsgr]

You could get an old Pentium 233MHz Laptop with Win95 from 1990s, they should be almost free and they take up little space.

You can use paradise utility directly under old msdos/win95, so you don't need the adf transfer program for that, anyway!
  BUT, most probable,the program will not run under win 95,so you must use it through cli as paradise is a classic multi attribute command line utility!

[mikkel_zen]

So many helpful people here full of quality experience.
I like this forum. You guys are awesome!

Guess what I just dug up from my parents basement? A big, maybe ten years old, fully operational, stationary PC with this connector on the back (guess its the right type of connector: its a pink 25 pin she). If its the wrong connector, I will probably buy the right one of you ikonsgr. If you still have them...

Hopefully Im moving in the right direction. In a few days, when my paycheck arrives, I will order the proper tools from you ikonsgr. Just one question: What kind of floppy discs do I buy? Does the A500 require a size limit on floppies? I believe the old ones I have here is maximum 1MB.

I will study this thread further, before I ask any more lazy questions...
Thanks guys.