Yes, you can create your own Utility disk with this. I’ll do some kind of a writeup but the utility is pretty easy to use.
The cable is a standard 9 to 25 modem cable (Not NULL modem) attached to a female to female adapter and then attached to the TPDD2. I uploaded an image of the Utility disk. It’s in the same folder in the members area. Kurt From: M100 [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Lee Olivares Sent: Wednesday, August 23, 2017 3:18 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [M100] Utility disk image from sector access Am I to understand with this it will be feasible to DIY a Utility disk? If so, how soon until we get a tutorial? ;) On Wed, Aug 23, 2017 at 2:55 PM, Kurt McCullum <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: Figured it out. There is indeed an ID field for every track. This is read by backup.ba <http://backup.ba> before the track data is read. Then on the write portion of backup.ba <http://backup.ba> , it is written back to the track before the data is laid down. The end result is a perfect copy that boots just as the original Utility disk. Kurt From: M100 [mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] On Behalf Of Kurt McCullum Sent: Wednesday, August 23, 2017 1:06 PM To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> Subject: Re: [M100] Utility disk image from sector access A bit too soon to declare total success. I can duplicate data disks without any issues. I can even duplicate the Utility disk. But even though the duplicate has all the same data, it won’t auto boot. So those extra save commands that I think play with the ID portion of the track are essential to creating a true duplicate of the Utility disk. I’ll get there but it’s going to take a bit to figure out the ID information. Kurt From: M100 [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Kurt McCullum Sent: Wednesday, August 23, 2017 10:13 AM To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> Subject: Re: [M100] Utility disk image from sector access I’ll document what I’ve got John. The backup utility that uses floppy does some strange calls which I don’t understand at all. But, if one reads the tracks from 0 to 80 and then in turn writes them from 0 to 80, those calls are not needed. Backup does some extra reads to determine just how many sectors to copy instead of reading the entire disk. And there are some writes that I don’t understand at all. I suspect they have something to do with the ID of the sector but I’m not sure. Without a manual I’m just guessing. My utility is a simple brute force read of every track and then the same routine in reverse. Slow, but it works. Kurt From: M100 [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of John R. Hogerhuis Sent: Wednesday, August 23, 2017 9:36 AM To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> Subject: Re: [M100] Utility disk image from sector access On Wed, Aug 23, 2017 at 9:24 AM Kurt McCullum <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: Success! I’ve got my utility reading AND writing TPDD2 disk images with the sector access commands. I’ve got a bit of cleanup and testing left to do and then I’ll put it in the members area. Kurt Documentation on the sector access protocol would be good too :-) It's the one dark corner of tpdd2 protocol (that we know of). -- John. -- - Lee - 909.437.0250 - Destroying technology problems.
