26 Jun
2002
26 Jun
'02
10:17 a.m.
Central Point Deluxe Option board: I don't recall how this card is
supposed to interface with the disks. There is a card edge connector
and a row of pins on the board. Does the board go inbetween the FDC and
drives, or does it replace the floppy controller entirely? Any special
cabling required, and can it run two drives?
Thanks,
Jeff
26 Jun
26 Jun
12:50 p.m.
Jeff,
I used to have one of these so I'll try to answer your questions as best as I can
remember. It goes between the regular disk controller and the floppy drives. I *believe*
you remove the cable from the existing disk controller and plug it into the card edge
connector on the Option card (that preserves any cable twists and drive addresssing) and
then installed a supplied cable between the edge connector of the existing controller and
the row of pins on the Option board. Yes, it can handle two drives. In fact, IIRC it will
handle four drives if your system can handle four drives on a single cable. It does
NOTHING during normal system operation. But when you run the Central Point SW it
completely takes over control of the drives and copies (or edits) ANYTHING on the disk
that the drive can physically access including all the stuff that MS-DOS and standard
drive controllers can't access. You can access 40+ tracks (as many as 43 depending on
the drive) and you can copy, access, edit the address blocks, CRC blocks, etc etc. It can
even simulate a laser burned spot or weakly magnetized sectors on a disk. Both of these
were commonly used anti-disk copying gimmicks. I never found a copy protected disk that I
couldn't duplicate with the Option card. I wish I''d keep mine.
Joe
At 06:17 PM 6/26/02 -0400, you wrote:
Central Point Deluxe Option board: I don't recall how this card is
supposed to interface with the disks. There is a card edge connector
and a row of pins on the board. Does the board go inbetween the FDC and
drives, or does it replace the floppy controller entirely? Any special
cabling required, and can it run two drives?
Thanks,
Jeff
11:48 a.m.
Joe,
That makes quite a bit of sense, and how I remember the cabling as
well. I need to make a suitable cable to go from the drive controller
to the option board it would seem. The issue is probably whether or not
the cable has a twist - I would assume it would NOT, since the standard
floppy cable would take care of that.
I've been meaning to set the Option Board up once my PC is back
together, and saw this picture on Ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2034301058
Looking at the stylized picture on the manual cover, it appears the OB
is replacing the drive controller. Needless to say this doesn't mean
much. I think it's safe to assume that the controller sits between the
drives and the OEM controller.
Would anyone happen to have a manual that could confirm our suspicians?
Thanks,
Jeff
On Wed, 2002-06-26 at 15:50, Joe wrote:
Jeff,
I used to have one of these so I'll try to answer your questions as best as I can
remember. It goes between the regular disk controller and the floppy drives. I *believe*
you remove the cable from the existing disk controller and plug it into the card edge
connector on the Option card (that preserves any cable twists and drive addresssing) and
then installed a supplied cable between the edge connector of the existing controller and
the row of pins on the Option board. Yes, it can handle two drives. In fact, IIRC it will
handle four drives if your system can handle four drives on a single cable. It does
NOTHING during normal system operation. But when you run the Central Point SW it
completely takes over control of the drives and copies (or edits) ANYTHING on the disk
that the drive can physically access including all the stuff that MS-DOS and standard
drive controllers can't access. You can access 40+ tracks (as many as 43 depending on
the drive) and you can copy, access!
, edit the address blocks, CRC blocks, etc etc. It can even simulate a laser burned spot
or weakly magnetized sectors on a disk. Both of these were commonly used anti-disk
copying gimmicks. I never found a copy protected disk that I couldn't duplicate with
the Option card. I wish I''d keep mine.
Joe
At 06:17 PM 6/26/02 -0400, you wrote:
Central Point Deluxe Option board: I don't recall how this card is
supposed to interface with the disks. There is a card edge connector
and a row of pins on the board. Does the board go inbetween the FDC and
drives, or does it replace the floppy controller entirely? Any special
cabling required, and can it run two drives?
Thanks,
Jeff
12:27 p.m.
On 26 Jun 2002, Jeffrey H. Ingber wrote:
That makes quite a bit of sense, and how I remember
the cabling as
well. I need to make a suitable cable to go from the drive controller
to the option board it would seem. The issue is probably whether or not
the cable has a twist - I would assume it would NOT, since the standard
floppy cable would take care of that.
No twist.
Just straight 34 pin ribbon cable with a dual row header on one end and a
card edge connector on the other. You could take an old AT floppy cable,
and cut it off before the twist. That's a bit longer than you need, but
works fine.
Looking at the stylized picture on the manual cover,
it appears the OB
is replacing the drive controller. Needless to say this doesn't mean
DOES NOT
Would anyone happen to have a manual that could
confirm our suspicians?
Don't need no stinkin' manual.
4:59 p.m.
On Wed, 26 Jun 2002, Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) wrote:
On 26 Jun 2002, Jeffrey H. Ingber wrote:
And make sure that J4 & J5 are jumpered to AT/Compaq if your connection
is from FDC to the card-edge on the DOB.
- don
That makes quite a bit of sense, and how I
remember the cabling as
well. I need to make a suitable cable to go from the drive controller
to the option board it would seem. The issue is probably whether or not
the cable has a twist - I would assume it would NOT, since the standard
floppy cable would take care of that.
No twist.
Just straight 34 pin ribbon cable with a dual row header on one end and a
card edge connector on the other. You could take an old AT floppy cable,
and cut it off before the twist. That's a bit longer than you need, but
works fine. Looking at the
stylized picture on the manual cover, it appears the OB
is replacing the drive controller. Needless to say this doesn't mean
DOES
NOT
Would anyone happen to have a manual that could
confirm our suspicians?
Don't need no stinkin' manual.
12:28 p.m.
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12:50 p.m.
On Thu, 27 Jun 2002, Tony Duell wrote:
The board contained one large ASIC, so I couldn't
figure out what it was
The earlier (NOT "Deluxe") version was available in a version of discrete
TTL. It shouldn't be too hard for us to find one, if you want to check it
out.
AFAIK it therefore supported as many drives as your
original controller
could support.
The hardware did, but the software needed to be patched in a few places if
you want to use that software with more than two drives.
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin(a)xenosoft.com
28 Jun
28 Jun
7:47 a.m.
"Fred Cisin (XenoSoft)" <cisin(a)xenosoft.com> said:
On Thu, 27 Jun 2002, Tony Duell wrote:
I'd be interested in having a look at one, too, maybe reverse engineer
it.
Unfortunately there are only two options:
Non destructive (pick a probe point and then go over the entire board
looking for connections, then draw up a schematic and build a clone on a
protoboard)
Destructive (take a heatgun to the board and remove all the components,
then strip the soldermask, scan the PCB and import it into
Eagle/PADS/Protel).
Believe me, those are the only two options. Unless someone raided the
dumpsters at Central Point before Symantec absorbed them and managed to get
a schematic...
Anyone got a copy of CopyIIPC (latest rev if possible)? Or know how it
worked?
Later.
--
Phil.
philpem(a)dsl.pipex.com
http://www.philpem.dsl.pipex.com/
The board contained one large ASIC, so I
couldn't figure out what it was
The earlier (NOT "Deluxe") version
was available in a version of discrete
TTL. It shouldn't be too hard for us to find one, if you want to check it
out.
8:49 a.m.
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9:14 a.m.
"Tony Duell" <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk> said:
I managed to get a HTEC "Kitty Card" 8031-based
system. 32K RAM, unknown
amount of program ROM, 8031 CPU and an AMD PALCE to do all the address
decoding. The PALCE will be a pain in the rear to decode - I don't have a
Universal Programmer so I can't just pull a JEDEC file out of it and run it
through JED2EQN anyway...
> "Fred Cisin (XenoSoft)"
<cisin(a)xenosoft.com> said:
> > On Thu, 27 Jun 2002, Tony Duell wrote:
> > > The board contained one large ASIC, so I couldn't figure out what it
was
> > The earlier (NOT "Deluxe") version
was available in a version of
discrete
> > TTL. It shouldn't be too hard for us to
find one, if you want to
check it
> > out.
> I'd be interested in having a look at one, too, maybe reverse engineer
it.
> Unfortunately there are only two options:
> Non destructive (pick a probe point and then go over the entire
board
looking for
connections, then draw up a schematic and build a clone on a
protoboard)
Why is doing this a problem? The time taken to trace out a schematic
in
this manner goes roughly as the square of the number of components (but
perhaps a smaller power), it's faster the more large components there are
(since those can be used in one way, and tie down a lot of signals). The
PC edge connector and drive connectors count as 'components' for this as
they indentify signals. I would estimate that a PCB of 20 TTL chips would take
a good afternoon
to trace out. Not that long. How many chips are there on the old Option
Board anyway? And where can I find one?
That's what I'd like to know,
too...
Later.
--
Phil.
philpem(a)dsl.pipex.com
http://www.philpem.dsl.pipex.com/
27 Jun
27 Jun
1:08 a.m.
Jeff,
I had a couple of Option cards and (I think) a manual that I gave away when I cleaned up
last year. I think I gave the stuff to Mike Haas <dogas(a)bellsouth.net>et>. You might be
able to get him to dig the manual out and check it.
Joe
At 07:48 PM 6/26/02 -0400, you wrote:
Joe,
That makes quite a bit of sense, and how I remember the cabling as
well. I need to make a suitable cable to go from the drive controller
to the option board it would seem. The issue is probably whether or not
the cable has a twist - I would assume it would NOT, since the standard
floppy cable would take care of that.
I've been meaning to set the Option Board up once my PC is back
together, and saw this picture on Ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2034301058
Looking at the stylized picture on the manual cover, it appears the OB
is replacing the drive controller. Needless to say this doesn't mean
much. I think it's safe to assume that the controller sits between the
drives and the OEM controller.
Would anyone happen to have a manual that could confirm our suspicians?
Thanks,
Jeff
On Wed, 2002-06-26 at 15:50, Joe wrote:
> Jeff,
>
> I used to have one of these so I'll try to answer your questions as best as I
can remember. It goes between the regular disk controller and the floppy drives. I
*believe* you remove the cable from the existing disk controller and plug it into the card
edge connector on the Option card (that preserves any cable twists and drive addresssing)
and then installed a supplied cable between the edge connector of the existing controller
and the row of pins on the Option board. Yes, it can handle two drives. In fact, IIRC it
will handle four drives if your system can handle four drives on a single cable. It does
NOTHING during normal system operation. But when you run the Central Point SW it
completely takes over control of the drives and copies (or edits) ANYTHING on the disk
that the drive can physically access including all the stuff that MS-DOS and standard
drive controllers can't access. You can access 40+ tracks (as many as 43 depending on
the drive) and you can copy, acc!
e!
ss!
, edit the address blocks, CRC blocks, etc etc.
It can even simulate a laser burned spot or weakly magnetized sectors on a disk. Both of
these were commonly used anti-disk copying gimmicks. I never found a copy protected disk
that I couldn't duplicate with the Option card. I wish I''d keep mine.
Joe
At 06:17 PM 6/26/02 -0400, you wrote:
Central Point Deluxe Option board: I don't recall how this card is
supposed to interface with the disks. There is a card edge connector
and a row of pins on the board. Does the board go inbetween the FDC and
drives, or does it replace the floppy controller entirely? Any special
cabling required, and can it run two drives?
Thanks,
Jeff
5:13 a.m.
I had a couple of Option cards and (I think) a
manual that I gave
away when I cleaned up last year. I think I gave the stuff to Mike
Haas <dogas(a)bellsouth.net>et>. You might be able to get him to dig the
manual out and check it.
The Central Point Deluxe Option Board manual had about as much information
in it as the manual for a generic mouse.
There has now been MORE information about installing the board on this
list than there was in the manual. Some versions of the manual mentioned
the jumper (some didn't), but only said to use it if you had a Compaq,
without explaining that it dealt with interchanging the input v output
connectors. The rest of the installation section of the manual dealt in
considerable detail with how to open the case of PCs!
If you need that level of installation detail, then the option board will
never work.
I am a firm believer in finding and reading all information in any
available documentation. ALL information from that manual has already
been posted here. At this point, the manual is of less actual use than
the original shipping box.
7:30 a.m.
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26 Jun
26 Jun
12:35 p.m.
board. Yes, it can handle two drives. In fact, IIRC it
will handle
four drives if your system can handle four drives on a single cable.
The software supplied with it can only handle two drives.
It does NOTHING during normal system operation. But
when you run the
Central Point SW it completely takes over control of the drives and
Well,...
It supplements the existing controller to provide a "flux
transition" level of track read. It still uses the stock controller for
track seeking, etc.
copies (or edits) ANYTHING on the disk that the drive
can physically
ALMOST anything.
these were commonly used anti-disk copying gimmicks.
I never found a
copy protected disk that I couldn't duplicate with the Option card. I
wish I''d keep mine.
On a bet, once, I made a disk from which a usable copy could be made with
DISKCOPY on a stock 5150, but that the option board, with it's software,
could not copy.
Hint: it had problems with DISKCOPY when using Teac drives.
--
Grumpy Ol' Fred cisin(a)xenosoft.com
27 Jun
27 Jun
3:36 a.m.
On Wed, 26 Jun 2002, Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) wrote:
On a bet, once, I made a disk from which a usable copy
could be made with
DISKCOPY on a stock 5150, but that the option board, with it's software,
could not copy.
Hint: it had problems with DISKCOPY when using Teac drives.
Details, please.
Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
* Old computing resources for business and academia at www.VintageTech.com *
5:43 a.m.
> On a bet, once, I made a disk from which a usable
copy could be made with
> DISKCOPY on a stock 5150, but that the option board, with it's software,
> could not copy.
> Hint: it had problems with DISKCOPY when using Teac drives.
On Thu, 27 Jun 2002, Sellam Ismail wrote:
Details, please.
No guesses or ideas?
Or is it a subject for which nobody but Sellam gives a shit?
Very simply:
The option board software is completely dependent on the index pulse. No
index pulse; no read (crash with some versions!)
Format a disk normally, then block the index hole (either by covering it,
or removing the disk from its cover and reinstalling it with the cover
reversed). Put a disk label on the backside, so that the user knows which
way to put the disk in.
Now the disk is still readable by DOS, and even DISKCOPY, but the option
board software chokes.
"But the user could just uncover the hole, or punch a new one (Using the
XenoSoft (formerly Berkeley Microcomputer) Flip-Jig (tm))"
So, ...
modify a drive to index off of the spindle, instead of the index
photocell. While you're at it, jumper it to not need a write protect
notch.
Format the disk (upside down) and use it normally.
DOS and DISKCOPY are perfectly happy with it, even with a
"normal" drive. (But most errors that could occur will be misreported as
err code 128: "drive not ready".)
But, unless the user makes a comparable mod to their drive, the
option board software chokes.
And, just to make sure that punching a hole doesn't work: use a hard
sectored disk! When upside down, no index holes show. The modified drive
will not see any, and will index off of the spindle.
Stock drives will see no holes, which will not bother DOS (for READING),
but will frustrate the option board software. If the user punches a hole,
then instead of getting an index hole, he gets TEN index holes, which will
also discombobulate the option board software (and DOS).
But, ...
TEAC drives (and probably some others) wouldn't work with the technique,
since they look for drive up to speed by monitoring the index pulse.
8:18 a.m.
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9:47 a.m.
On Thu, 27 Jun 2002, Tony Duell wrote:
You're absolutely right, of course.
DISKCOPY was merely an example, since the premise of the bet was making a
disk that DISKCOPY could make a working copy of, but that the option board
could not. And, as you said, a no index diskette will cause the Teac
drives to choke on any type of read attempt.
The point was that the OEM 5150 drives (Tandon TM100-2), could read and
write without index. Therefore, since the option board software needed
index, it was possible to create a disk that could be accessed without the
option board, but not with it. Presence of the option board did not
interfere with the "normal" disk I/O.
We used to have to block the index for reading and writing some disk
formats on the PC. For example, some TRS-80 formats, and even some Kaypro
formats, start their first sector too close to the index for comfortable
reading with a 765. We were able to do them, by just putting a piece of
opaque tape over the index hole. But with Teac drives (55B), blocking the
index kept the drive from functioning. For those, we would just interrupt
that wire in the cable, so that the index was seen by the drive, but not
by the FDC.
--
Fred Cisin cisin(a)xenosoft.com
XenoSoft http://www.xenosoft.com
PO Box 1236 (510) 558-9366
Berkeley, CA 94701-1236
But, ...
TEAC drives (and probably some others) wouldn't work with the technique,
since they look for drive up to speed by monitoring the index pulse.
Why did this
only affect DISKCOPY? Surely such a modified disk (no index
pulse) would cause problems with Teac drivs no matter what program you
were using to read it.
7989
days inactive
7991
days old
17 comments
7 participants
participants (7)
-
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
cisin＠xenosoft.com -
donm＠cts.com -
foo＠siconic.com -
jingber＠ix.netcom.com -
philpem＠dsl.pipex.com -
rigdonj＠cfl.rr.com