2 Jan
2014
2 Jan
'14
4:37 p.m.
The local craigslist equivalent yielded a tiny advert "Imsai 8080 computer from
1977".
price : 110 USD, negotiable....
The picture was a tiny B/W jpg lifted from the internet, and did not look too promising.
The actual hardware ?
An absolutely mint, as-new, IMSAI 8080...
from the orignal owner....
with full documtation,
including original invoice...
in the original IMSAI cardbox !
Also MPU-A and MIO cards..
24 Kbytes of 2102 SRAM..
all ICs socketed..
with papertape software....
handpulled papertape reader...
Needless to say no further price negotiations took place.
About the only minus is the MDC-A4 floppy controller, which requires more difficult to
find hardsectored disks.
( Original diskdrive and disks were scrapped a long time ago )
I will also need to find some extra s100 connectors to complete the backplane.
it seems the '2014 project is defined !
Jos
2 Jan
2 Jan
5:20 p.m.
You lucky, lucky bastard!
On 2 January 2014 21:37, Jos Dreesen <jdr_use at bluewin.ch> wrote:
The local craigslist equivalent yielded a tiny advert
"Imsai 8080 computer
from 1977".
price : 110 USD, negotiable....
The picture was a tiny B/W jpg lifted from the internet, and did not look
too promising.
The actual hardware ?
An absolutely mint, as-new, IMSAI 8080...
from the orignal owner....
with full documtation, including original invoice...
in the original IMSAI cardbox !
Also MPU-A and MIO cards..
24 Kbytes of 2102 SRAM..
all ICs socketed..
with papertape software....
handpulled papertape reader...
Needless to say no further price negotiations took place.
About the only minus is the MDC-A4 floppy controller, which requires more
difficult to find hardsectored disks.
( Original diskdrive and disks were scrapped a long time ago )
I will also need to find some extra s100 connectors to complete the
backplane.
it seems the '2014 project is defined !
Jos
--
Yoyodyne Propulsion Systems: "The Future Begins Tomorrow"
Visit us at: http://www.yoyodyne-propulsion.net
--------
"It's easy to win. Anybody can win."
-- Philip K. Dick, A Scanner Darkly
5:52 p.m.
On Jan 2, 2014, at 13:37 , Jos Dreesen <jdr_use at bluewin.ch> wrote:
The local craigslist equivalent yielded a tiny advert
"Imsai 8080 computer from 1977".
price : 110 USD, negotiable....
The picture was a tiny B/W jpg lifted from the internet, and did not look too
promising.
The actual hardware ?
An absolutely mint, as-new, IMSAI 8080...
from the orignal owner....
with full documtation, including original invoice...
in the original IMSAI cardbox !
That's fantastic! Congratulations on that cool find!
--
Mark J. Blair, NF6X <nf6x at nf6x.net>
http://www.nf6x.net/
6:31 p.m.
On Thu, 2 Jan 2014, Jos Dreesen wrote:
The local craigslist equivalent yielded a tiny advert
"Imsai 8080 computer
from 1977". price : 110 USD, negotiable....
The picture was a tiny B/W jpg lifted from the internet, and did not look too
promising.
The actual hardware ?
An absolutely mint, as-new, IMSAI 8080...
from the orignal owner....
with full documtation, including original invoice...
in the original IMSAI cardbox !
Also MPU-A and MIO cards..
24 Kbytes of 2102 SRAM..
all ICs socketed..
with papertape software....
handpulled papertape reader...
Needless to say no further price negotiations took place.
Sometimes the stars and planets align. Great isn't it?
--
6:42 p.m.
Holy crap! Nice find! :-) Nice of you not to negotiate lol. I guess I can
say my 2014 start now that it's finalized (well one other deal is still in
negotiation so it will go unmentioned). Ended up bidding and winning an
item I've always sorta fancied ever since I turned one down years back at a
ham fest for being overpriced, but got a (well ok two .. one wasn't working
the other was) TI-59 with the PC-100A printer unit. Pretty excited to play
with it and see what the other one may have wrong. I can't quite remember
the price at the HAM Expo but think it was either $200 or $150 at the time,
although it was a pristine unit I just didn't feel like doing the song and
dance to get it down in price. But it was on my list since.
The other cool news was I just found a Commodore Educator 64 and for
whatever reason it came with an ADM-22 in the sale. The ADM-22 I honestly
don't have much interest in (has both were sold as not working). But
either way, it was a set. I could be misleading myself but I'm hoping the
Educator has mostly C64 innards so outside of a major power supply fault
I'm crossing my fingers for a nice inside and potential common 64 part
being bad.
lol although my Educator 64 cost about as much as your IMSAI so I'd say you
win for now ;-)
On Thu, Jan 2, 2014 at 3:37 PM, Jos Dreesen <jdr_use at bluewin.ch> wrote:
The local craigslist equivalent yielded a tiny advert
"Imsai 8080 computer
from 1977".
price : 110 USD, negotiable....
The picture was a tiny B/W jpg lifted from the internet, and did not look
too promising.
The actual hardware ?
An absolutely mint, as-new, IMSAI 8080...
from the orignal owner....
with full documtation, including original invoice...
in the original IMSAI cardbox !
Also MPU-A and MIO cards..
24 Kbytes of 2102 SRAM..
all ICs socketed..
with papertape software....
handpulled papertape reader...
Needless to say no further price negotiations took place.
About the only minus is the MDC-A4 floppy controller, which requires more
difficult to find hardsectored disks.
( Original diskdrive and disks were scrapped a long time ago )
I will also need to find some extra s100 connectors to complete the
backplane.
it seems the '2014 project is defined !
Jos
9:49 p.m.
Enjoy the TI-59, Sam! That was my first programmable device when I was in college and I
loved it!
I did a podcast on the TI-59. Floppy Days episode #3 (floppydays.libsyn.com, iTunes or
Stitcher.com).
Did you ever own one before?
Randy Kindig
host Floppy Days
co-host Antic
On Jan 2, 2014, at 6:42 PM, Sam O'nella wrote:
Holy crap! Nice find! :-) Nice of you not to
negotiate lol. I guess I can
say my 2014 start now that it's finalized (well one other deal is still in
negotiation so it will go unmentioned). Ended up bidding and winning an
item I've always sorta fancied ever since I turned one down years back at a
ham fest for being overpriced, but got a (well ok two .. one wasn't working
the other was) TI-59 with the PC-100A printer unit. Pretty excited to play
with it and see what the other one may have wrong. I can't quite remember
the price at the HAM Expo but think it was either $200 or $150 at the time,
although it was a pristine unit I just didn't feel like doing the song and
dance to get it down in price. But it was on my list since.
The other cool news was I just found a Commodore Educator 64 and for
whatever reason it came with an ADM-22 in the sale. The ADM-22 I honestly
don't have much interest in (has both were sold as not working). But
either way, it was a set. I could be misleading myself but I'm hoping the
Educator has mostly C64 innards so outside of a major power supply fault
I'm crossing my fingers for a nice inside and potential common 64 part
being bad.
lol although my Educator 64 cost about as much as your IMSAI so I'd say you
win for now ;-)
On Thu, Jan 2, 2014 at 3:37 PM, Jos Dreesen <jdr_use at bluewin.ch> wrote:
> The local craigslist equivalent yielded a tiny advert "Imsai 8080 computer
> from 1977".
> price : 110 USD, negotiable....
> The picture was a tiny B/W jpg lifted from the internet, and did not look
> too promising.
>
> The actual hardware ?
>
> An absolutely mint, as-new, IMSAI 8080...
> from the orignal owner....
> with full documtation, including original invoice...
> in the original IMSAI cardbox !
>
> Also MPU-A and MIO cards..
> 24 Kbytes of 2102 SRAM..
> all ICs socketed..
> with papertape software....
> handpulled papertape reader...
>
> Needless to say no further price negotiations took place.
>
> About the only minus is the MDC-A4 floppy controller, which requires more
> difficult to find hardsectored disks.
> ( Original diskdrive and disks were scrapped a long time ago )
> I will also need to find some extra s100 connectors to complete the
> backplane.
>
> it seems the '2014 project is defined !
>
> Jos
>
>
>
>
>
3 Jan
3 Jan
4:59 p.m.
Neat, I'll download that and listen to it this weekend. I've never owned
this model before, just always caught my eye and was interesting
historically. Sort of that verge of calculators becoming computers which
honestly I've tried to avoid any calculator collecting but again, I find it
too interesting that this had software and could be programmed by magnetic
strips.
Years back I remember seeing one at the state that was apparently still
commonly used for geological equations and chemistry equations.
- John
On Thu, Jan 2, 2014 at 8:49 PM, Randall Kindig <randall.kindig at gmail.com>wrote:
Enjoy the TI-59, Sam! That was my first programmable
device when I was in
college and I loved it!
I did a podcast on the TI-59. Floppy Days episode #3 (
floppydays.libsyn.com, iTunes or Stitcher.com).
Did you ever own one before?
Randy Kindig
host Floppy Days
co-host Antic
8:13 p.m.
On 02.01.2014 22:37, Jos Dreesen wrote:
The local craigslist equivalent yielded a tiny advert
"Imsai 8080 computer from
1977".
price : 110 USD, negotiable....
The picture was a tiny B/W jpg lifted from the internet, and did not look too
promising.
The actual hardware ?
An absolutely mint, as-new, IMSAI 8080...
from the orignal owner....
with full documtation, including original invoice...
in the original IMSAI cardbox !
Congratulations! This time you were not too reluctant :-P (remember my first
H316?)
handpulled papertape reader...
Oh, I want such a
device! Can you PM me a picture?
Needless to say no further price negotiations took
place.
No??? I'd have asked for a discount because of the missing floppy.
About the only minus is the MDC-A4 floppy controller,
which requires more
difficult to find hardsectored disks.
( Original diskdrive and disks were scrapped a long time ago )
I will also need to find some extra s100 connectors to complete the backplane.
I
probably have such a drive and some floppies. PM me if I should dig for it.
9:53 p.m.
New subject: Using AltairZ80 simulator: Question about mounting different types of disk images
Hi all,
I'm trying to use the AltairZ80 simulator to patch a Northstar .nsi disk image, with
the final goal being to use it with my real SOL-20 + Northstar disk controller. I will use
Dave Dunfield's NST utilities to copy over the patched Northstar .NSI image via serial
to my real SOL-20, and hopefully I will be able to generate a working CP/M 2.2 boot
floppy. I have Dave's NST utils already 'talking' to my SOL, so hopefully the
last part, generating a real floppy, should not be difficult.
I have the following files:
- A disassembled dump of the SOL-20 CP/M CBIOS (found on the net)
- A HEX file of the SOL-20 CBIOS that I generated in the AltairZ80 simulator
- A Northstar .nsi CP/M disk image that is bootable in AltairZ80 by 'Attaching'
MDSAD, Northstar MDS-AD Disk Controller (Memory Mapped to 0xE800-0xEBFF)
Now before I actually get into the nitty gritty of patching the SOL-20 CBIOS (which I will
also probably need some advice with) onto the Northstar disk image, I figured I need to
first find a way to copy the CBIOS HEX file that I generated, from the PC (or from the
standard CP/M disk image) onto the Northstar disk image. The standard CP/M disk image that
comes with AltairZ80 has two programs, 'R' and 'W' that allow copying to
and from the simulator to the PC. The Northstar disk image I have, of course, does not
have these two programs.
Now my first problem is to either get 'R' and 'W' onto the Northstar disk
image, and/or have the standard CP/M disk image mounted as drive A and the Northstar Disk
as drive B. I was hopeful that It would be easy to attach the standard CP/M image and the
Northstar CP/M image at the same time, and just copy the files over from one to the other.
However I can't seem to do this. I have tried various sequences of attaching the
standard CP/M disk image to drive A, then ?enabling? the Northstar controller and
attaching the Northstar disk image to drive B, then either trying to boot from A or B.
Unfortunately this does not work and CP/M does not boot, and results in some strange
activity in the simulator.
As many of you know, I'm a bit of a noob at this stuff, so hopefully I haven?t made
any wrong assumptions about what I need to achieve.
I was wondering if anyone had any idea how I can go about this?
Much thanks in advance.
Philip
4 Jan
4 Jan
12:15 p.m.
New subject: Using AltairZ80 simulator: Question about mounting different types of disk images
On 01/03/2014 09:53 PM, Philip Lord wrote:
Hi all,
I'm trying to use the AltairZ80 simulator to patch a Northstar .nsi disk image, with
the final goal being to use it with my real SOL-20 + Northstar disk controller. I will use
Dave Dunfield's NST utilities to copy over the patched Northstar .NSI image via serial
to my real SOL-20, and hopefully I will be able to generate a working CP/M 2.2 boot
floppy. I have Dave's NST utils already 'talking' to my SOL, so hopefully the
last part, generating a real floppy, should not be difficult.
I have the following files:
- A disassembled dump of the SOL-20 CP/M CBIOS (found on the net)
- A HEX file of the SOL-20 CBIOS that I generated in the AltairZ80 simulator
- A Northstar .nsi CP/M disk image that is bootable in AltairZ80 by 'Attaching'
MDSAD, Northstar MDS-AD Disk Controller (Memory Mapped to 0xE800-0xEBFF)
The
standard NS* CP/M image for the Horizon is fine as all you need to
do is patch the CONin and CONout and printer
if used. Thats the only real difference between the various systems
using the NS* MDS disk. Make sure you have
enough memory for the version your booting 56K is likely enough.
Now before I actually get into the nitty gritty of
patching the SOL-20 CBIOS (which I will also probably need some advice with) onto the
Northstar disk image, I figured I need to first find a way to copy the CBIOS HEX file that
I generated, from the PC (or from the standard CP/M disk image) onto the Northstar disk
image. The standard CP/M disk image that comes with AltairZ80 has two programs,
'R' and 'W' that allow copying to and from the simulator to the PC. The
Northstar disk image I have, of course, does not have these two programs.
Easily
done on the SOL itself, easy in that you can patch memory directly.
Load the working version to memory and boot it, reset and then patch it,
run it, if working then reset and
use your utillities to save it to a new piece of media.
Generally I get NS* dos running first as its, smaller, simpler to patch
and once thats running you can use it to
edit and patch CP/M media. NS*DOS with the monitor that loads at 2A00h
will need only 8K of ram starting
at 2000H. Plus it doesn't interact with the sol monitor for memory
space nor will it get into space typically
used when CP/M is loaded.
Now my first problem is to either get 'R' and
'W' onto the Northstar disk image, and/or have the standard CP/M disk image
mounted as drive A and the Northstar Disk as drive B. I was hopeful that It would be easy
to attach the standard CP/M image and the Northstar CP/M image at the same time, and just
copy the files over from one to the other. However I can't seem to do this. I have
tried various sequences of attaching the standard CP/M disk image to drive A, then
?enabling? the Northstar controller and attaching the Northstar disk image to drive B,
then either trying to boot from A or B. Unfortunately this does not work and CP/M does not
boot, and results in some strange activity in the simulator.
As many of you know, I'm a bit of a noob at this stuff, so hopefully I haven?t made
any wrong assumptions about what I need to achieve.
I was wondering if anyone had any idea how I can go about this?
As someone that
started using CP/M and NS* hardware in 1977, it was
obvious to me. I still have
working hardware and use it.
The problem with the .nsi files is getting them into the computer (sol
not the PC). Fortinatly Dave has
provided tools to get the stuff on the computer so you can write it out
to disk. The emulator is handy
for a lot of stuff but it can't write real media directly.
From the top, do you have a disk drive that works and
hard sector media
for the SOL? Otherwise this is
all moot. If you have hard sector media you can't write it in a PC that
only know soft sector, don't bother
unless you have a catsweasel or other multimedia floppy interface.
I'll assume you have a MDS, Enough installed ram, working and a PT SOL
plus a floppy (better to have several).
IF you do then its real easy as the SOL has a keyboard monitor that will
allow viewing and patching memory.
The procedure is in the NS* CP/M manual as well. All that is needed to
do is boot the known MDS system disk
(write protected please) wait for it to stop. Then hit reset to get to
the SOL monitor and then using your listings
hand patch the CONIN, CONout and maybe printer part of the CBIOS. Then
GO/JUMP to the warm restart address
and see if CP/M comes up and issue a prompt and takes a command like
DIR. Save the resulting system to a NEW disk
and then try to boot it. preserve teh old disk like ti was gold (likely
more valuable per unit weight!). This is only
an outline but us old farts did it.
FYI: the hardest case was getting a NS*Horizon going that was broken is
that system does not have a user interface until
NSdos or NS*CPM was running as the only resident code was a very tiny
bootloader. Any patches needed to get the
system going the first time for me was using the front panel of the
Altair (switches feh!). My solution was a new CPU
board (computime) with local Eprom monitor, its own IO, and a working
system to test each bit first.
Allison
7 Jan
7 Jan
10:54 p.m.
New subject: Using AltairZ80 simulator: Question about mounting different types of disk images
On Jan 5, 2014, at 2:15 AM, allison <ajp166 at verizon.net> wrote:
On 01/03/2014 09:53 PM, Philip Lord wrote:
Hi Allison,
I took your advice an decided to start with Northstar DOS instead of CP/M.
I also took a different and hopefully simpler tact. I decided to just alter the HEX of one
of the N* DOS double density disk images found online (and also bundled with Dave
Dunfield's N* Utils).
I got myself a copy of a SOL-20 N* BIOS (also found on the net), and assembled it. I then
converted the resultant HEX file in to a BIN file so I could patch it into the disk image.
Now this is where it gets a little weird.
Once I opened up the Disk image in a HEX editor, so I could do the patches, I saw that the
jumps at the beginning of the DOS in the 20xx range jump to the 29xx range...all good so
far. However when I looked at the 29xx addresses I couldn't see anything that looked
like a BIOS. Instead I saw the BIOS was at the 28xx range. So I patched in the new SOL
BIOS at 28xx, and adjusted the jumps accordingly to the 28xx range.
I was then able to use Dave's NST utility to copy the image to the SOL, and the SOL
was able to make a real floppy. This floppy was able to boot, and I could see the boot
screen and the keyboard worked fine.
The problem was that I couldn't seem to do anything. Any N* command I issue failed.
For example, I tried to (LI)st the directory, and the drive spun up, but after a while
stopped and the SOL became unresponsive.
So I went back and made another disk, this time with the BIOS at 29xx and the jumps to the
29xx addresses. The resultant floppy was not able to boot.
So that's where I'm at. Basically trying to figure out why in the disk image's
BIOS is not at the expected addresses, but why the I/O jumps still jump to 29xx, and why
the disk that seems to boot fine crashes when issuing commands.
Thanks again for your time.
Philip
Hi all,
I'm trying to use the AltairZ80 simulator to patch a Northstar .nsi disk image, with
the final goal being to use it with my real SOL-20 + Northstar disk controller. I will use
Dave Dunfield's NST utilities to copy over the patched Northstar .NSI image via serial
to my real SOL-20, and hopefully I will be able to generate a working CP/M 2.2 boot
floppy. I have Dave's NST utils already 'talking' to my SOL, so hopefully the
last part, generating a real floppy, should not be difficult.
I have the following files:
- A disassembled dump of the SOL-20 CP/M CBIOS (found on the net)
- A HEX file of the SOL-20 CBIOS that I generated in the AltairZ80 simulator
- A Northstar .nsi CP/M disk image that is bootable in AltairZ80 by 'Attaching'
MDSAD, Northstar MDS-AD Disk Controller (Memory Mapped to 0xE800-0xEBFF)
The
standard NS* CP/M image for the Horizon is fine as all you need to
do is patch the CONin and CONout and printer
if used. Thats the only real difference between the various systems
using the NS* MDS disk. Make sure you have
enough memory for the version your booting 56K is likely enough.
Now before I actually get into the nitty gritty
of patching the SOL-20 CBIOS (which I will also probably need some advice with) onto the
Northstar disk image, I figured I need to first find a way to copy the CBIOS HEX file that
I generated, from the PC (or from the standard CP/M disk image) onto the Northstar disk
image. The standard CP/M disk image that comes with AltairZ80 has two programs,
'R' and 'W' that allow copying to and from the simulator to the PC. The
Northstar disk image I have, of course, does not have these two programs.
Easily
done on the SOL itself, easy in that you can patch memory directly.
Load the working version to memory and boot it, reset and then patch it,
run it, if working then reset and
use your utillities to save it to a new piece of media.
Generally I get NS* dos running first as its, smaller, simpler to patch
and once thats running you can use it to
edit and patch CP/M media. NS*DOS with the monitor that loads at 2A00h
will need only 8K of ram starting
at 2000H. Plus it doesn't interact with the sol monitor for memory
space nor will it get into space typically
used when CP/M is loaded.
Now my first problem is to either get 'R'
and 'W' onto the Northstar disk image, and/or have the standard CP/M disk image
mounted as drive A and the Northstar Disk as drive B. I was hopeful that It would be easy
to attach the standard CP/M image and the Northstar CP/M image at the same time, and just
copy the files over from one to the other. However I can't seem to do this. I have
tried various sequences of attaching the standard CP/M disk image to drive A, then
?enabling? the Northstar controller and attaching the Northstar disk image to drive B,
then either trying to boot from A or B. Unfortunately this does not work and CP/M does not
boot, and results in some strange activity in the simulator.
As many of you know, I'm a bit of a noob at this stuff, so hopefully I haven?t made
any wrong assumptions about what I need to achieve.
I was wondering if anyone had any idea how I can go about this?
As someone that
started using CP/M and NS* hardware in 1977, it was
obvious to me. I still have
working hardware and use it.
The problem with the .nsi files is getting them into the computer (sol
not the PC). Fortinatly Dave has
provided tools to get the stuff on the computer so you can write it out
to disk. The emulator is handy
for a lot of stuff but it can't write real media directly.
From the top, do you have a disk drive that works and hard sector media
for the SOL? Otherwise this is
all moot. If you have hard sector media you can't write it in a PC that
only know soft sector, don't bother
unless you have a catsweasel or other multimedia floppy interface.
I'll assume you have a MDS, Enough installed ram, working and a PT SOL
plus a floppy (better to have several).
IF you do then its real easy as the SOL has a keyboard monitor that will
allow viewing and patching memory.
The procedure is in the NS* CP/M manual as well. All that is needed to
do is boot the known MDS system disk
(write protected please) wait for it to stop. Then hit reset to get to
the SOL monitor and then using your listings
hand patch the CONIN, CONout and maybe printer part of the CBIOS. Then
GO/JUMP to the warm restart address
and see if CP/M comes up and issue a prompt and takes a command like
DIR. Save the resulting system to a NEW disk
and then try to boot it. preserve teh old disk like ti was gold (likely
more valuable per unit weight!). This is only
an outline but us old farts did it.
FYI: the hardest case was getting a NS*Horizon going that was broken is
that system does not have a user interface until
NSdos or NS*CPM was running as the only resident code was a very tiny
bootloader. Any patches needed to get the
system going the first time for me was using the front panel of the
Altair (switches feh!). My solution was a new CPU
board (computime) with local Eprom monitor, its own IO, and a working
system to test each bit first.
Allison
8 Jan
8 Jan
8:59 a.m.
New subject: Using AltairZ80 simulator: Question about mounting different types of disk images
On Jan 8, 2014, at 12:54 PM, Philip Lord <philip at neoncluster.com> wrote:
On Jan 5, 2014, at 2:15 AM, allison <ajp166 at
verizon.net> wrote:
I now have Northstar DOS working on my SOL-20...finally.
As I said previously, by looking at the HEX on the disk image I really believed the I/O
was supposed to go into the 2800h area, but everything I had read stated that it resides
at 2900h
I had actually tried the new I/O at 2800h and changed the jump codes to the 2800h
addresses, The resultant disk booted, but had issues doing any DOS commands.
Today I decided I'd also try patching the new I/O at 2800h as before, but this time
I'd leave the jumps to the 2900h address area (This is actually how the disk image was
set up originally)
IT WORKED !!!!!
Not sure why, but at the moment I'm so happy I don't care.
Thank for your support.
Next on the list...CP/M.
On 01/03/2014 09:53 PM, Philip Lord wrote:
Hi Allison,
I took your advice an decided to start with Northstar DOS instead of CP/M.
I also took a different and hopefully simpler tact. I decided to just alter the HEX of
one of the N* DOS double density disk images found online (and also bundled with Dave
Dunfield's N* Utils).
I got myself a copy of a SOL-20 N* BIOS (also found on the net), and assembled it. I then
converted the resultant HEX file in to a BIN file so I could patch it into the disk image.
Now this is where it gets a little weird.
Once I opened up the Disk image in a HEX editor, so I could do the patches, I saw that
the jumps at the beginning of the DOS in the 20xx range jump to the 29xx range...all good
so far. However when I looked at the 29xx addresses I couldn't see anything that
looked like a BIOS. Instead I saw the BIOS was at the 28xx range. So I patched in the new
SOL BIOS at 28xx, and adjusted the jumps accordingly to the 28xx range.
I was then able to use Dave's NST utility to copy the image to the SOL, and the SOL
was able to make a real floppy. This floppy was able to boot, and I could see the boot
screen and the keyboard worked fine.
The problem was that I couldn't seem to do anything. Any N* command I issue failed.
For example, I tried to (LI)st the directory, and the drive spun up, but after a while
stopped and the SOL became unresponsive.
So I went back and made another disk, this time with the BIOS at 29xx and the jumps to
the 29xx addresses. The resultant floppy was not able to boot.
So that's where I'm at. Basically trying to figure out why in the disk
image's BIOS is not at the expected addresses, but why the I/O jumps still jump to
29xx, and why the disk that seems to boot fine crashes when issuing commands.
Thanks again for your time.
Philip Hi all,
I'm trying to use the AltairZ80 simulator to patch a Northstar .nsi disk image, with
the final goal being to use it with my real SOL-20 + Northstar disk controller. I will use
Dave Dunfield's NST utilities to copy over the patched Northstar .NSI image via serial
to my real SOL-20, and hopefully I will be able to generate a working CP/M 2.2 boot
floppy. I have Dave's NST utils already 'talking' to my SOL, so hopefully the
last part, generating a real floppy, should not be difficult.
I have the following files:
- A disassembled dump of the SOL-20 CP/M CBIOS (found on the net)
- A HEX file of the SOL-20 CBIOS that I generated in the AltairZ80 simulator
- A Northstar .nsi CP/M disk image that is bootable in AltairZ80 by 'Attaching'
MDSAD, Northstar MDS-AD Disk Controller (Memory Mapped to 0xE800-0xEBFF)
The
standard NS* CP/M image for the Horizon is fine as all you need to
do is patch the CONin and CONout and printer
if used. Thats the only real difference between the various systems
using the NS* MDS disk. Make sure you have
enough memory for the version your booting 56K is likely enough.
Now before I actually get into the nitty gritty
of patching the SOL-20 CBIOS (which I will also probably need some advice with) onto the
Northstar disk image, I figured I need to first find a way to copy the CBIOS HEX file that
I generated, from the PC (or from the standard CP/M disk image) onto the Northstar disk
image. The standard CP/M disk image that comes with AltairZ80 has two programs,
'R' and 'W' that allow copying to and from the simulator to the PC. The
Northstar disk image I have, of course, does not have these two programs.
Easily
done on the SOL itself, easy in that you can patch memory directly.
Load the working version to memory and boot it, reset and then patch it,
run it, if working then reset and
use your utillities to save it to a new piece of media.
Generally I get NS* dos running first as its, smaller, simpler to patch
and once thats running you can use it to
edit and patch CP/M media. NS*DOS with the monitor that loads at 2A00h
will need only 8K of ram starting
at 2000H. Plus it doesn't interact with the sol monitor for memory
space nor will it get into space typically
used when CP/M is loaded.
Now my first problem is to either get 'R'
and 'W' onto the Northstar disk image, and/or have the standard CP/M disk image
mounted as drive A and the Northstar Disk as drive B. I was hopeful that It would be easy
to attach the standard CP/M image and the Northstar CP/M image at the same time, and just
copy the files over from one to the other. However I can't seem to do this. I have
tried various sequences of attaching the standard CP/M disk image to drive A, then
?enabling? the Northstar controller and attaching the Northstar disk image to drive B,
then either trying to boot from A or B. Unfortunately this does not work and CP/M does not
boot, and results in some strange activity in the simulator.
As many of you know, I'm a bit of a noob at this stuff, so hopefully I haven?t made
any wrong assumptions about what I need to achieve.
I was wondering if anyone had any idea how I can go about this?
As someone that
started using CP/M and NS* hardware in 1977, it was
obvious to me. I still have
working hardware and use it.
The problem with the .nsi files is getting them into the computer (sol
not the PC). Fortinatly Dave has
provided tools to get the stuff on the computer so you can write it out
to disk. The emulator is handy
for a lot of stuff but it can't write real media directly.
From the top, do you have a disk drive that works and hard sector media
for the SOL? Otherwise this is
all moot. If you have hard sector media you can't write it in a PC that
only know soft sector, don't bother
unless you have a catsweasel or other multimedia floppy interface.
I'll assume you have a MDS, Enough installed ram, working and a PT SOL
plus a floppy (better to have several).
IF you do then its real easy as the SOL has a keyboard monitor that will
allow viewing and patching memory.
The procedure is in the NS* CP/M manual as well. All that is needed to
do is boot the known MDS system disk
(write protected please) wait for it to stop. Then hit reset to get to
the SOL monitor and then using your listings
hand patch the CONIN, CONout and maybe printer part of the CBIOS. Then
GO/JUMP to the warm restart address
and see if CP/M comes up and issue a prompt and takes a command like
DIR. Save the resulting system to a NEW disk
and then try to boot it. preserve teh old disk like ti was gold (likely
more valuable per unit weight!). This is only
an outline but us old farts did it.
FYI: the hardest case was getting a NS*Horizon going that was broken is
that system does not have a user interface until
NSdos or NS*CPM was running as the only resident code was a very tiny
bootloader. Any patches needed to get the
system going the first time for me was using the front panel of the
Altair (switches feh!). My solution was a new CPU
board (computime) with local Eprom monitor, its own IO, and a working
system to test each bit first.
Allison
3854
days inactive
3860
days old
11 comments
9 participants
participants (9)
-
ajp166＠verizon.net -
barythrin＠gmail.com -
hachti＠hachti.de -
jdr_use＠bluewin.ch -
john＠yoyodyne-propulsion.net -
nf6x＠nf6x.net -
philip＠neoncluster.com -
randall.kindig＠gmail.com -
snhirsch＠gmail.com