.IMD diskette image file recovery

[Tony Nicholson]

[Please excuse the lack of threading - I read cctalk in digest form.]

On Wed, 3 Feb 2016, Jim Simpson wrote:

> Is there a utility that will read .IMD diskette archive files and recover
> the data?  I've found a wealth of BigBoard & BigBoard II data (and lots of
> other stuff too) on many different sites, all saved in .IMD format.  Is it
> possible to read these files and recover the data instead of writing a
> floppy disk with DiskImage?

Jim (and other cctalkers),

Grab a copy of the SIMH Altairz80 simulator from
http://schorn.ch/altair.html and the zip file of my cpmplus for the
CompuPro Disk1 controller from the Other Operating systems link at
http://schorn.ch/altair_5.php

This supports IMD disks in BB II 1.4Mb (1024byte x 9 sector) format.  You
can attach the IMD file and use the "W" command to extract files to the
host operating system -

mini:cpmplus tony$ altairz80 cpm3bk

Altair 8800 (Z80) simulator V4.0-0 Beta        git commit id: 4ff1e317

LDRBIOS for SIMH System - V3.2-Y2K 01-AUG-2008
DISK1 8" boot floppy

CPMLDR3 - CP/M V3.0 Loader
Copyright (C) 1982, Digital Research

 BNKBIOS3 SPR  FA00  0600
 BNKBIOS3 SPR  C600  1A00
 RESBDOS3 SPR  F400  0600
 BNKBDOS3 SPR  9800  2E00

 61K TPA

CP/M Plus for SIMH System - V3.2-Y2K 06-AUG-2008
Banked memory
CCP loads from A: and reloads from bank 0
DISK2 dual 20Mb M20 winchesters (A-F)
DISK1 8" (I-L) [BB-II] floppies


A>SETDEF * A: [ORDER=(COM,SUB) DISPLAY UK]

Drive Search Path:
1st Drive            - Default
2nd Drive            - A:

Search Order         - COM, SUB
Program Name Display - On
Date format used     - UK

A>  <CTRL-E>
Simulation stopped, PC: 0FE8F (AND 02h)
sim> att disk1a3 ../s100/BB2-011.IMD
sim> go

A>l:

%FDDISK1 unit 3 is type BigBoard-II 1024x9 Read-Only
L>dir
L: BULLETIN     : BYE      COM : CALL-JAN PQN : COMMANDS HLP : DIR      COM
L: ELAPSED  COM : HELP     COM : HELP     HLP : INFO         : MAGAZINE HLP
L: MBOOT    ASM : NEWS         : PAMSFEB1 0Q6 : PASSWORD COM : RBBS     COM
L: TYPE     COM : USERDISK CQT : WHATSNEW HLP : XYAM     COM : XYAMHELP T
SYSTEM FILE(S) EXIST
L>w
A:W        COM

WRITE V-1.17 (01-Mar-08)  SIMH Interface V004
Usage: WRITE <file name> [B|T]
Copy <file name> to host environment. Default is text, B for binary, T for
Text

Examples
WRITE BDOS.MAC      copy BDOS.MAC as text file
WRITE PIP.COM B     copy PIP.COM as binary file
WRITE PIP.COM       copy PIP.COM as binary file [.COM .REL .DAT imply B]
WRITE TEST.DAT T    copy TEST.DAT as text file
WRITE *.COM         copy all files matching *.COM as binary files
WRITE SRC/BDOS.MAC  copy BDOS.MAC to directory SRC as a text file
WRITE COM/*.COM B   copy *.COM to directory COM as binary files

L>w type.com b
A:W        COM

WRITE V-1.17 (01-Mar-08)  SIMH Interface V004
Write "TYPE.COM" to "TYPE.COM".
3.5kB written (Binary).

If you need to support other CP/M disk formats, the BIOS source files and
submit files to put them together are in the A1: directory on the hard disk
image.  There's also CP/M program to make IMD disk images natively under
CP/M-Plus in A3: (it will span the IMD file across multiple floppies if the
image file is too large). I used this to copy all my 8" floppies (including
BB II ones) to IMD images.

Tony

-- 
Tony Nicholson <tony.nicholson at computer.org>