trying to copy Pinball Dreams from 3"5 to 3"

jbaudrand · 15:16, 18 December 23

ZbyniusR: Please, when you don't know something, stay cool.

Poulette: Connais-tu quelqu'un qui répare les mauvaise connections de bord de carte en France? Je pense que mon port d'expansion est defectueux. (I ask Poulette if someone could fix bad board in France)

poulette73 · 20:50, 18 December 23

Non désolé...

Il y a 20 ans en arrière, je t'aurais redirigé vers @Giants (qui officiait sur le site Phenix Informatique) et touchait pas mal au hardware, mais je n'ai pas ses coordonnées...
Tu peux poser la question sur le site CPCRulez, ça ne coûte rien.

poulette73 · 21:08, 18 December 23

Another solution as suggested by @SerErris : buy a greaseweazle.

With this, you can export 3" floppy disks directly to the PC, or write images directly to the 3" drive from the PC.

Some photos of mine :

And the link to the CPCRulez forum where I created several 3" floppy disks from the DSK images : https://cpcrulez.fr/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=6829&start=45#p58709

With this solution, you can copy both sides of Pinball Dreams directly onto 3" in less than 2 minutes.

jbaudrand · 20:33, 20 December 23

I must admit I haven't looked at greasewezel along time ago, it's very cheap now. If it's my amstrad board that is faulty it will probably my next step.

thanks for your link. I have to wait christmas to test the XMEM on CPC's wife (at her mother's house), until that:
Merry Christmas

SerErris · 11:02, 21 December 23

Your Wife has an CPC?

I am jealous

SerErris · 12:45, 21 December 23

Quote from: poulette73 on 21:08, 18 December 23Another solution as suggested by @SerErris : buy a greaseweazle.

With this, you can export 3" floppy disks directly to the PC, or write images directly to the 3" drive from the PC.

Regarding the cable to connect the 3" cable. Do you have any details on how this cable has to be created?

Or is it just the cable we find in the inside of the FD1 drive?

Just asking as your cable has the twisted version, vs. actually for CPC a straight cable would do with and using --drive=0.

poulette73 · 20:24, 21 December 23

It is a cable modified especially for communication with the PC.
This is explained a few posts further down in my link:

https://cpcrulez.fr/hardware_montage_drive-nappe_lecteur_3_sur_PC_par_JMD.htm

Nothing complicated but the implementation is not easy...

The best thing is to do like me, and buy a ready-made version, which also includes the special "inverted" power supply for drive 3" :

https://www.ebay.fr/itm/234651177028

jbaudrand · 18:11, 26 December 23

Ok I finally managed to make X-mem working. I'm clueless about the next step, how it can help me to make a working copy from a working 3"1/2 disk? the manual doesn't explain how to launch PARADOS, and moreover how PARADOS will help me to copy 3"1/2 to 3"?
I will try to launch discology and take benefit of extra ram, maybe it won't break the copy by doing it in a single pass?

It must be very easy for you, but I'm a complete newbie when it comes to make anything else than play on CPC.
thanks for your patience.

Yes my wife got a CPC. it's her CPC, not mine.

poulette73 · 06:42, 27 December 23

To use PARADOS, start it with command |DRIVE

Here you can find some documentations about PARADOS : http://quasar.cpcscene.net/doku.php?id=dossier:roms#la_rom_de_substitution_parados

To summarize, PARADOS uses 3 types of menus (and functions) :

MAIN Menu (without SHIFT or CONTROL key) to : use Attributes/Copy/Erase/Filespec/Move/Rename/Tag/un-Tag

SHIFT Menu (use it when SHIFT pressed) to : Backup/Configure/Format/Log/Sort/Un-Log/Verify)

CONTROL Menu (use it when CONTROL pressed) to : Attributes/Copy/Erase/Filespec/Move/Rename/Tag/un-Tag

So, to copy from B to A :
Select LOG DRIVE (SHIFT + L) as B.
Select COPY (in standard menu, without SHIFT and CONTROL).
Select DESTINATION as A.

If necessary, you can specify the media type on drive B before copy (number of tracks, single or double sided) with SHIFT + Configure.

It's very effective, and very fast !

poulette73 · 07:05, 27 December 23

One last solution when you have cleaned or corrected your Edge extension port, with the fantastic USIfAC II interface from @ikonsgr !

Especially since it is only available at 11€ for the month of December, you have to hurry!!

With the RSX |DSK : it allows you to make instant copies from a DSK image to drive A, drive B, or the Gotek drive, without any parameters !

The RSX itself detects whether the DSK image is a 40-track or 80-track mode image (single-sided or double-sided) !

All you have to do is download the DSK image of your choice and copy it to the USB key.

Example here, where I did the opposite operation to you : I recreated the version of the game "Orion Prime" on a real 3"1/2 floppy disk with my external 3"1/2 drive, from the DSK image specially designed for 3"1/2.

The copy only took a few seconds :
(Beforehand I had set the switch of my external 3"1/2 drive as drive A)

And the game works perfectly on my new 3" 1/2 floppy disk :

So in your case:
Simply copy the two 3" DSK images of the "Pinball Dreams" game onto the USIfAC II USB key.
Then use the RSX |DSK.

jbaudrand · 13:55, 27 December 23

Sorry to be totally newbie:

poulette73 · 19:12, 27 December 23

I don't have a X-MEM so I can't help you anymore, sorry...

Are you sure you have loaded PARADOS rom into X-MEM ? You should see the PARADOS Copyright on boot.
Can you try standard OS Firmware instead of Firmware 3.15 ?

Maybe ask to @TotO if he can help you with X-MEM.

jbaudrand · 22:37, 27 December 23

Ok,

I need a .dsk containing parados .rom to put it on 3"1/2 via XPCPC. I only found zip containing .rom

where can I find a ready to use .DSK?

SkulleateR · 00:41, 28 December 23

Quote from: jbaudrand on 22:37, 27 December 23Ok,

I need a .dsk containing parados .rom to put it on 3"1/2 via XPCPC. I only found zip containing .rom

where can I find a ready to use .DSK?

like this ?

poulette73 · 06:08, 28 December 23

Thanks to @SkulleateR.

Note you can create your own DSK with the wonderfull ManageDSK utility : https://www.cpcwiki.eu/index.php/ManageDsk

With ManageDSK it's possible to :
- open an existing DSK.
- create a new formatted DSK image.
- add/remove/rename/delete files with import or export button.
- view files as hexa/ascii/amsdos format
- etc.

jbaudrand · 21:13, 28 December 23

wow, thanks for dsk, I've never heard of that tool. Ok, I'll try to upload rom, and try to finally copy this game.

SkulleateR · 00:42, 29 December 23

Quote from: jbaudrand on 21:13, 28 December 23wow, thanks for dsk, I've never heard of that tool. Ok, I'll try to upload rom, and try to finally copy this game.

I used this one btw

http://www.cpcmania.com/cpcdiskxp/cpcdiskxp.htm

Anthony Flack · 23:32, 04 February 24

You're trying to copy the 3.5" version of Pinball Dreams onto 3" disk? That's not going to work, surely. You need to download the version that's specifically made for a 3" drive and copy that, and forget about doing a disk to disk copy of the wrong version.

Have I misunderstood?

jbaudrand · 22:12, 09 February 24

Yes, there's a two sided A/B 3" .dsk available on cpc power. but it's a non standard format discology can't copy it.
I was unable to upload parados on x-mem via the dsk, ther's a pb with header in the provided dsk. so I've switched to FutureOS, very nice OS. unfortunately the format used by batman required a greazeweasel to be written on real 3". so I bough it, hope I will succeed I'm planning to offer the disks to my bros for his birthday next month (he got a vanilla 6128+)
I'm reading poulette73 stories, and the manual carrefully I don't want to destroy something.
Cheers and thanks for support.

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trying to copy Pinball Dreams from 3"5 to 3"