C64 Preservation - Late Activision titles

[aph]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Hi Pete,

> If you got as far as extracting the sectors, you were already past what
> we need for a G64.

Oh yes, I'm sure 😉

> If you have a way to get me the raw GCR data from each track, I can get
> it into the G64 file format with no problem.

The fdi2raw.c file I sent you should contain everything needed. The
main routine is fdi2_decode. The last parameter "mfm" should be set to
0. Also, the standard_MFM_2_bit_cell_size and
standard_MFM_8_bit_cell_size variables, initialized at the beginning
with Amiga-correct values, should be initialized correctly for a
specific speed zone. 50000 is the number of bits for the speed zone
with the least density. If you don't know how to change this, please
contact me directly (we're going into bird names here ;-) ). For these
values, you must know the exact densities above the lowest one (which
is 125KB/s I suppose). If you don't know or can't find them easily, I
would have to dig them from my source, but I'm not sure I got them from
technical reference...

Vincent.

 

[santos]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

well, you can solder together a breadboard and work on intricate timings
like some are suggesting/working on, or you can find a pirated copy of the
games with protection already removed. I'd choose the path of least
resistance but what do i know.

"Pete Rittwage" <peter@rittwage.com> wrote in message
news:B8CdnSSR8uDCzHnfRVn-vQ@comcast.com...
> Greetings everyone,
>
> I have run across several later Activision titles (~1990) that I am not
> able to image *at all*. They pretty much are detected as blank tracks by
> all my routines. So far I have Afterburner, F-16 Combat Pilot, Project
> Stealth Fighter, and Skyfox 2. All seem to lack a proper track cycle at
> any density, much like certain tracks on later Epyx titles.
>
> Anyone that has any insight into Activision's later protections (beyond
> the Pirateslayer years), please contact me. It looks like maybe density
> changes within the tracks or something.
>
> Pete Rittwage
> C64 Preservation Project
> http/rittwage.com/c64pp

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Aaron Bilger wrote:

> Development
>
> This idea is pretty involved, requiring high speed sampling, probably
> extra hardware, and a new emulator disk format. There may be smarter
> ways to achieve the kind of low-level emulation I'm talking about, but
> I don't believe there is a higher level alternative you could be
> confident in applying to an arbitrary protected disk.
>
> If you want to discuss this or have other ideas and want to bounce
> them off me, that would be great. If you decide to implement
> something here, I could help with logic design of the circuits, but am
> not the one to help design in discretes such as resistors or
> capacitors if needed, let alone touch a soldering iron (though this
> *might* be breadboardable). I'd be up for tackling VICE usage of a
> raw format too (I'm assuming CCS64 is not open source).


Aaron, this sounds like a great intro for a 1541 in circuit emulator.
This is a truly great idea with many uses and I hope you don't abandon
it. This could be a great way of sending a g64 over and much more.


Christian

>
> Aaron
>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

In article <1123406808.694103.187030@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>,
ApH <bidulecornu@hotmail.com> wrote:
>Oops, forgot to answer this:
>
>> Have you ever converted a captured .fdi to a .g64 to test?
>
>No. I don't have such code ready. Pete told me privately that such code
>could be the first step to support FDI files in the C64 community, and
>I do agree. Do you think you could create such a convertor?

Where can one obtain Commodore (1541) FDI images? I'm interested in
working on conversion code to be implemented in 64COPY, but have no way to
make FDI images. If someone has some, I would be grateful.

I am presently working on D80/D82 and D2M support (finally!). D80/D82 is
basically done, with D2M partially working. Native partition support is
still a work-in-progress.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Schepers, | Author of : 64COPY, The C64 EMU file converter
Info Systems & Technology | http/ist.uwaterloo.ca/~schepers/personal.html
University of Waterloo, | My opinion is not likely that of the
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada | University, its employees, or anybody
(519) 888-4567 ext 2456 | on this planet. Too bad!

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Peter Schepers wrote:
> I am presently working on D80/D82 and D2M support (finally!). D80/D82 is

Sorry to ask, but what formats are this?
D80/D82 for the CBM 8050/8250 disks? VICE uses these extensions.

Thanks
Andre

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

In article <dfng89$814$1@news.musoftware.de>, A. Fachat <afachat@gmx.de> wrote:
>Peter Schepers wrote:
>> I am presently working on D80/D82 and D2M support (finally!). D80/D82 is
>
>Sorry to ask, but what formats are this?
>D80/D82 for the CBM 8050/8250 disks? VICE uses these extensions.

Yes, D80 is 8050 and D82 is 8250. These are the generally accepted
extensions, along with D2M for FD2000 and D4M for FD4000 images.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Schepers, | Author of : 64COPY, The C64 EMU file converter
Info Systems & Technology | http/ist.uwaterloo.ca/~schepers/personal.html
University of Waterloo, | My opinion is not likely that of the
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada | University, its employees, or anybody
(519) 888-4567 ext 2456 | on this planet. Too bad!

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Peter Schepers wrote:
> In article <dfng89$814$1@news.musoftware.de>, A. Fachat <afachat@gmx.de> wrote:
>>Sorry to ask, but what formats are this?
>>D80/D82 for the CBM 8050/8250 disks? VICE uses these extensions.
>
> Yes, D80 is 8050 and D82 is 8250. These are the generally accepted
> extensions, along with D2M for FD2000 and D4M for FD4000 images.

Cool 🙂 I invented D80 and D82 when I worked on the 8050/8250 support
in VICE (or at least re-invented them, I then had no idea if they
already existed)

Andre

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

In article <dfpfnk$e95$1@news.musoftware.de>, A. Fachat <afachat@gmx.de> wrote:
>Peter Schepers wrote:
>> In article <dfng89$814$1@news.musoftware.de>, A. Fachat
><afachat@gmx.de> wrote:
>>>Sorry to ask, but what formats are this?
>>>D80/D82 for the CBM 8050/8250 disks? VICE uses these extensions.
>>
>> Yes, D80 is 8050 and D82 is 8250. These are the generally accepted
>> extensions, along with D2M for FD2000 and D4M for FD4000 images.
>
>Cool 🙂 I invented D80 and D82 when I worked on the 8050/8250 support
>in VICE (or at least re-invented them, I then had no idea if they
>already existed)

I don't think they existed when you made them up. Logical extensions,
though. I certainly won't take it upon myself to make them up since I'm
not the one implementing these formats into an emulator.

One question about these newer formats... why do people want D2M, D80 and
D82? They can't be sent back to an original disk to use on a real machine
can they, nor can you read an original, so why the need for these virtual
images?

PS.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Peter Schepers wrote:
> One question about these newer formats... why do people want D2M, D80 and
> D82? They can't be sent back to an original disk to use on a real machine
> can they, nor can you read an original, so why the need for these virtual
> images?

Of course they can. There are programs on the web that read a disk and
store them in a D80/D82 file and vice versa. See the PETindex for
example: http/www.6502.org/users/andre/petindex/drives/progs/index.html
(Of course you have to have some means to transfer the files to the PC
and back, which I and others have).

Andre

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

In article <dfphbr$ee2$1@news.musoftware.de>, A. Fachat <afachat@gmx.de> wrote:
>Peter Schepers wrote:
>> One question about these newer formats... why do people want D2M, D80 and
>> D82? They can't be sent back to an original disk to use on a real machine
>> can they, nor can you read an original, so why the need for these virtual
>> images?
>
>Of course they can. There are programs on the web that read a disk and
>store them in a D80/D82 file and vice versa. See the PETindex for
>example: http/www.6502.org/users/andre/petindex/drives/progs/index.html
>(Of course you have to have some means to transfer the files to the PC
>and back, which I and others have).

Either I'm being dense today, or your above references to how to
read/convert a 8050/8250 disk to an image makes no sense to me. Both
dsk2file and file2dsk work on the native C= machine, but you're still
reading and writing to local floppy disks. What type of disk can you hook
up to the PET to write a segmented disk image (D80/D82) to that can be
read to the PC? A 2031, or some other 4040/154x compatible drive? It's
been some time since I've worked in BASIC/ML mixed, but I don't see from
the source to dsk2file how a 1.6Mb 8250 disk can be segmented to another
drive for transfer to a PC.

PS.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Peter Schepers wrote:
>>Cool 🙂 I invented D80 and D82 when I worked on the 8050/8250 support
>>in VICE (or at least re-invented them, I then had no idea if they
>>already existed)
>
>
> I don't think they existed when you made them up. Logical extensions,
> though. I certainly won't take it upon myself to make them up since I'm
> not the one implementing these formats into an emulator.

I've created D80 and D82 images long ago with a software called prlink, which
was made to create disk images of any drive. I doubt support in VICE existed
at that time, but who cares. prlink nowadays is called cbmlink.

> One question about these newer formats... why do people want D2M, D80 and
> D82? They can't be sent back to an original disk to use on a real machine
> can they, nor can you read an original, so why the need for these virtual
> images?

cbmlink (and still prlink) can read and write *any* disk image that is used
by a Commodore disk drive. it runs on a PC (which can run DOS, Windows or
Unix), Amiga, and some Unix workstations, and it attaches to many Commodore
computers by RS232, PC64 cable or even X1541 cable. The Commodore runs a
little server program that talks to the disk drive and therefore can be
connected by almost any interface (serial, IEEE488, TCBM, ...). You see
cbmlink is very flexible

D2M in addition can be read and written with 1581copy I think, directly in
the PC's 3,5" drive.

I use D80 and D82 for archival purposes for a long time already, and having a
tool like 64copy makes managing them a lot easier (I use SC most of the time,
but 64copy always had its advantages. This is yet another!). The same is true
for the people who use D2M for a long time for archival purposes as well.

Nicolas

--
--> Email address is valid for replies (requires Re: in the subject) <--
- My Commodore hardware projects and the X1541 Shop at http/x1541.de -

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

In article <3ob8avF56abgU1@individual.net>,
Nicolas Welte <welte_spam@freenet.de> wrote:
>Peter Schepers wrote:
>>>Cool 🙂 I invented D80 and D82 when I worked on the 8050/8250 support
>>>in VICE (or at least re-invented them, I then had no idea if they
>>>already existed)
>>
>>
>> I don't think they existed when you made them up. Logical extensions,
>> though. I certainly won't take it upon myself to make them up since I'm
>> not the one implementing these formats into an emulator.
>
>I've created D80 and D82 images long ago with a software called prlink, which
>was made to create disk images of any drive. I doubt support in VICE existed
>at that time, but who cares. prlink nowadays is called cbmlink.
>
>> One question about these newer formats... why do people want D2M, D80 and
>> D82? They can't be sent back to an original disk to use on a real machine
>> can they, nor can you read an original, so why the need for these virtual
>> images?
>
>cbmlink (and still prlink) can read and write *any* disk image that is used
>by a Commodore disk drive. it runs on a PC (which can run DOS, Windows or
>Unix), Amiga, and some Unix workstations, and it attaches to many Commodore
>computers by RS232, PC64 cable or even X1541 cable. The Commodore runs a
>little server program that talks to the disk drive and therefore can be
>connected by almost any interface (serial, IEEE488, TCBM, ...). You see
>cbmlink is very flexible

I'm understanding now!

>D2M in addition can be read and written with 1581copy I think, directly in
>the PC's 3,5" drive.
>
>I use D80 and D82 for archival purposes for a long time already, and having a
>tool like 64copy makes managing them a lot easier (I use SC most of the time,
>but 64copy always had its advantages. This is yet another!). The same is true
>for the people who use D2M for a long time for archival purposes as well.

Did you get my email about downloading the latest 4.3b1 test version with
D80/D82 support?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Schepers, | Author of : 64COPY, The C64 EMU file converter
Info Systems & Technology | http/ist.uwaterloo.ca/~schepers/personal.html
University of Waterloo, | My opinion is not likely that of the
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada | University, its employees, or anybody
(519) 888-4567 ext 2456 | on this planet. Too bad!

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Peter Schepers wrote:
>>example: http/www.6502.org/users/andre/petindex/drives/progs/index.html
>>(Of course you have to have some means to transfer the files to the PC
>>and back, which I and others have).
>
>
> Either I'm being dense today, or your above references to how to
> read/convert a 8050/8250 disk to an image makes no sense to me. Both
> dsk2file and file2dsk work on the native C= machine, but you're still
> reading and writing to local floppy disks. What type of disk can you hook
> up to the PET to write a segmented disk image (D80/D82) to that can be
> read to the PC? A 2031, or some other 4040/154x compatible drive? It's

In fact the dsk2file and file2dsk do at this time not split the image.

Personally, I have my PC running as harddisk for the PET using my LPTIEC
hardware. There I have space in abundance (at least for PET measures ;-)

Andre

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Hi Nicolas,

sorry, I did not want to take any credits for D80/D82. Seems we just had
the same idea.

Andre

Nicolas Welte wrote:
> Peter Schepers wrote:
>
>>> Cool 🙂 I invented D80 and D82 when I worked on the 8050/8250
>>> support in VICE (or at least re-invented them, I then had no idea if
>>> they already existed)
>>
>>
>>
>> I don't think they existed when you made them up. Logical extensions,
>> though. I certainly won't take it upon myself to make them up since
>> I'm not the one implementing these formats into an emulator.
>
>
> I've created D80 and D82 images long ago with a software called prlink,
> which was made to create disk images of any drive. I doubt support in
> VICE existed at that time, but who cares. prlink nowadays is called
> cbmlink.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: comp.sys.cbm,comp.emulators.cbm,rec.games.video.classic (More info?)

Peter Schepers wrote:
> Did you get my email about downloading the latest 4.3b1 test version with
> D80/D82 support?

Yes, thanks a lot for that! I didn't want to post publicly about this, and I
didn't have the time to test it out yet. But I already downloaded it (I was
afraid it might be a temporary download) I'll let you know when I ran it
on some of my D80/82 images.

A. Fachat wrote:
>
> Hi Nicolas,
>
> sorry, I did not want to take any credits for D80/D82. Seems we just had
> the same idea.

I also don't want to take credits for D80/82. The choice of the file
extensions is just too obvious, and I only used already existing software to
create them. Therefore I'm sure I'm not the first person to create such
images, the authors probably did this long before me (because it took me a
long time to get prlink working on my system).

Nicolas

--
--> Email address is valid for replies (requires Re: in the subject) <--
- My Commodore hardware projects and the X1541 Shop at http/x1541.de -