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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : External Storage for the TRS80
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| mookster1 Regular Member  Joined: 10/06/2011 Location: New ZealandPosts: 81 |
Hey guys, I recently was given a TRS80 Model 4P computer - this was before Tandy's Color Computer, and used in business (it was portable too, if you call 10-15kg portable!  ) It has 2 5 1/4" floppy drives (for a computer that came out in August 1983 this was high-end stuff) and 64KB of RAM expandable to 128KB. I discovered how difficult it is to get hold of working 5 1/4" floppies when I bought 20 of them off Trademe (shrinkwrapped and everything... this would've been perfect!) but sadly water got through the shrink wrap and the disks are spotted with rust/mould which I tried to remove with a bit of meths and gently swabbing with a cotton bud but to no avail (I've still got 19 disks to try so if anyone has any suggestions, sing out!  )
Anyway, the Maximite has a serial port and so does the TRS80. I figured I could write a program that read data over a serial port coming from the Maximite off an SD card, directly into RAM and then run (probably in the form of BASIC programs but I might also use compiled programs.) Has anyone done this before? The program on the TRS80 needs to fit inside 1.5KB of storage space, as that's all the space I've got left on the OS disk, which so happens to be the only working floppy I've got. As a spinoff I'll also be able to use the Maximite via the TRS80 in terminal mode. Thanks Capacitance is futile - roll on 2012! |
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BobDevries Senior Member  Joined: 08/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 266 |
Hi Mookster, What you are suggesting sounds suspiciously like DriveWire4 . The server software (for use on PC, mac, Linux, etc) is written in JAVA (so not compatible with Maximite), and to use it on the TRS80, you'd need to write drivers for it to communicate with the server end. I don't know if anyone has already written drivers for anything other than the Tandy Colour Computer, but you could ask the author. Regards, Bob Devries Dalby, QLD, Australia |
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James_From_Canb Senior Member Joined: 19/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 265 |
Knowing how some of us hoard stuff (cough, cough) I'd be surprised if at least one member doesn't have a box of 5 1/4" floppy disks stashed away in a cupboard, just waiting for someone to ask for them. Why don't you make a separate post asking if anyone has some? Regards James My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought careening through a cosmic vapor of invention. Hedley Lamarr, Blazing Saddles (1974) |
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| VK2MCT Senior Member Joined: 30/03/2012 Location: AustraliaPosts: 120 |
Umm Would that be soft or hard sector floppies needed, John |
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Bryan1 Guru  Joined: 22/02/2006 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1344 |
All depends if any Viagra is present....... Sworry couldn't resist |
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| mookster1 Regular Member Joined: 10/06/2011 Location: New ZealandPosts: 81 |
<GROAN> 
It uses soft sector diskettes from memory... I figured out to boot the TRS80 over a serial port, meaning I'll never have to rely on a floppy again A link to the comp.sys.tandy newsgroup posting is here: http://groups.google.com/group/comp.sys.tandy/browse_thread/ thread/d8de6b60fe59e789/0fccff62430830e1
However, as this was a function that was used as a self-testing tool at the factory (they'd load a few programs on the bare boards, then run them to stress-test the machines) there are no OS's out there that utilise this feature, meaning I'll have to write my own. Capacitance is futile - roll on 2012! |
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