techtravels.org

inital results on error correction

While I have yet to actually implement the full-scale error correction as I want to, I did some manual tests today. I basically took a track that I was erroring out on, and swapped in 1-bit away values for the bad bytes.  In some cases, it appeared...

Latest articles

new book

I recently received “On the Edge: the Spectacular Rise and Fall of Commodore” and have read about half of the book so far.  Very interesting read.  It’s fun to read about how the various Commodores...

SX software progress

Welp, since I fine tuned the PC to very reasonable numbers, I figure a small overhaul of the SX code is in order too. I had somewhat of an epiphany working the on the SX, which I haven’t *really* looked at in...

first real world tests

Well I tried to read about 70 disks in via my project tonight. I had mixed results. First, the Teac loves HD media but doesn’t fare as well with LD media. The Samsung hates HD media, but does very well with LD...

Success!@#

I hestitate to jump to conclusions, but I think I just passed a crucial first step in getting this to work!@#!# After adjusting some timing on my new code on the SX, I’ve found my first 0x4489 0x4489 pattern. This...

MFMSanityCheck

While I’m hesitant to post this at all, this is a quick and dirty application I threw together, and I do mean threw, that will check for valid MFM bytes. See the previous post for the link to the actual bytes. It...

Latest attempt

Tim mentioned something in the last post regarding SYNC which really had me thinking about how to SYNC the data coming in the drive with the data going to the UART of the USB2SER converter. Then I was thinking, now that...

Timeline

I’ve put together a time line of events starting from November 2004, the initial idea.

CLICK THE ABOVE IMAGE FOR A FULL SIZE VERSION.

Logicport screenshots and project file

I thought this might be neat to put up. Sorry about the high-res image but you lose too much when it compresses it. Click here for the screenshot. Also, I uploaded the .LPF project file which can be viewed for free with...

more hardware

When in doubt, just throw some more money at the problem! 🙂 Actually, I’m kidding. But I do have the Parallax USB2SER on its way — maybe the USB will be much faster, buffered, and more reliable. Those...

adding more commands

Now that I *think* I’ve got a handle on the reading portion, I’ve been adding a couple more commands. I added support so that the SX knows what cylinder number it is on.  The F and B commands increase and...