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Copy downloaded games to Disk's

R

Roman78

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Joined
Jun 30, 2011
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Hello everyone,

Since yesterday im a proud owner of an Intertec Superbrain link. I only have one disk whit it. Wordstar.

Now i googled and downloaded some games for CP/M 80, But how can i save those on a 5,25" disk?

I have a lot of disks for the C64, so i can use some of those to save the games on. But i also have no tools/OS disk. I think i have to use that to format and copy disks.

I found this: http://www.gaby.de/ecconver.htm but that software woun't run properly on fast computers like Pentium... so i doubt it will run on a Core2Quad.

Or is there a possibility to run an emulator on my PC, connect this whit a 5,25" diskdrive and than make diskimages from the downloade filkes and mount those in the emulator. So that i can make a diskcopy from the diskimage to the 5.25" diskdrive?
 
You have a rare machine. You will have to have a boot disk specific for the Superbrain. I am trying to find the disk image online that you can download. I thought Dave Dunfield's site had it, but I can't seem to find it on his website. I'll check my disks later today and see what I can come up with.
 
Does your copy of WordStar boot? If so, you may be able to use it as a starting point for building up a working system disk.
 
The computers boot from the disk. And i can run wordstar. But i don't know if it is CP/M or some kind of build im OS from ROM (like C64 or Arcon). I going to make some screenshots.... eeehhh pictures from the screen :D

I got the machine from a man who's company imported those here in Holland, and he said that they maybe imported 30 of those. So there a not much here. :cool:

I also looked at Dave's site but did not found a Superbrain disk there.
 
I own a C128D. That one is also able to run CP/M (it has a Z80 cpu). May this be helpful?

/edit:

Now i some information about the boot process.

First when i turn on the computer it says: "3.1 PROGRAMMA_DISKETTE IN DRIVE A"

Then i insert the Wordstar Disk, than is starts booting automatically. Almost instantly after i insert the disk he is finished booting and the screen says: "64K SUPERBRAIN QUAD DENSITY DOS VER 3.0 FOR CP/M 2.2" and a "A>" is shown beneath that.

And now i'm able to start WS.

These are the files on the disk:
WS.COM
WS.OVR
WSINSTAL.COM
CONFIGUR.COM
PIP.COM
DAISYTST.BAK
WS.MSG
DAISYTST
 
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OK, if I remember my CP/M from 25 years ago, you've got a CP/M 2.2 boot disk with Wordstar.
All of the WS files are Wordstar, of course, Daisytst sounds like a program to test a daisy-wheel printer.
PIP.com is Peripheral Interchange Program, which copies files from disk to disk, or disk to printer, etc.

Do you have the CP/M disks for the C128D? If you do, fire it up and see if it will read the Superbrain disk. If it will, you can hook the C128D to a PC and use it to burn disk images for it, or at least use the C128D to make a backup copy of your one and only disk.

22DISK is a CP/M-to-DOS Diskette Interchange Utility.
The registered version supports these formats-
Superbrain JR - SSDD 48 tpi 5.25"
Superbrain 40 track - SSDD 48 tpi 5.25"
Superbrain QD - DSDD 48 tpi 5.25"
Superbrain II - DSDD 96 tpi 5.25"
Superbrain - SSDD 48 tpi 5.25"

If you have a DOS PC with a 5 1/4" disk drive.

The main thing is to keep that one disk safe. Write protect it and make a backup as soon as you can. If I remember correctly, PIP can do a one drive disk copy (with about 10 disk swaps) one of the CP/M gurus will know the proper sytax, or will have a link to a CP/M 2.2 manual. :)
 
Having a bootable floppy is certainly better than having no boot floppy at all.
But not by much, because you still have no way of formatting new floppies.
A proper CP/M boot disk for that model will have all the hardware-specific utilities to do that and more.

PIP can copy the files to another disk, but not the boot tracks.
And only onto a formatted disk.

I don't think 22DISK will format a floppy, will it?
 
ahm said:
I don't think 22DISK will format a floppy, will it?
Click to expand...
Yes, it will. I use it to format 8" SSSD floppies for use with my CompuPro 8/16 since I don't have a fully working system disk for CP/M-80 (like the OP, mostly it just boots).
 
I don't have any CP/M disks for the C128D.

It's a wonder that the disk still working. It's a little bend.

I downloaded 22Disk, but now i need a 5,25" disk drive in and old slow system. But that must not be a problem. Also will send Dave and e-mail.
 
I received the answer from Dave. He told me that the Superbrain uses an odd disk format which is not supported on a PC. So it's not possible to write SUperbrain disk using any kind of PC program. The only way is to copy it from original disks on a superbrain.

So who has a Superbrain???
 
I have a Comstar version of the Superbrain. Give me a couple of days to check this out. The unit has Tandon TM100-2A floppy drives and I'm quite sure I imaged the one boot diskette I have for it. If my image doesn't work, I'll make a copy of what I have using the machine.

Right now I'm working on another project, so give me a little time. As I remember, there weren't a lot of files on the disk.

Chuck
 
OK, found the images I made. Turns out I made them in both Teledisk and Imagedisk format.

Fired up the Intertec Comstar and booted from disks made from both of those images(both work). The opening banner shows that the disks are some version of DOS for CP/M. It also includes a disk utility called DIR+.

Below are links to the screenshots. Tried to run PIP and it returned PIP?

So, not sure what's going on there.

BTW: the floppy controller in this unit is a FD1791B-02

http://s909.photobucket.com/albums/ac299/cledford22/Intertec%20Comstar%20DOS%2021%20for%20CPM%2022/

Disk Images are here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?pq5akkaseqarm
 
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Chuckster_in_Jax said:
Below are links to the screenshots. Tried to run PIP and it returned PIP?

So, not sure what's going on there.
Click to expand...

If you look at the directory listing, there's no PIP.COM
Can't run what's not there.

The directory listing looks very sparce. You appear to be missing most of the standard CP/M utilities.
 
So, is it possible to copy over CP/M utilities from some other CP/M disk and they still work? What are the possibilities that other CP/M disks would even be readable by the Superbrain(as long as the Superbrain has booted up to CP/M)?
 
Chuckster_in_Jax said:
So, is it possible to copy over CP/M utilities from some other CP/M disk and they still work?
Click to expand...
Maybe. The standard CP/M utilities should work, as long as they're for the same processor. But system disks usually also contain a few hardware-specific programs. Those are the ones you'd need, for instance, to format a floppy.

What are the possibilities that other CP/M disks would even be readable by the Superbrain(as long as the Superbrain has booted up to CP/M)?
Click to expand...
Unlikely.

You''ll need some sort of intermediary system that can read and write the different disk formats.
I use an old Gateway 486 desktop running 22DISK or ImageDisk.
 
The problem whit 22DISK is that, according to Dave Dunfield, that it is not possible to copy software from a DOS Pc to a Superbrain Disk.

The SuperBrain uses an odd disk format which is not supported on the PC
controller - although 22disk has definitions for it, I have never been
able to write a superbrain disk from a PC - the only way I know of to get
system disks is to copy the disks on a working brain.
Click to expand...
 
I'm definitely not going to argue with Dave of all people, but oddly enough 22disk has at least three Superbrain entries; wonder if Chuck has any insights?
 
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