Re: Remote Virtual Disk Drive Emulator

["Vince Briel" <vbriel@comcast.net>]

Eric,

You are the man. Sorry I haven't had time to help out. As a matter of fact, 
the kit is still sitting unbuilt. I'll build it this week and have it ready. 
Kind of hard to find time for the doing the things that don't pay the bills. 
IIRC this will mean .nib's will fit in the SVD and play as well. You will 
have access to load most (some may not work guys) disk images into the SVD 
from your pc. Very nice.

Vince

-- 
Replica 1 the Apple 1 clone
http://home.comcast.net/~vbriel/index.htm


"Eric J. Rothfus" <eric@rothfus.com> wrote in message 
m27jkvj6zt.fsf@rothfus.myvnc.com">news:m27jkvj6zt.fsf@rothfus.myvnc.com...
> This is what the SVD was meant to do (www.theSVD.com).
>
> The SVD is a little device that uses a serial-port connection
> to your PC to download diskette images which are served-up to
> your vintage machine just as if the image was a real diskette
> in a real drive.  The box isn't too complicated, a slow PIC,
> some memory, and "glue" logic to match the floppy signals
> necessary in the old machines.
>
> I originally built it for the TRS-80 line, then expanded it
> support Heathkit, and now (drum roll please Vince) the
> Apple ][!
>
> The "dongle" that Vince was refering to is a little device
> that "matches" the signals from the Disk ][ controller to
> those made popular by the Western Digital 17xx floppy
> controller chips.  In fact, this dongle would allow you to
> connect one of the old TRS-80/PC style 5 1/4 drives to your
> Apple - though why you'd do that is beyond me. :-)
>
> The hardware is done and works.  I've played Lode Runner
> for the first time on my 2+.  Alien Rain is pretty cool
> too.  Yes, I mostly play with the old games.
>
> The software has a bit left to go.  It supports .DO,
> .PO, and .NIB images - though any conversion back and
> forth should be done with Cider Press.  The NIB support
> seems to be good enough to handle copy protected disks
> like Alien Rain.  It also allows booting of DOS 3.2
> disks too.  DOS 3.3 images have expanded support, allowing
> you to download single program files instead of an entire
> disk at a time - just another short cut that you can also
> do with Cider Press.
>
> All I have to do is to find time to finish things!  And
> Vince, your dongle will be in the mail in a week or so.
>
> Eric