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davidgiven / fluxengine

PSOC5 floppy disk imaging interface
MIT License
362 stars 69 forks source link

QuickDisk #633

Open kacman1 opened 1 year ago

kacman1 commented 1 year ago

David, Thanks for this great software: FluxEngine.

I am wanting to see if I can use it to read Roland QuickDisks. I see in the past, you had a version for trying to read a QuickDisk. The issue I have with that code is my hardware is the GreaseWeazle. It does not recognize it as a FluxEngine hardware.

I have also tried a later GUI version. The GreaseWeazle is recognized, but the QuickDisk option seems to have been removed. My QuickDisk setup with a special custom cable. When I tell it to read the drive does spin up and goes through the motions; but the software want an RPM reading.

I am just wondering if you had any information on why the QuickDisk was dropped (can not actually read flux) or is it possible to get the older code to recognize the GreaseWeazle?

Just wondering if you think this is a waste of time and if I should just buy QDC instead.

Thanks, Steve Kac...

davidgiven commented 1 year ago

Hello!

I did have someone a while back who had a QuickDisk, but they never got back to me about testing... the problem is that they work quite differently to normal floppy disks (they have a single long spiral track) and there will be various assumptions in the firmware that may not be true.

I'd like to make it work but I suspect this will be impossible without having the hardware here for testing. If you're looking for a project, however...

I have no idea about the Greaseweazle QuickDisk support --- this was the first I was aware of it.

kacman1 commented 1 year ago

Thanks for the reply. GreaseWeazle does not support QuickDisk directly. I was taking the FluxEngine support for QD and FluxEngine works with GreaseWeazle hardware, hoping to get the series to work.

I see two possible paths: 1) Get the GreaseWeazle to work with the older FluxEngine code (USB support) OR 2) Edit the latest FluxEngine code to work with the QD.

Not sure which path is the easiest. It would probably be the best for everyone if I can edit the latest code rather than fork the older code.

Thanks again.

davidgiven commented 1 year ago

Ah, I see. The old FluxEngine code never worked --- it was pure speculation based on my understanding of the hardware. Also, the firmware's changed since then, so it'll require updating anyway.

I'd suggest that if you have the Greaseweazle hardware, the way to go is to get QuickDisk reads working with the Greaseweazle using the native tools, and then I can add FluxEngine support for doing reads and decodes.