I used the screws from the metal holders for this, but there are three screws included with the floppy emulator which might be better for this since they have a sharper edge. Now screw the floppy emulator back on the MPC and connect the power- and ribbon connector. There is no need to change any jumper settings for the MPC60, it just works. USB Emulator SFR1M44-FU-DL 3.5' USB 1.44MB Floppy Drive Emulator For Embroidery Machine. Features: Use normal USB flash drive as the medium for transfer design. 34pin floppy driver interface, 5V DC power supply, easy to install. 1.44MB built-in flash memory, with FAT12 format, used for cache data from USB flash drive.
There is little reason to buy overpriced “pre-configured” floppy emulators for most studio gear. Aside from Lotharek HxC, most other floppy emulator units on eBay are simply inexpensive Gotek units flashed with a freely available operating system firmware known as FlashFloppy and configured with sound disks, and other content freely. Use emulator UFA1M44-100, plug usb flash drive on it, connect to computer, read and write data under WINDOWS XP/2000/7. Jumper setting (SFR1M44 -TU100 K SFR1M44 -U100K -R) J5 -JA set to generete READY signal on 34pin of floppy driver interface JC -JB -S0 Driver select 0 S1 Driver select 1 MO Motor Jumper setting (SFR1M44 -U100K) J5. GoTek Floppy Drive to USB Conversion Manufacturer Factory, get here all types of solution regarding Floppy to USB, Floppy to USB Converter, Floppy Drive, USB Floppy Emulator, Floppy to USB Emulator, Floppy Disk Drive, Floppy Drive to USB, Floppy to USB Conversion, Floppy Disk Reader, External Floppy Disk Drive, USB Floppy Drive, Floppy Emulator, Disk Drive at gotekemulator.com.
Gotek Floppy Emulator Jumper Settings
I wanted to post a more in depth instructions for those using this on there mpc 2000 or 2000 xl , it could also probably work for other mpc in general , I spent days trying to figure out how to use this drive it came with zero instructions most videos I felt people were more so showing off that they got it to work and really didnt explain. More than a few articles and forum posts I saw that people using certain programs on there pc could only truly get there usb drive to partition too 100 1.44mb. I found out a hybrid solution using a free program , and a tendak usb floppy drive. Both Gotek and Tendak drive were just under 50$ us.(using windows) 1.)Turn off power to mpc and open it up basic screw setup get the backing and control panel board off mpc and gently remove hard drive, detach the cables and put gotek drive in place attach the two cables, put everythig back on mpc . 2.)Download version 1.40i from the free software company called IPCAS http://www.ipcas.com/support/usb-floppy .. nload.html, this is the program you will use to format one of your usb with this . Here is the quick steps to use the disk emulator program after instalation I do believe there youtube videos showing how to. a.)Put in usb flash drive ,open program top left corner you will see the drive you plugged in go to the drive and right click format, keep in mind this will erase anything previous on that flash drive.There will be a window prompt pop up make sure you set the partition to 100 it will break the drive into 100 1.44mb folders essentially and make sure you click the dos option this will add a dos prompt to each folder you only need it in one but it makes it easier and you can always delete with a click in the folder. hit format it will ask you if your sure or not just dot it, and your usb is now partioned in a way your mpc can understand. b.)On the right of the screen you will now see or should now see the 100 partitions click on the very first partition this will be the very first file your gotek drive will read to the mpc, you will see the three dos boot files you need this for the boot up part. c.)Plug in Tendak usb floppy drive on my computer the drive read was A, insert your boot floppy I have 1.72 and it will read it like any other hard drive open the drive folder and you should see three files for the OS boot up , highlight those files and drag them in the first folder in your ipcas program, unplug usb plug into gotek drive power it up to show that it works and will boot from the first partition on that storage device. What few have explained about the GOTEK drive is that there are two buttons that serve functions of scrolling through the partitions inside of mpc or what ever compatible and when the usb is unplugged it also has a few functions because of its internal memory its to set read or writing modes that allow it to be transported info from pc to mpc etc, that part is tricky and where I think should be written about or explained more . So the concept is that you really dont need to format usb on pc the idea is that it formats from the GOTEK drive itself and partitions to 1000 on its own which is amazing considering it eliminates the need for possible faulty drives or disks. The only problem I ran into is that when you go through the partition process it wipes the OS so you need to find a way to boot mpc after you partition gotek drive if that makes sense. So I figured I would make two compatible forms of using usb drive with mpc 2000.
2.)Now that you have a 100 partitioned boot drive , you can now setup and partition the second usb. a.)plug in second usb into the gotek drive make sure that it isnt turned on and hold in the two buttons on the drive and power on machine you will see it start to count up once you see that let go it will go up to 998 or so once its done creating your 1000 partitions you will notice now that after you power off it will give you a disk error message or something. power machine back off, you second usb is now successfully partioned and formated to use fully on your mpc...but now you notice there is no OS boot on the new second usb. b.)plug second drive into pc you will notice it will be name fl000 or something like that and it will seem that the whole drive is the size of a floppy disk that is just the first partition on your gotek drive the pc is registering , no problem though go into the ipcas program make sure usb one is plugged in your pc and open up the first folder like before and you just highlight and copy the files in the floder including the mpc ones and drag them into your second usb drive, you now have a dos boot mpc OS file in the first partition on your usb so you can now plug in mpc power up you now have your boot and a thousand partition usb. The first usb I use as a back up boot and a way that is easy for me to drag files from old disks to add to and from my pc to the mpc and the second drive is for my main stand in drive I hope this rant made sense to you this method works great for me and I think allot out there searching could be helped .
Preamble or why GOTEK?
One can find a lot of stuff and rumors about the “HxC floppy emulators” in relevant forums and also, that “cheap” alternatives won’t work with computers like Amiga or Atari. This article should prove the opposite, since I successfully exchanged my internal HD-drive for the floppy-emu “SFR1M44-U100 updated version” from “Gotek”. I decided for this paticular drive, because it (theoretically) can deal with 1000 disks and supports HD. Also, I feel the price of the HxC-emus a bit overdrawn. On Amazon or ebay there are always a lot offers for about 20€ for the Gotek devices. Here’s a product picture:
What means “updated version”?
“updated version” refers to a schematic error, that could have lead to the computer failing to detect that the drive is ready (please insert a disk…). For the updated version certain chip-resistors have been reduced in their values, so that the detection runs reliable. One can distinguish the updated version by the values of “RN4″ to “RN6″ (red square in the picture). If the value is 102 (= 1 kOhms), it’s already the updated version. If one has the old version, it is recommended to replace the resistors by 1 kOhm-resistors. Regarding this I found a PDF document on the CD of my version with the name “REPAIR SOLUTION – VB516.pdf”. If you’re missing it, you can download it here.
Requirements for a successful operation Download easeus for mac.
The following criteria have to be met if one want’s to use the 1.44MB-model of the floppy-emu with an Atari:
The floppy-controller already needs to be fitted for HD-operation. That mean, it should run at 16MHz und should be able to stand this clockspeed permanently. So this means either the Ajax-FDC or a WD1772-02–02.
Mixed operation with an additional, external drive may be possible, but hasn’t been tested so far.
On the floppy-emu the jumpers “MO” and “S0″ need to be set (see picture). The Atari (in contrast to a PC) expects the first drive to be ID0.
One needs an USB-key with enough space. Since the floppy-bus only runs with 500kb/s it doesn’t need to be fast.
For comfortable disk management on the key one needs a PC running Windows. Maybe there’s also appropriate software for Mac OS or Linux, but I don’t know.
What works, what doesn’t work?
– What works:
Using either DD or HD virtual disks. One can mix them in any order.
Formatting virtual disks via software on the PC, writing and reading data, importing or exporting standard disk-images.
Formatting DD-disks any arbitrary disk-format using the Atari, writing and reading, importing and exporting disk-images in any format(*).
Formatting HD-disks using the Atari, writing and reading, importing and exporting images.
Boot from the first disk (or the currently selected one if you do a warm boot).
– What doesn’t work:
HD-disks with more than 18 sectors. 18 is the limit of the emu’s firmware. If one tries more, one gets an “illegal sector” error.
Trying to write disk-images with “strange” formats via the PC software. In that case the program refuses to work saying it’s not a “FAT-12″ image file.
Since the disks are put sequentially as binary images on the key, it’s not possible to access any other than the first disk directly via the Windows Explorer without additional software.
(*) Using JayMSA I was able to write *.ST-Images on the virtual disks. This, however, only worked running it on the Atari. So selecting the desired disk via the two buttons and then using the program to write the ST-image on the disk. More on that further down!
The sorry subject detecting media(disk) change
Unfortunately Atari saved a few pennies that days when designing the floppy-bus. So the disk change is not detected properly using the dedicated pin 2, but misusing the pin 28 (write protect) in that way, that this line is pulled to 0V (GND) for a short time when the user changes a disk. (Thanks to P. Putnik at this point for the analysis, further reading on this topic here.) A few older drives offered the option to get this demand by setting some jumper, but for modern drives or floppy-emus I’m quite sure there is no such option any more.
Hence I present a “dead simple” solution for this that is easy to build and at least works like a charm for my Gotek floppy-emu:
My solution relies on the fact that pressing the buttons pulls a dedicated line to GND (0V). That’s exactly what we need to simulate the media change. Using two schottky-diodes this “pulling to ground” is fed to pin 28 of the floppy-bus. The diodes prevent that the buttons are short-cicuited and that signals on pin 28 coming from the bus can’t trigger an unwanted counting-up of the selected image. On the pictures one can see the wire connected to pin 28. The other end of the wire is connected via one diode to the “free” pin of one button, respectively. In my case I just connected them to two through-holes of the traces to the buttons. If one now presses one of the buttons the pin 28 is pulled to ground simultaneously. This is interpreted as a disk change by the Atari then. Below you can find a schematic of the circuit with my modifications marked in red:
The floppy-emu in use
Here’s a picture of the floppy-emu in use. The funny case is from an old Commodore-PC. Inside there’s the mobo of an Atari 1040STF with lots of extensions (4MB RAM, SCSI-controller, 2 HDs, CDROM, real time clock, Lacescan, …). The bunch of wires crossing the case has nothing in common with the Atari, it’s just from my musicial equipment. But that just as an aside. ?
Sorry at this point for the mediocre picture quality. These are “real” screen-shots and it seems my TFT and my digicam aren’t best friends. ?
Formatting of all available virtual disks at once / Initializing of the USB-key
If one wants to initialize or format all of the available virtual disks at once, one can simply use the inbuilt function of the emu’s firmware. To do so, keep both buttons pressed while powering up the computer. Shortly after switching on the version of the installed firmware will be displayed on the seven-segment displays, then there’s displayed “F01”. If one now releases the button, the drive INSTANTLY starts formatting all of the disks. Caution, there is no further security query. So why one should use that function at least once with a new USB-key is a short story: The controller checks how many virtual disks can be created on the key and formats them. That way one knows the excact number of available disks and additionally can be sure that the key is working correctly on the drive. However, doing so will result in all disks formatted with 1.44MB. If one wants other formats, the following procedure may help:
Formatting of custom formats
Like I already mentioned at “What works”, one can format disks with customs formats using the Atari. The number of tracks doesn’t seem to be limited, at least I was able to format a DD-disk with 85 tracks and 11 sectory/track using Kobold (thats the max Kobold can handle!). For testing I put as many files as possible on that “disk” from the GEM-desktop to see if they can be opened correctly again afterwards. Indeed, that works without any problems!
Gotek Floppy Emulator Manual
Theoretically one could also format HD-disks that way, but like I already mentioned at “What doen’t work” 18 sectors is the maximum. So the only option that is left over is to increase the number of tracks. For me, it’s no big deal since I hardly saw any up-formatted HD-disks anyway.
Writing back of disk-images using JayMSA
Like I mentioned above, one can write back disk-images using JayMSA. On the following screenshots you can see me using that procedure to write back an image of “Zak MC Kracken”. When using that tool one should pay attention to two points: On the file selection dialog one has to change the extension to *.* manually (see red mark on the picture). If not, one can’t select *.ST images there. The physical writing-back is labeled “Extract” in the tool. For me, I’d suspect some other function behind that name. However, using that function the writing-back works perfectly like you can see on the additional screenshots.
Gotek Floppy Emulator Jumper Settings
Questions and answers
Here I will collect and hopefully be able to answer questions I got via comments here or on the Atari forums
Q: Do you connect the floppy cable just the same way as to a ST floppy drive or do you need to twist the cable? A: No, like I wrote the Atari expects the first drive to be “A” or ID0. So there is no need to twist the cable. Just plug the cable of the former disk drive on the emu’s connector.
Q: Do you have a picture of where the diodes are soldered to the switches? A: I’ve just updated the relevant paragraph with a schematics picture that reflects the changes.
Q: Once all the mods are done, is it possible to write the game .ST images to the usb pendrive on a PC or can it only be done from a ST? And how to do this? A: This is only possible for the first virtual disk since the PC “sees” only the first disk. The software supplied with the emu does not work with ST-images unfortunately. I’m planning to write an application that can access all virtual disks on the key and supports ST and STX images.
Q: With the program Winimage it is possible to make .img files from real Atari ST disks, this is the file format the gotek uses to put files on the usbstick in Windows, would these images work in the ST? A: I can’t answer that since I haven’t tried it yet.
Q: Do the games boot from the floppy emulator and can disks be swapped for multidisk games? Can games be saved on the emulated disks? A: Yes and yes if you have modified the media change circuit so that the game can detect the disk change correctly.
Q: What about images of copy-protected (original) disks? Any chance to get them running on the Gotek? A: Sorry, but no chance. The Gotek only supports “cooked” images, no raw trackdata. Thus all copy-protected disks relying on “weak” sectors and stuff will certainly fail.