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Tandy Disk Extended Color Basic for CoCo as .WAV file?

smp

smp

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Oct 4, 2011
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Location
Bedford, NH, USA
Hello all,

As you can see from my CoCo related posts, I have a CoCo 3, and I am currently using HDBDOS via a .WAV file, and I have been using Drivewire to serve my virtual disks.

As I have gained more experience with my CoCo setup, I have been coming across .DSK files that even though the application on them is a .BIN file, the application has some expectation that Disk Extended Color Basic is installed. Obviously, back in the day, if you had the disk and you got the program loaded, then DECB must be there.

Of course, since I do not have DECB, and I have been using HDBDOS and Drivewire as my virtual floppy disk system, I encounter errors when I attempt to run programs like this. Every time I try a new program or application, it's a bit of a crap shoot. Will it run, or will it crash because it makes use of something that would have been there if DECB was installed.

Does anyone know if I can get a copy of DECB as a .WAV file? I don't think that DECB and HDBDOS occupy the same memory space, because I have seen articles talking about loading an EPROM containing HDBDOS into the spare EPROM location on a drive controller. If I can get DECB as a .WAV file, I could load that before I load HDBDOS, and then everything would be in memory as if a drive controller is installed. Then, when I load an application that uses something from DECB, it will be there, and hopefully the application will no longer crash.

Thanks for listening. I'm happy to hear all comments and pointers that you may have to offer.

smp
 
Last edited:
amadama said:
No guarantees on this:

Try the file called dbpatch.wav found here:
http://www.colorcomputerarchive.com/coco/ROMs/XRoar/CoCo/DOS/DISK_BASIC12_v21/

Descriptions here:
http://www.colorcomputerarchive.com/coco/ROMs/XRoar/CoCo/DOS/DISK_BASIC12_v21/ReadMe.txt
Click to expand...

Hello again, amadama,

Thanks very much for this pointer!

I have also been looking around within the Color Computer Archive (http://www.colorcomputerarchive.com/). Within the ROM folder, there is what appears to be a .BIN file for Color Computer Disk Basic here: http://www.colorcomputerarchive.com/coco/ROMs/Color Computer Disk BASIC 2.1/Original/

Over the coming weekend, hopefully I will have some time to spend with these couple of possibilities. When I have some results to report, I will post back here again.

Thanks a million for all your attention and support!

smp
 
Hello all, here's an update:

I posted about my problem on the CoCo mailing list, and I received the following assistance:

I think most of your problems are the result of not having a disk controller.
That means your HDBDOS is in RAM only instead of both RAM and ROM. There are
many Disk Basic machine language programs that will run in full RAM but switch
to ROM/RAM mode for disk I/O. Emulators don't have this problem because the disk
ROM is emulated.
Click to expand...

I followed up by asking if I needed to have an actual floppy disk controller, or if having HDB-DOS in an EPROM cartridge would perform the same way.

That will be fine as long as you have no intention of acquiring actual floppy
drives for the Coco.

With your Disk ROM (Drivewire HDBDOS) in a ROM cartridge, you will be able to
access drives on the Drivewire server. You will need to ensure that the command
DRIVE ON is the default condition or you will be trying to access non-existent
floppies for drives 0-3.
Click to expand...

So, this past weekend, I finally got around to constructing my EPROM cartridge. (I purchased PCBs from here: https://github.com/NF6X/CoCoEPROMpak) (I also purchased HDB-DOS in a 2764 from Cloud-9) Everything worked great. I did make a mistake and I installed the autostart jumper. But another request for help to the CoCo mailing list brought the assistance that I should not have that installed. Now, I am happily instantly booting HDB-DOS upon power-on.

I still cannot get Disk EDTASM to go, nor can I get Zork I. I now can get Zork II and Zork III, so I know that I am making progress. I guess that some things simply do require a real floppy disk controller, or the use of an emulator.

Anyway, that's where I am today. I thought that this information might be useful to someone else in the future.

Thanks for listening...

smp
 
Sounds great!
I couldn't find where you ordered the PCB though. This is something I'd love to try out myself.
Do you mind putting up a pic of your finished cart? (I know, I always ask for pics, I'm a nerd that way!)
Thanks!
Alex

EDIT: Wow, did not realize that this was made by VCF forum member NF6X. Also found the link to the OshPark PCB house.
Thanks!
 
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Re:Tandy Disk Extended Color Basic for CoCo as .WAV file?

I have just started to get into CoCo's too..

9 Months ago, I got a CoCo 3 from a guy along with ALL of his Apple ][ Stuff.. ( I have been into Apple ]['s since JAN-1982 )

For some really good CoCo history, along with lots of Technical Information, try this little book, Tandy's Little Wonder..

In the past Four Months, I have bought a CoCo 2, Two different FD-500 units, one I have paired with an Original 26-3022, with a replaced Drive Controller, and the other with a J&M Controller, a Multi-Pak Interface, and a few Cartridges...

One of the Cartridges, Skiing, I removed the ROMs, and replaced them with Sockets..

Something else I just found out, is the CoCo 3 has a 6Kb Graphic in the ROM, that could be removed, and replaced with HDB-DOS.

MarkO
 
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