Catweasel Mk4 Update
Catweasel Mk4 Update
Over the holiday I've finally had the time to try out the updated Catweasel software on my WinXP/Pentium 3 machine.
First, the Individual Computers web site could use some work. You won't find the latest software under "Support", rather, you need to go to "News" find the story (it's the story from 15-Sep-2007), and download the software from there.
The package's installer isn't smart enough to upgrade the existing drivers & software. Rather, the readme instructs you to delete the driver files from the windows\system32\drivers directory, then you reboot and let windows detect the new hardware, at which point you direct it to a temp directory with the new drivers.
The Catweasel card actually implements a number of devices, so you have to install drivers for 4-6 devices or so.
The software includes the original imagetool software and a new program, imagetool3. Imagetool appears to be essentially the same as earlier versions. This means that the disk formats supported are more limited than you'd think. Probably 20-30 different formats.
Imagetool3 includes support for a few more formats, including the Apple formats. Imagetool3 also includes a graphical display of the disk being read (similar to what you'd see in a defrag program), as well as a way to see the signal being read from the disk. Another really nice feature of imagetool3 is the ability to format and write the various disk formats. I haven't tested this, though. Unfortunately, the new graphical displays in the tool are not documented. In fact, the documentation is limited to a readme file. The program itself is listed as beta (version 0.3).
In short, I believe I've been able to now read TI-99 and Atari 810 diskettes, but, was not able to read the TRS-80 nor Apple IIe formats (despite it being listed as supported). I tried both imagetool and imagetool3. No luck.
Also, amazingly, you can't add your own disk formats to the program. Somehow all of the disk formats supported are coded into the imagetool program.
On the plus side, the software package does include the C routines and header files so that you can write your own disk read/write routines if you'd like.
I'm still pretty disappointed with the card. I can only conclude that the package is intended more for supporting Amiga disk interchange.
The entire package would be a lot better if 1) More technical documentation were included, 2) The package could support user-defined disk formats, 3) It actually supported the formats it claims to support, 4) There existed a user forum where the 2600 or so buyers of the card could communicate and share experiences and help each other.
Despite the problems, I did come across a comment on the web (Amiga disucssion forum?) that the card is sold out and that another production run was scheduled for 1Q 2008.
So, where am I with my disk archiving? I'm going to try the Linux cw2dmk utility to see if I can read the rest of my diskettes. I'm also toying with the idea that I should be on the look out for a Central Point Option Board, which, essentially does the same thing.
If all else fails, I can use various platform-specific disk archiving tools (like the Apple ADT). I'm really hoping it doesn't come to that, given that that would be a painful process for any number of disks more than 10.
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