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Floppy Emu - Yellowstone and Total Replay

V

Vipersan

Experienced Member
Joined
Apr 12, 2020
Messages
66
Hi all..
Treated myself to a Christmas present which arrived 2 days ago.
BMOWs Yellowstone card.
I have had a floppy emu for some time and so can access floppy images on my Apple IIe no problem.
I guess what I want to do is use the smart port functionality of the yellowstone card...to access total replay using the floppy emu.
Effectively Total Replay is a hard drive image rather than a floppy image.
I am assuming this will be possible but am at a loss as to how to do this...which is why I'm seeking help.
A step by step guide would be useful.
Where do I put this .hdv image on the sd card ?
Does it have to be in a specific folder ..or can it remain in the root ?
Is it then just a case of selecting smartport mode on the floppy emu...re-booting the appleIIe which will then hopefully autoboot the replay image ?
Any advice welcomed ..as I am dealing with hardware unfamilliar to me...ie the Yellowstone card.
Thanx
VS
 
Thanx for the info VV ...
Looks like I may need to update the firmware of the floppy emu.
..and rename the Total Replay image to SMART0.hdv
The Yellowstone card being so new should be totally up to date.
Cheers
 
Sadly this may take a while to get to grips with....
I am still not sure of the SD menu structure..
I have navigated to Smartport...rebooted...and am greeted with 'Big Mess o Wires - floppy emu'
'press any key to enter bitsy-bye' on screen
So assume I'm getting somewhere..
..just not sure jst where...
lol
did that ...and entered a prodos menu with games listed....of which there are many...
I'm assuming the Total replay image has loaded...??
..but it may well be that bmow has already incorperated this massive games list on the SD. ?
as I can select games and play them.
Here are a couple of pix
 

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So ...it looks like I have solved this mystery...or at least it is working for now.
Opened the BMOW sd card in windows.
In the root there are 2 files smart0.po and smart1.po
Smart1.po appears to allow smartport to autoboot (runs prodos)
Smart0.po contains a drive image loaded with games and utilities which bmow supplied.
I copied this to a safe location on my pc.
Then deleted it from the sd card.
Copied Total Replay.hdv into the sd card root and renamed it to Smart0.po thus replacing the original.
Put the sd card in the floppy emu and turned on the Apple IIe..
I was auto booted into Total Recall....since I had already configured the Floppyemu to use smartport
It came up with this screen.
The selection process and games do run ...or at least the 2 I tried did.
 

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Yep you were correct V V ...but I seem to have it nailed now...see previous post
 
Now I need a way to have both versions of smart0.po on the SD ..selectable...
or just make a different sd card ...one original and the other modified.
 
After reading as much as I could find on the combination I have..
Yes I can use my floppy emu in smartport mode to boot one 32mb drive image ...but only one at a time.
Even though the sd card can support 4 x 32mb images ....only one example smart0.po can exist in the root of the SD ...
..at least this is true for the Apple IIe
I think it only allows the 4 selectable images to be menu accessed in later Apples such as the 2c or 2gs.
So..I have concluded that I have to swap out the sd card to one with a different drive image in the root if I want to change the drive image.
..or drop in a replacement image and re-name it to smart0.po
Such that the yellowstone card can then boot the new image.
A bit inconvenient ..but at least it works.
such is life.
I guess this restriction is related to the fact that the older Apple II computers were never designed to access hard drives...
 
VeryVon said:
@Vipersan which foppy emu firmware version are you running?
Click to expand...
That is a good question V V
I am using the firmware the Floppy Emu came with at purchase.
Never attempted to change it...and TBH not even sure how ?
How can I find out the current version ?
Is there a combination of button presses that will bring up the firmware version on the OLED display ?
rgds
VS
 
mighty confusing ...I have never seen the menu screen in your picture above..

The closest thing I ever see is just after self test - ok ... and the smiley face
Smartport mode
Floppy Emu - model C
Apple II version 0.2V
CPLD Firmware 34
select : config menu

This only displays for a few seconds...then it is gone.
gotta be quick or I miss it.
so I guess firmware 34 if that means anything ?
 
Vipersan said:
Floppy Emu - model C
Apple II version 0.2V
CPLD Firmware 34
Click to expand...
ah nice catch! Looking at the change log, appears to be version "2V" - October 28, 2021. Quite old.

If you're happy how it is now, then you can certainly stick with this version, or update if you want the latest whistles and bells like selecting hard drive images.

I would suggest you use the first one listed, "Apple II firmware, for Floppy Emu Model C or B, normal version: 240208A"

Floppy Emu Disk Emulator for Apple II, Macintosh, and Lisa | Big Mess o' Wires

www.bigmessowires.com www.bigmessowires.com
 

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Cheers V V.
useful info indeed
I wont deny I am tempted to update if only for the hard drive image selection ability.
But it is working just fine with single images ..renamed to smart0.po
I guess I'm just wary of bricking the emu.
I'll watch the video you linked to many times until I feel comfortable with the process..and then decide.
Being in the UK it's no easy of fast task to return it to BMOW if I mess up.
:oops:;)
 
Ok ...bit the bullet and did the firmware update..
appeared to go smoothly..
I can now pull up a 4 drive position memory sadly not really readable in my photo..
but smart0.po is in position one.(0). just bleached out (a camera issue)
I can toggle through the other positions 1 2 and 3
I have a second drive image on the sd card containing Total Replay....which I have named smart1.po
but it isn't seen in the floppy emu display.
I assume this is a naming convention thing...
perhaps all drive images have to be named the same smart0.po ?
but this defies logic as you surely cant have 2 x smart0.po drives in the root of the sd card..
help with naming the images such that they would both appear in the emu menu ..but remain distiguishable from each other ....would be appreciated.
rgds
VS
 

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Hmmm..
It would appear I'm approaching this wrong...
I have Bitsy in position 0 and labled as smart0.po and Total Replay in position 1 but left as an HDV file.
The Emu can load either extension now it would seem..
but it is less of a select from the menu and reboot...
More like unmount ...change and mount an image ...then reboot. ?
So I was going about it all wrong.
Even though an image is listed it has to effectively be 'mounted' followed by a power down and re-boot.
???
merely selecting it from the list and re-booting does not unmount the previous image and mount the new one.
but it does work...even though it had me confused.
 
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