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How to Get SRAM Card Working on Sharp PC 3100 and Tidalwave PS-1000

A

ArchiMark

Member
Joined
Mar 3, 2023
Messages
13
Hi,

Hope someone can help with getting SRAM card working on my HP 200LX and recently acquired Sharp PC 3100 and Tidalwave PS-1000 palmtops.
Just received a Pretec 2MB SRAM card SN5002. Installed a new battery.

When I put the card into my HP 200LX, I get:

A:\> DIR

Not ready for reading Drive A
Abort, Retry, Fail?

Did Fail and got:

Current drive is no longer valid

Did:

C:\> format A:
format not supported on drive A:
format terminated


I tried card in the other two palmtops and card working.

Any suggestions to get sram card working with the palmtops?

Thank you for any all suggestions.

Mark
 
I see you already posted to Tankraider so that eliminates that as a suggestion.

Have you tried to initialize the card from the Filer on the HP-200LX? The manual has it as <menu key I can't read>, O, C followed by F10. That is on page 22-8 of the manual. I would suggest trying to get the card working on the HP-200 first since there is a lot more documentation available for it.

What is the model of the card? Pretec has two variants and recommends using the model with 8KB attribute memory. If their documentation is correct, it should have part number of S65??? (S65002 for 2MB) while the ones without the 8KB have SN5???. I admit that it doesn't make much sense to me for a manufacturer to sell a card that manufacturer believes won't work.
 
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Thank you for your help, krebizfan!

Yes, tried that....

Agree, it's best to get card working on 200LX first....that's my strategy.....

It's weird that it is not working....from what I read, it should......
 
The Sharp PC3000/3100 had limited support for some low capacity SRAM PCMCIA type 1 cards. DIP produced some loadable drivers that would extend that support further and supported some additional SRAM cards plus some flash cards (IBM Thinkpad manufactured by SUNDISK). This code would also support low capacity CF (up to 32 Mb - limitation of DOS3.3) particularly SANDISK (SDCFB) via a SANDISK CF to PCMCIA PC Card ATA adapter.

DIPSSD code:

ASK.COM
DIPSSDP.SYS
HP95SDP.SYS
SDISK.EXE
SFORMAT.EXE
SINSTALL.BAT
UPDATE.SYS
DIPSSDP1.SYS

The code will install on either a SHARP or HP95 (different variants), I have only ever used the Sharp variant.

You will need to either use LAPLINK or another PC with working PCMCIA support to copy the code to the SRAM PCMCIA card. You can then install the drivers for the other PCMCIA cards. NB Sharp only supports memory PCMCIA type 1 cards, there is no support for I/O based type 2 cards so NO: IDE, SCSI, Ethernet, MODEM, SOUND, or other i/o based pcmcia cards.

Peter
 
THANK YOU so much, Peter, for all your detailed info and help!

I should receive another SRAM card to try early next week. it is a 1MB Pretec card and was tested in a HP 200LX ( I have one too...) and worked without adding a driver. Hopefully, it will work in my 200LX and the Sharp and Tidalwave palmtops.

As for getting files from computer to SRAM card, I bit the bullet and bought a (very expensive...) card reader that can read SRAM and other old flash cards. Hope to have it tomorrow. I can then use in my laptop and transfer files to the SRAM card that way. I don't have any old computers now with PCMCIA support... However, if the card reader doesn't work, I'll have to get an old laptop......

Will report back on how this goes....

Thanks again,

Mark
 
OK, some good news!

The new 1MB SRAM card I received works in my devices!

Now I want to install the 'SUNDRV' driver on my Sharp PC-3100 to be able to use CF cards (in a pc card adapter...) in the machine.

I copied the unzipped SUNDRV folder to my SRAM card.

In File Manager on 3100, I can see all the files in the SUNDRV folder.

Do I need to copy the folder or all the files to D: or other drive (C: or E: ?) and then run the 'sinstall.exe' file or ?

I'm fairly new to the wonderful world of DOS and these little palmtops.

Thanks for any advice!

Mark
 
Mark,

Copy the DIP files to the SRAM in A: Then run the sinstall program, follow the instructions, it will setup your PC3x00 for Flash drives in B:
Format the Flash then copy any files you want onto it.

Peter
 
THANK YOU, Peter!

Got driver installed!

But now have issue with recognizing the 1999 SanDisk 16MB CF card (SDCFB).

When I do 'sformat b:' I get message 'General failure accessing card'.

Did something else and got message that driver only works on SunDisk cards......

SanDisk cards are SunDisk cards...company just changed name.....

Any suggestion how to resolve this issue?

Thanks.

Mark
 
Mark,

If the DIP format doesn't recognise the SANDISK try the dos FORMAT program. I have only had partial success with CFs. It does not work on CFs larger than 32 Mb, or rather I should say I have not managed to make it work on any larger than 32 Mb. if you have PCMCIA on a PC you coyuld try to format them there.

Peter
 
Peter,

Thanks again for your help!

Just tried dos FORMAT program.....

Unfortunately, it gave me 'Format failure'.......dang!

Only machine I have with PCMCIA slot is my handhelp pc running WinCE.....

Does it have to be formatted in PCMCIA slot or could I format in PC with USB card reader and put CF card in it?

Or I can put CF card in the PC card adapter and put it in my USB Omnidrive Professional LF card reader.

thanks,

Mark
 
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