Victor 9k / Sirius 1 Software

[1302L]

Dear all,
I lately purchased a V9k Mod. 264 with 20 MB Harddisk and one Double sided Floppy Drive as this was the first Comuter my dad brought home as those were made redundant in the Mid-80's in his Company.
The Computer starts up, screen works, if the Keyboard is working is not sure due to my lack of any Software. So I don't know if it will boot, no boot from Harddisk, but you can hear the HD running.
Which brings me to my Challenge: Acquiring software for this olg gem. :-
I saw Paul Devine's Huge software Library and bought a Greaseweazle Device, Cables and a 5.25" Teac Floppy drive.
My Question is: If I download an OS, i.E. DOS 1.25 as a ZIP File, is it possible to write the unzipped data to a 5.25" formatted (no V9 Format) Floppy and stick it into the V9 to have a boot disk?
I doubt this procedure as it seems a little bit too easy.
May anyone help me on this issue?

Many thanks for your reply in advance and best regards,

Martin.

 

[ajacocks]

Welcome to the forum @1302L .

- Alex

 

[pdevine]

Welcome #1302L, nice to meet you Martin.

Unfortunately the path you describe won't get you to a boot floppy. The Victor9K has a unique floppy format that will need to be respected in order to boot the machine. In addition, the OS can't simply be un-zipped; it needs to be laid out on the disk in a specific location so the machine knows where to read it from.

You do, however, have the right set of tools to get you going hardware wise. The greaseweazle and the Teac floppy are enough to create a boot disk of your own. You'll need to install the fluxengine software on your computer to drive the greaseweazle. Fluxengine has built-in support for Victor 9000 disks and will instruct the greaseweazle hardware on how to write the correct format. You can download the software here: https://github.com/davidgiven/fluxengine/releases. The documentation for it can be found here http://cowlark.com/fluxengine/index.html#how. There's a page on writing victor disks in the documentation, but I'll walk you through it below.

I would recommend you start with the 2.11 OS version disks. It's more likely to be compatible with a larger range of Victor hardware. The 3.10 is newer but some machines can't boot with that version of the OS. These disks would be a good version to try first: https://archive.org/details/MS-DOS-MS-BASIC-Ver-2.1.

Once you download that archive.org link, expand the zip file, and you'll see a folder named "MS-DOS-MS-BASIC HD - DOMESTIC (1 OF 2)" and then inside that folder a file named "MS-DOS MS-BASIC Ver 2.1.img." This is the disk image of a bootable floppy. Then to write that to a disk with the fluxengine software, connect your TEAC to the greaseweazle, and then the USB of the greaseweazle to your computer. I tried getting the GUI version of fluxengine to work and on my Mac it kept giving me errors about not reading the file, you might have better luck in Windows. I switched to the command line and used the command:
./fluxengine write victor9k --612 -d drive:0 -i "MS-DOS MS-BASIC Ver 2.1.img"

and the greaseweazle wrote the .img file to the floppy. Depending on how your floppy drive is connected to the greaseweazle, you might need to replace the drive:0 with drive:1. I then was able to boot my victor with that floppy.

If all else fails, I'm also happy to snail mail you actual floppies. Hope the above works as it'll be faster overall and allow you to print many of the disk images I've already uploaded.

best,
Paul

 

[1302L]

Dear Alex, dear Paul,

many thanks for your warm welcome here!

Paul, also many thanks for your detailed description of the process!
I hope, I'll find the time next weekend to make a fist attempt to create a bootable floppy.

On more question: I have some 5.25" DD Disks which are used and contain IBM / MS-Dos files, should I format the disks in IBM Format before making my attempt to create a bootdisk?

I keep you closely updated, being very curious of the outcome!
Big thanks again and talk soon!

Best regards,

Martin.

 

[pdevine]

Happy to help Martin. Formatting the disk ahead of time won't have any impact. The Victor needs its own format that differs from the IBM version. When you run the greaseweazle it will overwrite whatever you have on the disk beforehand, formatted or blank would have the same outcome.

 

[1302L]

Dear Paul,

thanks again, unfortunately the greaseweazele did not arrive yet, all other things are ready to go for the first attempt, I will keep you updated here.

Cheers,

Martin.

 

[Gary C]

Hi Paul

I am still struggling to write Victor disks.

I did manage it once with my GW V4 but after it suddenly working I forgot how and now the victor disks have failed I am once again trying to work it out, could you help ?

So I have a GW V4, and using fluxengine from the command prompt and using the DOS 2.1 image from above

Do I need to use a 1.2mb PC drive with a HD 96 TPI disk ? (I cannot for the life of me remember which drive I used and I don't seem to have a HD drive about)

When I run the command as above I get

C:\Program Files (x86)\Cowlark Technologies\FluxEngine>fluxengine write victor9k --612 -d drive:0 -i "MS-DOS MS-BASIC Ver 2.1.img"
OPTION: 612kB 80-track DSHD GCR
IMG: read 80 tracks, 1 sides, 612 kB total from MS-DOS MS-BASIC Ver 2.1.img
Measuring rotational speed...
Using Greaseweazle GW00B53BB84C874000076C0716 on COM5
Rotational period is 204.5ms (293.3rpm)
0.0: writing 204 ms in 77142 bytes
0.0: 245 ms in 65825 bytes
0 raw records, 0 raw sectors
sectors: 0.0.0? 0.0.1? 0.0.2? 0.0.3? 0.0.4? 0.0.5? 0.0.6? 0.0.7? 0.0.8? 0.0.9? 0.0.10? 0.0.11? 0.0.12? 0.0.13? 0.0.14? 0.0.15? 0.0.16? 0.0.17? 0.0.18?
0 bytes decoded
bad read
retrying; 5 retries remaining

Its odd that it almost seems as if its not getting any data from the file ? (0 raw records, 0 raw sectors)

Any ideas ?

(still got the XEBEC card to try but I can't until I can get the machine booting again !)

 

[westveld]

Do I need to use a 1.2mb PC drive with a HD 96 TPI disk ? (I cannot for the life of me remember which drive I used and I don't seem to have a HD drive about)

1.2MB PC Drive, BUT use DSDD disks

 

[pdevine]

Agree with @westveld. Use a 1.2MB PC drive, with DSDD disks. The error you're getting is fluxengine writes out the track and then reads what it wrote. If it doesn't get back a track that matches what it wrote it retries the write. You also likely need the drive to be correctly jumped for the speed you're writing at. Most PC drives can write and read at either 300rpm or 360rpm. I forget now which the fluxengine presumes the drive is working at by default. There's a command line flag to change it but it needs to match what the drive is doing.

 

[pdevine]

Also, if all else fails I can mail you a disk.

 

[Gary C]

Ok, I'm sure I had a 1.2MB drive around but I can't find it. I have a FD-55GFR coming and I know these drives are pretty robust and configurable so will give it a go once it comes.

 

[pdevine]

I've written disks with a FD-55GFR so it definitely works.

 

[1302L]

Dear all,
just wanted to let you know that my GW V4 has just arrived, now. I now have gathered the full set (Floppy Drive, Floppy Cable, Floppy Power Cable and GW) I will report how things will go with creating a boot disk. I have also 1.2MB DsDD Disks.
Very curious greetings!
Martin.

 

[1302L]

Dear all,
quick update on my first attempt, which was a little bit sobering.
I should have thought about this in the first place. The GW hasn't been able to provide enough power for the 5.25" Floppy drive. I have ordered now a 370W molex power supply, this should be capable to power up the old floppy.
Keep you posted.
Best,
Martin.

 

[Gary C]

GFR arrived and ML strap made to make the spindle rotate.
Running FE and I can now write a Victor disk image to a HD disk.

I dont have the working Sirius with me so cant test yet, but things are looking better.

One question, the disk is of course rotating at 360 rpm. Do I need to strap it to run at 300 or does FE compensate ?

 

[pdevine]

I haven't messed with the rotational speed at all. To write a disk I simply use the command line:

./fluxengine write victor9k --612 -d drive:0 -i "MS-DOS MS-BASIC Ver 2.1.img"

That's for a single-sided disk. For a double-sided disk you change the --612 to --1224.

 

[Gary C]

Cheers, yes got the SS / DS bit (though the previous version of FE was easier to remember with victor9k_SS) but good to know that I should be able write at 360. I know the GFR can run at 300 or 360.

I'm using a HD disk at the moment because that has the best chance of not having errors, but I believe I will have to use a 96TPI non-HD disk for the Sirius itself.

Thanks for your advice.

 

[Gary C]

1.2MB PC Drive, BUT use DSDD disks

Interestingly, I can write a HD disk but cannot write to any DSDD drives, even 96 TPI ones.

 

[Gary C]

Correction to above. I mean in the HD drive I can only write a victor image to a HD disk but not to a DSDD disk, even one supposedly 96TPI.

I imagine the victor will still see the flux reversal of a HD disk but not sure if it will write it.

 

[pdevine]

I've been using 96TPI DSDD disks. I wrote out a disk earlier today and realized it wrote correctly on one drive but not on another. By that I mean the Victor was able to boot from the same image when I wrote it from my Panasonic drive but not when I wrote it from a Ye-Data drive. I think it has to do with the jumper settings and which speed the drive defaults to. I can chase down what I think is working if you run into troubles.