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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
Catweasel MK4plus PCI
I wonder if anyone has any experience with it and 8bit CBM floppies? |
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WVL
Registered: Mar 2002
Posts: 889 |
I used to have the MkIII and my experience is that it was a complete piece of crap. :D Really, I tried a lot of different drives, but only occasionally managed to read/write a disk. The best working drive was a Panasonic DD drive. I never managed to find a Teac drive to test though (and these seem to be the best). |
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Jon
Account closed
Registered: Apr 2005
Posts: 247 |
I have an old ISA Catweasel. Worked great for my CBM and Amiga stuff.
However, unless you have a "blind" drive (one that does not need the sync hole or whatever it's called) it'll only read the front side of 5 1/4 disks.
Better off using a 1541 and a cable if you just want to do 5 1/4 floppies.
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chatGPZ
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 11302 |
if you are only after reading/writing 1541 disks, then its probably not really worth it ... as wvl said, it very much depends on the drive, and its not easy to find one that works properly. |
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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
Thanks for your input. I'm not looking into just 1541 disks but also 1571 and 1581 ones too. Do you have any feedback on other than 5,25" drives?
Second question: I did some google research and found out drivers for linux. How in reality does driver support look like? I'm asking because I found some older opinions regarding problems with those. |
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chatGPZ
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 11302 |
other formats, especially 5.25"HD and 3.5"DD/HD work much better
as for linux driver support, check http://www.soundtracker.org/raw/cwfloppy/ |
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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
Again: thank you for valuable info. Has anybody tried it to read v-max or rapidlok disks with it for example? How does it compare to mnib in case of transfering the originals? |
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chatGPZ
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 11302 |
i have only used it to transfer regular disks.... however in theory its the perfect tool to do images of original disks - the problem is the software to do it =P as for 1541 disks, baccy wrote a tool that is supposed to do it: http://arjuna.sourceforge.net/ |
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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
Ok, I think I'll try to get one than. Thanks for the info once again. |
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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
One more question: is there any list of flopy drives that works with Catweasel? I was trying to find one but could not find anything more than opinions that there are problems with certain types of drives. |
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chatGPZ
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 11302 |
not a list because: TEAC =) for 3.5" and 5.25"HD anyways ... for real 5.25" DD drives it doesnt really matter, since the drives from that time are generelly superior to the crap sold today. i use drives made by olivetti (ripped out of some cp/m machine). |
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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
Quote: not a list because: TEAC =) for 3.5" and 5.25"HD anyways ... for real 5.25" DD drives it doesnt really matter, since the drives from that time are generelly superior to the crap sold today. i use drives made by olivetti (ripped out of some cp/m machine).
Thanks for the tips. Time for shopping now :) |
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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
Finally got it! Out of curiosity: did anybody tried to install Catweasel drivers on XP x64? |
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chatGPZ
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 11302 |
they are 32bit, so that doesnt work :) yet... just got the 64bit testing box =P |
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AlexC
Registered: Jan 2008
Posts: 298 |
Quote: they are 32bit, so that doesnt work :) yet... just got the 64bit testing box =P
Just like me - hence the question. Unfortunately I do have XP x64 Professional and there is no possibility to run 32 bit drivers :( Is there any chance to get the source for Windows drivers? I guess they are written in C/C++ so porting to x64 should be possible.
UPDATE: the way to run CW on x64 XP is following: burn UbuntuLiveCD and run it. On usb stick have a copy of cwfloppy archive for 2.6 kernel and compile it after extracting to the desktop. Than as root install the driver and viola... ;) |
