Re: Did Commodore cheat with the quad density floppies?

From: groepaz_at_gmx.net
Date: Wed, 09 Jan 2019 13:04:05 +0100
Message-ID: <16469638.LXf5Ab8zbZ@rakete>
Am Mittwoch, 9. Januar 2019, 12:56:23 CET schrieb Gerrit Heitsch:
> On 1/9/19 12:49 PM, groepaz@gmx.net wrote:
> > Am Mittwoch, 9. Januar 2019, 12:45:05 CET schrieb Gerrit Heitsch:
> >> On 1/9/19 12:08 PM, Francesco Messineo wrote:
> >>> On Wed, Jan 9, 2019 at 12:02 PM <silverdr@wfmh.org.pl> wrote:
> >>>>> On 2019-01-09, at 11:43, Francesco Messineo
> > 
> > <francesco.messineo@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>>> At least IEC still allows more than two devices ;-)
> >>>>>> 
> >>>>>> But no, the IEC on the C64 is another example of CR(ippled) hardware,
> >>>>>> plus VIA-bug workaround ridden implementation. Its big brother GPIB,
> >>>>>> while predating both, wasn't bad though.>>>
> >>>>> 
> >>>>> Yes it was slow, but I couldn't think about a better compromise,
> >>>>> really.
> >>>> 
> >>>> The major issue was actually the speed - not really of the bus but of
> >>>> the
> >>>> 1541 implementation with 6522 software workarounds making the bus look
> >>>> worse than it really was. Common thing was to add at least the parallel
> >>>> connection to 1541, bringing it somewhat closer to the original GPIB.
> >>>> And yes - it still allowed more than two devices and obviously not only
> >>>> the floppy drives.>
> >>> 
> >>> Yes, that was due to a bug in the 6522 chip. And sure, one of the
> >>> first things that I purchased when I could,  was the speeddos mod,
> >>> even if I needed to go back to plain IEC speed whenever I wanted to
> >>> plug the super-fast 300 bps user port modem :)
> >>> 
> >>   From what I read, Commodore had planned to do a rework of the 1541
> >> 
> >> using a 6526 (probably like in the 1570/71, or just replacing one 6522
> >> with a 6526), but someone deleted the necessary traces to use the shift
> >> register from the C64 schematics and when that was found, they already
> >> had a lot of boards produced. So they dropped the rework of the drive
> >> and went with bit banging I/O. And they even had to slow that down
> >> compared to the VIC-20 due to the badlines VIC-II introduced.
> >> 
> >> I would really be interested in what would be necessary to get a C64 to
> >> what was initially planned.
> > 
> > http://a1bert.kapsi.fi/Dev/burst/ - VICE emulates this, and the C64RMK2
> > can do it too
> 
> Ok, I wrote it in a way that is easy to misunderstand... This would also
> include what would need to be done to a 1541 to change it.
> 
> Would it be possile to replace one of the 6522 with a 6526 plus some
> software adjustments or would you have to add a 6526?

i'd say it can be done as you say... however the software changes would be 
quite massive, i guess. which probably is the reason for why the 6526 is ONLY 
used for burstmode in 157x (you can remove it if you dont use burstmode)

-- 

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Received on 2019-01-09 14:01:53

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