LAWS@rsre.mod.UK (John Laws, on UK.MOD.RSRE) (11/09/87)
In INFO-ATARI16 385/87 - >Date: 21 Oct 87 02:58:52 GMT >From: oliveb!pyramid!prls!philabs!sbcs!lean@ames.arpa (Lean L. Loh) >Subject: format 923K and cold boot programs >To: info-atari16@score.stanford.edu > > The folowing posting is an arced file consisting of 2 programs. The first >is a desk accessory that formats double-sided diskette to 920K !!! Works for >single-side diskettes too. I got this from GEnie; have used it without any >problem. However, READS/WRITES appear to be slower for diskettes so formatted >when compared with the FAST format using Dcformatter. The BIGFORMA.ACC is highly suspect. It formats 11 sectors to a track (just!) and there are 0 to very small gap bytes between a preceding data sector and a following ident sector. In consequence and depending on drive variation / performance, there may be an over-writing of the following ident sector when writing the data sector. The start of track 0, the ident sector and start of sector 1 - 0000 89 C9 C9 C9 C9 C0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 14 A1 A1 ................ 0010 FE 00 00 01 02 CA 6F 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E ......oNNNNNNNNN 0020 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 00 00 00 NNNNNNNNNNNNN... 0030 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01 14 A1 A1 FB 00 00 ................ 0040 00 00 00 00 00 00 B0 C5 14 73 FF E7 E7 F3 FF E4 .........s...... 0050 7F FE 67 C0 13 C3 FF 83 FF E7 FF FF FF FF FF FF ..g............. The end of data sector 1 leads into sector ident 5 and data sector 5 - 0230 FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FF FE 60 C0 00 .............`.. 0240 80 00 00 00 00 00 14 A1 A1 FE 00 00 05 02 06 AB ................ 0250 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN 0260 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 00 00 00 00 00 00 14 A1 A1 FB NNNNNN.......... 0270 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ Finally the final data sector (8) stops just before the end of the track - 1860 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 DA 6E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E ..........nNNNNN 1870 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN 1880 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E 4E NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN Sectors are written from the index mark as 1 5 9 2 6 10 3 7 11 4 8. This is the cause of slower performance. track: 0 side 0: 11 sectors side 1: 11 sectors trk sid sec lth crc dly err trk sid sec lth crc dly err 0 0 1 2 51823 76 0 1 1 2 64863 69 0 0 5 2 1707 2683 0 1 5 2 12699 2655 0 0 9 2 17350 2717 0 1 9 2 29942 2682 0 0 2 2 40764 2655 0 1 2 2 43020 2717 0 0 6 2 21496 2682 0 1 6 2 25800 2655 0 0 10 2 5781 2685 0 1 10 2 8613 2681 0 0 3 2 44045 2656 0 1 3 2 39741 2687 0 0 7 2 24777 2685 0 1 7 2 22521 2682 0 0 11 2 9636 2681 0 1 11 2 4756 2658 0 0 4 2 13722 2682 0 1 4 2 682 2680 0 0 8 2 28919 2656 0 1 8 2 18375 2681 It formats 82 tracks, this may result in damage for drives driven to there endstop. track: 81 side 0: 11 sectors side 1: 11 sectors trk sid sec lth crc dly err trk sid sec lth crc dly err 81 0 1 2 51680 68 81 1 5 2 12820 2774 81 0 5 2 1316 2688 81 1 9 2 30585 2687 81 0 9 2 16457 2683 81 1 2 2 43907 2683 81 0 2 2 40115 2656 81 1 6 2 26439 2656 81 0 6 2 20599 2716 81 1 10 2 8746 2717 81 0 10 2 5402 2683 81 1 3 2 39090 2683 81 0 3 2 44930 2657 81 1 7 2 21622 2660 81 0 7 2 25414 2686 81 1 11 2 4379 2683 81 0 11 2 9771 2684 81 1 4 2 293 2684 81 0 4 2 13845 2659 81 1 8 2 17480 2667 81 0 8 2 29560 2682 81 1 1 2 65232 2880 The FAT is not initialized. The size of the root directory is 6*16 rather than 7*16. John Laws