[comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware] Floppy Drive Direct Access

hitman@kk4fs.UUCP (Hit Man) (12/21/90)

How does one go about controlling the floppy drives on an AT at the I/O poet 
level?  (Doing such tasks as seek, motor on, motor off, read sector, and 
write sector)   That's about all of the pertinent information that I can 
give.

Thanks..
Hitman

Hitman@kk4fs.UUCP

hollen@megatek (Dion Hollenbeck) (12/24/90)

In article <yJ6Hu1w163w@kk4fs.UUCP> hitman@kk4fs.UUCP (Hit Man) writes:
> 
> How does one go about controlling the floppy drives on an AT at the I/O poet 
> level?  (Doing such tasks as seek, motor on, motor off, read sector, and 
> write sector)   That's about all of the pertinent information that I can 
> give.
> 
I would suggest you get hold of an old IBM Technical Reference
Manual for an XT.  In the back, it has the BIOS code listings
for the floppy device driver.  Although it would not be good
manners to rip this off, it would give you an outline to write
your own from.  With this information on hand, look at the section
in the front for the floppy controller.  It has the complete
instruction set for the controller chip and the addresses of the
control and status ports.  Now write your code.

OR (and this solution requires money, but is real nifty) contact
ANNABOOKS here in San Diego.  They put out a complete BIOS for
an AT with source code written for Microsoft C and MASM (95% C)
which does everything you could ever want including a built-in
monitor debugger.  It will only cost you a $150 or so, but what's
that against maybe hundreds of hours of your time (by the way,
youi do have an In-Circuit Emulator don't you, if you are writing
it yourself?).

ANNABOOKS
12005 Avenida Sivrita
San Diego, Ca.   (sorry, phone books do not give zip codes)
(619)271-9526

--
	Dion Hollenbeck             (619) 455-5590 x2814
	Megatek Corporation, 9645 Scranton Road, San Diego, CA  92121
        uunet!megatek!hollen       or  hollen@megatek.uucp