HDOS 3 Distribution Images

[Les Bird]

Greetings,

 

I'm not sure if anyone else knew about this (I didn't) so I tought I'd share it.

 

I was exploring the HDOS 3 distribution images that we have in our library with a HEX editor and I discovered that they are in H8D format. So I renamed them from .IMG to .H8D and was able to read them with my cataloging utility. I then tried to boot the system disk with my emulator but nothing happened. I uploaded the system image to my SVD on a real H-89 with a Z-89-37 (thanks Alex Bodnar!) and H17 controller and discovered that it is actually trying to boot from the Z-89-37 device. I then booted from my SVD with the H17 working copy of HDOS 3 that Norm Sokol sent me (which is also in our library) and loaded the original distribution system to SY1:. I ran HDOS 3 INIT on a real soft sector floppy, sysgen'd it from the original distribution system disk and was able to boot it from my Z-89-37. I now have a fresh original distribution of HDOS 3 running on my H89. I'm going to try to create an H17 bootable distribution disk and if I succeed, I'll upload it to the web site. I'm not sure what needs to be changed in order to do that though. Maybe just put the H17 device driver on the system disk? I tried that and it didn't seem to work. I'll keep exploring...

 

It's my understanding that we don't have a fresh unaltered working distribution copy of HDOS 3 in our library except for the Z-89-37 Double Density version, right? And not many people out there can use that copy. Or does someone else out there have a clean fresh version that boots on the H17? If so, send it over so I can add it to our library. In any case, I'll see if I can get a version up and running on the H17 over here and keep everyone posted.

 

- Les

http://sebhc.lesbird.com

 

[Mark Garlanger]

Hey Les,

When you put the H17 driver on, did you rename it to SY.DVD? I had notice that those disks would mount on my emulator but did not initially boot. If I remember correct. I booted with one of the HDOS 3.0 'working' disks on your site, had the distribution boot disk in SY1: and the disk with the H17 driver in SY2:.  I then removed the SY.DVD on the boot disk and copied the H17 one to the boot disk with the name SY.DVD. It then booted fine.

Mark

--

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "SEBHC" group.
To post to this group, send email to se...@googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to sebhc+un...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sebhc?hl=en.

[Les Bird]

Mark,

 

I did name it SY.DVD but it seemed like the boot sector had code there that was trying to access the 37. Maybe I copied the wrong driver over though. I'll keep at it. So you're saying that you were able to get the distribution copy to boot by just copying the H17.DVD driver and renaming it to SY.DVD?

 

- Les

[Mark Garlanger]

Oh, now I remember, yes I had to change the boot track too. I did this back around the time we first got a bootable HDOS 3.0. I think I took the boot track from one of the 'working' disks and combined that with the distribution disk and changed the SY.DVD. But since I didn't know what the state of the 'working' disk's boot track, I then transferred it to a physical disk, booted from it, and INITed another disk. I captured that newly imaged disk and used it's boot track to replace the distribution disk (again). I believe the boot track information is self-contained in the INIT program, so this method should get as close to possible to an original h17 distribution disk. Maybe GC can confirm, or correct this, if it's wrong.

Mark

[Les Bird]

Ah, ok. That explains it then. I'll see what I can do given the information you supplied here.

[Les Bird]

Well, thanks to Mark's input I was indeed able to create an H17 bootable distribution image of HDOS 3. It's up on the web site if anyone wants it. I have three HDOS 3 downloadable packages up there. The first is the unaltered H-37 soft sector image zip file, these are the original distribution disks but setup to boot from the H37 controller. The second is the same package but with the files renamed to H8D and now includes a H17 bootable system distribution disk. The third is the package from Norm Sokol that was copied from soft sector to hard sector with a bootable system image but it's not a true "distribution" copy.

 

So now we have the original distribution disks that we can use on H17 controller systems.

 

http://sebhc.lesbird.com/software.html