English Amiga Board - View Single Post

Sinphaltimus · 13 January 2018, 18:15

I think Retro1234 was looking at a way to turn a GotTek into an internal HDD by using a really big ADF file. Which means installing software to it and such. Possibly installing full Wb to it and booting from it. I think it would be super slow (as fast as the floppy bus) but for someone without an HDD in their Amiga, it could be a poor man's solution and i think something interesting if such a capability were to be developed.

But that leaves so many questions unanswered, like, to install WB, you'd need at least a DF1: So could you possibly change DF0 ID without mucking up DF1 capabilities and such?

I dunno, I think it's an interesting question.

For example, on the TI-99/4a, in emulation and soon to be a new hardware device, you can use something called FIAD which allows a directory of any size to be used as a floppy drive instead of dsk files. Not unlike using folders as hard drives in WinUAE except those folders get assigned as floppy drives. You can see this done in emulation using classic99 and in the real world using TiPi which is not out yet but in beta, I have one becaus I'm on the beta testing team.

TiPi plugs into the side port expansion of a TI-99/4a (with sideport 32k) and interfaces with a raspberry pi for the shared folders used as floppy disks. It just saves files directly to the folders without regard for sectors and tracks. And yes, as Toni points out about the Amiga, "Of course it won't work with trackloading programs." holds true on the TI as well.

Perhaps not something for the GoTek but a completely new kind of floppy emulator developed for such functionality. Although Toni makes it sound possible, so yes, interesting indeed.

13 January 2018, 18:15	#11
Sinphaltimus Registered User Join Date: Aug 2016 Location: Cresco, PA, USA Age: 53 Posts: 1,126	I think Retro1234 was looking at a way to turn a GotTek into an internal HDD by using a really big ADF file. Which means installing software to it and such. Possibly installing full Wb to it and booting from it. I think it would be super slow (as fast as the floppy bus) but for someone without an HDD in their Amiga, it could be a poor man's solution and i think something interesting if such a capability were to be developed. But that leaves so many questions unanswered, like, to install WB, you'd need at least a DF1: So could you possibly change DF0 ID without mucking up DF1 capabilities and such? I dunno, I think it's an interesting question. For example, on the TI-99/4a, in emulation and soon to be a new hardware device, you can use something called FIAD which allows a directory of any size to be used as a floppy drive instead of dsk files. Not unlike using folders as hard drives in WinUAE except those folders get assigned as floppy drives. You can see this done in emulation using classic99 and in the real world using TiPi which is not out yet but in beta, I have one becaus I'm on the beta testing team. TiPi plugs into the side port expansion of a TI-99/4a (with sideport 32k) and interfaces with a raspberry pi for the shared folders used as floppy disks. It just saves files directly to the folders without regard for sectors and tracks. And yes, as Toni points out about the Amiga, "Of course it won't work with trackloading programs." holds true on the TI as well. Perhaps not something for the GoTek but a completely new kind of floppy emulator developed for such functionality. Although Toni makes it sound possible, so yes, interesting indeed.