How to transfer an adf file from pc to amiga using high density floppy diskette

[Galder]

Hi all, based on the suggestion of McTrinsic and the enlightenment from other people such as Prowler, tomse, I am asking for your help to solve this mystery I have an amiga 500 plus (with KS switch for 2.0 and 1.3), attached to it is an A500HD+ Hdd (workbench 2.04 resides in it), disks with workbench 2.0 and 2.04, a laptop PC with windows 7 (it does not have floppy drive) and an external usb PC floppy disk drive(which I am planning on buying) and all I would like to do is to transfer an adf file (game) from my PC into my Amiga's hdd (A500HD+) or RAM and then write it in an Amiga diskette in order to play it from my amiga disk drive. My amiga has 2 mb graph memory and 8 mb other memory. Could someone please guide me on how to do that step by step? If I haven't written any necessary info for you to know please let me know. Your help is greatly appreciated guys!

[tomse]

I'll try and do a Step-by-step here, but first a little extra info which might be needed.

[Requirements]
Amiga w/OS2+ and working diskettedrive
Computer with floppy drive
atleast 1 diskette


Only the later Amiga's like the A4000, and maybe A3000 has a HD diskettedrive, so unless you have one of these, the target diskette should be a DD diskette.

In this tutorial there are 2 options for transfering files larger than what can be on the diskette.
Join/Split and Zipping (compressing) a file.

The initial setup

[PC]
Download a split/join program like this: http://aminet.net/package/util/misc/splijo
This will split any file into smaller pieces, and join them again. This can be needed for transfering large files using DD floppies.
Running some of these split programs causes problems on 64bit machines.

Download Unzip: http://aminet.net/package/util/arc/unz542xA
This will unzip, zip compressed files.

Download TS-Gui: http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/tsgui
this can transfer an ADF file to diskette on your amiga, and from diskette to ADF.

Download the LHA archiver: http://aminet.net/package/util/arc/lha
This archive program is similar to Zip, but is needed for most programs you get from i.e. Aminet, i.e. like TS-Gui

Download 7-Zip http://www.7-zip.org/ choose the version that suits your system, if you are in doubt, use the 32-bit version.
This needs installing on your Windows computer. (I take it you already know how to install programs so I won't go into details here).

[Amiga]
In OS 2+ you have SYS:Storage/DOS Drivers/PC0
this will need activation (double click on it after you boot into Workbench).
If you have an Amiga diskette in DF0: you'll now see an extra icon PC0:???, if you have a 720KB MSDOS formatted floppy drive, you'll see DF0:??? and PC0:<disk id>
If you can't find PC0 in the above mentioned folder, and you already have PC0:??? showing on the desktop it's already activated, it resides in SYS: Devs/DOS Drivers/.

[PC]
Format a diskette as DD:

Put a piece of tape covering the hole -front and back-, that doesn't have a write protect tab. (when inserting the diskette into a diskette drive it's the hole to the right).
Some drives don't like to format HD disks as DD when the hole isn't covered.

1. open the command prompt as Administrator (running as Administrator may be required for format access to the floppy)
    * Click "Start"
    * type in "CMD" in the search field
    * rightclick on "Command Prompt" in the search results
    * click "Run as Administrator"
2a. format the diskette inserted into the diskette drive
    * type in: format a: <enter>
    * Answer the prompts, i.e. format y/n, volume name, format more?
2b. If formatting complains about incorrect parameters or something try this.
    * type in: format a: /f:720 <enter>
    * Answer the prompts, i.e. format y/n, volume name, format more?
3. Now it's time to transfer the first stuff to your amiga, unzip / join/split
    a) find the files unz542xA.lha and splijo.lha which you downloaded earlier, thy should be in your Downloaded folder.
    b) right-click on unz542xA.lha and choose open with. Choose 7-zip from the list, if it isn't on the list you can find it in in it's folder which is either "C:\Programs Files\7-Zip" or "C:\Programs Files (x86)\7-Zip". Choose the file called 7zFM.exe. You should now see a list of files inside this compressed file.
    c) Open the diskette in the A: drive using your explorer
    d) Now you can drag the file "UnZip" from the opened archive, into the diskette, this is the only file you need.
    d) Open the splijo.lha file using the same procedure step 3.b
    e) drag the files "doJoin" "doCompare" "doSplit" into the diskette
    f) wait till the diskette is finished writing and move the diskette to the amiga.

[Amiga]

1. copy the 4 files from PC0: to C:
    * Open "CLI" from the "System" directory
    * type in: copy PC0:#? to c: <enter>

[PC]
* Delete the contents of the 720kb formatted diskette, or format a new and use this.
* Copy lha.run and tsgui.lha from your Downloaded folder to the/a empty 720kb disk.
* move the diskette to the Amiga

[Amiga]
Note: this step installs LHA and tsgui. LHA is a command which is mostly used in a shell/cli, tsgui is a graphical interface used from Workbench.
TS Gui will be installed in your SYS dir, on the same level as you have i.e. Prefs, Devs, Tools etc. You can move it into other dirs/hdd's it as you want, by dragging/dropping the icon.


In the CLI, type in the following each new line requires you to hit enter:

copy pc0:lha.run to ram:
cd ram:
lha.run
copy lha_68k to c:lha
lha x pc0:tsgui.lha sys:

Now the initial setup is done.

[tomse]

To move large files (adf) from PC to Amiga with diskette Part 2
Make sure you have enough ram or harddrive space.

Note: Split/Join should have been here too, and it might come in the future if I can find a version that works in 64bit windows. Split zipped files doesn't work with the unzipper program.

[PC]

1. Find an adf file you want to transfer.
2. Rightclick on it, and choose from the menu
    * 7-Zip -> Add to "xxx.zip"       
Note: Make sure you choose the one with ZIP as extension, xxx is taken from the filename, if it's long I can recommend you rename it i.e. to disk1.zip. I'll be using disk1.zip as reference thoughout the tutorial
3. Copy the zipped file to a 720kb formatted diskette
4. Move the diskette to the Amiga

[Amiga]
I'll be using RAM: to extract to as you have 8MB, otherwise you can choose the HDD as destination, There might be a Work: partition which is most prefered rather than using SYS:

Open a CLI, extract the zipped file. Type in the following:

unzip pc0:disk1.zip RAM:

When it's extracted, you can open TS-Gui, which we installed in SYS:TSGui/ this can be opened from the Workbench.

[Amiga/TS Gui]
This program can be used to make ADF files from Diskettes, the other way around. Also making hdf files from harddrives.

Make sure you have a diskette in the drive, that you want to use as the target diskette.

To transfer the ADF file we now have in RAM:
* Click on "DF0:"
* Click on the "Browse" button to the Right of the File field (bottom-right)
* You should see your diskette in the list, if not, check if the listing is from RAM: else click on "Volumes" and select "RAM:"
* Click on the ADF file and click OK

You should now be back in the main window of TS Gui.
If you want, you can check:
Format while writing
Verify
Both are recommended

Make sure
Create Custom ADF is deselected

Now you can click File -> Disk

Congratulations when transfering is done, you can now use the diskette in the drive.

[Galder]

You are fantastic, many thanks for a guide that I believe is going to help a lot more beginners like me!

[tomse]

You're welcome..
I wrote it as a newbies guide.. I hope it doesn't translate into a Dummies guide

I still need to find a modern split/join package as these old ones doesn't work in 64bit, thus I can't test them.

But the meaning of the split/join programs is that you can, as the name says, just split a file into smaller pieces which you then copy to the amiga one at a time, using the diskette(s), and then join on the amiga side.

There is the option of using DMS files, which is an other format of compressed ADF. the TS-Gui program can extract the DMS while transfering. It requires the DMS program. And that the file is DMS compressed in the first place. These DMS files aren't so common anymore as diskspace is cheap.

[Arnie]

I've not used zip/rar on the Amiga but on the PC you can split the files into smaller parts. Does the Amiga version unpack split archives?

[tomse]

Originally Posted by Arnie

I've not used zip/rar on the Amiga but on the PC you can split the files into smaller parts. Does the Amiga version unpack split archives?

No it doesn't unfortunately, atleast not with any of the methods I've tried... else it would have been somewhat easier ;-)

[Hewitson]

Originally Posted by Arnie

I've not used zip/rar on the Amiga but on the PC you can split the files into smaller parts. Does the Amiga version unpack split archives?

The WB "join" command is the easiest solution.

[tomse]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

The WB "join" command is the easiest solution.

if you can find a "split" for windows 64bit it would be great ;-)

[Arnie]

Is there any way to unpack/write back a .adz file on the Amiga?

[robinsonb5]

Originally Posted by Arnie

Is there any way to unpack/write back a .adz file on the Amiga?

I think .adz files are simply .adf files compressed with gzip - so try gunzip. You might have to rename the files to .adf.gz first.

[Retroplay]

Originally Posted by tomse

if you can find a "split" for windows 64bit it would be great ;-)

Total Commander can do that.

Screenshot taken from x64 version.

I did a test and the file joins fine in Workbench.

[tomse]

thanks retroplay I'll add that to the tutorial tomorrow :-)