Request for IPF image of Xenon II - Megablast KIXX budget 1 disk version

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by solarmon

Hi,





I tried looking for the IPF image of Xenon II - Megablast KIXX budget 1 disk version in the EAB file servers, TOSEC area, but can only find the two disk versions.

Can anybody point me to a clean/good IPF image of this 1 disk version so that I can restore my original disk, which works, but seem to have some random bit errors on it.



Thank you!

send me your dump of your disk, i'll help you.

[DamienD]

You crack me up Denis

Firstly you say:

Originally Posted by dlfrsilver

We can't help you

...and then immediately afterwards you say:

Originally Posted by dlfrsilver

send me your dump of your disk, i'll help you.

[solarmon]

Originally Posted by dlfrsilver

When a game is speedlock, it's never written in the bootblock.

P47 is a speedlocked game, and there is nothing about it. only the tracks on the disk.

We can't help you, because Xenon 2 1 disk with speedlock is undumped.

I'm only going by what I see in the boot block. I used WinUAE when loading the SCP and IPF image to quickly look at the boot block:



My corrupted SCP dump of this Xenon II KIXX disk can be found at:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ozb...ew?usp=sharing

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by DamienD

You crack me up Denis

Firstly you say:


...and then immediately afterwards you say:

I don't own this specific version of the game. Hard to know without having a proper dump.

can't help = no version available to fix

I asked for the dump in order to see which version it is.

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by solarmon

I'm only going by I see in the book block. I used WinUAE when loading the SCP and IPF image to quickly look at the boot block:



My corrupted SCP dump of this Xenon II KIXX disk can be found at:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ozb...ew?usp=sharing

Ok, your KIXX version is the 1 disk version protected by Rob Northern PDOS with long tracks. There are 6 tracks that are bad.

You need to clean the disk....

[solarmon]

Originally Posted by dlfrsilver

Ok, your KIXX version is the 1 disk version protected by Rob Northern PDOS with long tracks. There are 6 tracks that are bad.

You need to clean the disk....

I have tried cleaning the disk several times. There is no visible damage I can see in that area (when viewed with HxC software), so it is probably a magnetic media degradation issue.

This is why I'm looking for a clean dump image to be able to restore it.

[jotd]

it's possible to copy those disks using RNCopy, a program which is able to shorten the gap of RN protected tracks.

I remember being able to make a copy of Xenon II back in the day. This copy works, and is then copiable with a nibble copier.

from the IPF, use RNCopy on an extended .ADF, then nibblewarp/mfmwarp/wwarp it (or directly wwarp it, wwarp knows the PDOS format but not sure if wwarp can write back to disk with proper format).

Then use the warp to create a working copy of the floppy on a real amiga, and copy back only the bad sectors on the original disk.

wwarp is also able to write those back (maybe) ?

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by jotd

it's possible to copy those disks using RNCopy, a program which is able to shorten the gap of RN protected tracks.

I remember being able to make a copy of Xenon II back in the day. This copy works, and is then copiable with a nibble copier.

wwarp is also able to write those back (maybe) ?

wwarp yes, because it strips the GAPs between sectors. Otherwise you can't write RN PDOS track on a standard amiga drive.

[jotd]

you can use RNCopy (an old program dedicated to PDOS/RN 12-track format) to backup PDOS disks (non copiable using nibble) into PDOS-like disks (reduces the gap too, disks can be written & copied)

[Keir]

An update on this. There are at least three track-format variants of Xenon 2.

2-disk, AmigaDos with Copylock. This is SPS IPF #0297. It is original retail 2-disk.

1-disk, custom *very* long tracks + Speedlock. This is SPS IPF #2234. It is 1-disk version from The Power Pack compilation.

1-disk, RNC PDOS, no protection track. It is 1-disk KIXX budget version. We want a dump of this one!!

All of these can be checked/verified/converted with my Disk-Utilities. Unfortunately solarmon's KIXX dump has 6 or 7 bad PDOS tracks.

[Keir]

And with that, solarmon just found his earlier good dump of the KIXX release! This is confirmed by 100% perfect conversion of the dump to IPF by my Disk-Utilities.

I have zipped the SCP and IPF files and uploaded to The Zone. In my opinion at least the IPF belongs in the Unofficial IPFs collection on the EAB file server, as I don't believe that version is preserved anywhere else. There is no official SPS/IPF version of it.

[solarmon]

Originally Posted by Keir

And with that, solarmon just found his earlier good dump of the KIXX release! This is confirmed by 100% perfect conversion of the dump to IPF by my Disk-Utilities.

I have zipped the SCP and IPF files and uploaded to The Zone. In my opinion at least the IPF belongs in the Unofficial IPFs collection on the EAB file server, as I don't believe that version is preserved anywhere else. There is no official SPS/IPF version of it.

Thanks Keir, you are a legend!

[dlfrsilver]

I will sort it tonight and will be doing an IPF out if this dump. Thanks keir

[jotd]

there are at least 6 versions of this game (a lot of different 2 disk copylock versions)... a nightmare to support them all in whdload.

Not sure at all that 1-disk, custom *very* long tracks + Speedlock. SPS IPF #2234 is supported though...

[Retroplay]

2234 is supported
Xenon2_v1.12_1Disk_2234

[Keir]

Originally Posted by jotd

there are at least 6 versions of this game (a lot of different 2 disk copylock versions)... a nightmare to support them all in whdload.

Not sure at all that 1-disk, custom *very* long tracks + Speedlock. SPS IPF #2234 is supported though...

Yeah, I read that in the WHDLoad notes. I figure/hope that these six probably all use one of the three stated track formats (eg, AmigaDOS + Copylock) and just the data content is varying.

[jotd]

okay, here's a small tutorial on how to convert PDOS RN tracks from .IPF to extended .ADF

All the info is in the wwarp "readme.txt" file but for PDOS it's pretty straightforward (so much that I only was able to do it successfully in 2020 )

Okay so:

- first mount the .IPF image on WinUAE
- then use wwarp to create a warp file of the disk (here: Xenon 2 1 disk)

wwarp xenon2.wwp C 0-159

creating new wwarp file "xenon2zzz.wwp" from DF0: 160 tracks
reading track 0 format dos ($1600+0 bytes)
reading track 1 format robnorthen ($1800+4 bytes)
reading track 2 format robnorthen ($1800+4 bytes)
...
reading track 158 format robnorthen ($1800+4 bytes)
reading track 159 format robnorthen ($1800+4 bytes)

- now apply automatic format detection (wwarp knows RN format). The output is off-putting but it actually works (and it's very fast)

wwarp xenon2.wwp F
skipping track 0, no raw mfm-data!
skipping track 1, no raw mfm-data!
...
skipping track 158, no raw mfm-data!
skipping track 159, no raw mfm-data!

- now transfer this wwp file to your real amiga. Now all operations are done on a real amiga.

- finally, insert a blank floppy in DF0: and type

wwarp xenon2.wwp W 0-159
writing track 0, format dos
writing track 1, format robnorthen
testing drive/dma speed at track 1, $317C.0 $317C.0 $317C.0 $317C.0 $317C.0, using writelen $3194.
writing track 2, format robnorthen
writing track 3, format robnorthen
writing track 4, format robnorthen
writing track 5, format robnorthen
...
writing track 159, format robnorthen

now the floppy is bootable and runs the game

You can also perform the test with WinUAE, selecting a blank custom (extended) adf disk that you create with floppy tab in winuae. The extended adf boots all right.

If you just want to restore the corrupt sectors of your original, now use this copy and x-copy in nibble mode to only copy the corrupt tracks from the copy to the original. And keep the .wwp file somewhere for backup.

There's also a very nice tool to use on amiga called RN-Copy that allows to copy original PDOS disks (Xenon 2, Superfrog, Project-X Special Edition, ...) to another floppy. You need 2 drives. You can use it on winuae to convert .IPF to extended .ADF but that doesn't solve the "write back to disk" issue on real hardware

RN-Copy.zip