exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

Hi guys,

I was just testing programs on my machine and accidentally found this issue again in a way that is easily demonstrated.



It's not a biggy, but it does mean I have to access the drive just to make it stop and then exit again.

For me, the reason I use Atari is for the lack of such things.

It doesn't nag me like the PC does. :lol:

Went to play GTA 5 last night and it took 10 mins to get everything updated. :lol:

Tbh, I cannot see from your video what the possible issue even is. Can you please describe it in written? Also, to understand and recreate your setup: you're running the PRG version of EmuTOS from an AUTO folder, right?

czietz wrote: 03 Nov 2020 21:38 Tbh, I cannot see from your video what the possible issue even is. Can you please describe it in written? Also, to understand and recreate your setup: you're running the PRG version of EmuTOS from an AUTO folder, right?

Hi. Yes, starting the PRG version from an AUTO folder. If I have a blank disk in the drive at startup, the disk is detected and the motor stops, just like on TOS 1.04. However if I start without a disk in the drive (which sometimes happens if I've been trying a program that runs automatically from a floppy disk and need to take it out) the motor never switches off when I put a disk back in.

Cosmic Puppet wrote: 03 Nov 2020 21:43 Hi. Yes, starting the PRG version from an AUTO folder. If I have a blank disk in the drive at startup, the disk is detected and the motor stops, just like on TOS 1.04. However if I start without a disk in the drive (which sometimes happens if I've been trying a program that runs automatically from a floppy disk and need to take it out) the motor never switches off when I put a disk back in.

I remember my ST doing this on Atari TOS, too. I always thought it was a hardware thing. But I'll either test myself under EmuTOS or ask someone to test.

czietz wrote: 03 Nov 2020 21:49

Cosmic Puppet wrote: 03 Nov 2020 21:43 Hi. Yes, starting the PRG version from an AUTO folder. If I have a blank disk in the drive at startup, the disk is detected and the motor stops, just like on TOS 1.04. However if I start without a disk in the drive (which sometimes happens if I've been trying a program that runs automatically from a floppy disk and need to take it out) the motor never switches off when I put a disk back in.

I remember my ST doing this on Atari TOS, too. I always thought it was a hardware thing. But I'll either test myself under EmuTOS or ask someone to test.

Awesome! I love EmuTOS because it has made my setup waaay sweeter than I imagined it could be. 8-)

czietz wrote: 03 Nov 2020 21:49 I remember my ST doing this on Atari TOS, too. I always thought it was a hardware thing. But I'll either test myself under EmuTOS or ask someone to test.

TOS206 acts oddly with not turning the floppy motor off for ages. Never had that issues in TOS104 though.

Just to confirm, my TOS 1.04 switches the motor off correctly.

Ok, after my own tests and discussion on the EmuTOS list, here's what we found out: Unfortunately, there is no clean way to handle an floppy access that fails because no disk is inserted. This is because of limitations of the WD1772 floppy disk controller. You can only chose between two unsatisfying options:

1. You keep the drive selected indefinitely. This is what TOS 1 does. You can observe that the floppy drive LED keeps on.
2. You keep the motor on signal asserted indefinitely. This is what TOS 2, 3, 4 and EmuTOS do. It means that after inserting a disk, it will spin until a successful floppy access has been done.

Apart from the visible indication (LED keeps on), the choice #1 can have other more subtle implications, which is why Atari changed the behavior starting with TOS 2. Since EmuTOS handles this case exactly as newer Atari TOS versions do, the outcome of the discussion was not to change EmuTOS (to TOS 1 behavior) in this regard.

I hope I could at least explain to you why.

PS: I'm so used to the behavior of TOS 2 (I rarely use Atari TOS 1) that I never even thought about this; it was perfectly normal for me.

@czietz

Is this the reason Amigas have that funny floppy click constantly, was that their solution? I remember the first time I got an Amiga it worried me till I realised it was normal lol

TOS 1.04 just added a time-out I think. If no floppy read within a certain time then it turned it off until the user tried to access it again.