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+--- Thread: ZCPR 3.3 disks for the Microbee (/thread-96.html)
ZCPR 3.3 disks for the Microbee - ChickenMan - 05-03-2020
I have had a DS80 Microbee ZCPR 3.3 disk in my collection since the 1980's. It was written by R Whitby in 1987 and based on Peter Broughtons 512k system. See picture below.
However, attempts with a Floppyio and a PC over the past few years have been made to image the disk error free, but without success. Some images would partly boot, most would not even get that far. With the new GreaseWeasle hardware and latest firmware, attempts were made to image the disk once again. What I did find was the results varied considerably using different brands and units of floppy drives. I found 7 different brands of 3.5" floppy drives in the cupboard and imaged the disk with them all and then examined each image file with HxC Floppy Emulator software. I then used the GW to write out some of these images again back to a floppy using the 3.5" drive that appeared to give the best results, a TEAC FD-235HF. Then using my old PC I imaged these with ubeedisk to a RAW file, rather than a DSK file. Some of the best DSK images made years ago were converted to RAW files and then using a Hex Editor I started comparing sector by sector the differences between them, concentrating on the first 2 boot tracks. A couple of sectors were different and these were then swapped, and bingo, the image now boots
Many of the programs on A0: and A15: would not run but would from other disks, so hopefully all working files have been located and now on the one disk in its original form. No other programs have been added and nothing removed. It still boots with Dskerr: 01 but everything appears to be working correctly. Using Setsys I was able to generate bootable DS40 and SS80 images also.
The extra facilities that ZCPR3 offers over standard CP/M 2.2 or ZCPR2 as used on Microbee disks is to large to summarize here so have included the ZCPR 3.3 Manual.
So in the Repository in the MbeeTech\Microbee\Software\System_Disks\System_Disks folder we placed
zcpr3_ds40.dsk
zcpr3_ss80.dsk
zcpr3_ds80.dsk
zcpr3_manual.pdf <--- in the MbeeTech\Microbee\Documentation\Manuals\Software folder