I found this llink (Tandy_Portable_Disk_Drive_Service_Manual_26-3808S_text.pdf
(archive.org)) and it says "Service Manual" on the first page. It's not the
typical service manuals I've seen.
Yes I ran the IPL from Bank1 which was a file I created by following the TPDD2
Operations Manual; within the IPL file it was simply => RUN "COM:98N1ENN." I
ran it with the drive off then I turned it on - nothing happens. With my drive
that works this command works fine, but with this one with problems it doesn't
work. Agree running this command from basic would do the same thing. On pg 8 of
the Ops Manual it says exactly what to do as far as saving this IPL BA file. No
rocket science or convoluted details but simple straight forward details. I
know it's not the serial cable or port on the T200 because it works with my
other TPDD2. So on the misbehaving drive it never shows the "INITIAL PROGRAM
LOADER II" header. Didn't get any message about "SYSTEM EXISTS" - nada. Got the
Util diskette with Backup.ba and Fremem.ba and other files. My serial cable is
the one that I bought 2 years ago that came with the drive and the Utility
diskette and they work. I'm assuming it's the original cable because it was
nicely packed with the nice little blue carrying case with Tandy written on it.
I have TS-DOS on ROM, but haven't tried it yet with a TPDD2.
The TPL I'm referring is the file that Ops Manual suggested creating and adding
the COM line to it (just one line above).
Ultimately with the drive that works I simply ran the IPL, turned on the drive
and it did it's thing, then I began using the utility diskette with backup and
made copies of the Utility disk, so this times me the problem is with the
troublesome drive. I would run the IPL, turn on the drive and nothing. I even
went upstairs for a cup of coffee and still nothing when I returned, so
shift-break to get out of it. That's all I've got.
Thanks for your time! It's appreciated.Spencer
On Monday, November 14, 2022 at 11:40:10 PM EST, Brian K. White
<b.kenyo...@gmail.com> wrote:
The operation manual is on-line several places.
http://tandy.wiki/TPDD
I don't think anyone has ever turned up a service manual or programming
manual for it yet.
I'm confused by what you said earlier.
You said you ran the IPL from ram, but, the boot procedure for TPDD2
doesn't require saving any IPL. You just manually enter a single command
in BASIC and the drive does the rest.
But there is more to it than that. You don't just run the command, you
have to arrange several details and conditions exactly a certain way and
THEN run the command at a certain point in a short sequence of
procedures. If you omit any steps or do anything out of order, it
doesn't work, and some of the details don't seem important so it's
natural to gloss over things not realizing they actually matter.
It requires the special util disk for TPDD2 (the TPDD1 one won't work on
TPDD2), the special serial cable (includes transistors inside, it's not
an ordinary cable).
Start with the drive connected and turned OFF.
Make sure the write-protect hole on the TPDD2 util disk is OPEN.
Insert the TPDD2 util disk.
Type into BASIC:
RUN "COM:98N1ENN"
and hit Enter
Only now turn the drive ON.
The drive does the rest itself.
The drive is checking a few different things one time at power-on to
decide if it should do the bootstrap.
* disk must be inserted
* disk must be write-protected
* DSR pin must be low
* disk must contain the necessary data in the expected location on disk
(I don't know the exact rules the firmware is following, just that the
util disk satisfies it.)
All that has to be in place before power-on. It doesn't matter any other
time. You can't trigger the bootstrap after the fact. It's a one-time
check right at power-on.
You can also skip the normal util disk and just use any other TPDD
client instead of Floppy. You can use a bootstrapper to install TS-DOS
onto the 200 from a PC, and then us TS-DOS with the drive.
You only need the util disk if you want to run the original Floppy tpdd
client that came with the drive. But it's not the best DOS so there
isn't really much reason to bother with it except just for academic
reasons. If you just want to use the drive, none of the bootup procedure
matters since the util disk is the only disk know that does it. Every
other program has to be installed some other way.
To install TS-DOS from a pc, If Windows try github.com/bkw777/tsend
if mac or linux, try github.com/bkw777/dlplus
each one's readme has further details. You want TS-DOS.200 in either
case since you have a 200.
Possible problems:
The serial cable is special and has transistors inside. Do you have an
original cable or a proper replacement (github.com/bkw777/TPDD_Cable),
or something that's just wire and connectors without the level-shifting
transistors? The original cables have a sharp bend at the plug that I am
amazed isn't broken wires on everyone's cables by now. Most original
cables still seem to work actually, but I just suspect that cable until
proven working, or if it looks like it hasn't been flexed a lot right at
the db25 boot and "looks good".
The disk is special. Do you have an original TPDD2 util disk or a proper
copy on 720K media, or something else? TPDD1 util disk is different and
won't work. A copy made on a 1.44M disk may work but is untrustworthy. A
copy made by manually copying the files instead of using the backup
utility won't work.
If by IPL you mean the 3 or-so line BASIC for TPDD1, that won't work for
TPDD2. If you mean the single command for TPDD2, it requires more than
just running the command but I already went over that above.
If you have a linux or mac machine, and can scrounge up the necessary
9-25 & gender-change adapters *without* null-modem, you can interrogate
the drive manually with this bash tpdd client:
github.com/bkw777/pdd.sh
see the hardware link in the readme for links to the right adapters.
After install just try "$ pdd ls"
bkw@fw:~$ pdd ls
----- Directory Listing [0] -----
AFLOPY2.SYS | F | 11475
BACKUP.BA | F | 1940
FREMEM.BA | F | 372
-------------------------------------
186880 bytes free [WP]
bkw@fw:~$
(that A in AFLOPY2.SYS is really reverse video, and stands for a
normally non-printable binary byte 0x01 that's on the disk but not
normally visible in any normal DOS like Floppy or TS-DOS, it's part of
what makes this disk "special")
If you don't get a file listing, you could try increasing the debug
verbosity to 1, 2, 3 or more, and try the "status" command, or
"condition" (a similar but different command), or "ls" again, and see
what kind of error code(s) the drive returns.
$ DEBUG=3 pdd status
"drive not ready" could be all kinds of things, but the drive firmware
actually returns a bunch of different possible numeric error codes as
part of the response to every commend, and pdd.sh will display a text
meaning of the numerical code. (you can look at the list near the top of
the script too)
High levels of debug will show a lot of stuff that won't make a lot of
sense, but it's the actual traffic between the pc and the drive, in hex,
with the various parts of the packets seperated and parsed.
Mainly though you just want to see if traffic is flowing in both
directions and you're getting meaningful responses from the drive at all.
And see things like, can you make the drive spin on demand with commands
like "ls" or "format"?
With ordinary serial cables connecting to a drive emulator on a PC
instead of a real drive, "drive not ready" usually means the serial
cable doesn't have the necessary DTR/DSR connections, or at least
loop-backed. It should never be a problem with an original cable and a
real drive, but, it's just a data point that suggests looking at the
serial connection. Maybe the cable, maybe the port is bad on the 200.
TPDD needs RX, TX GND, DTR, and DSR. RTS & CTS don't matter.
Other things you can try are "format" to erase and format a disk.
It's possible the drive is good and only your disk is bad.
Get a "new" 720K disk (NOT 1.44M, and by "new" I just mean one you are
willing to erase, not your original util disk!), close the write-protect
door in the corner, and try "format" (from within pdd.sh I mean).
If you don't have a TPDD2 util disk, and you think maybe the drive is ok
but maybe just your disk isn't, get a new or disposable 720K disk and
try the restore-disk command to create a new TPDD2 util disk from the
included disk image. The directions are in the readme on github but here
is a session capture too just for reference:
bkw@fw:~$ pdd
(I ran "pdd" with no args, which puts you into interactive mode)
PDD(opr:6.2,F)> status
Ready
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)> cond
Disk Write-Protected
Disk Changed
("PDD(opr:6.2,F)>" is a prompt that shows a bunch of
current mode/status stuff. The client (pdd.sh is a tpdd client)
doesn't know anything about the drive yet, so it's just showing
the default settings.
The status command caused some one-time init/detect stuff to
happen along the way before doing the actual status command,
so after the status command, the prompt changes to show that
we detected a TPDD2, and the [0] means any file operations will
happen in bank 0.
The condition command returned that the disk is write-protected,
and detected that the drive door had been opened since the last
command.
Here I also removed the disk and closed the write-protect window
in the corner of the disk and re-iserted.)
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)> cond
Disk Changed
(shows the drive door was opened again, and no write-protect this time)
(below for "rd" it's the full path to the file where I happen
to have my clone of the repo)
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)> rd
~/src/pdd.sh/disk_images/TPDD2_26-3814_Utility_Disk.pdd2
Restoring Disk from File:
"/home/bkw/src/pdd.sh/disk_images/TPDD2_26-3814_Utility_Disk.pdd2"
Formatting Disk, TPDD2 mode
: Are you sure? (y/N) y
[########################################] 100%
Loading "/home/bkw/src/pdd.sh/disk_images/TPDD2_26-3814_Utility_Disk.pdd2"
Writing Disk
[########################################] 100%
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)>
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)> ls
----- Directory Listing [0] -----
AFLOPY2.SYS | F | 11475
BACKUP.BA | F | 1940
FREMEM.BA | F | 372
-------------------------------------
186880 bytes free
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)>
(The util disk is created, but the drive firmware will ignore it at
power-on unless it's write-protected, so open the write-protect door...)
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)> ls
----- Directory Listing [0] -----
AFLOPY2.SYS | F | 11475
BACKUP.BA | F | 1940
FREMEM.BA | F | 372
-------------------------------------
186880 bytes free [WP]
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)>
(the [WP] in the corner shows that the disk is write-protected)
PDD(pdd2[0]:6.2,F)> exit
bkw@fw:~$
It's very easy for the client and the drive to get out of sync.
The protocol has almost no provision for detecting and handling
unexpected events gracefully. If anything irregular happens on either
side, with the drive or the pc, the two will be immediately out of step
and no recovering. Just power-cycle the drive and exit & restart the
script any time anything at all out of order happens like if you open
the drive door in the middle of a format or ctrl-c the script in the
middle of a file copy etc.
When the drive realizes that "something ain't right", it blinks the
low-battery light and stops responding or doing anything.
If at any time you see the low-battery light blinking, just power-cycle
the drive and start over whatever you were trying to do.
--
bkw
On 11/14/22 18:09, Spencer wrote:
> Found nothing of value when I looked again. I found that on some earlier
> models (so it appears) it had a physical dip block, but on later models
> it had four jumpers on SW1 but were soldered (or etched in the board) at
> the factory and the bottom part of the four switches showed the contacts
> as open. It looks like they should be off, but please set me straight if
> my assumption is wrong. In any event still the "drive not ready" error
> still there ;-(. I'll see if I can find a service manual unless any of
> you have one you wouldn't mind sending me.
>
> Thanks for your help!
>
> On Monday, November 14, 2022 at 04:57:18 PM EST, Spencer
> <spencer...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
> Ok I popped the hood and YES there is a dip block of four switches and
> all are off, and yes it's covered by the shield so opening that little
> door shows just the shiled. If anyone knows how they should be please
> let me know. Something I did find was the power supply has a white
> connector that plugs into a board with the fuse and it was some pulled
> out from one side but not all the way. Actually don't know if I pulled
> it out when I opened it or not. Btw the 1A fuse is good. Everything
> looks good. Don't see any popped/leaking caps or broken solder joints,
> but I'll try it again and share what I find.
>
> Thanks
>
> On Monday, November 14, 2022 at 03:26:44 PM EST, John R. Hogerhuis
> <jho...@pobox.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 14, 2022 at 11:59 AM Greg Swallow <gswal...@mchsi.com
> <mailto:gswal...@mchsi.com>> wrote:
>
> Oh my. Checked for cover and assumed DIP under it as the TPDD1 I
> once had. Opened the TPPD2 lid to expose bright shiney shield. No
> DIP switches. Never had to change anything so never opened it before
> now.
>
>
> And my recollection is that means short of somehow populating the DIP
> (which may or may not work) you're locked at 19200bps on the TPDD-2. The
> TPDD-1 is actually a rebadged Brother FB-100. The FB-100 has the dip
> switches, but defaults to 9600bps which the Brother Knitting machine
> devices are locked to. So although TPDD-1's can be used with Brother
> Knitting Machines, the TPDD-2 cannot.
>
> -- John.
--
bkw
