Most liked posts in thread: INSERT SYSTEM DISC... ORIC MICRODISC NEARLY THERE

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Oric-atm...328177?hash=item3da9e47ab1:g:2KcAAOSwGpxfMme7
£180 or Bid

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pravetz-...751559?hash=item2624c69607:g:XAkAAOSwcu9dWwVv
£230

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/ORIC-ATM...426733?hash=item5953d3016d:g:-4gAAOSwejBfL7UG
£270 or offer

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pravetz-...702678?hash=item2642286c56:g:Q2IAAOSwn1dfJulq
£290

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/RARE-VIN...190882?hash=item445bef61a2:g:8JkAAOSwddBe1jHB
£350

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Pravetz-...640552?hash=item2a41dd2d68:g:JdkAAOSwjW9cL1ic
£501.78

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/RARE-RET...232354?hash=item5dac925f62:g:EwAAAOSwErlfDvEL
£500

I honestly think the £180 it far to much, I must be a tight fisted sod.
Give me a nice case and keyboard I'll make the rest !
I wouldn't mind some are clones !!

 

I was planning to send my Oric-1 down with it if you were up for it with the Cumana, I have schematics, parts lists and two PCB’s, one set up to run on 10v and power the Oric the other was going to be powered by a 5v psu separate from the Oric but I never went that far with it.
If you could get it into a case with a decent power system and get it to work and boot Sedoric then that would be great, plus you can play around with an Oric. The Atmos is essentially an Oric-1 with a much better keyboard and a v1.1 BASIC ROM.
You up for a challenge? You sound like you have better diagnostic tools than me so will be able to see what is going on.

 

The Oric-1 will need a SCART lead though I think, I’ll need to check the RF output as it was an Oric that had 9V through the board and every chip was dead so it’s a total rebuild and the only thing I didn’t replace is the PROM for the RF as I was using my SCART lead.
I do have a PROM Steve Marshall sent me so I can fit one if it’s toast as well.

 

The price of Oric’s is ridiculous right now but if you really want one the leboncoin.fr is a good hunting ground if you can persuade them to post to the U.K.

 

Hi Richie
I'll be o.k with just knocking up a scart lead, so its upto you in regard sorting out the RF, but I don't use this usually. I have PM'ed you all the details late last night or may have been this morning.

 

How's things going with Andy's Microdrive to Gotek conversion?

 

It’s not going to work sadly, the bracket for the Gotek is too small and it doesn’t look good behind the Microdisc cover plate, too many gaps.
I think the way to use a Gotek going forward would be to set the Jumper on the 3” to drive 2 and connect the Gotek externally as drive 1. I am going to try this today so I can test if it can format or read a disk. It might be out of alignment.
I don’t have the kit to fabricate a bespoke fascia for a Gotek to fit internally so my options are a bit limited on that front.
The Oric-1 is fixed and works well. It’s a very early production run model ( probably less than 2000 ) although it’s serial number is missing. It’s a issue 2 PCB with two 8K EPROMs as the ROM. Which means no ROMDIS pin ( only the mask ROM had this ) so no external upgrade will work as they cannot disable the internal ROM. Only very early Oric’s have this setup. Most are issue 3 boards with a 16K V1.0 mask ROM. I haven’t been able to work on it as much as I’d like as I have had several falls and have been incapacitated for several days.

 

Hey, Richie.
Lovely to hear from you and thank you for the update.
Fascinating to hear of where that particular Oric fits in, historically, in the production run timeline: a ruddy early beast, eh?
Right now retro retrograde microdisc fittings can take 3rd/4th/5th place backseat priority as health and you and yours are 1st.
No worries, many thanks for all you've done so far and just take darn good care mate and go steady on those feet.
Falls are bloody nasty shocks to our systems (I take much more care now on our staircase) and can really knock us back so please go uber careful on those pins, Richie.
Cheers once more, guys.

 

Exactly, Paul - their advice was literally try before you buy.

 

...and moving on to the going rate these days for a microdisc 3" drive for the Oric...



They're gonna set you back £200.

 

Yeah I saw that one, no PSU and untested

 

So, for a PSU - which are as rare as hen's teeth - and to have one in working condition, you must be looking at £250 plus, Rich, yeah? Eye-watering...

 

Nice One Andy
At Hospital with Mum today But did briefly check 800XL, and powered straight up with no issue at all, certainly not what it was doing .. Shorter wiring and a 74F08 replacing the 74LS08. I think there may have been an issue with the GITA Socket. so I'll be changing that, the LS138, LS08 , MMU sockets to be sure. A fair bit of work but I'll be happier sending it back to Martin with those bits sorted, hopefully stops anything working loose in transport back.

 

Brenski will be delighted - nice one, Graham and of course my best wishes to your mum.
Hope she's coping through these very challenging times.
Take care, folks and hopefully, with us all pulling together, we'll all get through this COVID crap.

 

As Andy's MicroDrive has made it back to me I/F fully tested out but the Drive not playing ball, I've also got a Gotek to pass on that Richie has worked his magic on, a few 3" disc's with Sedorc the ORIC DOS on.
Now I have an Atmos I can at least replicate the issues with the drive, and hopefully replace it with a I'll call it a similar unit but that's only because its 3" Single sided and made by the same company ... and physically the same size ...
The similarity stops there...
Have a look...
https://atari-owner.com/club/blogs/more-pictures-of-the-internals-of-the-oric-microdrive.20/

 

Hmm Yes tempremental ... thats a bit of an understatement ..
Well with Physical disc drives at least.
I've not been doing that much to be honest, I've been back in work for a few days a week, I've recieved the PCB's I'd got from JLCPCB for various bits and bobs some have been sent of to Matt. Also had a problem with my 800, the incognito didn't want to work, now solved (thought it was the additional PIA board but no, something entirely different.
I've also been gradually moving bits from Martins original 800XL to another board but due to the nature of each addon, been very slow in doing this and allowing to just be on soak test in between..
The microdrive however .. well it's certainly working with a gotek, as soon as physical drives are added weather 51'4" 3.5" or 3" (including both Hitachi drives and a bunch of Amstrad drives via adapters.. well thats not so positive, maybe I should try a 8" as well, but none to hand ... hehe
And yes Andy would be good to catch-up.

In between I've also been trying to improve my coding skill's the USB version of TK-II has a bug only 99.98% reliable. and I can't find why not 100% (AVR C) .. very annoying so I've left it for assembler programing in 6502 and a bit of Z80 thrown in for good measure (and just to confuse me) on a CPC6128.
I guess the amount of time I spend on Retro has dropped a lot, as I used to 'play' for the two days I'm now working.
Running into this weekend I've had a bit of a mare. The 'IT' system I have uses all professional Ubiquity network hardware, along with fairly high end Synology NAS with about 24TB of hard disk space..
Well some software update rendered my two Win 7 laptops unable to connect to the NAS. been like it for a few weeks.. sorted that out and would you know the Win 10 and Linux boxes now didn't connect to any of the drives, worse I could no longer log in as admin to the NAS. BUT the win7 laptops started seeing the files on the NAS.
had to buy several rather large Harddrives to back up the NAS vis the win7 laptops..
Backed up now. going to start rebuilding the NAS afresh tomorrow. and have multiple ways of recovery, likely another NAS to back up the first (even though this has a spare 'redundant drive') its no good when the O.S locks you out
I may use my HP Micro server as I don't run multiple virtual computers as I used to. (I used it as an ESXi box if anyone knows what that is)

I've now read through the release information you posted Andy good to know that the micro drive supports 4 drives.

 

Hi, fellas.
Just a quick update on this thread (which really merits its own new thread - GRAHAM's GREAT GROOVY GIFTS), as I just wanted to share with you the kind of care and attention Graham shows when sending packages.

Tip top - as many of yours are too when I'm lucky enough to get something sent through the post.

Graham's attention to detail with all the individual components all enclosed in foam strips as well as in boxes within boxes is just a joy to behold - many thanks, mate.

As soon as I get chance to get set up again I will give the Gotek a go! Thank you for all your time and effort spent on this project - it's massively appreciated, Graham.


One groovy Gotek to run off the microdisc controller board - thank you very much, Graham.


Box brimming with goodies but note although Graham's mega generous - he did not send the radiators that are bubble wrapped in the background!


Microdisc and PSU back "home" to Baz's biome and new cave (hopefully) to appear shortly...watch this space, folks.


Next up, parcel 2 received this week - RICHIE'S REGAL RETRO RELEASES..!

 

Narrowed it down to the 3” Drive yesterday Graham, my Gotek works like a charm so the logic board is fine. So need to have a look at the disk drive now.. talking to Andy about fitting a Gotek instead as a possible option if the drive is not fixable.
Amstrad CPC drives are different and are not drop in replacements.

If anyone has a Hitachi HFD305SE drive get in touch... apparently they were also used with Apple 2 computers so might be obtainable in the U.S.A

 

Good luck Graham...

 

Thanks Paul .

More info on the drives https://atari-owner.com/club/resources/hitachi-3-disk-drive-information-oric-amstrad-sinclair.71/

 

Fab, Graham.

My, you have been busy and I'm sorry to hear about some of your IT hiccups due to updates and of course work and family life require your time too.

I'm just about to "hit the pit" but if anyone wants an online natter either this coming Sun afternoon or later in the evening, just holler else I'll give you a buzz, Graham.

I don't want this drive to bog you down forever and a day so please don't worry if it won't play ball as I'll just have it back and come up with a plan B, eg. stick an 8" floppy in it, as you suggest, or a cipher tape drive!!

Cheers, Graham and thanks for everything you've done/tried so far.

Night, all....