C64 issues

[Curlypaul]

Any C64 fans around here?

I was given a C64 a while ago along with a 1541 disk drive. Finally got round to setting it all up last night and there seems to be a problem with the disk drive, was wondering if anybopdy could help?

1. The disk doesnt eject in anyway. Is this by design? its pretty fiddly to get the disk back out.

2. The spindle does not spin at a constant rate, is this normal?

3. The head sometimes seems to get stuck when reading the outer part of the disk. There is a part of the locking mechanism that sometimes doesnt clip into place properly and prevents the head from moving properly

Dispite all of this I did manage to read some files of a few disks, so I'm pretty sure these things can be sorted out. I can provide pics of the locking mechanism if you would like?

[Hatta]

It's been a while since I used a 1541, so I can't be of any direct help. I do know that these are pretty unreliable drives though, which is why you see 1571s going for so much. But since they're notoriously unreliable, there's a lot of maintenance information out there. I'd ask over at Lemon64, I bet some grey bearded commodore hacker will be able to help you figure it out. These do sound like fixable problems.

[CRTGAMER]

Two non-eject designs. Lever or a center pull down flap. Neither ejects the disk, just clears the drive head-spindle so you can pull that 5¼" floppy. I think the older design when opening, sometimes would eject the floppy out slightly. The newer lever design has more room for you to grab that disk. When you here knocking at times no worries, that's the copy protection of a given commercial disk.

Reliability has never been an issue with mine.

The 1541 is one smart drive, it even sing Daisy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gnMgmlKi_o

[Curlypaul]

OK well thats one thing to rule out. This one has the pull down flap which tends to take some persuading to stay down and then sticks and wont release.

I read that somewhere about the copy protection, ingenious idea. I have took the top of though and I can see that the head has trouble moving when its reached the outer part of the disk. It wont do anything useful then until I switch everything of and back on again.

Also, is it normal to have to switch the drive on before the C64?

[CRTGAMER]

Also, is it normal to have to switch the drive on before the C64?

Doesn't matter, as long as its on before you do a LOAD"*",8,1

A good investment is the EPYX Fastload cart, really speeds up that disc load.

Maybe pull out slightly when you press down the pull down flap.

[Hatta]

Best investment is the 1541U-II, which comes with built in Epyx Fast Loader/Action Replay support. 2nd best is the uIEC/sd2iec/etc, which doesn't support fast loaders or copy protection, but it loads as fast as it can read from the SD card, and most games you'll want to play are available in a a format it can read.

[CRTGAMER]

Have not heard of that drive, had to look it up. A very slick C64 cart! A memory card supplement to the regular 1541.
Still need your regular 1541 for that stack of hard to find floppy games though.

http://www.1541ultimate.net/content/ind ... icle&id=42

Drive Serial plugs in the left. Where is Lord_Santa !

[Hatta]

You misunderstand. The 1541U is a complete replacement for the 1541. The serial port on the cartridge actually gets plugged into the serial port on the C64. The cartridge boots a menu program where you can select .d64 images from a micro-SD card. The internal 1541 emulation then presents that disk image over the serial port as if it were an actual 1541. It's intended to be 100% compatible, even emulating the sounds a real 1541 would emit when loading a copy protected disk. You can load custom 1541 roms (jiffy dos), it acts as a RAM expansion unit, emulates fast loader/freezer cartridges, loads .PRG files via DMA, there's even a port on the bottom that plugs into the tape port on the C64.

With all that it's a very expensive cartridge. The uIEC is probably a better option for most users. It only emulates the drive at a protocol level, rather than a physical level, so it's less compatible. But from what I hear most people find that compatibility is pretty good with what they actually want to play.

[3GenGames]

Time to upgrade, Get a Coco with a SuperIDE drive and your set!



Nice to see this piece of hardware out there for the C64. Great for development and archiving. Just saying, as i appreciate these computers.....even if their Basic was inferior to.... -gulp-.....Microsoft Basic.

[CRTGAMER]

You misunderstand. The 1541U is a complete replacement for the 1541. The serial port on the cartridge actually gets plugged into the serial port on the C64. The cartridge boots a menu program where you can select .d64 images from a micro-SD card. The internal 1541 emulation then presents that disk image over the serial port as if it were an actual 1541. It's intended to be 100% compatible, even emulating the sounds a real 1541 would emit when loading a copy protected disk. You can load custom 1541 roms (jiffy dos), it acts as a RAM expansion unit, emulates fast loader/freezer cartridges, loads .PRG files via DMA, there's even a port on the bottom that plugs into the tape port on the C64.

With all that it's a very expensive cartridge. The uIEC is probably a better option for most users. It only emulates the drive at a protocol level, rather than a physical level, so it's less compatible. But from what I hear most people find that compatibility is pretty good with what they actually want to play.

I understand, It is a nice CART. Great for .d64 files stored on a memory card.

I was meaning that for ORIGINAL FLOPPY C-64 disks, wouldn't work on the UIEC. A 1541 floppy drive needed to run real thing.