.Markku Reunanen.

MSX + floppy controller + HxC

April 9th, 2013

As I apparently didn’t have enough mass storage options for the MSX, I had to get one more! This time an Interface Floppy MSX 2013 produced by Brazilian Paulo Maluf. Some friends, too, were in need, so I got four of them altogether. The final price per piece ended up being about 33 euros including postage, which was not bad at all – module-based MSX floppy controllers and drives are notoriously expensive and hard to find these days.

Let’s see here… where is the documentation? Not that there would be much to configure with just two jumpers, but at least it might be nice to know what kind of drives are supported. Luckily I happen to have an HxC which lends itself to various configurations. The first attempt with PC floppy emulation didn’t seem to go anywhere, so I switched back to the normal Shugart setting I’ve been using with all the other devices as well (twisted cable primary drive, even though the cable is not twisted). The HxC settings tool even has an “MSX 2” mode, which seemed to do the trick, since the controller started reading the virtual floppies perfectly. The disk images had to be converted from dsk to hfe, as usual. One more nice surprise: the gadget works with the MSX1, too! Actually, it’s even more useful with the 1st generation computers, since they don’t easily support MSX-DOS 2, which is required for directory support.

Using a plain PCB means trouble, so the controller had to be put into a case. I had some extra module cases from Sunrise, but they seemed a bit too tiny for the circuit board. Fortunately, after about an hour of carving and sanding, it finally fit. The end result probably can’t be called elegant, but at least the PCB is well protected now.

Some further details might follow later on, when I find out more. As a potential project I have a cheap-ass memory stick based PC floppy emulator lying around. It would also be nice to know whether the controller works with real Amiga or PC drives.

edit: Yes indeed, the controller does seem to work with PC DD drives. Tried HxC in PC 720k mode and after changing the lower jumper (of the controller) to the left, all seems fine & dandy.

edit2: Even the cheap floppy emulator (see eBay for “floppy drive emulator”) works with 720k images. They are clones of this and the original software will work. Unfortunately Windows-only 🙁 If you want to make an image bootable, make sure you copy msxdos.sys there before any other file. If you use Linux, just dump this image to the raw device to get a bootable floppy.

edit3: The controller works fine with a turbo R, too, but as the machine automatically boots to 60 Hz and R800, most demos have trouble with the settings.

edit4 (there are plenty, it seems): I put a little collection of MSX1 demos in HFE format online here.

Filed under: laitteet,retro