Rev. 9/25/01

Using Floppies On PC99

Roger Price in Micropendium (reprinted from Hoosier Users Group.) by Ted Peterson
As I have been using PC99 from CaDD Electronics for awhile I have figured out that you do not always have to change the disk "path" to load a program from the TI disk if the file is on a 1.44 floppy. There are two different ways to go about this.
1. Set up your path as :
path for dsk1. a:\one.dsk
path for dsk2. a:\two.dsk
path for dsk3. a:\three.dsk
Name the first three TI "disks" files on the 1.44 floppy, one, two and three. I am talking about the MS-dos filename not the name that is the TI "disk" that is the name of the disk you had on the original TI 99/4a floppy. These disknames only count as a matter of cataloging and for programs that load using a disk name as in the Atari games like Mrs. Pac-man. This way any floppy that you put in the floppy drive will automatically have the correct path to the first three disks on the floppy. If you forget and have the MS-dos name something other than "one. two. or three" then you can still load the TI "disk" programs without changing the path with this second method
2. When you put the TI "disk" files on the 1.44 floppy make sure you know what file is the first one on the disk, the second and the third and I do not mean the order that they appear as cataloged. I mean which file is copied to the floppy disk first, second and third. I do this by using Explorer to drag and drop them to the floppy. Now start up the PC99 program and put a disk in with the correct path names. I call this my startup disk. When you have reached the point of where you select either BASIC, E/A OR EXTENDED BASIC to load your program, remove the startup floppy from the floppy drive and put in any other floppy with the programs you want to load. If the program you want to load is on the first file of the disk then if it is for example and extended basic program called game then type: OLD DSK1.GAME As you would normally. The PC99 program will look for the disk as directed by the path. When it does not find this "disk" it will default to the first file on the disk and proceed to look for the named program. The important thing is to then know what "disk" file is first, second and third and to know which file the program is in.
With this setup you can run your computer nearly as you did with the old original console and floppies as you used to. I caution you to plan your disks to be downloaded from the TI floppy to the PC "disk" files carefully as you can mess up the directories on a floppy if you do too much adding or deleting of programs or files from one "disk" to another on the 1.44 floppy.
Keep in mind that you can have five TI "disk" files on a 1.44 floppy but these methods only work with the first three TI "disk" files. If you had 4 drives this would work with the first four files the same being true with five drives and so on.
One thing that is also very important is that if you have a program that loads everything from drive one. then this "disk" must be named as disk "one .dsk" or must be the first MS-dos "disk" file on the 1.44 floppy. Otherwise the loading program will not find the program if wants to load just the same as if you had the floppy in the wrong drive on the TI 99/4a.
GENEVE: NOTE! I was not able to download disks with the Geneve because I always got an error code with Rsector.
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