Mike's PCjr Page

Greetings! Thanks again for all of your work on this. I'm really enjoying using the card reader with the Jr.

This is just a suggestion, and perhaps this has already been done, and I have missed it. But, as you are updating your files, would it be possible to add the ability to insert flags when loading the driver file (non boot rom version) in the config.sys (e.g. -Y = yes load driver, vs asking Y/N).

Thanks again,
Ryan

creekmore34 wrote:This is just a suggestion, and perhaps this has already been done, and I have missed it. But, as you are updating your files, would it be possible to add the ability to insert flags when loading the driver file (non boot rom version) in the config.sys (e.g. -Y = yes load driver, vs asking Y/N).

Yes, this is exactly one of the things I want to add. I'm also thinking of adding an "Auto" option, where it installs only if a card is detected.

A new release is now available on the project page. Sorry for keeping you waiting!
https://www.raphnet.net/electronique/sd ... dex_en.php

Changes:

• BIOS : Improvements for co-existing with another hard drive BIOS. By default, the SD-Cart JR becomes the last drive in the system. (tested only with JR-IDE)
• BIOS : Add an options menu to allow non-default behavior, such as:
  • Installing the SD-Cart JR as the first drive in a system with another hard drive BIOS (existing hard drive becomes second hard drive and remains accessible)
  • Installing as single drive (other hard drive not accessible)
  • Not installing the SD-Cart BIOS.
  • The option menu count down can be skipped by pressing ESC.
• sdcart.sys : Add support for command-line options /Y (always install) and /A (install only if card present). Also displays the drive letter it got assigned to on DOS 5.
• sdpart.com : Add a 'b' command for some BIOS tests. (for debugging purposes)

Versions: sdpart.com v0.5, sdcart.sys v0.5, bios v0.41

In case you are wondering what the difference between BIOS v0.40 and v0.41 is, well I found a small last minute bug which I fixed. It turns out that even though DOS would see all drives (for instance, my SD-Cart JR and jr-IDE) fdisk would only recognize the first one. If some of you already have BIOS v0.40 and need fdisk to recognize two drives, let me know. I can write a small TSR program to workaround the issue.

Another thing I added in v0.41 is a way to skip the countdown for the options menu (press ESC). While debugging the above, I must have rebooted at least 50 times, and I got tired of waiting

Hello,

I just received the SD-Cart with Boot ROM in the mail!

I'm trying to get it set up as a hard drive (preferably drive C:), but not exactly sure what steps to take. The user guide says to use fdisk then format /s. However, my dos floppies are all versions 2.x, and it doesn't look like fdisk is a viable command.

For reference, I'm currently trying this with a 1gb Hewlett Packard SD card.

Any suggestions for how to proceed?

Thanks!

I suggest you get PC DOS 5.0 ... currently there are a bunch of new/sealed 5.25 disk versions on eBay (likely from Computer Reset).

https://www.ebay.com/itm/IBM-DOS-5-0-Op ... Sw309gT~pZ

Thanks for the suggested link. I'll definitely pick up a copy of DOS 5.0 if I can't get this to work any other way. I decided I'd give the linux method a go. I booted up an old laptop in Linux and created the image file, and I have images for PC-DOS 5.0. Where wold I get the JRCONFIG.NRD file, and what does it do? I looked on my existing PCjr DOS floppies, and they don't have it. I suspect they have some custom configuration to make the 640k sidecar work properly, but if they contain equivalent config files, i'm not sure if I could just patch those in as a substitute.

Thanks again!

Hello again,

I've been following SD-Cart setup guide, using Linux to create a card.img file, then using dosbox to install DOS 5 image files. When trying this method, I'm currently hitting two problems:

- In step 4 of the walkthrough, it says to copy any config files or games that might be wanted on the SD card. I'm able to copy individual files, but can't figure out how to copy a folder full of games. XCOPY isn't a viable command in dosbox. The alternative I've found online is to use the REN (rename) command instead. When I've tried commands like 'REN d:\Games c:' I get no result at all, just another ready command prompt. Is there some simple way to make this transfer? Or will I be able to copy files between systems after writing the image to the SD card? If the card functioned as a normal drive on a modern machine after all this setup is done, that would be amazing. I'm curious if I this is the only point at which I can load the card up with data.

- Without having moved over the games folder, I copied in some config files and tried moving on to step 5, just to see if it would boot to dos. Unfortunately I got a message stating "Missing Operating System". The dos installation went well as far as I could see. I installed to the default C:\DOS directory and it went through all 5 disks without complaint. On a side note, I copied the config files like JRCONFIG.NRD to the root directory. Should that go in C:\DOS instead?

- Just to confirm I'm doing this right, my SD-Cart bios gave the CHS numbers as 123,255,63. While following the walkthrough, I should be substituting those numbers into the Dosbox settings, correct? So the setup for step 3 (to install dos) would look like: -noautoexec -c "mount c ." -c "c:" -c "imgmount 2 card.img -size 512,63,123,255 -fs none" -c "boot Disk01.img Disk02.img Disk03.img Disk04.img Disk05.img"?

Thanks

Jiidari wrote:- In step 4 of the walkthrough, it says to copy any config files or games that might be wanted on the SD card. I'm able to copy individual files, but can't figure out how to copy a folder full of games. XCOPY isn't a viable command in dosbox. The alternative I've found online is to use the REN (rename) command instead. When I've tried commands like 'REN d:\Games c:' I get no result at all, just another ready command prompt. Is there some simple way to make this transfer? Or will I be able to copy files between systems after writing the image to the SD card? If the card functioned as a normal drive on a modern machine after all this setup is done, that would be amazing. I'm curious if I this is the only point at which I can load the card up with data.

Hmm, I had not considered the problem of copying files recursively... One solution could be to copy pkunzip and a zipped version of your games folder, then unzip it. But otherwise the card will work as a normal drive on your machine after this setup is done. So for now, you could only copy necessary files such as JRCONFIG.NRD.

Jiidari wrote:- Without having moved over the games folder, I copied in some config files and tried moving on to step 5, just to see if it would boot to dos. Unfortunately I got a message stating "Missing Operating System". The dos installation went well as far as I could see. I installed to the default C:\DOS directory and it went through all 5 disks without complaint. On a side note, I copied the config files like JRCONFIG.NRD to the root directory. Should that go in C:\DOS instead?

JRCONFIG.NRD in the root directory is fine. But it can be anywhere as long as you load it from config.sys with the correct path: EG: DEVICE=C:\DOS\JRCONFIG.NRD

Jiidari wrote:- Without having moved over the games folder, I copied in some config files and tried moving on to step 5, just to see if it would boot to dos. Unfortunately I got a message stating "Missing Operating System". The dos installation went well as far as I could see. I installed to the default C:\DOS directory and it went through all 5 disks without complaint. On a side note, I copied the config files like JRCONFIG.NRD to the root directory. Should that go in C:\DOS instead?

Well that's strange. Maybe you entered the wrong -size numbers at one of the previous step? Also, you mention using Linux to create the image file. Did you use DOSBox under Linux too?

Jiidari wrote:- Just to confirm I'm doing this right, my SD-Cart bios gave the CHS numbers as 123,255,63. While following the walkthrough, I should be substituting those numbers into the Dosbox settings, correct? So the setup for step 3 (to install dos) would look like: -noautoexec -c "mount c ." -c "c:" -c "imgmount 2 card.img -size 512,63,123,255 -fs none" -c "boot Disk01.img Disk02.img Disk03.img Disk04.img Disk05.img"?

I just noticed this as I was following the guide but using your card's CHS geometry to test. If the SD-Cart JR BIOS CHS numbers were 123,255,63, you should use -size 512,63,255,123. The order is reversed. "C" "H" "S" becomes "S" "H" "C". (Here you have invetred 123 and 255 it seems).

Ok, so I installed DOS 5 and after step 3, it boots fine in DOSBox. Note that I used -size 512,63,255,123 everywhere. I took detailed notes of what I did, see below. Could you try doing exactly as I did, and confirm if it works?