Stumped on a Cartridge Repair

[RalfR]

If you only want to copy from cartridge to cartridge, you can use QLone from Ultrasoft (available from Dilwyn), which copies the random number.

However, this does not work with other encryption methods (e.g. Tankbusters).

[t0nyt]

If you only want to copy from cartridge to cartridge, you can use QLone from Ultrasoft (available from Dilwyn), which copies the random number.

However, this does not work with other encryption methods (e.g. Tankbusters).

It does have the limitation of only copying the format MDV1->2 or MDV2->1 though

I tried Qlone+ CFORM for West and it suffered the same magic number problems as the other methods on my systems (as I didn't have an original that still worked, only an image of it)

[RalfR]

I tried Qlone+ CFORM for West and it suffered the same magic number problems as the other methods on my systems (as I didn't have an original that still worked, only an image of it)

Stefan Schmidt, who wrote "QL Strip Poker" at the time, once told me that Talent had given him a specific way to protect the program.

Talent's method may be different from the query methods that were previously common, such as those used for cartridges with the "_" file (from Tony Tebby's Software Production Kit (see Wiki)).

And that's why copying may not work with QLone either.

[martyn_hill]

Hi Tony!

Just to be clear, once I’ve sorted out my last few recoveries I’ll be putting vMap back in as it’s one of my favourite pieces of QL equipment

If that protection mechanism indeed attempts to spin-up > 8 MDV units (which wouldn't usually be noticeable on an unmodified QL), then it is quite conceivable that it upsets vMap which does clever things with the COMMS CLK signal and may be responding to the unexpected/out of standard signalling used by that protection... Mr Ingley might be best placed to comment on this point

[t0nyt]

Hi Tony!

Just to be clear, once I’ve sorted out my last few recoveries I’ll be putting vMap back in as it’s one of my favourite pieces of QL equipment

If that protection mechanism indeed attempts to spin-up > 8 MDV units (which wouldn't usually be noticeable on an unmodified QL), then it is quite conceivable that it upsets vMap which does clever things with the COMMS CLK signal and may be responding to the unexpected/out of standard signalling used by that protection... Mr Ingley might be best placed to comment on this point

Yes, that sounds like a plausible reason thanks

[t0nyt]

Have managed to restore 2 of my 3 original West carts, the 3rd cartridge is just too badly physically worn/damaged so have binned it

I'm now trying to work out why my 3D Slime is failing protection checks!

[tofro]

Hi Tony!

Just to be clear, once I’ve sorted out my last few recoveries I’ll be putting vMap back in as it’s one of my favourite pieces of QL equipment

If that protection mechanism indeed attempts to spin-up > 8 MDV units (which wouldn't usually be noticeable on an unmodified QL), then it is quite conceivable that it upsets vMap which does clever things with the COMMS CLK signal and may be responding to the unexpected/out of standard signalling used by that protection... Mr Ingley might be best placed to comment on this point

If you really had 8 drives connected, I'm sure the original QL PSU would have quit when all of them ran at the same time.

[t0nyt]

Hi Tony!

Just to be clear, once I’ve sorted out my last few recoveries I’ll be putting vMap back in as it’s one of my favourite pieces of QL equipment

If that protection mechanism indeed attempts to spin-up > 8 MDV units (which wouldn't usually be noticeable on an unmodified QL), then it is quite conceivable that it upsets vMap which does clever things with the COMMS CLK signal and may be responding to the unexpected/out of standard signalling used by that protection... Mr Ingley might be best placed to comment on this point

Yes, that sounds like a plausible reason thanks

Actually vMap was preventing formatting with the correct magic number, not preventing it running

[t0nyt]

Ok, I'll have to back track on that

Just done more testing and vMap is preventing it _running_, so magic number was probably correct all along (which explains why when I imaged it back it worked in q-emulator still)

Sorry

[dilwyn]

If you really had 8 drives connected, I'm sure the original QL PSU would have quit when all of them ran at the same time.

I'm sure there's a joke in there somewhere, tofro - "How many PSUs does it take to power an 8-MDV QL?"

Wasn't there a bug in pre-MG ROMs (i.e. versions AH/JM/JS) which caused the OS to forget about some MDVs if an attempt to access MDV8_ was made? I'm sure I remember something about that in Simon Goodwin's ROM Bugs articles.