Tempest

Is there a working disk image for Sorcerer of Claymorgue Castle? The
only one I seem to be able to find doesn't want to load on a real
Apple IIe (the disk drive just makes some nasty noises on the loading
screen).

Tempest

schmidtd

On Jun 25, 5:42*pm, Tempest <temp...@atariprotos.com> wrote:
> Is there a working disk image for Sorcerer of Claymorgue Castle? *The
> only one I seem to be able to find doesn't want to load on a real
> Apple IIe (the disk drive just makes some nasty noises on the loading
> screen).

If it works in emulation, I'd start to doubt my hardware or the floppy
disk itself - can you run a disk speed test on your drive? Did you
get any errors when transferring the image to disk? No chance the
floppy is high density, right?

sicklittlemonkey

On Jun 26, 9:42*am, Tempest <temp...@atariprotos.com> wrote:
> Is there a working disk image for Sorcerer of Claymorgue Castle? *The
> only one I seem to be able to find doesn't want to load on a real
> Apple IIe (the disk drive just makes some nasty noises on the loading
> screen).
>
> Tempest

I've seen plain DOS DSK images written to real disks that didn't boot,
so I'm sure this can happen, but I didn't have time to get to the
bottom of it.

Have you tried re-doing the transfer?
Reformatting?

Cheers,
Nick.

Tempest

On Jun 27, 9:36*am, schmidtd <schmi...@my-deja.com> wrote:
> On Jun 25, 5:42*pm, Tempest <temp...@atariprotos.com> wrote:
>
> > Is there a working disk image for Sorcerer of Claymorgue Castle? *The
> > only one I seem to be able to find doesn't want to load on a real
> > Apple IIe (the disk drive just makes some nasty noises on the loading
> > screen).
>
> If it works in emulation, I'd start to doubt my hardware or the floppy
> disk itself - can you run a disk speed test on your drive? *Did you
> get any errors when transferring the image to disk? *No chance the
> floppy is high density, right?

No problems transferring the disk and it looks like it starts to
load. However once it gets past the initial title screen it starts to
load again and then makes nasty grinding noises like the disk head is
hitting. I can try another set of drives (I'm using a Duo Disk) but
I've never had trouble with them before.

Are the Duo Disks known to have any incompatibilities vs the regular
disk drives? The reason I ask is that I have another game
(Burgertime) that I know worked back in the day on my IIe and now it
doesn't. The only thing I've changed is swapping out the two 5.25"
drives for the Duo Disk.

If it is a speed issue, how do I go about fixing that?

Tempest

David Schmidt

On 6/30/2011 10:12 AM, Tempest wrote:
> On Jun 27, 9:36 am, schmidtd<schmi...@my-deja.com> wrote:
>> On Jun 25, 5:42 pm, Tempest<temp...@atariprotos.com> wrote:
>> No chance the floppy is high density, right?

My money's on this, still...

> No problems transferring the disk and it looks like it starts to
> load. However once it gets past the initial title screen it starts to
> load again and then makes nasty grinding noises like the disk head is
> hitting. I can try another set of drives (I'm using a Duo Disk) but
> I've never had trouble with them before.

Go ahead and try the different disk drive. Heads can get dirty, and
speed can vary.

> Are the Duo Disks known to have any incompatibilities vs the regular
> disk drives?

Just on the IIgs, as I recall - there was a one-wire difference that
affected something, but I'm fuzzy and/or lazy on looking it up. But all
is well for the IIe.

> The reason I ask is that I have another game
> (Burgertime) that I know worked back in the day on my IIe and now it
> doesn't. The only thing I've changed is swapping out the two 5.25"
> drives for the Duo Disk.

Bit rot happens. The magnetic coating on disks doesn't last forever.
So it could be that, or it could be head dirtiness or speed, too.

> If it is a speed issue, how do I go about fixing that?

There's a potentiometer on the analog boards inside any Disk II drive.
Open it up, run a speed test program, and adjust it while running.

Steven Hirsch

On 06/30/2011 11:39 AM, David Schmidt wrote:

>> Are the Duo Disks known to have any incompatibilities vs the regular
>> disk drives?
>
> Just on the IIgs, as I recall - there was a one-wire difference that affected
> something, but I'm fuzzy and/or lazy on looking it up. But all is well for the
> IIe.

There was an issue that affected operation when piggybacking with a 3.5"
drive. The fix involved cutting out a resistor in the Duo drive.

Tempest

On Jun 30, 5:45*am, sicklittlemonkey <nick.westg...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Jun 26, 9:42*am, Tempest <temp...@atariprotos.com> wrote:
>
> > Is there a working disk image for Sorcerer of Claymorgue Castle? *The
> > only one I seem to be able to find doesn't want to load on a real
> > Apple IIe (the disk drive just makes some nasty noises on the loading
> > screen).
>
> > Tempest
>
> I've seen plain DOS DSK images written to real disks that didn't boot,
> so I'm sure this can happen, but I didn't have time to get to the
> bottom of it.
>
> Have you tried re-doing the transfer?
> Reformatting?
>
> Cheers,
> Nick.

Yeah I've tried retransferring and that didn't work. I'll try the
different disk drive this weekend.

As for Burgertime, it's not the disk it's the game. I've tried two or
three different copies of it and it always crashes. It has to be the
DuoDisk or possibly the RGB Card that doubles as a 80-col RAM card.
Those are the only two things that have changed on my system.

Tempest

Tempest

A little update. After attempting to clean out my DuoDisk and finding
nothing out of the ordinary (the thing is spotless inside) I decided
to give the Sorcerer of Claymorgue another go. This time I noticed
the tiny little TURN DISK OVER message in the corner of the cracked
screen so I did so. The game loads now, but I'm still not 100% sure
it's playing right. I only seem to alternate between two screens, the
castle entrance (I'm in a field and see a castle with a drawbridge)
and a forest screen (I'm in the enchanted forest). Those are the only
two screens I can see no matter what I try. The game might be working
right and I'm just lost in a forest maze, but I thought I'd check with
everyone here to see if I'm right.

No idea what the problem with Burgertime is. Still looking into that
one.

Tempest