28-Mar-2024 09:18 GMT.
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Anonymous, there are 13 items in your selection
[News] dfx: is not a Catweasel!ANN.lu
Posted on 16-Aug-2002 00:52 GMT by Jens Schönfeld13 comments
View flat
View list
A lot of inquiries about the dfx: interface have reached us during the past week, asking for our involvement in the dfx: project, if any. A lot of inquiries about the dfx: interface have reached us during the past week. The most frequently asked question was if dfx: uses Catweasel technology. The answer is no! If you are looking for a floppy controller for a Pegasos, AmigaOne or Amithlon that is as flexible and as fast as the Catweasel, your only choice is the original.

In time with the release of the new mainboards, we will have a Catweasel that fits on them.

Pre-orders are NOT taken. Even if it has become common use in this market to charge money for things that are not even developed yet, individual Computers only takes money for things that we can ship next day.
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 1 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 15-Aug-2002 23:06 GMT
No preorder.... nice!
Will get something like it for my A1...
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 2 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Darrin on 16-Aug-2002 00:07 GMT
Well, as I want to be able to read Amiga formatted disks on my AmigaOne then they can mark me down as a potential customer :)
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 3 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by priest on 16-Aug-2002 04:57 GMT
It would be very nice to be able to use also the existing Amiga keyboard & mouse & joystics...
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 4 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by DaveW on 16-Aug-2002 05:13 GMT
Me too!
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 5 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by cOrpse on 16-Aug-2002 05:50 GMT
In reply to Comment 3 (priest):
IIRC USB adpators exist for amiga joysticks , drivers would be needed tho :\ .. Keyboards , i wouldn't know about , i've only ever had *desktop* amiga's ( when new , yes i do have a tower 1200 :) ) but i gotta maxim account if someone wants to know up an apdator ;)
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 6 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by cOrpse on 16-Aug-2002 05:52 GMT
In reply to Comment 5 (cOrpse):
thats meant to be "knock up" ...
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 7 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Desmon on 16-Aug-2002 06:39 GMT
Here's the real thing...
http://dfx.boing.net/
Have fun.
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 8 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 16-Aug-2002 07:39 GMT
The ISA Catweasel works well with Amithlon (if you have a board with
an ISA slot) for reading and writing Amiga disks, but it will not
read/write PC disks, unlike the Amiga Catweasel.
This is presumably just a software problem, but it would be nice to
get it fixed, so that only one floppy drive would be needed.
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 9 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Bill Hoggett on 16-Aug-2002 08:22 GMT
In reply to Comment 8 (Don Cox):
The real problem is that it is ISA only. This is now a RESTRICTION, and is the one thing that prevents me from buying one (I can't use it).
So, while the dfx may not be a Catweasel, it's the only thing that will work for now.
From Jens' post I gather something new is planned for when the AmigaOne/Pegasos are released to the public, but I haven't seen any details yet. Will this also work on Amithlon?
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 10 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by A.Scott Pringle on 16-Aug-2002 10:01 GMT
Before work was started on DFx i emailed Jens, to ask if a PCI Catweasel would be released at any stage in the future. The answer was NO, as it would be too costly. Hence we began work on DFx.
This product has had its first batch manufactured and we need to get them in action so we can find and fix any remaining bugs. This is why we have let local users in for a pre-order and a discount in the process.
This product was designed and manufactured in Melbourne, Australia and has nothing whatsoever to do with Catweasel apart from a similarity in its function.I hope this clears up any misunderstandings that may have occurred. 8)
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 11 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Joe "Floid" Kanowitz on 16-Aug-2002 10:22 GMT
Just to save everyone some Googling, here's a nice reference to how 'unusual' the format really is:
http://perso.club-internet.fr/lclevy/adflib/adf_info.html
...and Dr. Kittel giving the short review:
http://www.rot13.org/~dpavlin/amiga-faq.html#ToC4
However, http://www.oldskool.org/disk2fdi/ seems to prove *reads* can be done with suitable banging on the floppy hardware. I imagine a similar level of support elsewhere (thinking Linux or NetBSD here) wouldn't be strictly impossible?
The burning question on my mind- if you'd need a Catweasel for full Classic-floppy reads on an AmigaOne, what format will OS4 produce on a generic drive? 'FFS2' on PC-style sectors? FAT (CrossDOS-style)? UDF? :)
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 12 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Radfoo on 16-Aug-2002 11:41 GMT
This DFX thing seems quite good though! Hopfully it will work with the AmigaOne.
dfx: is not a Catweasel! : Comment 13 of 13ANN.lu
Posted by Phill on 16-Aug-2002 12:36 GMT
In reply to Comment 11 (Joe "Floid" Kanowitz):
disk2fdi is not a main stream solution. for a start you need two floppy drives & the disk in the second drive gets wiped. IIRC it doesn't support writing either.
Anonymous, there are 13 items in your selection
Back to Top