Oh my freaking crapping goodness!
This is freaking amazing!
I almost can't believe this!
I have been wondering about if this was possible for a long time!
AAAAAWWWWWWSSSSSSOOOOOMMMMMEEEEEE!

Just need equipment.
Oh, by the way, if the reason noone is talking to me is because you all think I;m psyco, i'm not. I just want to add some humor to the posts. People should LAUGH MORE OFTEN!
O.k. i'm done.

Uh, just because no one replied to your post within a couple days doesn't mean you're being ignored.

*Checks e-mails, sees none( especially from burntfuse relating to programming), sighs, writes e-mail to self*

So you want me to send you an e-mail about programming? :-)

I have no more to say.

heck freaking yeah bums!!! /me converts LOTR to 32*64 greyscale video

***** 96*64

edit: 96*64, also any chance of using this with other shells like Crunchy or DCS6?

Since it copies to RAM and then executes a shell, it would take a change of precisely 8 bytes to make it DCS6-compatible.

ahh, but even if you change

sMirageName:
DB AppObj,"MirageOS"
to
sMirageName:
DB AppObj,"DoorsCS6"

does DoorsCS6 have the call to start the program at the same place? or does it just have to know where the name of the app and use the jump table in the app for it to be able to run the program?

If I understand correctly, it just opens MOS so that the user can run the program. The other possibility is that it uses the MOS RunProgram vector, which I could easily emulate in DCS.

It sets up RAM appropriately and then calls the MirageOS RunProg entry point. The user never "sees" MirageOS, the program is appears to be run directly from msd8x.

Ah, thanks Dan. Well, I believe I have partial support for the RunProg entry point; with a bit of work, I could probably perfect it.

@kerm: why not just point it at your RunProg routine?

hmmm.. with a 4 gig drive, and timm, you could watchwhole moovies on a 84+... now only to add sound to timm...

4GB HDDs wouldn't be supported, since MSD8X uses the FAT file system. 4GB HDDs have to use a different file system (like FAT32).

But I do have a question. Would a USB Floppy Drive work?

In theory, any USB mass storage device would work, even external hard drives and floppy drives. However, most (if not all) floppy disks are formatted as FAT12, which won't work here.

Quote: any USB mass storage device would work, even external hard drives and floppy drives.

As long as they are formatted with FAT16, right?

Maybe EXT2 would be a better choice for a file system, although it's not directly compatible with Windows. EXT2 handles anything from floppy disks to huge hard drives.

In short: Is it possible to port the MSD driver to EXT2?

Sure it's possible. :) It's even designed for you to be able to add other file systems of your own. But is it easy? I'm going to say no.

You can break up a large external hard drive into partitions and format all or part of it as FAT16 if you like. It doesn't have to be the only partition on the drive for msd8x to work.

I wouldn't call this easy. :)

Even so, it's probably easier to add FAT32 support than EXT2, given the similarity in the file systems. FAT12 is probably even easier since it shares the same boot sector structure but not as important.

It's too bad I can't tinker with this. My calcs are from an older generation without USB ports but this sounds like a fascinating project with lots of potential. Great job guys. :)

May I inquire what FAT12 will work with today? I thought it was stuck back in the days of 5" floppies (I still have an unopened pack of them)

I believe 3.5" floppies use FAT12 as well.

oh, ok

They do.

If anyone happens to be interested, 3.5" FAT12 floppies can be formatted as 720 KB (old) or 1.44 MB. The main difference is that 720 KB floppies have 1440 sectors and 2 sectors per cluster (720 clusters) where 1.44 MB floppies have 2880 sectors and 1 sector per cluster (2880 clusters). Each entry in the FAT represents one cluster, so 1.44 MB floppies have much larger FAT tables than 720 KB floppies. See the link if you want more information (interesting search results.. I was in that class).

oops.. I tried to catch it but just wasn't fast enough. Ignore that link and use this one. Or ignore both. Whatever. :P

I wouldn't call this easy. :)

Even so, it's probably easier to add FAT32 support than EXT2, given the similarity in the file systems. FAT12 is probably even easier since it shares the same boot sector structure but not as important.

It's too bad I can't tinker with this. My calcs are from an older generation without USB ports but this sounds like a fascinating project with lots of potential. Great job guys. :)

EXT2 has much more posibilities than FAT32. FAT32 has too many limitations, like a 32GB max-size limitation (by WIN2000 format tool) whereas EXT2 has 8 terrabytes. Also, if you wanted, EXT3 filesystems could be mounted as EXT2, but it also removes the use of the EXT3's journal. Also, floppy disks could be formatted as EXT2, which makes USB floppy drives functional. (EXT2 does have a third-party driver somewhere on the internet for Windows). Besides, a boot structure is not important for MSDs, since they are generally not booted from.

It might not be easy, buy definately more useful.

ISO9660 filesystem, anyone? ;-)

You misspeled "terabytes"

See my later post on the floppy drive issue -- I gave it a shot with 2 different setups, neither of which worked.

I also tried several other devices -- see my later post where I said the problems/what worked

I tried everything I could think of on it.