[posted] Tape Simulator for Exidy Sorcerer

[Citabria]

The Exidy Sorcerer (http://oldcomputers.net/sorcerer.html) is an early personal computer, arriving in 1978 on the heels of the Apple II, TRS-80, and PET. It features a 2 MHz Z80, up to 48K RAM, ROM cartridges (made from 8-track tape cases!), and a high-resolution monochrome display. Half the character set is based in RAM, so 512 by 240 pixel graphic displays are possible.

The Sorcerer comes with a cassette tape interface which can run at either 300 or 1200 baud, pretty good for its day (but not entirely reliable). The Teensy-based simulator replaces the cassette interface and transmits software from a microSD card at 20833 baud. Instead of queuing up a tape and waiting 15 minutes for a 24K program to load at 300 baud (or trying it twice at 1200 baud), the user loads a menu, selects the program, and loads it, all in under a minute.

Teensy 3.5 has 300 times the speed and 10 times the memory of the Sorcerer, so making it a storage peripheral is like the tail wagging the dog. But Teensy is cheap and easy, and using it this way preserves the best part of the retrocomputing experience as no system emulator can.

The Sorcerer's cassette interface is on a daughterboard which feeds a UART on the motherboard. The UART chip's spec is good up to 30k baud. The Teensy replaces the daughterboard and generates the UART clock signal (16 times the baud rate) using the FrequencyTimer2 library. In practice, the Sorcerer's ROM-based loader can't keep up at 30k baud, but it can at 21k (and 2 stop bits). Teensy's second serial port connects directly to the 5V UART chip with no level converters required.

In operation, Teensy repeatedly transmits a small piece of Z80 code, the terminal/loader, along with the required 5-second header. When the user enters LOG (LOad and Go) the Sorcerer runs the code and signals Teensy to send a menu. Teensy uses the SDFAT library to build the menu and sends it off. Sorcerer waits for a keypress and asks Teensy for another menu or for a file. The simulator presently supports 3 file types: .BAS for BASIC files, .COM for CP/M executable files, or .BIN for MESS/MAME binary files. When a file is selected, Sorcerer jumps to its ROM-based loader and Teensy transmits the header and program at a blazing 20833 baud (actually faster than some floppy drives of the day).

Long ago I happened on a Sorcerer motherboard without case, keyboard, and cassette interface. I upgraded its RAM to 56K and modified its ROM for a third-party keyboard, but then it languished for decades with no software to run. Thanks to Teensy and software libraries from the Internet, my Sorcerer has a new life. I decorated it with LEDs driven from a data bus buffer and hung it on the wall. A friend of mine with a complete Sorcerer uses the Teensy now instead of playing WAV files off a CD into the cassette port (still less than reliable). The Teensy 3.5 is visible at upper left, below the colored clip leads.

[Citabria]

A friend of mine with a complete Sorcerer uses the Teensy now instead of playing WAV files off a CD into the cassette port (still less than reliable).

I meant to say that CD WAV file loading is less than reliable. Teensy has proven quite reliable.

[pictographer]

Very cool! Thanks for sharing this. This would be great for the PJRC projects page.

[XFer]

Very nice! Congratulations!

[Citabria]

Thanks!

At 20833 baud with 2 stop bits, the transfer rate is 1.85K bytes/sec. I don't know what the typical rate was for CP/M machines but the Atari 810 was about 1.0 and the CBM 1541 about 0.5 KB/sec (they used serial ports). Apple Disk II was as high as 15 KB/sec!

[Citabria]

Wiring diagram for early (32K) Sorcerers:

Remove cassette interface daughterboard and connect Teensy as shown:

[Citabria]

In model II (48K) Sorcerers, the cassette interface is on the motherboard, so the Teensy must connect directly to the UART:

Remove the power supply daughterboard. Remove the UART IC from its socket at 9E. Slightly bend up pins 17, 20, 25, and 40, just enough to clear the socket when it's plugged back in. With clip leads, connect Teensy to the UART pins:
UART Teensy
1 --- +5V
3 --- Gnd
17 -- 5 FreqOut
20 -- 1 Tx1
25 -- 0 Rx1
40 -- 5 FreqOut

Replace the daughterboard. If it interferes with the clip leads, add a spacer under the right side bolts.

[Gadget999]

can you use this tape emulator on other devices - eg CBM 64 / Spectrum ?

[Citabria]

This simulator implements the Exidy tape file format, so it's not directly portable to other systems. However, it could be adapted. I don't know C64 nor Spectrum well, but I suspect there are already several more capable disk emulators available for them. The Sorcerer had no built-in disk support, and this simulator provides some disk-like features without the need to modify Exidy's original ROMs.

[JBeale]

I remember playing with an Exidy Sorcerer one summer, on loan from a family friend. That was the first computer we had in the house; maybe a year before we got our own Apple II. I remember the Sorcerer's tape drive storage was pretty frustrating, I thought maybe I just had a bad tape recorder. Guess I wasn't the only one!

[XFer]

I remember fussing over the "azimuth calibration" of my Commodore64 Tape Unit. Tapes were not fun!! Purchased a 1541 disk unit after two years of saving weekly allowance.

[bogdanabosaia]

Very cool! Thanks for sharing this.

[robjordan]

The Teensy-based simulator replaces the cassette interface and transmits software from a microSD card at 20833 baud. Instead of queuing up a tape and waiting 15 minutes for a 24K program to load at 300 baud (or trying it twice at 1200 baud), the user loads a menu, selects the program, and loads it, all in under a minute.

This is brilliant! I have just started renovating a Sorcerer, the same one I learned to program on in 1979, the start of a 35-year career in software! To my amazement, the hardware mostly still works but I am really struggling to load software from WAV files via cassette interface... only one successful load so far. I just found your post while googling for ideas.

Is your software posted somewhere? I have a couple of questions:

• I guess you must have written a Z80 module to receive and present the menu, is that right?
• How did you convert the WAV files software to binary?

It's a beautiful idea, I hope to do something similar, maybe with a different microcontroller.

Rob

[Citabria]

Thanks!

Yes, I wrote the Z80 code which works as described above: "In operation, Teensy repeatedly transmits a small piece of Z80 code, the terminal/loader, along with the required 5-second header. When the user enters LOG (LOad and Go) the Sorcerer runs the code and signals Teensy to send a menu. Teensy uses the SDFAT library to build the menu and sends it off. Sorcerer waits for a keypress and asks Teensy for another menu or for a file. The simulator presently supports 3 file types: .BAS for BASIC files, .COM for CP/M executable files, or .BIN for MESS/MAME binary files. When a file is selected, Sorcerer jumps to its ROM-based loader and Teensy transmits the header and program at a blazing 20833 baud (actually faster than some floppy drives of the day)."

I have not yet posted the code. I was in the process of prettifying it when my W10 laptop updated itself to death. I managed to recover the code but have not yet reinstalled Arduino and Teensyduino and libraries to continue the work. It will be a project for this winter.

This thread traces the development and also has a utility to convert wav files. I haven't tried it, since I started with binaries collected from the 'net. http://www.vcfed.org/forum/showthrea...r-II-Questions

This page describes another installation of the TapeSim: http://www.atariprotos.com/othersyst...sc/tapesim.htm

[robjordan]

Thanks for replying, I guess you are ClausB over on vcfed. I found that thread there, and subsequently posted my WAV to binary converter, written in python. Still would be very interested to see your Z80 program at some point. Sorry to hear about W10 crisis!

All the best
Rob

[Citabria]

That's me. Saw your post there. Sorry, didn't connect.

Here's the Z80 side of the code, not quite pretty:

const char trmld[] = {  // Z80 code TRMLD:
  0x3E,0x0C,      //TL LD A,FF 
  0xCD,0x1B,0xE0, //   CALL VIDEO  clear screen
  0x06,0x0E,      //   LD B,14
  0x3E,0x0A,      //LL LD A,LF   
  0xCD,0x1B,0xE0, //   CALL VIDEO  set cursor position
  0x10,0xF9,      //   DJNZ LL
  0x11,0x40,0x00, //   LD DE,$0040
  0x21,0xC0,0xF0, //   LD HL,VID+$40  screen RAM pointer
  0x3E,0xCB,      //   LD A,$CB
  0xD3,0xFC,      //   OUT A,UARTD  ask Teensy for file list
  0xDB,0xFD,      //IL IN A,UARTS   
  0xCB,0x4F,      //   BIT 1,A
  0x28,0xFA,      //   JR Z,IL  wait for byte
  0xDB,0xFC,      //   IN A,UARTD
  0xFE,0xCB,      //   CP A,$CB  end of list signal
  0x28,0x15,      //   JR Z,KL
  0xFE,0x0D,      //   CP A,CR  handle Carriage Return
  0x28,0x08,      //   JR Z,RC
  0xFE,0x0A,      //   CP A,LF  handle Line Feed
  0x28,0x0A,      //   JR Z,FL
  0x77,           //   LD (HL),A  write text to screen
  0x23,           //   INC HL
  0x18,0x07,      //   JR DN
  0x7D,           //RC LD A,L  Carriage Return
  0xE6,0xC0,      //   AND A,$C0
  0x6F,           //   LD L,A  reset pointer to start of line
  0x18,0x01,      //   JR DN
  0x19,           //FL ADD HL,DE  Line Feed, advance pointer
  0x18,0xDF,      //DN JR IL
  0xDB,0xFD,      //KL IN A,UARTS
  0xCB,0x47,      //   BIT 0,A
  0x28,0xFA,      //   JR Z,KL  wait for UART ready to send
  0x3E,0xCB,      //   LD A,$CB
  0xD3,0xFC,      //   OUT A,UARTD  send signal that TRMLD is waiting for user
  0xCD,0x18,0xE0, //   CALL KEYBRD
  0x28,0xF1,      //   JR Z,KL  wait for user choice
  0x77,           //   LD (HL),A  display it
  0xDB,0xFD,      //UL IN A,UARTS
  0xCB,0x47,      //   BIT 0,A
  0x28,0xFA,      //   JR Z,UL  wait for UART ready to send
  0x7E,           //   LD A,(HL)
  0xD3,0xFC,      //   OUT A,UARTD  send user choice to Teensy
  0xFE,0x0D,      //   CP A,CR
  0x28,0xAA,      //   JR Z,TL  loop if next list
  0xDB,0xFD,      //IL IN A,UARTS   
  0xCB,0x4F,      //   BIT 1,A
  0x28,0xFA,      //   JR Z,IL  wait for signal from Teensy
  0xDB,0xFC,      //   IN A,UARTD
  0xFE,0xCB,      //   CP A,$CB
  0x28,0x03,      //   JR Z,LD  jump to loader
  0xC3,0xFA,0xDF, //   JP PWARM  or jump to BASIC
  //0xC3,0xFD,0xDF, //   JP PCOLD
  0xBF,           //LD CP A,A
  0xF5,           //   PUSH AF
  0xC3,0x2D,0xE0, //   JP BASLOD  jump to ROM loader
  0};

[robjordan]

Cool thanks! I'm away from home for a couple of weeks now, but will try it when I get back.

[Citabria]

Here are the source files. Not pretty, but commented at least, so you can follow it.

It's built on Arduino 1.8.13, Teensyduino 1.53, and SDFAT library 1.1.4.

[robjordan]

Here are the source files. Not pretty, but commented at least, so you can follow it.

It's built on Arduino 1.8.13, Teensyduino 1.53, and SDFAT library 1.1.4.

Thank you. I've let this slip in favour of other projects, but I'll get back to it. Thanks for taking the time to post this.

Rob

[PaulStoffregen]

This was posted on the PJRC website. Here's the link.

https://www.pjrc.com/exidy-sorcerer-tape-simulator/

[Citabria]

Cool! Thanks.

[guibrush]

Here are the source files. Not pretty, but commented at least, so you can follow it.

It's built on Arduino 1.8.13, Teensyduino 1.53, and SDFAT library 1.1.4.

Hi Citabria
As I am in the process of restarting a Sorcerer II DP1000-2, I am doing some research on the web, and came across this excellent post. Congratulations on this upgrade, it's great! I would love to equip my Exidy with it, but unfortunately, I have no Arduino skills and have no idea where to start. I know it's a lot of work, but is there any way you could build one for me? I will of course pay you for the work and the parts.

Thanks
Guibrush

[masonlvvy]

Thank you for your sharing.

[Citabria]

Shame that Teensy 3.5 is out of stock everywhere until next year. This project could be adapted to T3.2 with an SD card shield, but that might not be available either. Because we are interfacing with 5V TTL here, we need the 5V tolerance of those two Teensys. Others won't work.

[guibrush]

ok, I understand. I just looked around, the 3.2 isn't available too, at least at first sight.
But I asked a friend of mine that could still have one in stock and can give it to me, we will see, maybe I'm lucky :-)