How to make a boot floppy for early 520ST without TOS?

[Factor6]

Hi, I got my Atari 520ST+ and I'm quite surprised because it does not have TOS in ROMs. Only 2 of 6 ROM sockets are used. When I turn the ST on, a colourful boot screen appears and wants a disk from me. I will replace the boot chips with TOS 1.04 probably, but until that, I'd like to ask if there is possibility to make a bootable ST TOS floppy and how? Or just format a 720K floppy on PC and copy a TOS.ROM image onto it. I don't know. Or is there an image of bootable TOS for download somewhere on the net?

Thanks,
Alan

[Klapauzius]

Or is there an image of bootable TOS for download somewhere on the net?

Hi and welcome to the forum Alan

here is what you're looking for:
http://www.planetemu.net/index.php?section=roms&dat=355

You could try the 2.06 disk first. If that fails, the 1.00 ones should be fine for your machine.

[Frank B]

Hi, I got my Atari 520ST+ and I'm quite surprised because it does not have TOS in ROMs. Only 2 of 6 ROM sockets are used. When I turn the ST on, a colourful boot screen appears and wants a disk from me. I will replace the boot chips with TOS 1.04 probably, but until that, I'd like to ask if there is possibility to make a bootable ST TOS floppy and how? Or just format a 720K floppy on PC and copy a TOS.ROM image onto it. I don't know. Or is there an image of bootable TOS for download somewhere on the net?

Thanks,
Alan

Might be good if we can get a really early mobo pic for the twiki too

Frank

[Klapauzius]

My very first ST was one of that kind. It lasted only for 2 days though, that's when I got my TOS 1.00 ROMs built in.
It was plain terrible to handle.

[Factor6]

here is what you're looking for:
http://www.planetemu.net/index.php?section=roms&dat=355

You could try the 2.06 disk first. If that fails, the 1.00 ones should be fine for your machine.

Oh, that's exactly what I needed. Thanks! Now, I need to get an external floppy drive first
I'm thinking of letting the machine be as it is, because it seems many people haven't seen it so it could be quite interesting attraction at Atari parties But a friend of mine said he's able to burn EPROMs with Czech version (and bugfixed) of TOS 1.04 for me, so it's also an exciting alternative for me. Anyway, I'm looking for a disk drive first.

[Factor6]

Oh cool! Never seen one of them. Any chance you could upload pictures of the machine, the boot screen and the ROM contents for archival purposes?

Frank

Yeah, I can even make a short video of the TOS booting process, but I need to get a working floppy drive first I'll try eBay or similar auctions to get it.

F6

[Frank B]

My very first ST was one of that kind. It lasted only for 2 days though, that's when I got my TOS 1.00 ROMs built in.
It was plain terrible to handle.

I've never seen one. I have a 520 ST with the external disk drive but it has TOS in ROM. Might be neat to see the boot screen

Frank

[insanity]

Might be good if we can get a really early mobo pic for the twiki too

Great idea - if you could photo the motherboard (showing revision numbers etc)
that would be great - I can upload it to here then:

http://www.atari-forum.com/wiki/index.p ... _revisions

Thanks

baz

[Factor6]

So guys, here is the video of the 520ST+ with no TOS Sorry for quality, YouTube has lowered it a bit
Photos of the mobo and the machine will follow later

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1jscTrkeso

[Frank B]

So guys, here is the video of the 520ST+ with no TOS Sorry for quality, YouTube has lowered it a bit
Photos of the mobo and the machine will follow later

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1jscTrkeso

Cool! I love the early boot strap screen

Frank

[wongck]

So guys, here is the video of the 520ST+ with no TOS Sorry for quality, YouTube has lowered it a bit
Photos of the mobo and the machine will follow later

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1jscTrkeso

Thanks man. Never saw one before.
Look like a real cool demo in the beginning with those colour changing in the bkgound.

[simonsunnyboy]

That boot disk requester is pretty nicely done! Never seen this before....

Will it show the screen if no floppy is present or will it directly boot the TOS disk if inserted?

[Factor6]

That boot disk requester is pretty nicely done! Never seen this before....
Will it show the screen if no floppy is present or will it directly boot the TOS disk if inserted?

If the disk drive is off, it shows the screen with "Connect the Disk Drive...", if it's on, it requires to insert a floppy disk saying "Put the Systems Disk...".
If there's a bootable floppy already inserted in the drive when turning the power switch on, it starts booting automatically without any requester, just showing the cute palette cycling and a 'fly' busy pointer

F6

[Desty]

Wow, never seen (or heard of) that before. Thanks for putting this up!

[Cyprian]

can you dump this ROM into file?

[Frank B]

Wow, never seen (or heard of) that before. Thanks for putting this up!

I guess it's meant to look like GEM but it doesn't quite carry it off. The OK box and menu bar look slightly odd. I wonder if there are any error messages in there too.
What happens when you feed it a non TOS disk?

Frank

[Nyh]

Wow, never seen (or heard of) that before. Thanks for putting this up!

Just load the Fnill demo by TNT-crew, hit the reset button and see for yourself.

Hans Wessels

[nativ]

Hi,
Another solution is to boot your TOS rom from a hard drive or substitute.

/|\

Have fun !

Ashley

[Factor6]

Wow, never seen (or heard of) that before. Thanks for putting this up!

I guess it's meant to look like GEM but it doesn't quite carry it off. The OK box and menu bar look slightly odd. I wonder if there are any error messages in there too.
What happens when you feed it a non TOS disk?

Frank

Nothing happens, just tries to boot and if it fails, it waits approx. 2 seconds and tries it again
The menu is fake, not functional at all. It seems odd, as I think it's just a part of the picture. You can click on it like a maniac and nothing happens.

F6

[Factor6]

Wow, never seen (or heard of) that before. Thanks for putting this up!

Just load the Fnill demo by TNT-crew, hit the reset button and see for yourself.
Hans Wessels

Yes, it's there. Just press F7

F6

[Factor6]

can you dump this ROM into file?

I tried it with ROMDUMP and TOSDUMP but with no success. ROMDUMP doesn't dump anything and TOSDUMP dumps actual TOS in RAM.

F6

[Desty]

Wow, never seen (or heard of) that before. Thanks for putting this up!

Just load the Fnill demo by TNT-crew, hit the reset button and see for yourself.

Sounds fun, will do

[Factor6]

Might be good if we can get a really early mobo pic for the twiki too

Great idea - if you could photo the motherboard (showing revision numbers etc)
that would be great - I can upload it to here then:

http://www.atari-forum.com/wiki/index.p ... _revisions

Thanks

baz

Hey, I don't know how to upload my mobo pic just to this site... Plz help

F6

[wongck]

Just use the attach file using the tab "upload attachment" to upload the image file.

[Frank B]

Might be good if we can get a really early mobo pic for the twiki too

Great idea - if you could photo the motherboard (showing revision numbers etc)
that would be great - I can upload it to here then:

http://www.atari-forum.com/wiki/index.p ... _revisions

Thanks

baz

Hey, I don't know how to upload my mobo pic just to this site... Plz help

F6

Just upload it as an attachment here and someone will add it to the twiki That's what I did.