Bohdan Milar
2022-08-06
I was pleasantly surprised to find out recently that SpartaDOS X is still in development. It is perhaps the only actively developed DOS for 8-bit Atari.
SpartaDOS X can be loaded and used from a floppy disk. However, this is inconvenient because of its memory requirements. It is therefore preferable to use it in cartridge form.
I realized that I own 3 different devices with SpartaDOS X.
The first one is a classic cartridge from ICD (original manufacturer) equipped with ROM or EPROM. There, an update would be possible by removing the original and reprogramming or replacing it. I will not go into that in this article.
I also have an internal memory expansion add-on in one of my 800 XEs - Lotharek 2010 Sdx 4.4xF. It is a ROM replacement board for the operating system that also contains an internal cartridge just with SpartaDOS X.
I own a third instance of SpartaDOS X in the form of an external IDE Plus 2.0 interface, which I wrote about in FLOP 57 and 58 (unfortunately only in Czech language).
The latter two devices have the DOS stored in flash memory, which allows easy updating. And current developers can take advantage of this...
You can find all you need at the SpartaDOS X Upgrade Project web - https://sdx.atari8.info/
Select "Stable release" from the "Download" menu. You will see a list of about 15 images for updating DOS on different types of devices.
So select the images you are interested in. Below the list you can also choose whether you want to download the SpartaDOS X Toolkit. Then just click on "Download selected items" and a ZIP with the selected items will be downloaded.
At the time of writing, the latest stable release of SpartaDOS X is 4.49, dated April 7, 2020.
I used an Atari 800 XE without extended memory for flash.
For this device, it was clear that the "IDE Plus 2.0 interface" image needed to be downloaded. I connected the obtained SDX449_ideplus.atr via SIO2PC USB (using RespeQt).
I turned on the Atari and used RESET+START to go to the IDE+2.0 configuration screen. There I set both "Boot drive" and "CONFIG.SYS" to D1:. Saving the configuration and rebooting is done with CTRL+B.
After booting, the "SDX upgrade flasher" program started and announced:
"If SDX or flashing is disabled, enable now, then hit a key."
So, I verified that SpartaDOS X was enabled on IDE Plus 2.0 (i.e., the switch in the position closer to the 2.5" IDE connector).
I did not find the switch to enable flash on the device. No mention of it in the documentation either. So I pressed the key.
Then the program asked
"Use SpartaDOS I/O?"
I assumed that using the SDX I/O routines would increase the read speed. So I pressed "Y" in agreement.
The program itself found the new flash memory file (SDX449_I.ROM) and displayed its date and size.
It also detected the device and the Am29F040 memory of 512 KiB.
It then asked:
"Full chip erase?"
I assume I want to erase the entire contents. So I pressed "Y" again in agreement.
The program announced "Erasing all..."
When it finished (Done), it asked
"Do you want to proceed?"
I pressed "Y" again.
The flash process followed, with the program sequentially reading memory blocks (banks 0 to 63) from the file, writing them to memory and verifying what was written.
The process took several minutes and ended with the message "Done" and the question
"Restart program?"
It is now convenient to eject the update disk from D1:.
Pressing "N" will restart the computer.
The "Y" response would cause the program to return to the beginning with a new flash option.
When finished, it is advisable to return to the IDE+2.0 configuration (using RESET+START) and return the "Boot drive" and "CONFIG.SYS" to their original values.
I did not have documentation for this extension and it is not available from the manufacturer's website. However, from studying the web I concluded that it is an implementation of a device known as "intSDX 128", specifically a flash memory version.
I therefore downloaded the item labeled "intSDX128 and intSDX128 flash" from the web site.
SpartaDOS X needs to be activated, i.e. the pins marked "off" need to be disconnected (e.g. remove the jumper).
I inserted the obtained SDX449_sdx128.atr image into (emulated) drive 1 and turned on the computer. SpartaDOS X started and automatically ran the SDX128.COM file from D1:.
The "SDX upgrade flasher" program started by displaying a prompt:
"If SDX or flashing is disabled, enable now, then hit a key."
SpartaDOS X is running. But now you have to enable flashing (connect the flash pins) on Sdx 4.4xF. Then the key can be pressed.
Then the program asked
"Use SpartaDOS I/O?"
I assume that using the SDX I/O routines will increase the read speed. That's why I pressed "Y" in agreement.
The program itself found the new flash memory file (SDX449_R.ROM) and displayed its date and size.
It also detected the device (SDX cartridge) and the 128 KiB ST29EE010 memory.
It then asked:
"Full chip erase?"
I assume I want to erase the entire contents. So I pressed "Y" again in agreement.
The program announced "Erasing all..."
When it finished (Done), it asked
"Do you want to proceed?"
I pressed "Y" again.
The flash process followed, with the program sequentially reading memory blocks (banks 0 to 15) from the file, writing them to memory and verifying what was written.
The process took several minutes and ended with the message "Done" and the question
"Restart program?"
Now you need to disable (turn off) flash on Sdx 4.4xF using jumper or switch. It is also advisable to eject the update disk from D1:.
Pressing "N" will restart the computer.
The "Y" response would cause the program to return to the beginning with a new flash option.