Spectre GCR Manual Manuals - Atari Documentation Archive

Mac Mode
I just mentioned the ST will usually miss a disk-insert or disk-eject
if the disk is write protected. Why? Well, it has to do with how the ST
sees those events. Every 1 /70th of a second, the ST checks out each
disk drive, to see if the "write protect" switch is closed (that's the little
tab you set on the disk to write protect it.) During disk-insert or diskeject,
there is a "glitch", where the write protect signal shifts, because
of how a disk goes into the drive. When the ST sees this glitch, bing!, it
knows you're doing something to the disk. Unfortunately, this clever
idea doesn't work on write-protected disks. Whups.
You've seen this before in ST mode, where you have to press ESC
to get the ST to notice that you've changed disks.
& . ....
Sometimes the ST's keyboard microprocessor, which is a full computer
itself (!), gets confused if you type too fast. If you hit S, then E, real
quickly, sometimes the keyboard sends an "Fl" keypress on to the ST.
The Mac OS thinks you just put a disk into the " A" drive, and starts
dealing with it. If the Mac as thinks you already had a disk in there, it
gets very confused; sometimes it asks you to put the disk back in
AGAIN, thinking you manually ejected it with a paperclip (and probably
mumbling to itself about its users.) Usually, hitting Fl again cures
this problem.
You'll know this happens if the ST's disk drive suddenly turns on
when you haven't put a disk in it, and the ST informs you that the
(non-existent) diskette in there has a problem. It will then ask if you'd
like to initialize or eject the disk; click on Eject, press Fl again, and
you're out of it.
With Spectre GCR, note that the GCR nearly dies trying to read
whatever disk is in the drive, doing retries of all sorts, recalibrating itself,
chanting prayers to the gods of silicon chips, and so on. This takes
time. The GCR doesn't know that there's no disk in that drive; it just
thinks your disk is in really terrible shape. You're going to appreciate
all that hang-in-there trying when you have a flaky disk, so Patience!,
okay?
There's nothing to be done about this bug. Go easy on S-E keys.
The next problem is some aftermarket drives. The ST senses disk
changes by watching the write-protect switch on the disk drives, 70
times per second. If it sees the switch change position, then it knows a
disk has been inserted or removed. Again, if a disk is write protected,
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