Article on how to preserve/copy your Famicom Disks

[rbudrick]

A lot of you helped me out over the last year and a half on this project covered in this thread:

http://www.digitpress.com/forum/view...=845164#845164

Well, since the project is done, and I think a lot of people saw that thread, noticed it's 5 pages and skipped over it rather than read it. I figure people probably didn't want constant progress updates and such...they want the finished product! Since the project is finished and I no longer need help with it, I think a new thread would is convenient for most readers and appropriate at this point.

Originally, Memblers at Nesdev posted the files here, but you need eMule to get them:

http://nesdev.parodius.com/bbs/viewt...er=asc&start=0

Well, thanks to Simplynes, you can now download them directly and only WinRAR is needed to unzip them.

Thanks, Simplynes! I hope you all enjoy these, and be sure to let me know if you have any questions, and especially let me know if any corrections are needed to the doc!

There's a lot of Famicom disks out there rotting to death and I hope this helps you folks get a whole lot more mileage out of your FDS disks, along with allow folks who refused to play FDS games (due to their volatile nature) to have a new gusto for it. If used with FDSloadr, there's no more dead disk worries!

Now if I could only do an article on FDS drive repair..... On the backburner, folks...

-Rob

[Skyway_Recreation]

.ok

[Skyway_Recreation]

sorry, i didn't mean to post that, i was gonna ask if you had any progress your self on actually backing up any of your games.. also i have some questions about diagnosing a fds. if i replace the belt, and pop in a disk, and the disk drive's head does the normal routine of going up and dwn on the disk but just hangs at the bios loading screen, any ideas? everything seems to be physically fine, but who knows........

[rbudrick]

Some games I have had progress on backing up, others won't back up due to a well known error, taken directly from Brad Taylor's FDS doc:

Software disk copy protection
-----------------------------
Special thanks to Chris Covell for bringing this to my attention.

Apparently, some FDS disks implement a very simple copy protection scheme, which the game relies on in order for the game to refuse to work on the copied disk. Normally, the number of files that exist on an FDS disk is stored in the second block recorded on it. However, some games maintain "invisible" files, which are basically files that exist beyond what the file count number in the file count block indicates. This poses somewhat of a problem for copy software like FDSLOADR, since these tools rely on the file
count block, and don't assume that there is any valid data past the last file found on the disk. This means that when these types of disks are copied, the invisible files will be lost, and when the game loads the files that do exist, the game's going to give the user heat about there being a
file missing or somthing, gumming up the works. However in practice, when an FDS disk is programmed, the unused end of the disk is usually completely zeroed out, and this makes detecting the end of the disk simple: just wait
to find a GAP period of extreme length. Except in rare cases, this model for detecting the true end of an FDS disk should generally provide the best results for copying the complete contents for all types of FDS disks.

To be honest, to back up a disk, you don't need this translated doc, as defeating the copy protection is only needed when writing to disks. To back them up, you'll need a tool like Brad Taylor's FDSLoadr.

Tomy of Tototek will soon be releasing a product similar to Brad's FDSLoadr that should address this problem. However, this bug described above does not prevent the technique described in the translated doc from copying from disk to disk or from using Brad's software and cable to write a .fds image to a disk. Also, did you know you can use Brad's cable to load an FDS image right onto the RAM Adapter like a flash cart? Technically, brad's design calls for two cables: one for loading games directly to the ram adapter, and one that hooks into the disk unit itself--this cable is for dumping disks and rewriting them.

The cable in the translated doc is for disk-disk copying, as opposed to Brad's cables.

Now, about your question on the belt. First, you must be positive the belt is identical to the original...no room for micky mousing on that (same diameter, width). Second, there are some adjustments you can make to the drive to get it recalibrated once the belt has been replaced. I intend to make an FAQ eventually, but right now, here's the closest thing that I remember seeing online:

http://members.lycos.co.uk/tomyweb/repair.htm

Now, I have never had any luck adjusting the motor of the FDS as shown on that site (I think I've made it worse doing this), but you may have better luck trying that other screw first....tiny adjustments only, as I understand it. I honestly have never successfully fixed an FDS drive, but armed with the knowledge in that link (and finally having a copy of Copy Master), I'd probably be able to get very good at it.

Chances are, there's nothing unrepairable in the drive, and it just needs some adjustments, so don't junk it.

-Rob

[Skyway_Recreation]

sweet, so someone is releasing a newer prog, hmm. well i my self have went otu and gotten an old 200mhz pentium laptop just for dumping, as i have tons of those hongkong pirate originals that are working intermidantly, and need dumped as soon as possible. they are games like chase HQ and such that were proted form carts. i've had this plan in the works to score as many discs as possible for fds back up, but problem is that unless your in hongkong, or japan (hongkong seems a hell of alot beter when it comes to getting disks still) you have to find someone with them and they try to charge you like 12dollars for a disc. have you had any succes Rewriting on to a disc which had data corruption? anywho, soon i will have another FDS to fiddle with as well. my belt that i reinstalled was an origial in bag one from nintnedo, (scored from a penpal of mine) so she runs perfect, but it still won't load anyhting. i thought if it was maladjusted it would spit error messages at me, instead it just sits ant the bios screen saying "now loading...." did yours do that after you tried to fix it?
by the way, i dled your translated FAMI mod Doc, and omg good job man, i give you mad props on that, i know it took you a long time (i read the other forum post)
o yea, any chance of me being able to get that copy master prog on disk. i'd gladly buy one off of you since you have copy abilities. it would prove EXTREMELEY usefull!

[rbudrick]

sweet, so someone is releasing a newer prog, hmm. well i my self have went otu and gotten an old 200mhz pentium laptop just for dumping,

Yes, and apparently it will be hardware-based, unlike FDSLoadr, allowing for much easier use (ie, can be run in Windows, not just pure DOS). Fdsloadr is extremely timing sensitive because it is done all via software...no added outside logic. Tomy's FDS project has been a long time coming, so don't hold your breath, heh heh. Lol, jk...Tomy's been very busy, but it will come out eventually.

As for your laptop, be aware that due to the port controllers used in most laptops, FDSLoadr (and many other dumpers and such for other systems) may not work. A desktop machine with a 95/98 OS may be required, and in pure DOS at that. Shitty, but true. You can try, though. My 333mhz 98 laptop will load .fds images to the RAM adapter, but won't dump disks. It's a crapshoot, really.

If you searched really hard, you could probably find some bulk quickdisks (the disks the fds format are based on....used in some old 80s PCs, word processors, musical keyboards). Only problem is, you have to cut 2 little tabs off of quickdisks and remove the face plate of the FDS to get them to work. Some Asian and Australian music stores have old stock of quickdisks. You can also open a Famicom disk (very carefully) and put the magnetic media from a quickdisk in one and reseal it, if you didn't want to remove the faceplate. Some piraters even sold adapters to make QDs work in the FDS (gave them that little extra length needed so they'd work in FDS units....FDS disks are slightly longer than QDs, making it so you have to take the faceplate off the FDS to use them. You still have to cut the 2 tabs off the sides, though.

But otherwise, yeah, blank Famicom disks are a pain to find and the Nintendo brand ones by leaps and bounds were the highest quality ones....errors are more prone on all other brands.

have you had any succes Rewriting on to a disc which had data corruption?

I honestly have not bult the circuit yet, nor do I have a 7201 FDS drive, so I haven't written to any disks. Many others have though, so I do know it works. Also, for dumping disk that have data on them that seem to be corrupted, with FDSLoadr you can sometimes do several scans of them to get it to read each block in seperate scans. Apparently, there's a way to splice several bad runs together to get a good one...I need to investigate this more, however.

my belt that i reinstalled was an origial in bag one from nintnedo, (scored from a penpal of mine)

I'd like to hear more about this, if you could tell me. PM is fine.

i thought if it was maladjusted it would spit error messages at me, instead it just sits ant the bios screen saying "now loading...." did yours do that after you tried to fix it

Yeah, they do that when they need to be recalibrated. They will also sometimes give any number of different error messages.

by the way, i dled your translated FAMI mod Doc, and omg good job man, i give you mad props on that, i know it took you a long time (i read the other forum post)
o yea, any chance of me being able to get that copy master prog on disk. i'd gladly buy one off of you since you have copy abilities. it would prove EXTREMELEY usefull!

I've been meaning to dump the disk for a while. Send me an email to remind me to...I need a backup anyway. Email is rbudrick at hotmail dot com. I can do a dump and email the .fds file to you. From there, you can load it via fdsloadr, or write it to a disk once you do the mod (of course, if your drive isn't working, then that option is out).

-Rob

[y-bot]

Here is some more disk system repair info:

http://jfgoods.net/disksystem.html

most of the info on the internet just shows how to replace the belt but not how to align the head. I haven't tried any of the procedures from the above website but I have replaced 6 belts and I was only able to get 2 drives working correctly. If I knew how to align the head when I was working on them I may have been able to get them all going. jfgoods also sells replacement belts. I just bought 4 from them.
y-bot

[Skyway_Recreation]

ybot! hey i bought one of your drives! i had changed the belt, only to notice your belt was't even bad. but the nintendo one fit MUCH better but in comparison, there was not really much diffrence, i can't get the thing to even try to load , when i pop a disk in it jsut runs and that's it, no errors or anything. if you still want to get rid of that one twin with he messed up sound get a hold of me next week, i'll take it off of your hands. what exactly, IF anythign, did you do to this one? lemme know, it would help diagnosing it a little better. you gona get back on the bay anytime soon?

[y-bot]

Hi, I don't get why it runs sometimes and won't stop. I had it working better than that but I did have that problem sometimes. I sold the Twin Famicom with the sound problem. I still have a Disk System and the nice Twin Famicom. If you want to swap the drive you bought for the other one I have that is no problem. Someone gave me the CEO of eBay's email address today so I sent her a polite email and eBay customer service another nasty email. We'll see what happens. I don't think they are going to do anything until I go through their ridiculous reinstatement process.
y-bot

[Skyway_Recreation]

i would totally be dwn for swapping drives, as long as i get to keep the belt, since i bought another one, and am gona have to use the extra one i have on it. lemme know, just PM me or something. are you trying to work on any of this back up stuff? im totally devoted to it at the moment. BTW ebay sux.
i've gotten narced on a million times for no reason for some of the bike stuff i sell and some of my "modded" stuff. suxx ass that's why i have two accounts......

[Skyway_Recreation]

i got it to spit errors at me and almost load a game! it turns out one of the pins on the actual drive whihc connects ti to the controller board was slightly bent in enough to make the control board not know when to stop reading, i overlooked it because it was so slight, but after bending it back to the proper position, the disk drive started to read proper! so i got errors 21,22,23,28. and that's bout it so im guessing head needs adjusted now as i adjusted the drive according to the guide y-bot posted. i hope i can get this up as it's not copy protected on the drive and would be perfect to test out the fdslodr on.

[rbudrick]

Thanks for the link on the repair and the source for FDS belts. BTW, folks, that repair looks a lot more complicated than it is (with having so many steps), so don't worry too much if you give it a shot, just be careful. I'm not saying it's easy or won't take a while, just that's it's pretty easy to take one of these apart.

-Rob

[chimyfolkbutter1]

Well folks, I fixed about 3 dead drives already. I replaced the belts and I had to adjust the motor and the head to get them working. There is actually a method that works to perform this.

1. Change the belt. I also used JF Good's belt.
2. Tune the motor all the way down! I believe it is counter clockwise (just look for the negative sign on the motor and adjust that direction). This is the real trick! All three drives I had to adjust the motor to run slower.
3. Now adjust the heads.

So, the errors really tell you what's going on.

a. When you turn the head adjustment screw, the trick is to get it right at the beginning of the disk track. So, if you see an Error 21 "Disk Header block (NINTENDO-HVC*) part is wrong", 22, "Disk Header Block Recognition isn't read and can't be ignored", this means that you are "BEFORE" the beginning of the header track. You need to adjust the head forward until you finally read the disk. This takes time. You basically have to keep loading a disk until you see the FDS game boots up. It is a great feeling when you see it!

b. If you adjust the head forward too much, you get a Disk Error 27, "Block end mark seen and ends prematurely". Or even Error 28, 29. Turn it back to the beginning until you get the error 21,22s.

I have been using this methodology for 3 FDS and I fix them everytime if the belt, motor adjustment, and alignment are the problem. If you have any electronics problems then you are SOL.

So, I have given everyone the secrets to adjustment and it really is not a secret anymore!

If you have a broken drive and you need it fixed, PM me. I can probably take a look at it. Anyway just PM me.

Good Luck and let me know if my methodology works for you.

-CFB

[Skyway_Recreation]

well see heres the problem though, my fds will boot a group of disks every time, Gunsmoke, dokidoki panic,double dribble, and two crappy hentai games from Hacker, the other's work intermidently, and seem to work better the more i try them, like i have some game by konami where you play as some guy that looks sorta like crocadiel dundee and he shoots some grappling device out and climbs up leves while you fight things, anywho. this game would play only the first level, then go to load the second and give me error 27. but here's the kicker, i popped it in and out like 6 times, then it loaded the level, and from then on, the second level also loads., no problems at all. it seems that some of the disks will work after i try them somany times. the porno games from hacker were like that then they suddenly decided to work, after many tries. i'm getting completely confused about this thing. as far as the screw adjustment and motor, im sure i got them set in a real good spot, so im waiting till my other one comes to see what's up. this fri i begin construction on my FDS to comp cable. which i will be doing by makeing a custom connector for the ram adator that lets me inter change the wire between the fds to comp, or comp to ram, and then unite them again to make a functioning fds to ram connection.
since my drive has no copy protection, i'll be set to test copy abilities, i've decided to get a shitty 10 gb HD and put it in my 1.1 ghz celeron and boot the fds loader form there, hopefully if i try to wrtie to the disks which i know are crap, maybe i can see if my fds is up to the task. i'm hoping that it will write the tracks properly. it seems to have no trouble saving my game in doki doki panic, but who knows what it'll do with saving on to a whole disk.

BTW chimmy, i know your name form somewhere, have you been buying up fds stuff lately? i think you may have out bid me for a fami basic keyboard, and you were bidding on a sharp twin? not sure, i know i remeber your name form somewhere though.

[y-bot]

wow, thanks for the secret information! I haven't seen anything about adjusting the head until a couple of months ago.

@Skyway_Recreation-A long time ago I had a disk system that I thought was working OK (it might be the one I sold you) but it stopped loading disks the next time I tried to use it. Some disks that it would never read work fine for me now. I think if one of the adjustments (motor speed or alignment) is a tiny bit off it may load some disks but not others.

y-bot

[rbudrick]

Like any magnetic media, the magnetic signals can degrade over time. Sometimes a disk just needs to be overwritten to be remagnetized. My theory is that some strings of data can become weak, but not necessarily corrupted. This is why after a few passes the analog head will sometimes pick up the signal correctly.

Also folks, don't forget to clean your drive head periodically, and make sure no crap is clung to the little felt thingy that touches the disk surface.

-Rob

[chimyfolkbutter1]

Rob makes a good point. However, I would not recommend using the FDS cleaning disk. I would take apart the famicom and clean the head directly with alcohol and a qtip. The reason being that the pressure pad that pushes the disk to the head can actually degrade to the point that it is hard as a rock. I believe it can be from the alcohol from the cleaning disk.

When I repaired the 3 drives, all the pressure pads where rock solid hard. I actually changed them by cutting pressure pads of old cassette tapes. It works great. So, check the pressure pads. If you don't change them and the pads are hard, it is like reading your disks with sandpaper!

-CFB

[Skyway_Recreation]

i changed the felt pad to a soft cotton, and it loaded even more disks. but i've noticed the head is pretty worn, it's got a slight flat spot on the top of it. like i said before, i'm thinking about just atempting to rewrite some of these disks, but not before dumping the cool ones. my SMB 2 one is hacked so you float like your in the water at all times, and can't die unless you fall dwn a hole. hacks like that deserve to be preserved in my opinion., then i've got games that just plain old suck. which will totally be writin over, like replicart, god that game sux, it's just snake, i dunno how in the hell it takes up two sides of a disc! LoL. hopefully after i go buy my parts for my cable, i can test out the writing cababilities, im hoping that if i write the games that are damaged over again, then maybe they will work perfectly on my fds. just a theroy i have. i'll make sure to sacrifice replicart first, LoL.

[chimyfolkbutter1]

I don't think it is worn out. All the heads I have seen on my FDS are flat as well.

-CFB

[rbudrick]

Hmmm...the head doesn't really touch anything so I'm not sure how it could be worn.

-Rob