DISK EMULATOR OPERATION
DISK EMULATOR INITIALIZATION
Before using the disk emulator, it needs to be initialized so that the 4C24 BIOS knows the size,
chip type, and organization of the disk emulator.
This initialization is done with INITRAMD.EXE. INITRAMD.EXE is supplied in the DISK
subdirectory of the 4C24 distribution disk. If INITRAMD is run with a /L parameter, it will list the
types of disk emulator chips supported by the 4C24 BIOS. Each type of disk emulator chip has a
corresponding Devicetype number.
To initialize a disk emulator, you invoke INITRAMD as follows:
INITRAMD /CStartChip /NNumberOfChips /DDeviceType [/F[O | D]]
Where StartChip is 0 or 1, NumberOfChips is 1 or 2 and DeviceType is a number listed by the
INITRAMD /L command.
The /F parameter invokes a built-in FDISK and FORMAT option. The /F option can optionally be
followed by D or O. This option selects standard DOS format (D) or a specially optimised format for
use with Datalight ROM-DOS (O). The ROM-DOS format uses 512 byte allocation units and saves
space in small drives. Do not use the O option with standard DOS or unpredictable file system
behavior will result!
On the 4C24, there are 2 available sockets, the upper socket (U11) and the lower socket (U14).
INITRAMD numbers these sockets such that the upper socket is socket 0 and the lower socket is
socket 1.
If you wanted to initialize a 2 socket disk emulator using device type 1, the INITRAMD command
would be:
INITRAMD /C0 /N2 /D1 /FD
( Initialize disk starting at socket 0, using 2 sockets and device type 1 - DOS format)
It is also possible to initialize two independent disk emulators by invoking INITRAMD twice,
once per socket:
INITRAMD /C0 /N1 /D3 /FO
( Initialize disk starting at socket 0, using 1 sockets and device type 3 - ROM-DOS format)
INITRAMD /C1 /N1 /D5 /FO
( Initialize disk starting at socket 1, using 1 sockets and device type 5 - ROM-DOS format)
Once the disk emulator has been initialized, the 4C24 needs to be reset before the new disk will be
recognized by the operating system.
You should not normally need to run FDISK or FORMAT as long as you specify the /F parameter
when initializing a drive.
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4C24 CPU USER'S MANUAL
