Jean-François DEL NERO (la persona che sta dietro lo sviluppo dell’emulatore Floppy HxC SD) ha recentemente rilasciato una versione del firmware HxC compatibile con il chip STM32 utilizzato nel Floppy Drive Gotek.

Questo significa che possiamo godere di quasi tutte le features che il firmware HxC supporta anche per l’economico Floppy Drive Gotek.

Il bootloader per convertire il floppy drive Gotek in HxC compatibile va acquistato sul sito di HXC 2001 inviando un’email a Jean-François DEL NERO. Il prezzo del bootloader e’ di 10 euro una tantum per ogni Gotek che si vuole aggiornare/convertire. Gli aggiornamenti successivi del software sono gratuti e possono essere fatti da chiavetta USB.

The HXC Usb (Gotek) firmware supports: + many more….

USB Stick STM32 (Gotek) HxC Floppy Emulator Firmware v3.1.60.5a -> v3.3.1.2a cumulative changelog:

• Fix multi-screens support (OSD + 7 segments screens)
• New Major feature !!! : On screen display support (OSD overlay)
• The HxC firmware for Gotek now support the On Screen Display !
• You can now select images and see the drive status on the machine’s screen without any additional software or LCD/OLED !
• No need to make holes in the machine case anymore ;).
• Picture: https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_drive_emulator/HxCGotek_OSDAmiga1.jpg
• You only need 2 wires and a resistor to connect the Gotek to the machine’s video signals :
• One wire is used for the CSYNC video signal (Composite Sync), the other wire for the red, green (prefered) or blue signal.
• One resistor must be put in serie on the color signal between the Gotek and the machine.
• You can use a value between 220 and 470 ohms for this resistor. A potentiometer can be also used to tune the OSD brightness/contrast.
• This was currently tested on Amiga 500, Atari STE and Amstrad CPC 6128 machines, but should work with any machines having a composite sync signal.
• HxC Firmware for Gotek OSD wiring:
• Gotek wiring:
  • OSD Video out : Gotek U8 Pin 5 (PB15)
  • OSD Video CSYNC in : Gotek “JTCK-SWCLK” pin (PA14)
  • Picture: https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_drive_emulator/HxCGotek_OSD_Mod.jpg
• Amiga 500:
  • OSD Video out : Gotek U8 Pin 5 (PB15) -> 220 / 470 ohms resistor (or a 1k ohms potentiometer) -> Amiga 500 Ferrite bead E432 (see picture).
  • OSD Video CSYNC in :  Amiga 500 U41 Pin 8 -> Gotek “JTCK-SWCLK” pin (PA14) (near the serial tx programming pin, please see HxCGotek_OSD_Mod.jpg picture).
  • Picture: https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_drive_emulator/HxCGotek_Amiga500_OSD_Mod.jpg
• Amstrad CPC6128:
  • OSD Video out : Gotek U8 Pin 5 (PB15) -> 220 / 470 ohms resistor (or a 1k ohms potentiometer) -> CPC6128 R128 (see picture).
  • OSD Video CSYNC in :  CPC6128 IC116 Pin 5 -> Gotek “JTCK-SWCLK” pin (PA14) (near the serial tx programming pin, please see HxCGotek_OSD_Mod.jpg picture).
  • Picture: https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_drive_emulator/HxCGotek_AmstradCPC6128_OSD_Mod.jpg
• Atari STE:
  • OSD Video out : Gotek U8 Pin 5 (PB15) -> 220 / 470 ohms resistor (or a 1k ohms potentiometer) -> Atari STE R420 (see picture).
  • OSD Video CSYNC in :  Atari STE R475 -> Gotek “JTCK-SWCLK” pin (PA14) (near the serial tx programming pin, please see HxCGotek_OSD_Mod.jpg picture).
  • Picture: https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_drive_emulator/HxCGotek_AtariSTE_OSD_Mod.jpg
• Power supply voltage measurement:
  • You can now see/read the power supply voltage incoming to the floppy emulator.
  • This feature is quite useful to check the machine power supply state/working condition.
  • If you want to use this feature you must add this voltage divider to measure
  • the power supply on the JC jumper input :
  • VSS/GND|—| 1Ko Resistor |–(JC pin)–| 4.7Ko Resistor |—< 5V Power Supply input.
  • ( See https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_drive_emulator/HxCGotek_voltage_system_monitor.jpg )
  • Notes:
  • Use +/-1% Resistors if possible.
  • This voltage divider support up to 18V.
  • Use the embedded menu to access the system monitor :
  • Press both buttons to enter the menu. Choose “System Monitor” or “E  ” if you have the original 7 segments display.
  • “Temperature” menu renamed “System Monitor”.
• On-die STM32 temperature sensor support : You can get the current CPU core temperature from the embedded menu :
• press both buttons to enter the menu. Choose “temperature” or “E  ” if you have the original 7 segments display.
• Blackberry trackball : Sensitivity reduced/better usability.
• External/Additional select button support :  Behavioral fix -> remove glitch-like effect when selecting images.
• Fix the short and long read emulation pipeline buffer size options (custom fw web page).
• HFEv3 : Weakbits support added.
• Fix the files extensions display option : you can now also hide the file name extensions in selector/indexed mode.
• New major feature ! : Auto mount USB stick folder to a FAT/DOS compatible virtual floppy !
• This feature allows you to directly put your files in a stick’s folder and mount this folder as a FAT/DOS floppy disk !
• You can use it with any machine compatible with the FAT file system (PC, Atari ST, lots of keyboards/samplers and CNC machines…).
• To use this feature, copy an empty/preformatted DOS IMG image to the stick path “/mount/emptyfat.img”
• This image can be a 720KB or 1.44MB blank DOS image or any other FAT compatible blank image.
• You can use the HxC Floppy Emulator software Disk Browser to create it or take the ones present in the firmware archive.
• Once you select a “mount source” folder on the emulator, the emptyfat.img file is duplicated to a “MOUNTED.IMG” file.
• Then all files/subfolders present into the selected folder are added into this duplicated image.
• (Note : the emptyfat.img remains untouched).
• Your “mount sources” / root folders should have the extension “.mnt” to be mounted by the emulator :
• example : “myvirtualdisk.mnt”
• This new feature can be used with the “normal”/direct browsing (oled/lcd screen usage) and indexed modes.
• For the indexed mode just put the DSKAXXXX prefix in the mount point folder name.
• example : “DSKA0000_MyMidiFiles.mnt”
• Please note that the image duplication and files copy operations can take some seconds.
• I will try to optimize/speedup the mount operations in the next releases.
• Let me know if you have any problems or any suggestions/questions/comments on the HxC forum or by email.
• FAT 12/16/32 layer write support enhanced to create entries (files & folders) and allocate clusters.

This is only a little part of the changelog. The original one is very long and you can read it here. (instruction manual here)

The HxC Floppy Emulator Firmware Customization page: https://hxc2001.com/custom_fw/

Download: USB Stick STM32 (Gotek) HxC Firmware v3.3.1.2a (816)

source: hxc2001.com