Can't mount floppy images

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mhansen
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Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Hi

I wanted to try Stacker 2.0 on Mac and I got it from here:

https://www.macintoshrepository.org/2409-stacker-2-0

Unfortunately I can't get it to work.The file downloaded is a .sit file but inside of this are to .image files that are floppy-disk sized. But I don't know the format and I can't get them to mount I've tried both with System 7 on Basilisk and on Mac OS 9.0 in Sheepshaver. In Basilisk, if I add the image file as a volume then on boot I get an error saying it isn't recognized and if I want to format. In Sheepshaver it doesn't seem to be recognized at all. I've tried mounting it using Disk Copy in Sheepshaver but it says the mount failed.

Any help would be much appreciated! :-)
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Ronald P. Regensburg
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by Ronald P. Regensburg »

I do not know why it does not work for you.

I downloaded the "stacker_2.sit" disk image. After unstuffing I get one "stacker 2.0.image" file. When added to the volumes list, it mounts fine on the emulator desktop. Works in both BasiliskII and SheepShaver.

You get not one but two files after unstuffing? Maybe you do this on a Windows host? Then probably only one of the two files is the actual disk image file that needs to be added to the volumes list. The other file may contain Mac-specific files that you do not need for using the disk image.
mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Hi thanks a lot. Yes I did use StuffIt Expander on Windows to decompress the .sit because the StuffIt running inside Basilisk wouldn't recognize it (I googled and some suggested it could have been an old version etc.). Which version of Mac OS and StuffIt did you use to decompress it? The decompression on Windows yielded two image files (one called .image and another called .image.1) both 1,474,644 in size. So there's clearly something amiss in this decompression step.
mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Now I tried again to unstuff inside of System 7 in Basilisk and this time I only got one .image file. Still, if I add this file to the volumes list I get "The disk is unreadable by this Macintosh. Do you want to initialize the disk?" on startup (I simply add it as an extra image, in addition to the harddrive image).

The sha1sum of the image file (after decompression) is: 2708745b43e24809c39a664db08bf1b4dc287af1
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Ronald P. Regensburg
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by Ronald P. Regensburg »

The file should be fine. Here it is also: 2708745b43e24809c39a664db08bf1b4dc287af1

I honestly cannot imagine why it does not work for you.
After adding the file to the volumes list in the GUI, at next start of BasiliskII it should appear on the BasiliskII desktop.

Try changing the file name extension from .image to .img
mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

OK that is strange! Which version are you using? I'm using Basilisk 2 1.1 for Windows with System 7.5.3. The machine is configured as a "Quadro 900 (Mac OS 8.x)" with CPU 68040. The ROM is this file:

Old_World_Mac_Roms\1MB ROMs\1994-07 - 06684214 - LC,Quadra,Performa 630.ROM

Is there any obvious problems in this configuration that could cause it to not work or that is different from your setup?

Thanks a lot :-)
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Ronald P. Regensburg
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by Ronald P. Regensburg »

I am using BasiliskII on macOS, but that should not make any difference in behaviour with disk image files.

Did you download your BasiliskII from this post here: viewtopic.php?t=5282

And which BasiliskII build (not version number but build date) do you use?
mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

I'm not sure of the build number but it is from that page and the zip is called "BasiliskII-Windows-12-07-2022.zip".

Could it be a difference in the operating system? The operating system is clearly recognizing that something is there, and also the size of it, but not the format. Which version of Mac OS are you using (inside the virtual machine)?
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Cat_7
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by Cat_7 »

The Stacker image can be unstuffed inside Mac OS. StuffIt 5.5 works fine.
The image file can then be mounted with disk copy (6.1 works)

I tried adding the image to the volumes list, but also get the question to format the disk.
Disk first aid says the disk does not contain a hfs file system.
If you want to boot from the floppy disk image disk (it contains System 7), you'd probably need to copy the content to a new small disk image created with the GUI.

I used the download from the macintoshgarden.org

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mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Cat_7 wrote: Sun Aug 14, 2022 10:03 pm The Stacker image can be unstuffed inside Mac OS. StuffIt 5.5 works fine.
The image file can then be mounted with disk copy (6.1 works)

I tried adding the image to the volumes list, but also get the question to format the disk.
Disk first aid says the disk does not contain a hfs file system.
If you want to boot from the floppy disk image disk (it contains System 7), you'd probably need to copy the content to a new small disk image created with the GUI.

I used the download from the macintoshgarden.org

Best,
Cat_7
Hi

Thx, I tried downloading it from macintoshgarden.org but it is exactly the same .sit file so I guess this is not the issue.

I tried mounting using Disk Copy 6.1.2 (from https://www.macintoshrepository.org/241 ... 13-7-0-8-0). There I get the errror message:

"The Mount Image operation did not complete, (-39)

An unexpected end-of-file was encountered in "Stacker 2.0 img" which may indicate that it is corrupted or damaged."

I've tried putting the file in various locations (desktop or the 'This PC' shared folder) but the same error message occurs :( The file is 1474644 bytes and has the sha1sum mentioned earlier (2708745b43e24809c39a664db08bf1b4dc287af1). I would like to replicate your setup as close as possible. Which System 7 and which ROM are you using? Maybe see my past post where I posted the versions.

Thanks a lot :-)
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Ronald P. Regensburg
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by Ronald P. Regensburg »

I put the content of the floppy image on a new (100MB) HFS disk image named "Stacker 2.0 copy.dsk" and zipped it.
You can download it here: https://ronaldpr.home.xs4all.nl/emacula ... 0_copy.zip
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Ronald P. Regensburg wrote: Mon Aug 15, 2022 6:52 am I put the content of the floppy image on a new (100MB) HFS disk image named "Stacker 2.0 copy.dsk" and zipped it.
You can download it here: https://ronaldpr.home.xs4all.nl/emacula ... 0_copy.zip
Hi Ronald

Thanks a lot, that worked like a charm! However, when I try to run the program and select Install, it reports that it is not able to be installed on the drive since it's not connected to a SCSI controller. So this seems to be a requirement for the program. Do you know if it is possible to simulate this in Basilisk or Sheepshaver (I get the same error in both environments). Thx!
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Cat_7
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by Cat_7 »

Oh wow, old software. SCSI is not supported in current builds of Basilisk or SheepShaver.

However, if you are in for adventure there are two options:
-Run Cockatrice III (Old Basilisk build fixed to support SCSI). You can find it by searching the forum
-Run Qemu-system-m68k with Mac OS 7 to 8. It supports SCSI. See forum.

Best,
Cat_7
mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Cat_7 wrote: Mon Aug 15, 2022 10:36 am Oh wow, old software. SCSI is not supported in current builds of Basilisk or SheepShaver.

However, if you are in for adventure there are two options:
-Run Cockatrice III (Old Basilisk build fixed to support SCSI). You can find it by searching the forum
-Run Qemu-system-m68k with Mac OS 7 to 8. It supports SCSI. See forum.

Best,
Cat_7
Cool I will try and look into that and report back :)
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adespoton
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by adespoton »

mhansen wrote: Mon Aug 15, 2022 5:06 pm
Cat_7 wrote: Mon Aug 15, 2022 10:36 am Oh wow, old software. SCSI is not supported in current builds of Basilisk or SheepShaver.

However, if you are in for adventure there are two options:
-Run Cockatrice III (Old Basilisk build fixed to support SCSI). You can find it by searching the forum
-Run Qemu-system-m68k with Mac OS 7 to 8. It supports SCSI. See forum.

Best,
Cat_7
Cool I will try and look into that and report back :)
Hi; here to throw a splash of cold water on the discussion... sorry I wasn't around to head things off earlier in the process.

Stacker is an INIT for System 6 that applies a proprietary compression algorithm at the disk driver level to create more storage space on SCSI drives. I used it on a real Mac under System 6 and System 7... by System 7.5 it was incompatible enough that any bug in the disk writing process (app hangs, computer turns off, network drive disconnects, etc.) and the entire disk was irretrievable and needed to be formatted.

Unless you're using Stacker on System 6 or earlier on actual hardware, I'd stay far far away from it. And if you ARE using Stacker on System 6 or earlier on actual hardware, I'd still recommend just getting an SD2SCSI or similar instead; storage space isn't really an issue for us these days when running classic Mac OSes -- especially under emulation.
mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Hi thanks all!

I'm ready to resume my Stacker adventure ;-) First of all I'm only looking into this for curiosity, it's not in order to actually save disk space. I was a bit fascinated with disk compression back when it came out but only played with it on DOS. So I would be curious to see how the Mac version worked.

I haven't gotten it to work on Cockatrice :( I have been able to start Cockatrice using the 7.5 image it comes with, but now I'm stuck with the same issue I had in Basilisk that it won't recognize the floppy img file (and prompts to format). I've also tried mounting the full drive image Ronald kindly provided which contains the .sit file as "scsi1", but this doesn't mount at all on Cockatrice, maybe the image file format is changed somehow (it worked on Basilisk and is what allowed me to try to install Stacker there).

Any help would be much appreciated!
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adespoton
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by adespoton »

mhansen wrote: Sun Sep 04, 2022 8:18 pm Hi thanks all!

I'm ready to resume my Stacker adventure ;-) First of all I'm only looking into this for curiosity, it's not in order to actually save disk space. I was a bit fascinated with disk compression back when it came out but only played with it on DOS. So I would be curious to see how the Mac version worked.

I haven't gotten it to work on Cockatrice :( I have been able to start Cockatrice using the 7.5 image it comes with, but now I'm stuck with the same issue I had in Basilisk that it won't recognize the floppy img file (and prompts to format). I've also tried mounting the full drive image Ronald kindly provided which contains the .sit file as "scsi1", but this doesn't mount at all on Cockatrice, maybe the image file format is changed somehow (it worked on Basilisk and is what allowed me to try to install Stacker there).

Any help would be much appreciated!
Cockatrice is unlikely to help; Basilisk II just doesn't fully emulate what Stacker itself is manipulating. But Cockatrice DOES have SCSI support. What this means is that any disk images you use will need to not just be a HFS partition image, but a full device image, complete with drive partition and all the partition headers and alignment information. This is precisely what Stacker modifies (the driver partition), so you have the potential for it to work if you start from scratch, unlike using regular Basilisk II which just patches the toolbox to feed it the HFS partition on the image, ignoring the data that Stacker is manipulating.

What you'll likely need to do to test out Cockatrice (and eventually get to the point where Stacker "works" but then fails and corrupts your disk image) is to format your image file on Cockatrice and THEN mount it on BII to copy the files over.

You *might* have success using SoftMac XP; other than using actual SCSI hardware, it's the one place where all the toolbox routines are fully implemented.

One other word of advice: don't attempt to use Stacker on a floppy image; use it on a SCSI drive image. Floppy handling is all over the place in all emulators; at least SCSI has relatively robust support where support exists at all.
mhansen
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by mhansen »

Thanks but my problem I have now in Cockatrice is not related to Stacker etc. It's is actually the same problem I had in Basilisk II, namely that I can't get the emulator to recognize the img file. Cat_7 had the same issue as I did, but Ronald managed to somehow use the image and was so kind as to provide a harddrive file where the content was copied to. But the problem is, that this harddrive image doesn't work in Cockatrice, maybe the format is different (maybe even due to it being SCSI, I dunno). So I need to either find some way to get Cockatrice to use the floppy img file. Ronald how did you get the floppy disk to work in Basilisk? Thx! :)
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Ronald P. Regensburg
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Re: Can't mount floppy images

Post by Ronald P. Regensburg »

mhansen wrote: Sat Oct 08, 2022 7:08 pmRonald how did you get the floppy disk to work in Basilisk? Thx! :)
I did not do anything special. It simply worked for me the usual way. See my earlier posts in this topic.

Is only this specific disk image file not working for you while other disk image files mount as expected when added to the volumes list in the GUI?
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