07553: specpls3 [term2a]: Error when loading floppy disk with too many tracks

ID	Category [?]	Severity [?]	Reproducibility	Date Submitted	Last Update
07553	Media Support	Major	Always	Jan 22, 2020, 21:04	Aug 18, 2022, 22:02

Tester	StHiryu	View Status	Public	Platform	MAME (Official Binary)
Assigned To		Resolution	Open	OS	Windows Vista/7/8 (64-bit)
Status [?]	Confirmed			Driver	sinclair/specpls3.cpp
Version	0.217	Fixed in Version		Build	64-bit
		Fixed in Git Commit		Github Pull Request #

Summary	07553: specpls3 [term2a]: Error when loading floppy disk with too many tracks
Description	Trying to load terminator 2 disk from World Of Spectrum (term2a in softlist), I get the following messages: -dsk: Floppy disk has too many tracks for this drive (floppy tracks=45, drive tracks=42) -Error: Incompatible image format or corrupted data
Steps To Reproduce	Start the emu with the .dsk image in the floppy disk slot.
Additional Information
Github Commit

Flags
Regression Version
Affected Sets / Systems	specpls3 [term2a]

Attached Files

No.17370 Tafoid Administrator Jan 22, 2020, 22:54	I can confirm the message with the softlist entry "term2a" which is the same as the WoS image. It also doesn't have a "supported=no" flag so this would appear to be a valid issue.
No.17371 StHiryu Tester Jan 23, 2020, 00:51	I remember the same issue in the amstrad. But you cansolve it changing the 3" floppy to a 3,5" one.
No.20459 holub Tester Aug 15, 2022, 15:32 edited on: Aug 15, 2022, 15:33	I switched external to 3.5" but there are other things preventing to use this setup see: https://github.com/mamedev/mame/pull/10229 + https://mametesters.org/view.php?id=8396 Current way to make it work: * insert any disk in flop1 * insert term2a in flop2 * restart and load the game from B:
No.20460 Haze Senior Tester Aug 15, 2022, 16:19 edited on: Aug 15, 2022, 16:20	Official T2 was a 3 inch disk, not 3.5 I don't think any commercial games used 3.5 disks, as they wouldn't work with a standard +3 that way.
No.20461 holub Tester Aug 15, 2022, 16:35	internal drive stays 3". external switched to 3.5" Did official version with two drives (3" external) exist?
No.20466 Haze Senior Tester Aug 16, 2022, 06:27 edited on: Aug 16, 2022, 07:13	No official version of the +3 shipped with 2 drives, it was up to the user to buy something compatible. The Amstrad FD-1 was compatible with the +3, and is the one I remember being used in some cases, that's a 3 inch drive. Keep in mind the +3 was made by Amstrad, so compatibility with the CPC external drive as the official solution isn't surprising, nor the choice to go with 3 inch floppies on the +3 in the first place, as Amstrad had already standardized on their use for both external drives on the 464 and internal drives on the 664/6128 series. While you could fit a 3.5 inch external drive, it wasn't the 'official' solution back then. The only times I remember 3.5 drives being advertised were for shady piracy purposes, and that was more often than not for the older Speccy models that didn't have built in drives as you were typically looking at more DIY solutions involving buying an interface card of choice and bare drives of choice. The same is true for the CPC btw, unofficial 3.5 inch drive solutions were sold, but again, very uncommon, usually with dodgy tape-to-disk copying software, aimed primarily at the older machines that had an internal tape drive instead. The term2a set is almost certainly a bootleg copy if it's on 3.5 inch disks, possibly designed more for use on one of the models that didn't have a built in drive at all. These days 3.5 inch drives are much more common, as is software designed to work with them, so the option does need to be there, but it needs to be a choice, not forced, and definitely not default.
No.20467 holub Tester Aug 16, 2022, 22:53	So basically we need following: * A:3" - defaualt * A:3" B:3" - ext1 * A:3" B:3.5" - ext2 * A:3.5" B:3" - ext2 with drives swap which is common setup with switch too
No.20468 holub Tester Aug 16, 2022, 22:55	also confirmed term2a in 3.5" dump from WoS
No.20469 Haze Senior Tester Aug 17, 2022, 08:42 edited on: Aug 17, 2022, 08:44	well A as a 3.5 on a +3 would be a physical mod to the machine wouldn't it? unless there's a way to switch them otherwise. There's no 'disk A' port http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/userdata/images/large/96/99/product-119699.jpg anyway I think all we really need is mame specpls3 -upd765:1 3ssdd mame specpls3 -upd765:1 35ssdd as available options, with no 2nd drive connected by default. MAME lets you change the first drive too, although given it would be an unofficial hardware mod to the best of my knowledge, maybe that one shouldn't be changeable, and should be a clone machine. also if there's any special loopback logic / known read state when no 2nd drive is connected that will need to be handled in an appropriate way.
No.20470 cuavas Administrator Aug 17, 2022, 09:16	See this commit, as well as the comment about limitations: https://github.com/mamedev/mame/commit/e8989e30e7f141c2fdf1010ee7d75971b9022f77 If you don’t specify the 3.5" drive on the command line, the image won’t be mounted automatically, because the software item parts are distributed to media devices before shared features to set default slot options are applied. I don’t have time to investigate the feasibility of addressing that limitation right now.
No.20473 AmatCoder Tester Aug 18, 2022, 17:58 edited on: Aug 18, 2022, 18:01	Terminator 2 disk from World Of Spectrum is an overdumped image. It has 5 extra blank tracks probably due to misconfiguration of CPDRead: [...] Track 39 - Size: 5376 - Address: 0x33800 Track-Info: t=39 side=0 sectsize=2 nsects=10 gap=78 filler=E5 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=129 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=134 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=130 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=135 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=131 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=136 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=132 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=137 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=133 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Sec-Info: c=39 side=0 sectID=138 sectsize=2 r1=0 r2=0 length=512 Track 40 - Size: 0 - Address: 0x34D00 Unformatted Track Track 41 - Size: 0 - Address: 0x34D00 Unformatted Track Track 42 - Size: 0 - Address: 0x34D00 Unformatted Track Track 43 - Size: 0 - Address: 0x34D00 Unformatted Track Track 44 - Size: 0 - Address: 0x34D00 Unformatted Track This image still around because there is no redump in dsk format (there is in ipf format) and emulators typically ignore blank tracks > 42.
No.20474 ICEknight Tester Aug 18, 2022, 22:02 edited on: Aug 18, 2022, 22:04	@Haze "well A as a 3.5 on a +3 would be a physical mod to the machine wouldn't it? unless there's a way to switch them otherwise. " It looks like there's indeed a way to do that without physical mods: