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Using a Generic Tape Recorder as an Atari Cassette Drive? 50

Posted by Cliff from the blast-from-the-past dept.
JoeShmoe950 asks: "I recently got my hands on an Atari 65XE. It didn't come with a floppy or a cassette drive. I started programming when I realized there was no way to save my program. I wanted to ask you people if there is any way to wire up a normal cassette recorder to an Atari. What I need is the description for what part of a tape recorder(record, mic, speaker, etc) to each pin. I want to create an alternative to buying an Atari Cassette Drive from eBay."
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Using a Generic Tape Recorder as an Atari Cassette Drive? More

Using a Generic Tape Recorder as an Atari Cassette Drive?

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  • A better place to ask would be... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Kris_J ( 10111 ) on Thursday July 03, 2003 @04:34AM (#6356751) Homepage Journal
    The AtariAge 8-bit forum. [atariage.com]

  • odd (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 03, 2003 @04:34AM (#6356752)
    "I started programming when I realized there was no way to save my program."
    What a strange time to start programming.

  • there's some useful info here: (Score:5, Informative)

    by spiny ( 87740 ) on Thursday July 03, 2003 @04:35AM (#6356753) Homepage Journal
    http://www2.asw.cz/~kubecj/

    i'm more of an ST guy, but searching on google has found some info - it appears that the 65 tape drives are more akin to a modem than the Sinclair / Oric etc way of loading data, so it might not be that straightforward....

  • Mod story up (Score:2, Insightful)

    by BoneMarrow ( 577933 )
    Whoah, I think before the Trolls begin I would just say This is the coolest article on slashdot for ages. News for nerds stuff that happens - on slashdot?
  • Cassette!!! I mean, come on, I had to use cassette 20 years ago (I still have some tapes)

    they degrade faster than floppies

  • Atari (Score:3, Informative)

    by Detritus ( 11846 ) on Thursday July 03, 2003 @06:02AM (#6356946) Homepage
    Atari used a weird serial interface on their computer peripherals, partly to meet FCC regulations on RF emissions. Sort of like a prehistoric version of USB. I don't know if they ever published a description of the pinout, voltages and protocol. Making a controller for a cassette recorder would be a major development project.

    • Re:Atari (Score:3, Interesting)

      by The Lynxpro ( 657990 )
      Its called the SIO Port (Serial Input Output Interface). It wasn't weird; it was brilliant. The Atari employee who created it now works for Intel. And coincidentally, he created USB and is co-owner of the patent.

  • Atari 410 and it's ilk (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Craig Maloney ( 1104 ) * on Thursday July 03, 2003 @06:49AM (#6357018) Homepage
    The venerable 410 and its successors used a 13 pin Atari-specific interface called SIO (Serial Input/Output), just like every other Atari-specific device. It's a little trickier than just feeding in a standard cassette recorder input/output like the other computers. Plus the Atari tapes could feed in sound from the other track of the tape (which made load times mre berable). As an Atari owner, I was glad when I didn't have to load things from tape anymore, and pretty much abandoned tape when i got my disk drive. You might want to find a 1050 or XF551 and use that rather than attempt to retrofit a standard cassette tape to the Atari. Or if you want, find a broken Atari tape drive and study it. I think you'll find there's more going on there than you realize.

    Good luck with whatever you decide, and welcome to the world of Atari.

    Speaking of which, I haven't played Atari today. Need to get it out and rectify that

    • I at least know you don't mean the 2600 by "Atari". Shame most people do think Atari==2600. The 2600 sucked, but look at the Atari ST "Jackintosh"...the best of the PC and the best of the Amiga. :) BTW, there is a GPL'd clone of the ROM [sourceforge.net] to the ST.

      -uso.
      My message is -1, Offtopic.
    • Uhm...to use the XF551, wouldn't he have to load Atari DOS 2.5? And wouldn't that force him to turn off the computer and reboot it? He's gonna have to copy that text line for line by hand unless he has a printer currently attached...
      • Well, it's not good for the Atari to plug and unplug devices while it's on anyway (not that I've ever done that. :) ), so he'll have to power off the computer before he can save anything on it. If memory serves, the Atari detects all devices on boot-up and doesn't do anything like a hot-plug.

  • SIO2PC cable and De Re Atari (Score:5, Informative)

    by ip_vjl ( 410654 ) on Thursday July 03, 2003 @08:45AM (#6357456) Homepage
    Not what you're asking for ... but you should also pick yourself up an SIO2PC cable. It acts as a connector between your Atari and a PC. Running software on the PC like APE (Atari Peripheral Emulator) allows you to save and load disk images from the PC as if they were real disks on the Atari.

    This makes for better backups (as you can fit a lot of disk images on 1 CD ... and 5.25 floppies aren't as easy to come by these days)

    Also:
    It doesn't include the pinouts ... but there's some interesting stuff about how the Atari stores info on the tape in the book De Re Atari [atariarchives.org]

  • Skip the tape drive, go ATR8000 (Score:4, Informative)

    by TBone ( 5692 ) on Thursday July 03, 2003 @09:06AM (#6357606) Homepage

    Skip trying to hack yourself a tape drive interface, and try to find yourself an ATR8000.

    The ATR8000 is a interace box that I used to have on my 800XL. Had drive controllers, ran CP/M, lots of neat stuff. Find an old 8" or 5.25" floppy drive, plug it in, and go, cause the damn thing ran just about any tape drive you could find. On top of which, it will give you the ability to learn a little CP/M if you're so inclined.

    I remember, when my dad first picked it up, playing DOnkey Kong Jr., from 8" floppies, on the ATR. It was pretty cool :)

    • I still have one of these in the closet - haven't fired it up in at least a decade. About once a year I think about digging it out and seeing if it still works, and never get around to it.

      If I recall correctly, you needed a special OS to interface with external disk drives on the ATR8000. I don't think the standard Atari dos would work on non-standard size drives. Alas, I don't remember the name of the OS and I certainly have no idea where you would find it.
    • An MIO board (or BlackBox) is a good choice too. The MIO has 256K or 1 Meg of ram (powered seperatly from the main computer) for ramdisk / printer spooler use, an old HD interface (I want to say for RLL type hard drives, but I could be wrong about that) and serial and parallel ports. The BlackBox I belive was somewhat similar but had a SCSI interface. Check eBay.
      • Unfortunately, the North American 65xes can't use the MIO or Black Box. Both interface via the PBI (600xl/800xl) or the ECI (130xe). Atari left that interface off the 65xe.

        (For the adventurous, the 1200xl can be upgraded to have a PBI - Bob Woolley has plans on the net)

        The Black Box is still sold:

        http://www.nleaudio.com/css/index.htm
    • learn a little CP/M if you're so inclined

      You sick bastard. Kids read this site, you know.

  • 1050 floppy or SIO2PC is a better choice (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I would suggest using either a 1050 floppy drive, probably around $20 or so on ebay, or connecting to a PC and using it for storage via SIO2PC cable.

    You didn't state what language you were programming in either. The Atari cassette drive did not really play well with the newer models: 65XE, 130XE. If you were going to be using a compiled program instead of something written with BASIC, you had to hold down the option button on the computer to disable the built in BASIC for the entire time it took to load th
    • If i recall correctly, you didn't need to hold down option for the entire load time, but only whilst you switched the machine on. It would then emit a beep, and you would press return and the game would load.

      But yes, you are correct in saying that holding the option key disabled basic.

      in fact, thinking about it, you had to press start as well i think. anyways, one of those keys disabled basic and the other disabled the disk drive. or was it that you had to press select to boot from the disk drive? I can't
    • As far as what I'm programming, I've got a 65XE with Atari Basic(what I'm gonna use) built into the ROM. Thanks for the info BTW
  • > I want to create an alternative to buying
    > an Atari Cassette Drive from eBay.

    Why? Are they expensive?

    Unless you would rather have the satisfaction of doing it yourself, it might be cheaper to just buy one, when you consider the hours you will probably put into it, and the possibility that the conversion might fail anyway.

  • Perhaps it would be easier to send it out through a joystick port. You could easily wire one of those to the parallel port on a more modern computer and write some software to read it in. There are many schematics and bits of code on the net which could be adapted to such a purpose.

  • What! (Score:2)

    by eap ( 91469 )
    I wanted to ask you people if there is any way to wire up a normal cassette recorder to an Atari
    "You People"? Perhaps you should run your posts by Ross Perot's publicist before you submit them to Slashdot, You Insensitive Clod (TM)!
  • I would stay far away from anything atari based and tape recorders. Having used them in the early 80s, they were extremely unreliable (I would spend 60-70 minutes loading a copy of zaxxon only to have it hit some audio blip along the way, finish loading and crash). The data stored is not in any redundant form, so any degredation or damage will mean it is forever lost.

    Try eBay for atari 1050 or similar floppy disk drive then store 65K per floppy (or 130K if you use a hole puncher and make them 2-sided) :)
    • I agree. I have two Atari 810 cassette drives that are completely DOA. The belts have all but disintegrated and the rest of the mechanical stuff is shot. Even when thay did work (way long ago) the recordings were unreliable at best. I agree with Achacha not to waste any more time on tape. Build or buy an SIO2PC cable instead. Instructions to build this yourself (thanks to Nick Kennedy) can be found here [tcainternet.com]. I built one based on his original design. Also, an ebay seller from Poland seems to be doing decent bus
    • Check out atari800.sf.net. A sweet multi-platform, Atari 8-bit emulator.
  • In 1985 i built an interface for my C64 to connect it to a normal cassette recorder. It worked quite well.
    I dont know if the atari has similar signals on its cassette port. If the atari has one bit to switch the cassette motor on/off, and one output bit for record, and one input bit for play, my schematic should work for atari.
    I could scan the schematic and email it or put is on a website.
  • Before a power outage destroys his program!
    • From I'm being told, I guess I'm going to either buy an Atari Floppy off eBay an SIO2PC cable as those seem the best options. Thank you everone.
      • I'd definitely recommend the SIO2PC cable. Remember that blank disks are becoming an extreme rarety. Stick to interfaces that let you bring the data to modern storage (and back again).

        If all else fails, and if it has one (my research suggested that some models didn't), you could capture the program listing via the TV Output and use a PC program to OCR it. If you capture to VHS, use SP mode on a new tape (highest quality, uses more tape), and if possible make the listing display slow enough that you'll b
  • Long answer:

    A complete circuit is in the January 1984 issue of "Computers & Electronics". I built a "DeLuxe" version of that circuit for myself which included motor control and some sound routing so that I could monitor the sounds and override the automatic motor control to allow fast forward/rewind with my Sony TC-205 tape deck.

    Etched a PCB and put it in a nice box with shielded audio cables and such. It still works, but Atari tape storage is S-L-O-W and not too reliable. You're better off with a dis
  • 1400XL or a 1450XLD run on Ebay these days? Those were da bomb like Phantoms...

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