Vortex Disc Drives
A series of external 3.5" and 5.25" floppy disc drives from Vortex providing up to 720K capacity (704K available). The Vortex drives were most popular in Germany.
Contents
S- and D-Drives (720K)
These are the very first generation of 720K floppy disc drives from Vortex. They came in variants having either a single drive ("S" variant) or two drives ("D" variant). The 5,25" drives used were BASF 6138 type drives (double-sided, double density, 80 tracks).
Variants
- F1 - S Single 5.25" drive with power supply connected via ribbon cable to interface with NEC765 and VDOS 1.0 or 2.11
- F1 - D Double 5.25" drive with power supply connected via ribbon cable to interface with NEC765 and VDOS 1.0 or 2.11
- M1 - S Single 3.5" drive with power supply connected via ribbon cable to interface with NEC765 and VDOS 1.0 or 2.11
- M1 - D Double 3.5" drive with power supply connected via ribbon cable to interface with NEC765 and VDOS 1.0 or 2.11
Look inside the controller, a NEC 765 chip and VDOS upgraded to v2.0
A1-S Upgrade Kit
Vortex offered an upgrade kit consisting of a bare 5,25" drive (BASF 6138) and an installation manual, allowing to upgrade a single F1-S drive to a dual F1-D drive. To do this, one simply had to install the additional drive in the free slot of the drive case.
FDA-1 3" Drive Adapter
This adapter allows to use an external Amstrad FD-1 3" drive on Vortex F1/M1 setups connected to a CPC 464. Since only two drives can be used simultaneously, the 3" drive had to be manually selected first using RSX commands.
RSX | Description |
---|---|
|S,1 | Use 3" drive as drive A, upper Vortex drive is disabled |
|S,2 | Use 3" drive as drive B, lower Vortex drive is disabled |
|S,0 | Disable the 3" drive (default) |
FDC I/O Ports
All types of floppy disk controllers for the F1-S/F1-D/M1-S/M1-D range are based on the NEC 765 chip. The manual states that on "controllers having an integrated ROM module/eprommer" (probably the later 6128 interfaces?), the port addresses can be freely configured using a decoder ROM.
CPC 464:
Address | Description |
---|---|
0xFB7E | uPD control |
0xFB7F | uPD data |
0xFA7E | motor on/off |
CPC 664/6128:
Address | Description |
---|---|
0xFBF6 | uPD control |
0xFBF7 | uPD data |
0xFA7E | motor on/off |
Z-Drives (180K/side)
These are less expensive drives and were meant to be directly connected as B drive to a CPC 464 with DDI-1 or a CPC 664/6128. Since these drives do not ship with an own controller or a VDOS ROM, they do rely fully on AMSDOS and thus only 40 tracks can be accessed. The Z-drives were basically S-drives without a Vortex controller and CP/M license.
Variants
- F1 - Z Single 5.25" drive with power supply with ribbon cable (does not come with interface containing FDC or VDOS)
- M1 - Z Single 3.5" drive with power supply with ribbon cable (does not come with interface containing FDC or VDOS)
A1-Z Upgrade Kit
Vortex offered an upgrade kit consisting of a controller, manual, CP/M license and utility disk which upgraded a Z-Drive to a S-Drive.
X-Drives (720K)
These are the latest drives from Vortex for use with a CPC 464 with DDI-1 or a CPC 664/6128 (ie. on systems that already have a floppy disc controller); no additional controller was required anymore. Instead, a ROM module was supplied together with the drive, which provided VDOS 2.0-X. Only single-drive variants were available. The |S command (for accessing a third drive) is no longer used, the new |X command allows to swap drive A and B (same as X-DDOS from Dobbertin). These drives are very well designed and have solved many of the problems of the earlier series, especially in terms of compatibility.
- Vortex X-Laufwerke
(manual)
- Manual de las Unidades Vortex
(manual)
- NEC drive inside Vortex M1-X NEC drive inside Vortex M1-X
Variants
- F1 - X Single 80 track, Double Sided, 5.25" drive with power supply
- M1 - X Single 80 Track, Double Sided, 3.5" drive with power supply
- F1 - XRS same as F1-X, upgraded with RS232-C interface
- M1 - XRS same as M1-X, upgraded with RS232-C interface
X(RS)-Modul
The X-drives for the CPC 664/6128 are connected directly to the floppy port. To provide VDOS, the "X-Modul" had to be installed to the expansion port. This is a single-ROM board containing a VDOS 2.0-X ROM and was also available with an additional RS232-C interface (named "XRS-Modul"). The board supplied for the CPC 464 version came with a chunky housing in which both the "X(RS)-Modul" and the DDI-1 had to be installed.
RS232 I/O Ports
The RS232-C interface of the "XRS-Modul" was advertised to be compatible with Amstrad/Pace interfaces, but offers only one channel (so no channel B).
- Vortex RS232-C Manual
(pdf)
Address | Description |
---|---|
0xFADC | SIO data (R/W) |
0xFADD | SIO control (R/W) |
0xFBDC | 8253 counter 0 (R/W) |
0xFBDD | 8253 counter 1 (R/W) |
0xFBDF | Mode word (W) |
VDOS
See VDOS
- Benutzerhandbuch für das Diskettenbetriebssystem VDOS 2.0
(VDOS 2.0 user manual)