Finally, after years of will I / won’t I, I bit the bullet and got a Commodore 1581. Crazy money really but I got a comparatively a good price from a “local” EU seller. Absolutely delighted. Only down side is it’s part Christmas present, so beyond verifying it worked, I had to put it away and wait for Christmas Day. “Aghhh, I want it now”
I have a box of new old stock DS/DD disks I got from someone in work. I’ve used one or two with my Quadra 700 and Amigas. Looking forward to loading out a few with some lovely 8-bit software for my C64s and C128D.
I think I’ll probably get a JiffyDOS ROM in the new year.
Any tips or tricks from you guys on what I should do with it ?
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Zippy Zapp
- CA, USA
Congrats. Yeah I am not sure why the crazy money these days for a 1581.
As for uses the main thing I used mine for back in the day (I still have the disks and the drive) was BBS downloads section for our BBS, GEOS, Demos, SID files, games and utilities as well as Q-link and BBS Download files. Basically it was a poor mans hard drive back then for me.
GEOS is still a good use case if you are into that.
As for uses the main thing I used mine for back in the day (I still have the disks and the drive) was BBS downloads section for our BBS, GEOS, Demos, SID files, games and utilities as well as Q-link and BBS Download files. Basically it was a poor mans hard drive back then for me.
GEOS is still a good use case if you are into that.
I have some software and projects to recommend.
1) 1581 Toolkit. This is a very high-quality utility you'll definitely want to pick up. You can put the program on a 1541 or equivalent and just move the program/files over to a single 3.5" disk. Let it be a stand-alone thing you grab from time to time. Very cool, very useful.
2) Loadstar disks. Back in the day Loadstar made their disk magazine on 3.5" disks, too. They are great fun to use and explore on the speedier 1581. (I have the entire collection if you are looking for files, and Fender Tucker still sells the whole archive for a small sum...)
3) Compute's Gazette. They also put a ton of disks on 3.5" disks for 1581 users.
4) You can fit most of the GEOS program files you'll ever truly use on a single 3.5" disk. Then use a 2nd 3.5" disk for all of your 'work' Save files. IIRC I have 3 total disks in 1581 format that contain most of my GEOS files and it's' pretty great.
Of course, CMD drives double and triple (and more) everything with the snap of your fingers but that's getting GREEDY (which admittedly I am sometimes).
1) 1581 Toolkit. This is a very high-quality utility you'll definitely want to pick up. You can put the program on a 1541 or equivalent and just move the program/files over to a single 3.5" disk. Let it be a stand-alone thing you grab from time to time. Very cool, very useful.
2) Loadstar disks. Back in the day Loadstar made their disk magazine on 3.5" disks, too. They are great fun to use and explore on the speedier 1581. (I have the entire collection if you are looking for files, and Fender Tucker still sells the whole archive for a small sum...)
3) Compute's Gazette. They also put a ton of disks on 3.5" disks for 1581 users.
4) You can fit most of the GEOS program files you'll ever truly use on a single 3.5" disk. Then use a 2nd 3.5" disk for all of your 'work' Save files. IIRC I have 3 total disks in 1581 format that contain most of my GEOS files and it's' pretty great.
Of course, CMD drives double and triple (and more) everything with the snap of your fingers but that's getting GREEDY (which admittedly I am sometimes).