Sharp PC-3000
Re: Sharp PC-3000
Just had a few minutes to test a bit... So i tried the 1MB poqet card i found in my big stash of cards and i had the same phenomena you experienced - so the poqet cards seem to NOT be compatible with the PC3000... As a cross test i also tried my trusty OKANO brand card and it worked fine... I hope i have time to do more testing tonight since this is an interesting problem...
Re: Sharp PC-3000
I also had the same phenomena with a "Hatten" brand SRAM card in the PC-3000. Still not sure what the problem is, but i suspect it might be partitioning or formatting. Wish i had a Linux box with PCMCIA here so i could dump the cards and take a look at them. I need more time for some experiments...
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wintermute
- Regular user
- Posts: 48
- Joined: Tue Nov 01, 2016 3:26 pm
- Favorite Palmtop: Sharp_PC-3000
Re: Sharp PC-3000
Thanks a lot! Now I know I am not crazy! Well, I need to get another card then. Seems to be a lottery though... an expensive lottery. Any advice on other brands to go with wrt Sharp? How about Pretec? (Never heard of Okano but will keep it on my mind.)
Re: Sharp PC-3000
Before i make any recommendations my advise would be to wait a bit until i have done further testing.
I plan to test all my cards and make a list so we know which ones have problems in the SHarp and which don't. And hopefully i can discover the source of this problem.
Okano was the brand of German department store chain "Karstadt". I nearly always use this card since I never changed the battery for it but it just keeps working without any problems. If it has to be larger then i usually use the 4MB Mitsubishi SRAM melcard - can easily fit Windows 3.0 on it.
I hope i have some time for testing tonight. Not sure if i have a Pretec card - at least that brand doesn't ring a bell, but i probably have over a dozen SRAM cards.
I plan to test all my cards and make a list so we know which ones have problems in the SHarp and which don't. And hopefully i can discover the source of this problem.
Okano was the brand of German department store chain "Karstadt". I nearly always use this card since I never changed the battery for it but it just keeps working without any problems. If it has to be larger then i usually use the 4MB Mitsubishi SRAM melcard - can easily fit Windows 3.0 on it.
I hope i have some time for testing tonight. Not sure if i have a Pretec card - at least that brand doesn't ring a bell, but i probably have over a dozen SRAM cards.
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wintermute
- Regular user
- Posts: 48
- Joined: Tue Nov 01, 2016 3:26 pm
- Favorite Palmtop: Sharp_PC-3000
Re: Sharp PC-3000
Making a list would be awesome. I asked about Pretec because that brand seems to be the one mostly available these days on eBay (there are a dozen of them right now for sale).
Re: Sharp PC-3000
OK, i didn't have much time but i could still experiment a bit.
The problem is definitely related to the formatting. Unfortunately Windows 98 does not give out any information about the formatting, so i will need either a good tool for detailed info or setup a linux box.
So i did loads of formatting - testing the "hatten" card that i thought had worked before (if my memory doesn't play tricks on me). If i format it in Windows or the PC-3000 results in the weird behaviour we have seen.
Formatting it in a "Poqet prime" (PQ-0181, the "later" poqet with 640KB RAM) resulted in a WORKING SRAM card, which means windows, Sharp and even the poqet could read and write just fine.
Being curious now i also tried format in the HP 100LX and a Tidalwave - these did NOT work for the Sharp though.
I am a bit surprised i must admit - shame on me but i never formatted the SRAM cards much, I guess i was just lucky i did that in my Poqet since that was one of my first Palmtops.
I guess now we need to look for some tool that will format "the right way" for Windows 95/98/DOS. But at least for tonight i lack the strength to do much more testing, i will go to bed soon. Maybe tomorrow.
The problem is definitely related to the formatting. Unfortunately Windows 98 does not give out any information about the formatting, so i will need either a good tool for detailed info or setup a linux box.
So i did loads of formatting - testing the "hatten" card that i thought had worked before (if my memory doesn't play tricks on me). If i format it in Windows or the PC-3000 results in the weird behaviour we have seen.
Formatting it in a "Poqet prime" (PQ-0181, the "later" poqet with 640KB RAM) resulted in a WORKING SRAM card, which means windows, Sharp and even the poqet could read and write just fine.
Being curious now i also tried format in the HP 100LX and a Tidalwave - these did NOT work for the Sharp though.
I am a bit surprised i must admit - shame on me but i never formatted the SRAM cards much, I guess i was just lucky i did that in my Poqet since that was one of my first Palmtops.
I guess now we need to look for some tool that will format "the right way" for Windows 95/98/DOS. But at least for tonight i lack the strength to do much more testing, i will go to bed soon. Maybe tomorrow.
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wintermute
- Regular user
- Posts: 48
- Joined: Tue Nov 01, 2016 3:26 pm
- Favorite Palmtop: Sharp_PC-3000
Re: Sharp PC-3000
Wow man thanks for the effort that's some insane (and unfortunate) news. Will keep an eye on this thread... Will try to do some digging on my own but I don't have as many devices and cards as you.
Re: Sharp PC-3000
If i have some time tonight i will research a bit more. One idea i currently have is to try out the Poqet format program on my WIndows 98 laptop. If that works i could just upload it and everyone can use it from a normal laptop.
Re: Sharp PC-3000
Tried the Poqet FORMAT.COM tool and it seems it doesn't work outside a poqet. I posted for help in the Vintage Computer forums - usually some guys there know a lot about formatting, partitions and such. Maybe someone can help.
Re: Sharp PC-3000
OK someone at the vintage computer forum had a great idea - a disk image!
Unfortunately WinImage won't read the Win98 SRAM driver devices...
What i found was some guys article who used some Win2k driver (Windows 2000 stuff usually works in XP, too) and some proprietary cardware (there's a trial version though).
So with some web hacking i managed to get the driver from the transcend download site:
http://tw.transcend-info.com/files/Driv ... _Win2k.exe
Cardware trial here:
http://www.tssc.de/site/download/prods/cw2k.exe
Winimage here:
http://www.winimage.com/download.htm
So with all this you can still NOT acccess the card in Win XP file manager (doh!) buuuuuut... You should be able to make an image with WinImage. Afterwards you can (in theory) edit that image and add your favorite files...
And the final solution (In theory...) is that i setup a Win XP laptop, also install all this stuff - i make an image of my poqet formatted 2MB card, upload it here and you can write the image to your card and BANG you have a working one.
Well i need more time to setup the WinXP machine though. Not sure if i can do it tomorrow - hopefully till the weekend.
Unfortunately WinImage won't read the Win98 SRAM driver devices...
What i found was some guys article who used some Win2k driver (Windows 2000 stuff usually works in XP, too) and some proprietary cardware (there's a trial version though).
So with some web hacking i managed to get the driver from the transcend download site:
http://tw.transcend-info.com/files/Driv ... _Win2k.exe
Cardware trial here:
http://www.tssc.de/site/download/prods/cw2k.exe
Winimage here:
http://www.winimage.com/download.htm
So with all this you can still NOT acccess the card in Win XP file manager (doh!) buuuuuut... You should be able to make an image with WinImage. Afterwards you can (in theory) edit that image and add your favorite files...
And the final solution (In theory...) is that i setup a Win XP laptop, also install all this stuff - i make an image of my poqet formatted 2MB card, upload it here and you can write the image to your card and BANG you have a working one.
Well i need more time to setup the WinXP machine though. Not sure if i can do it tomorrow - hopefully till the weekend.