Talk:Commodore 1540

Latest comment: 14 years ago by Dexter Nextnumber in topic Origin of the name?

Origin of the name?

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How did the C-1540 come up with its name? The last two digits make it sound suspiciously similar to the 4040. What does the number '15' represent? 216.99.201.230 (talk) 06:18, 6 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

The number "15" relates to the TALK/LISTEN protocol inherent in communicating with it. To pass commands over to the disk drive, it was necessary to pass a command through channel 15 so it could be acted on by the drive alone, without further supervision from the "host" computer.

For instance, the following BASIC program lets you format a diskette that has been inserted into the disk drive:

100 OPEN 15,8,15
110 PRINT#15,"N0:FORMATTING COMMAND,AB"
120 IF ST<64 THEN 120
130 IF ST>64 THEN GOTO 200
140 CLOSE 15
150 END
160
200 REM (put error handler here)

If you are familiar with the TALK/LISTEN protocol, a similar sequence is involved in assembly language, e.g.,

LDA #$08  ; device 8
JSR TALK
BIT $90  ; examine status flags stored in page zero
BMI ERROR_HANDLER
LDA #$0f  ; secondary address 15
JSR TKSA
BIT $90
BMI ERROR_Handler

and so on. Pretty much ordinary, nothing too special once you get the hang of it.

All of the disk drives in the 15xx series use channel 15 for the channel you pass commands to it.

However, most people note a similarity with the Commodore 4040, which has a more extensive BASIC command set for managing ordinary disk operations. Dexter Nextnumber (talk) 02:37, 12 November 2009 (UTC)Reply