Copying VIC/64 DOS Wedge
I've tried to save the DOS support program from the test/demo diskette supplied with the VIC 1541 disk drive to one of my own. I also saved the loader. Both SAVE and VERIFY correctly, but when I run the loader my Commodore-64 spits back SYNTAX ERROR IN 52940!
Why does it do this, and if possible, how do I save it to another disk?
Erik Bard
You cannot SAVE or LOAD these programs as you would a BASIC program. This is the reason you are getting SYNTAX ERRORS. The DOS 5.1 program is in machine language, not BASIC.
Machine language programs have to be saved and loaded in a special way that specifies where they carne from in memory. I f you wish to copy this program to your own disk, here is the procedure:
1.
First, you'll need a machine language
monitor up and running in your 64. Supermon-64 (COMPUTE!,
January 1983) is a good monitor to
use for this purpose. Any monitor or assembler will do as long as it
does not reside in the $CC00 - $CFFF range (decimal 52224 - 53247).
2. While running from within the monitor, LOAD the DOS 5.1 program into memory by entering L "DOS 5.1 ", 08.
3. Place the diskette you wish to save the program to into the disk drive, and save the program by entering S "DOS 5.1",08,CC0O,CF5A.
4. Place the Commodore test/demo diskette back into the disk drive, and from BASIC, LOAD the 64 Wedge loader into memory.
5. Place your new diskette back into the disk drive, and save the BASIC program in the normal manner (i.e.: SAVE "C-64 WEDGE",8).
6. Now to run your new copy of the DOS 5.1 program, simply load the 64 WEDGE into your system, and RUN it as usual.
2. While running from within the monitor, LOAD the DOS 5.1 program into memory by entering L "DOS 5.1 ", 08.
3. Place the diskette you wish to save the program to into the disk drive, and save the program by entering S "DOS 5.1",08,CC0O,CF5A.
4. Place the Commodore test/demo diskette back into the disk drive, and from BASIC, LOAD the 64 Wedge loader into memory.
5. Place your new diskette back into the disk drive, and save the BASIC program in the normal manner (i.e.: SAVE "C-64 WEDGE",8).
6. Now to run your new copy of the DOS 5.1 program, simply load the 64 WEDGE into your system, and RUN it as usual.