[Coco] Yet another hurricane.... cassette files

[Roger Taylor]

At 04:56 PM 8/30/2004, you wrote:

>    We have a new person at work.  I actually got to tell him that "my
>computer is older than you are" (he was born 1982).  Apparantly, the
>concept of storing data on a regular cassette tape is amazing to some
>people.  I couldn't help but tell him that cocos were alive and well, but
>now we save to CD instead of cassette -- but you can use a normal CD
>player (just as you could have used a normal (e.g.


Here's something even better than cassette.  Use a CD recorder or Mini-Disc 
recorder to do the same through the cassette cable and you can double or 
even quadruple the data rate.  That is, you can use the 2mhz mode and maybe 
even shorten the wavelength in half as well.  I used to use the 2mhz mode 
to play around and save/load CoCo files, with NEVER a problem.  There is no 
dragging, no tone changes, and it won't get bit rot.  The only problem is 
the motor control.  Now that you remind me, back in the 80's I experimented 
with using a VCR as the device, but I created my own backup system.  The 
video portion showed what file you were on.  The audio portion was a 
custom/hacked job using my own waveform but using the BASIC ROM routines in 
all-RAM mode to handle the formats.  It's amazing how many good experiments 
went to total waste over the years.  That particular basement project was 
too inconvenient to use everyday.



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Roger Taylor