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Use CompactFlash cards in your PCMCIA slot

Author: t.jager@gmx.de (Torsten Jager)

Purpose Read and write your digital photos, mp3 files etc. directly from CompactFlash cards as used by many mobile devices.
The OS supplied "carddisk.device" appeared to be unable to understand CF cards. I already had bought that adapter card, so I decided to write a suitable alternative myself.

New:
Added experimental ATAPI support (Q Drive?). Increased compatibility.
A word on hardware:

you will need a special adapter card labelled "CompactFlash to PCMCIA", to "PC Card" or to "ATA". It looks like a normal 5mm PCMCIA card with a smaller slot for CF cards at the front side.

There are two types of such adapters sold in good computer stores, for "CF Type 1" and "CF type 2" cards.

The only two differences: "CF Type 2" adapters can also cope with thicker CF cards, like those expensive "MicroDrive" harddisks; and b) they cost more.

Mine is a "CF Type 1" which I got for EUR 10 (but I also saw the same model for the double price...).

Some testing results:
I have two CF cards, 16 and 64 Mbyte of capacity. 16Mbyte card (Hitachi): 1.0 Mb/s read, 600 kb/s write. 64Mbyte card (PQI): 1.6 Mb/s read, 800 kb/s write.

Good news everyone:

I got positive testing reports from CompactFlash, IBM MicroDrive, Sony MemoryStick and - taadaa! - SmartMedia adapter :^)) It may be required to re-insert the adapter after plugging the memory card into it. Only for CompactFlash and MicroDrive, the plugging order is irrelevant.

Another word on hardware:

Commodore back then introduced the Amiga PCMCIA port before (!) the official PCMCIA standard was released. As a consequence, it is not fully compatible.

Your results may vary on your actual hardware combination, including memory card, adapter, Amiga model, its chipset revision, and accelerator board model.

WARNING:
"CompactFlash" is (TM) by CompactFlash Association ;-)

System requirements

* AMIGA 1200 or 600, OS 2.0+
* "CompactFlash to PCMCIA/ATA" adapter card, see adapter.jpg for an example
* fat95 file system (disk/misc/fat95.lha)

Installation

Copy cfd/devs/compactflash.device to DEVS:
Have fat95 installed on your system.
Mount the drive by double-clicking cfd/devs/CF0.

If you run OS 3.5+:
Copy cfd/def_CF0.info to both sys:prefs/env-archive/sys and env:sys.

Problems

If some trouble occurs, like cards not recognized by cfd, please:

* report exact hardware type.
* mount CF0: if not already done.
* insert that very card.
* wait at least 1 second (yes, honestly).
* take cfd/c/cfddebug and type into a shell

cfddebug ram:cfdlog

* send me the binary file just created (about 4 kbytes).
I promise there are no passwords and such in it.

In case there is another PCMCIA driver (eg. a network card driver) blocking the card socket, try setting the CF0 mountlist entry "Flags" to

Flags = 1 /* enable "cfd first" hack */

Have Fun!

Editors note

For further Information regarding CompactFlash Card, Please refer to the Documentation supplied with the Program. To download CompactFlash Card, Please " click"on the Aminet link at the top of the page, and type "CompactFlash" in the search engine.