Re: Commodore 15 Second disk format routine disassembled

From: Francesco Messineo <francesco.messineo_at_gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 19 Jun 2026 15:37:37 +0200
Message-ID: <CAESs-_w4vAicbLzu-u6LL+t-j_Voa3JZtVckeGj6X8ecC_tacQ_at_mail.gmail.com>
On Fri, Jun 19, 2026 at 3:32 PM André Fachat <afachat_at_gmx.de> wrote:
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> Am 19. Juni 2026 14:52:50 schrieb Francesco Messineo <francesco.messineo_at_gmail.com>:
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>> On Fri, Jun 19, 2026 at 2:45 PM André Fachat <afachat_at_gmx.de> wrote:
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>>> Correct. The only difference is that due to the smaller tracks the bits on the media get smaller two. Eventually reaching a point where the quality of the material (e.g  granularity of the magnetic material) makes it unreliable.
>>>
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>> it's not the material, it's the head's pole gap that are too large.
>> 100 tpi heads (or 96 tpi ones, they're identical) have a much smaller
>> magnetic gap. So with even higher clock rates, 8x50/SFD-1001 drives
>> can format 29 to 23 sectors on the same magnetic media, and I've read
>> without errors disks written in 1986 with the SFD-1001.
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>
> The gap may be smaller but not much. It's the bit frequency that matters for blocks per track, not the track density (tpi).

of course, but 96/100 tpi drives need a smaller head that writes a
narrower track, and as a side effect probably the gap is also smaller
so CBM engineers decided they could also increase the clock rate by
3/2 (6 MHz vs 4 MHz clock, same dividers).

The first 100 tpi drive ever made was the Micropolis 1015-II (single
side) - 1016-II (double side).

IZ8DWF
Received on 2026-06-19 15:01:12

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