Famicom Disc System Game Re-Writing: Using FDS Loader to repair non-working Famicom Discs! 

I’m so glad that you found this video, and thanks so much for writing that program! I think it’s really interesting to document the early history of homebrew and console modding, and this was a pretty fun video to make. Hope you still work on projects like this and thanks again!

@@LIRetroGaming You're welcome, and I think what you guys are doing on your channel is pristine. I watched a couple of your videos where you built an NES motherboard from scratch, and I found those videos brilliant. The Playchoice 10 stuff you showed with those store-unit selectors are some of the coolest NES tech I know to exist! Anyway I did make USB-NES so now that's my baby, and at some point I'll see if it can work with a MISTer FPGA. Meanwhile yeah, I'm still doing lots of NES projects I'm trying to get published to the channel in a quality way, and strive on getting better than what's there already.

@@LIRetroGaming I would like to get a copy of the disk keeper. I have hit up the reddit community but would love to purchase directly through you if possible. I would give extra funds to support your channel.

Thanks, glad you enjoyed it! Yeah it would be awesome if blank FDS discs were something that you could find

FDS uses a particular format of magnetic disks called "Quick Disks", a commercial standard in the 80's. Those disks weren't a native Nintendo standard. Some computers used this kind of disk back then. You can try to find an old stock of blank Quick Disks.

@@gianmarcofilipponi2673 I think the dimensions are different and you have to add a bit of hardware on the end of them to get the drive to seat them properly. The embossed "NINTENDO" logo on the disks have an opposite-emboss in the drive itself. Personally, I just buy cheap games for $1.50-$3 when ordering other stuff from Japan, and overwrite those. Well, theoretically. Just got them and haven't done it yet. Waiting until I am sure I've fully calibrated my drive that I refurbished before I use it to do any writing, and the tools for me to do that accurately (calibration jig, and touchless tachometer) haven't quite arrived in the mail yet :D

I know this comment is old, but blank "bootleg" famicom disks exist, I have a few! The plastic is typically blue, and it has a funny engraving in it to mimick the piracy protection inside the "nintendo" engraving on the originals.

That’s pretty amazing! I’m grateful that he made the software because it can resurrect some of those old discs that have corrupted data on them

@@LIRetroGaming Yeah, that was especially nice to see. I sent him a link to the video too via e-mail. I’m somewhat curious why the back and forth swapping was needed instead of just hooking up the disk to the PC directly. I’m hoping Brad can speak to that.

That’s very interesting, I actually didn’t know that. I tried it with two systems and did not have any issues. But of course that is a very small sample size

theoretically you could calibrate an FDS to match some set of known "factory written" disks, by calibrating the drive and figuring out the max extents that the disk can be read, and then picking a value smack dab in the middle of that. might be a lot of trial and error, and probably isn't worth doing as an individual owner who doesn't really plan to resell, but might be worth it if you plan to rewrite many disks for resale. there's some articles by "Stephen" on "Tinker Different" that have a proposed read head calibrated distance, and he sells machined jigs on ebay that ensure calibration to that distance. I believe he might have used a similar technique as that I described above, but I only skimmed his articles so don't quote me on that. that, plus a cheap optical tachometer, he says will produce a well calibrated drive. also, IMO, this disk format is not a very good end destination for preservation anyhow. it's probably better to use this as a way to experience games, rather than as a tool for directly preserving them. because of that, I think overly worrying about whether the disks are readable by a lot of drives doesn't have much point. a better idea is to rewrite them when you need them to work, and keep the actual data in proper digital backups. digital backups are much more predictable, especially if you use industry standard archival backup practices.

I own an FDSStick as well, but I have not found good information on how to use it to copy discs. If you have any details on how to use it for a disk copying I would love to hear about it!

@@LIRetroGaming Of course! You need a copier cable (www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/dp/B0725X7MS1/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=fdsstick&qid=1609716451&sr=8-3) however. Once you have one, you plug one end to the FDSStick, the other end to your FDS, then plug the FDSStick to the USB port, then fire up the program. From there you can dump disk data using the "Read" function -- store it wherever you like. The "Write" function will actually allow you to pop a disk in and copy data from the FDSStick itself onto the disk, then ask if you wanna swap to Side B if it's double sided. It's my favorite copier to date, no muss or fuss. 😀

That’s awesome, thanks! And I assume that the FDS still needs the mod to the drive and the power supply right?

@@LIRetroGaming Yep! That will always be needed no matter what.

Thanks! This is something that is very poorly documented, so that’s one of the reasons why I wanted to make the video

Thanks! There are definitely better methods nowadays but I wanted to show this for historical reasons and it’s definitely cool to see how it used to be done!

Yeah I really enjoy the early history of these copying devices

@@LIRetroGaming Same, if you ever come across a wild card for the SNES or any of the SNES versions i would love to see a video & possible even a repair on them. As I bet lots of them are probably not working anymore so would be good to see the inside of those 🖐️

Thanks, I’m glad you enjoyed it! It’s a pretty obscure item so that was definitely one of the reasons why I wanted to make a video

Thanks I’m glad you enjoyed it!

Thanks, glad you enjoyed the video! You are right, there are definitely better methods nowadays including the one that you described. Eventually I need to get that cable so I can use my FDSstick to rewrite FDS floppies

@@LIRetroGaming its so easy, totally worth it! Just have to make sure you have a power-01 or 2 board. But on famicomworld.com there is a tutorial for how to mod the others to get through the copy protection. But a fellow of your talents could easily figure that out lol. Famicom collecting is very addicting, and my favorite new hobby. The RGB mod you guys did to my sharp twin is going strong, and paired with the new Retrotink 5x, it looks phenomenal. Crispy pixels for days!

I can probably help with that. The hardware that I show in this video is not mine, it’s a friends. But I can probably make arrangements to use it again and help you out

@@LIRetroGaming great! I sent you a email.

Hello! I'm the owner of the device shown in the video. From what I understand, each FDS is calibrated a little differently, and that leaves an "imprint" so to speak on the disk. If you can manage to calibrate two different disk systems to be as close as possible, then it should work.

This is a very old method. Modsville USA has a new guide that will work with your Sharp twin famicom

It takes a proprietary format called minidisc but it will not be recognized unless the disc is formatted correctly

@@LIRetroGaming Well, can you try?

@@happycoolhayden8767there's a website on the FCDS that shows the modified disks people used to make, among other things. You should go check it out

@@LIRetroGaming minidisc is the optical media, isn't it? isn't this actually "mitsumi quick disk"?

Yes, it would

ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-MHn_i7frLTk.html this video has a great modern guide for it

Thanks a ton man

You can get an FDSStick and the male to male RAM adapter cable from Tototek and use that to write disks to a modified disk drive as well.

ancient but you can use fdsloader tool (or even the newer fdsstick) to boot any number of the images of copy programs available online and use the copy program to copy itself to a disk

Marketing

japan loves to use english words. it's a thing. it's not that weird. american pop culture frequently uses a lot of japanese words, too.

Sure thing! I’ll take a look and join the server

@@LIRetroGaming discord.gg/7w7u4R93

I am UnoAphex.DLL on discord, thank you very much my friend.