- Exidy Sorcerer
- Micropolis Drive Controller ROM Replacement
- File Extraction from Sorcerer/Micropolis CP/M Images
- Sorcerer/Micropolis Disk Imaging with FluxEngine
- Using Greaseweazle with Sorcerer/Micropolis Disks
- Sorcerer ROMPAC Basic Games on CP/M
- Transferring ROMPAC Basic Programs from CP/M to Tape
This is one of several machines that came from a ARC Group member, Andrew, who was rehoming his brother’s collection. Andrew has been remarkably generous, and that generosity has made a lot of things possible that otherwise would not have been.
The Exidy Sorcerer represents the transition from S-100 microcomputers to more integrated designs. The computer unit with integrated keyboard has 48k of memory, rompac cartridge slot, video out, serial and parallel I/O ports, and an expansion bus. When used alone, the machine typically had a a basic ROM cartridge and programs were loaded from and saved to cassette. The machine has quite high graphics resolution compared to the other computers. Graphics were drawn using programmable characters.
This machine appears to have been used by a business. The expansion unit connects to the computer via the expansion port. It provides 4 S-100 slots. This was used mainly for a disk controller – in this case a hard sectored micropolis unit that operates with up to four unusual 77 track 100 TPI disk drives. It boots Micropolis DOS, Exidy CP/M, Lifeboat CP/M and SOftware SOurce CP/M (i don’t have a complete system disk for this Aussie rolled version).
The disks are challenging to read and write, but fluxengine did the job for me, and greaseweazle is now also capable of working with these disks. Hard sectored disks are unusual. Fortunately i have enough but i have a virtual sector generator as well so that soft sectored disks can also be used.
I have also added an 8kB memory card to the expansion unit at the same memory location as the rompac slot. Basic can be loaded into the card so that programs for the rompac basic can be executed.