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Liliwhite software

LCDLCD
edited January 2010 in MIA/STP/SDP
I recieved two software packages for Opus discovery disc system (with two drives). I was aware about its existence earlier, but had no details.
Company name: "Liliwhite Software", Author: Helge Keller (from germany, not active anymore on Spectrum afaik [sadness]).
"Quick-Copy 2.48" (c) 1994 English version. It can format and copy discs, even from other systems (+D, IBM, QL, SAM, Atari)
Price was: DM 10,- from germany or DM 15,- from Europa

"Quick-Move 1.4" (c) 1994 English version. It can copy and convert between various Opus disc formats, doing it seven times faster than the ROM routines.
On the disc is the updated version 1.6
Price was: DM 15,-/DM 20,-

Instructions are in german language.

I will check both programs after my Opus is set up (I got the version with swiss power plug), but afaik there is a copy protection on these discs, mentioned in the manuals.

I got the actual eMail adress of the Author and can ask him about the distribution on WOS, if the Archive is also for Opus-specific software.
Post edited by LCD on

Comments

  • mheidemheide
    edited January 2010
    Yes, Opus disks are preserved as well these days.

    I added both MIA records (without version numbers, as those are properties of the file sub-records).
  • Andrew BarkerAndrew Barker
    edited January 2010
    @LCD,

    This is good news to hear !. If you're willing and have a 3.5" drive hooked up to your PC,
    have a word with Simon Owen who maintains SamDisk. We've dumped many Opus disks with Samdisk, dumping to EDSK for analysis then convert to OPD where appropriate.

    Let me know if I can be of assistance in possibly preserving these.

    If you could also contact the Author, maybe we could also obtain other items to preserve.

    Best wishes

    Andy
  • rokoroko
    edited January 2010
    @LCD: Helge Keller visited the Spectrum Profi Club meeting in Cologne 24th april 1994, as one of the active members. You were there too, so you must have met him in person! As he was a student then and programmed for fun like we all did, I don't think that getting his permission will be a problem. I could not find a picture of Helge, but my search brought up a picture of young LCD! http://www.mascott.de/~meurer/spc/treff99/group99.html
  • mheidemheide
    edited January 2010
    Ohh, nice! There's Wolfgang Haller as well!
  • LCDLCD
    edited January 2010
    roko wrote: »
    @LCD: Helge Keller visited the Spectrum Profi Club meeting in Cologne 24th april 1994, as one of the active members. You were there too, so you must have met him in person! As he was a student then and programmed for fun like we all did, I don't think that getting his permission will be a problem. I could not find a picture of Helge, but my search brought up a picture of young LCD! http://www.mascott.de/~meurer/spc/treff99/group99.html

    Sure I meet Helge Keller, I remember this well.
    Young LCD... I was known as "Tigers Claw" there back in time. He he... I'm that old now...
  • LCDLCD
    edited January 2010
    So, I got a Reply from Helge Keller:
    "Hiermit erkl?re ich die beiden Programme Quick-Copy und Quick-Move in allen vorhandenen Versionen zu Freeware."
    It is german, and means that Both programs in all versions are now Freeware, which entitles WOS to carry them in Archive.
    He also wrote that these are not the latest versions, because the final versions are Quick Move 2.1 and Quick Copy 3.2, both from 1995.
  • Andrew BarkerAndrew Barker
    edited January 2010
    Cool, it's always nice to see these pix of retro gatherings.
    If there's any disks/carts/whatever you need dumping and either aren't sure or have the
    hardware, let me know and I should be able to help. I'm sure between us we can sort something out.

    Cheers

    Andy
  • rokoroko
    edited January 2010
    Only Quick-Copy and Quick-Move? There were several other, but smaller, tools too... I will see if there is any magnetism left on the disks with raw materials that Helge and I exchanged in those days.
    @ Andy:
    In the early days I made backups of my disks with a program that, as it appeared later, could not restore to real disks that use sector numbers starting from 0. Probably a version of Teledisk, as the files are .TD0. Is this problem known, and solved?
  • LCDLCD
    edited January 2010
    roko wrote: »
    Only Quick-Copy and Quick-Move? There were several other, but smaller, tools too... I will see if there is any magnetism left on the disks with raw materials that Helge and I exchanged in those days.

    I'm aware about this. Helge Keller and I were also two co-authors of "Sprint Royale", but I asked him only about his comercial software because freeware is still freeware and can be added to the WOS archive without permission anyway.
  • rokoroko
    edited January 2010
    Helge's earlier software was known under the names "Sorcerer" and "Somersault". My current PC is reacting as if trying to use a disk is a criminal act, which behaviour made me decide to take up the challenge of making .OPD files with the Opus Discovery itself. That should teach wintel a lesson!
  • Dr BEEPDr BEEP
    edited January 2010
    roko wrote: »
    @LCD: Helge Keller visited the Spectrum Profi Club meeting in Cologne 24th april 1994, as one of the active members. You were there too, so you must have met him in person! As he was a student then and programmed for fun like we all did, I don't think that getting his permission will be a problem. I could not find a picture of Helge, but my search brought up a picture of young LCD! http://www.mascott.de/~meurer/spc/treff99/group99.html


    And Helge Keller made his own version of the screendumproutine in 57 bytes.
  • HelgeHelge
    edited January 2010
    Hi Roelof, hi Leszek, hi all other Spectrum-fans :-)

    funny to read about myself and those long-ago-software of my good old Spectrum days. And I'm glad to see there's still someone around to keep the think alive.

    You can bring ALL programs from me up to WOS :-) Roelof, you can publish ALL sourcecode I send you during our vast communications. Whatever program you'll find from me - if it is of any use for anyone out there - make it public :-)

    As Leszek wrote I'm not using my Spectrum and Opus these days, but there's still a system here which worked the last time used (one or two years ago to copy some disks). I also have two PCs (one Win98SE, one Win XP, both with 3.5 drive) and tried "opusread" but this program only reads 180k Opus disks. Quickmove and Quickcopy are on 720K disks (even so they don't need so much space...). If there is a PC-program I can just install and use to convert the two Opus disks to a PC-format, you can send it to me by email and I will try to read the old Opus disks (I never used an emulator so far).

    Good luck to you Roelof for your .OPD project with the Opus :-)

    I won't be an active member of WOS, but will help you with this special task of preserving the two programs :-)

    And by the way: I used much more "y" long time ago - it was "Lilywhite" and (but I'm not perfectly sure about this) "Sorcery" ;-)

    Thanks to all of you for doing what you're doing with our old beloved Spectrum,

    Helge
  • rokoroko
    edited January 2010
    Hi Helge, good to see you around.
    Converting to PC format is done by making an 'image' file which can be stored on PC and read/viewed there. For OPUS there exist two dedicated programs (available in the WOS archive), only for standard disk-layouts 40Tr and 80Tr DS. Your disks have 82Tr each holding 10 sectors a 512 bytes. I'll send you a so called Private Message this weekend.
    Roelof.
  • HelgeHelge
    edited January 2010
    Hi Roelof,

    I will try to reactivate my Opus-system and make a copy of Quick-Move and Quick-Copy on 40 tracks disks and then read them with "opusread" and send the files to Leszek. Hope to find some time during the next two weeks...

    If you want to send me an email: helge_keller at yahoo.de

    Regards,

    Helge
  • Andrew BarkerAndrew Barker
    edited January 2010
    Hi folks,

    Simon Owens' SamDisk can dump Opus disks, well the unreleased version can, but just drop him a mail and he'll be glad to send you a copy. With SamDisk you can dump many disk formats as long as you can hook 'em up to your PC's FDC. So with Opus you'd dump to the EDSK format first for analysis and then convert to OPD. One Reason being that Damien Guards Disk Manager can handle and show info on EDSKs. OPD doesn't store much info, but in most cases it's fine for Opus dumps, I think all though :-o.

    I've now dumped numerous Opus disks as part of the SDP project, which were in the last TZX Vault update. I also dumped them for the SPS team for their own analysis.

    There's an OPD viewer in one of the other threads (probably about the Daton Opus disk I dumped) that will allow you to dump and extract from Opus.

    Cheers

    Andy
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