Fairlight IIx - instructions for using the HxC SD reader

The  HxC SD card reader is an excellent addition to your old Fairlight.

The HxC is a Floppy drive emulator.

The Floppy disk drives are 40 years old and hard to maintain, repair & replace.

I highly recommend you email Jean-Bernard of MUSTUDIO for one.

https://mustudio.fr/fairlight-2/kit-flash-for-fairlight-cmi/

I purchased the kit from mustudio.fr

Many thanks also to Peter W for his help in it's installation.

The Flash player uses a SD card to emulate 2 virtual drives. (A & B).

Compatable cards are SDHC up to 32MB.

Formated in FAT 32.... use a PC (not a MAC) to format the card.

I found navigation of the file structure in the SD card a bit confusing at first.

The left and right black buttons allow you to scroll through the choices. 

The RED validation button is to confirm your choice. 

In order to enter the MENU (configuration mode), press and hold the RED validation button for a few seconds, till a  menu item (System, Sound or QDOS) appears on the LCD display.

This is how it seems to be set up:

You only need to use the "Systems" and the "sounds" sections.

The original CMI uses two floppy drives (Drive 0 & Drive 1)

One handled the operating system, and the other handled the sounds.

To install the SD card reader you need to remove one of the floppy drives.

The card reader has 2 toggle switches that let you choose how the CMI picks which drive to use.

The SD card can behave as two virtual drives, or act as just one virtual drive allowing you to

still use the remaining floppy drive.

So my CMI can now boot or load sounds from the SD card alone 

or a combo of the SD card & the single remaining floppy drive.

There are 3 possible switch combinations:

1. S2 up, S1 up

2. S2 up , S1 down

3. S2 down, S1 up.

The 2 toggle switches (S2 & S1) must be in the correct position.

I like to configure the system to use two virtual drives (setting number 2).
That is, I'll bypass the use of the Floppy Drives completely.
Left switch (QFC9 or S2) : up

Right switch (Flash or S1): Down

1. Turn on the Fairlight.

    The monitor will as is usual display "Load System disk in drive"

  

2. "Systems" should be shown on the display.

  

      If not, use the left/right buttons to rectify till you find "systems".

      (pressing the left/right buttons will move you between Systems, Sounds & QDOS)

3. Hit enter when you see "Systems" (the centre red button)

    You should see two dots "  ..  "
4. Using the right button, step through till the desired software is shown.

    (Revision 20).  V4 C5 R1 20

    Hit enter.

    The Fairlight will now load the operating system

    It bleeps as it steps through sectors. The monitor should eventually show Page 1

5. Hold down "Enter" (middle red button) for a few seconds.

    The LCD will change... You are entering the "Function Menu" Mode.

6. Toggle through options till "change drive" appears.

     Hit "Enter"

7. Toggle until "B" appears.

    Hit Enter

8.  The LCD display will show the software revision.

 

Toggle left until only dots appear.

Hit enter

9. Systems should reappear.   

10.  Toggle left till "sounds" shows.

       Hit enter

(You are now in the sounds folder)

You will see those two dots ".." reappear

 

8. Step through till the desired library is found. (I normally use 1.3)

    Hit enter

(You are now in the 1.3 folder)

You will see those two dots ".." reappear

 

8a. Now to load one of the folders within folder 1.3

     you need to press the right button.  Each press will take you to a new folder.

     The first folder is called 1. The next one is 10.

     I've set up folder 10 to start things off. Use this.

     Note: once you have found folder 10, press the red button on the card reader.

   

9.   Now use the native Fairlight alpha/numeric keyboard itself.

     On the Fairlight go to page 2.

     (Type P2)

      You should see displayed the contents of the virtual disk.

10. Toggling left & right  on the SD card reader should show the contents of each virtual disk.

This is library (or virtual disk) 15

Test by loading a file.

EG:

Type L,A,filename<return> to load a file.

eg to load a file named GONG1.VC
type L,A,GONG1 <return>
You don't need to add the .VC after the file name.