Diamond Format V1.0

                           (C)1990 Robert D. Luneski
                  ST Careware from Oregon Research Associates

                  Please support all your ST Careware authors.

At last! The speed, flexibility, and reliability of Diamond Back II's custom
formatter in a standalone form.  I've been promising people I'd do this for
some time now and I finally got around to it.  Enjoy.

Provided in both PRG and ACC form, Diamond Format has all the standard
features you find in a formatter plus a few new twists.  You can choose 1 or
2 sides, 80 or 82 tracks, twisted or normal format, and 9,10 18 or 20 sectors
per track, verify or no verify. Click on the appropriate buttons to select your 
choice and then click on the Foramt A or Format B buttons to begin.  Control-C 
aborts the format at any time. 

What's that I hear? 18 & 20 tracks per sector?  Yes, Diamond Format allows 
you to format high density 1.44/1.6 meg drives like the PowerDrive from 
DreamPark Development. Obviously the 18/20 sector per track options only work
if you have a high density drive installed.  And yes, twisted format is still
the fastest way to go with the high density drives.

Additional features include:

1) The ability to quickly erase(zero) a preformatted disk. This is a lot 
   faster than deleting all the files from the disk.

2) Write a MS-DOS compatible boot sector to a preformatted disk so they can 
   be read by IBM 3.5" drives.(Note all disks formatted by Diamond Format
   have MS-DOS boot sectors on them).

3) Select the AFE button and Diamond Format will create a disk compatible
   with the Apple File Exchange utility on Mac II's and Mac SE's with FDHD
   floppy drives.  These are standard ST disks that you can use normally
   but are formatted in such a way that the Apple File Exchange can read them.
   This makes transporting files back and forth between ST's and Mac II's
   much easier. Twister formats will work, but the disks must be 2 sides, 
   80 tracks, and 9 sectors per track(Diamond Format automatically selects
   these settings when you click on AFE).  Apple File Exchange is a trademark 
   of Apple Computer, Inc.   

4) Diamond Back II automatic disk switching is implemented in Diamond Format.
   If you have 2 floppy drives, then you may place a disk in drive A and 
   select FORMAT.  The you can put a disk in drive B and press the 'b' key on 
   the keyboard, then status for drive B will change from Waiting to Ready. 
   Then when Diamond Format is finished formatting the disk in drive A, it
   will automatically start formatting the disk in drive B without pausing.
   You can continue to automatically switch between drives A and B as often 
   as you wish.  This makes the process of formatting a lot of disks go much 
   smoother and faster.


Diamond Format is distributed free of charge to all Diamond Back II owners, 
otherwise it is distributed as ST Careware.  If you care about the future of 
software development for the Atari ST AND you find this program useful then
please support your local ST software author(that's me) by sending $5 to:

                    Oregon Research Associates
                    16232 S.W. Bon Aire Dr.
                    Lake Oswego, OR 97035

You will be rewarded by a warm fuzzy feeling and the knowledge that you are
directly and materially supporting the future development of quality software 
for the Atari ST.

Thankyou very much for your support.

Bob Luneski

Genie: B.LUNESKI1
Usenet: bluneski@pogo.WV.TEK.COM