Sinclair QL - Maverick-Shark/retroGuru GitHub Wiki

Core Sinclair QL

NOTE: Some parts have been cloned from MiSTer Manual, Wiki MiSTer and MiSTer MkDocs

  • The Sinclair QL was a 68k based, high-end follow up to the Sinclair ZX Spectrum and was meant for more of a professional user. It used microdrives for storage which used magnetic tape and were meant to be more cost effective versus floppy disks however reliability got the better of that and soon floppy disk interfaces because available and that became the more preferred method of storage.

QDOS (System Firmware)

  • The main github repo is a bit out of date with respect to some of the ROM files so you’ll probably want to visit https://www.kilgus.net/ql/mister/ and get the QL OS zip file there.
  • It has both the ‘original’ Sinclair QDOS ROM and an enhanced Minerva based ROM.
  • The Minerva based ROM is a substantially upgraded ROM that is (seems to be?) compatible with all of the QL’s software. You can experiment with both and, for a start, see just how much faster the Minerva based ROM boots.
  • Furthermore, these images have been enhanced with QL-SD which is an SD card interface for the Sinclair QL allowing you to load software for the MiSTer I/O board’s SD card as well as .WIN files.
  • There’s also a sample QL-SD.WIN file here.
  • If you really want to have a great time with the QL I suggest pulling down the Sinclair QL User Guide from https://archive.org/details/sinclair-ql-user-guide., but I’ll walk through the basics here.
  • The first thing that happens when booting your QL is you’ll be asked to press F1 if you’re using a monitor and F2 if you’re using a TV (presumably because F2 switches to a lower resolution graphics mode that a TV can handle?).
  • I’ve been pressing F1. Your screen will then be divided into three areas with the bottom area allowing you to type immediate commands or enter BASIC program line by line in Super BASIC, the top right displaying output, and the top left allowing you to list the lines in your current BASIC program.

Loading Programs

  • You can mount .MDV (microdrive) images (a format for Microdrive cartridge preservation used by the old QLAY emulator) or .WIN (SD card) images from the MiSTer OSD.
  • You can get a list of files on the device with the ‘dir’ command however you must specify the device you want a directory from and device names are odd as they include a trailing underscore character:

mdv1_ and mdv2_ are the two Microdrives that this core supports win1_ is the .WIN file in your QL directory on the MiSTer SD card win2_ is the extra SD card in the I/O board’s slot (I have not tried this yet)

so

dir mdv1_ will list files on the .MDV file in simulated Microdrive #1 (and it’ll be just as slow as a real Microdrive so be patient) dir win1_ will list files on the .WIN file in the simulated QL SD interface (much faster than a Microdrive)

  • Often there will be a file named boot and you can load and run these using the lrun command by specifying a name that includes the device the file is on and the filename. lrun mdv1_boot will load and run the program boot on Microdrive #1.

  • You can also load and save Smart BASIC programs to a device with the load and save commands save mdv1_test saves the BASIC program in memory to a file names test on Microdrive #1. load mdv1_test loads the BASIC program test on Microdrive #1 into memory.

Some helpful key commands include

Ctrl-Space = Stop the running BASIC program
Ctrl-Left Arrow = Backspace
Ctrl+Right Arrow = Remove the character to the right of the cursor

Transferring files from a PC to the QL core

Unfortunately I have not found a great way to do this yet. I have yet to experiment with the SD card in the I/O board, but I read that files must be stored sequentially (no fragmentation) so that doesn’t seem like a great thing and I can’t find current tools to work with .MDV or .WIN files. There is a tool called qxltools for working with these .WIN files, but there’s no current Windows version of it.

Conclusion

This seems like a pretty neat and powerful (for the time) computer with a lot to it. I’ve been able to play some not so great games on it, get what seems like a GUI going from the QXL.WIN sample image with mouse support, and it seems like there’s quite a bit more to learn. Hopefully this gives you the start I didn’t have so you can see that the core itself it pretty great!