XUM1541 parallel port mod

This ebay object offers you the chance to store your Commodore 64 floppydisks onto pc and save them for posterity.

XUM1541 (a ZOOMFLOPPY variant) uses CBM Transfer as a GUI to access the disk drive directories and act as a disk manager, writing to disk and, regardless of protections, reading and copying the disk content as a raw flux of data.

Left: serial cable input, right: micro usb output to pc. Please note the parallel male port top

At the most basic operation, the Commodore disk drive outputs data via serial cable connected to the XUM 1541, and via USB onto the pc, loading data to the CBM Xtransfer software.

If you would like to copy single files from disk, that’d suffice.

If you would rather copy entire disks onto .d64 files, at a very convenient high speed, a parallel port mod is needed. It accesses the flux of data both from the serial and a parallel port built into the disk drive.

Open your breadbin 1541 disk drive and remove UC3

Please note if you would like to carry out this mod on a 1541-II or 1541C you’ll have to mod your units using a different guide.. This 🙂

Mount the removed ic on the new socket, hosting the male parallel port-careful with IC orientation

And here’s the parallel mod installed

My rather crudely drilled enclosure

A very easy mod all in all, please remember to switch the devices in this order to prevent damage to the XUM and the 1541:

–FIRST connect all the cables together: serial, parallel, and USB

-connect USB to PC

-switch on the PC

–LAST THING switch on the disk drive.

Install guide HERE