Music on the amiga

[Moroder]

Edit:
Problem solved. Thanks for the help! See bottom post :-)
----

Hi there!

I want to use my amigas for writing music. I've worked with trackers before, and I really want to work on proper amiga hardware now.

I want to get some kind of hard drive installed on my amigas, and software too (I'm guessing I'll need both amiga os and a tracker program, of course.)

I have two amigas, a 500 and a 600. From what I've read, it's easier to set up the 600 with a HD?

Edit:
I forgot to mention, I bought one of these some years ago, but never managed to get it working. I think I might have messed up and formatted it when I connected it to my mac via a usb connector. Doh.

[rampartsagain]

well frind conect to amiga 600 with amiga install disk of workbench open hdtools if drive appears you can partitionate and format otherwise have to use it internally with hd ide compact flash adapter

[Moroder]

Originally Posted by rampartsagain

well frind conect to amiga 600 with amiga install disk of workbench open hdtools if drive appears you can partitionate and format otherwise have to use it internally with hd ide compact flash adapter

obrigado! will try right away.

[rampartsagain]

anytime friend!

[Moroder]

Looks like I just need to format it and install with winuae thanks

[Cammy]

Wait, HDToolBox won't recognise it, it scans scsi.device by default, not compactflash.device! If you want to use it in PCMCIA it should be FAT-formatted, which you should be able to format from Workbench provided you have the drivers installed. They are:

http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/cfd
http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/fat95

With these files installed you should be able to read the CF card. Check if they're installed already, have a look in your Devs/ drawer in Workbench. CompactFlash.device should be in Devs/ and CF0 should be in Devs/DOSDrivers/ and Fat95 should be inside L/ (all these drawers are in your Workbench boot partition).

If all three of those files aren't there, then your card reader won't work at all.

[Moroder]

Thanks I was going crazy trying to figure it out. How do I get those files into the UAE environment? - And do I set my CF as IDE0 in winUAE?

[Moroder]

Originally Posted by Moroder

Thanks I was going crazy trying to figure it out. How do I get those files into the UAE environment? - And do I set my CF as IDE0 in winUAE?

Alright, figured it out - still not sure how to set the CF though - IDE0? Can I install workbench on it if it's formatted as fat?

[Turran]

When you are in winuae, you access the card directly in windows. You don't mount it as a hard drive if you need to reach it in winuae but you can mount it as a folder if you like. Since its formatted with FAT, windows can read it just fine.

When you move it into the PCMCIA adapter and into the Amiga though, you need the drivers in the amiga already.

The drivers does not go onto the CF card, since they do no good there =) You need them already on the amiga to be able to read the contents of the CF card in the PCMCIA slot.

Hard to explain... in short:
In windows, read the CF card normally since its FAT.
In Amiga with PCMCIA adapter, you need the drivers listed above to reach it.

Edit: I might be wrong here, but you can not boot from the CF card when its in the PCMCIA adapter. If you want to do that, you need a CF->IDE adapter and connect it to the IDE port inside the amiga.
Usually, the CF->PCMCIA adapter is only used to transfer files from the PC to the Amiga when you already have another HD in the amiga.

[Moroder]

Alright, thanks. I do have an IDE adapter for the CF card, but I don't have a harddrive to use internally. Since I have no workbench disks or anything, my only solution at the moment would be to use the CF card as an internal device.

In this case - should I mount it as an IDE in winUAE, and, how should I set this up and format it?

Thanks

Edit:
Found this guide
http://www.2e0zak.co.uk/amiga/CF-setup.html

Hope it works!

Edit2:
Managed to partition my CF using that guide, but when I try to format it, nothing happens. Litterally nothing, it doesn't even start the format program. Just sits there.
This is starting to drive me a bit crazy again. >_<

Maybe I should just buy a CF that is pre-set up as an internal HD, and use this one for transfering files....

[Turran]

You managed to get it partitioned in the amiga (or winuae) and can see it on workbench and the next step would be the format?

If you restart the amiga and open the partitiontool again, has the information you put in previously saved?

Oh, always click the Quick Format button.

Edit: Dont know why that guide says "it will not work with quick format". You should always quick format =)

I had a similar experience when I had made a rather large partition but not enough memory. Could be that easy. Toss in a bit more memory in winuae and try again, but do a quick format.

[Moroder]

I have no trouble partitioning the CF, but now when I try to format it says:

"Volume
Work
is not validated"

...FML

I did manage to get WB installed, but the work partition (which is a large one) is not working.

Edit:
Alright, I realised there was a 40mb max on each partition. Works now. Still having trouble running protracker though, and haven't had any luck writing adf's to disks yet...
Aaaand now I'm getting checksum errors. Time to look for a new CF card I guess.

Edit 2:
Found out I was using an older version of winuae (don't ask why) which messed the IDE0 up, installed the latest version and BOOM. Everything runs great!
Thanks for all the advice

[Moroder]

Hi everyone, I'm running into memory problems with ProTracker on my amiga 600 (aka "NOT ENOUGH MEMORY!") - will one of these help?
http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/...oducts_id=1038

[demolition]

If it only has 1MB chip, then yes it will help.

I don't know if PT can use fast mem? If so, then there are also various fastmem expansions out there, which will also speed up the Amiga by about 25% for stuff running in fastmem. They are a lot cheaper than chipmem, but I'd still recommend going to 2MB chip since some software needs it (like large modules played properly from chipmem).

[daxb]

Protracker needs Chipram for at least sample data but it use Fastram for programm code if available. So recommended is 2 MB Chip + some MB Fast.

A600 hasn`t "numeric keypad" what is useful with Protracker. An A1200 is a good basic because it has already 2MB Chip.

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by Moroder

Hi everyone, I'm running into memory problems with ProTracker on my amiga 600 (aka "NOT ENOUGH MEMORY!")

Go easy on the sample usage. Optimize your resources. If you are sampling yourself or converting samples from another format (like WAV), make sure to optimize the quality/filesize ratio on each sample, as some you can sample at lower rates without much of a loss while others will need a higher sample rate.

This thread might help: http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=66065