Misc a600 related questions (repairing/maintenance)

[foob]

Hi, just deciding to get back into the game after a few years, still have an a600 lying around that generally works but is in poor condition. Wouldn't mind a few questions i have answering about cleaning the unit up and getting it back into shape.

in order of most to least important to myself;-



1) Repairing/replacing the Fascia.

Basically, one of the clips that hold the fascia flush has snapped, specifically the one on the right hand side of the unit next to the floppy drive. This is majorly annoying, as it means even with all screws in place, the fascia sits apart and thus it blocks the floppy drive. Every time i insert/eject a disk i must squeeze the case together. Is there any sensible way to fix this without replacing the entire fascia? While i will get a new one as a last resort, it seems extremely difficult and stubborn to remove without snapping (i feel this is how the previous owner snapped it to begin with). The clip on the opposiote side of the unit is testament to this as its so tight i cannot get the fascia off even without the screws in. Now i realise this is not "so" bad if im replacing but it does mean my new fascia cannot be easily removed. This will be annoying as i have bought a Goteks drive emulator for use on this (externally, for writing floppies) but i wouldnt mind the option of making it an internal drive in the future with the least hassle possible.

2) Updating the KS ROM (and finding the chips to do it)

The unit is a .299 and is, as one may expect, hilariously annoying as i would love to be able to put a CF HDD in the unit. Now, ive researched how to do this myself (and from what i expect it wont be too much different from a standard cpu replacement on a normal PC, easy stuff) but i can't seem to find much information that actually makes sense in terms of what else needs doing. Some guides maintain that you MUST also upgrade RAM and other components for a KS upgrade to even work so i'm just confused. Can i just buy a chip and swap it over? do reams of other things also need replacing? The ultimate goal of the KS upgrade is to enable a WB HDD install, and possibly for WHDLoad so when im 20 years older and my current set of floppies have died, theres still an option.

3) Joysticks / Controllers

Is it possible to make/convert a new controller that will work on an amiga (and a C64, preferably)? It seems to me that working controllers are becoming waaaay more expensive, especially ones in good nick. I've already bought a converter for a usb mouse that seems to work fine. Is it possible to do this for a usb joypad also?

4) Are floppies restorable?

i don't actually know too much about why floppies are dying. i assume they're losing the magnetic properties or something. But, is it possible to restore them to working condition? Not really important, but i have a bunch of old official floppies of games that no longer work and now i have the external gotek on the way, ill have the ability to write fresh digital images. Ideally, it would be nice to write a working image back to the original disk for the software. Entirely cosmetic i know but its that level of nostalgia im hoping to re-create.

5) Any way to convert the a/v output to something more modern, say vga or even hdmi?

This is just pure futureproofing. I have an old bedroom CRT im using at the moment which is perfectly fine but its not gonna last forever. It would be far easier to replace it with an old LCD monitor (and way more space efficient). Is this feasible?


Sorry for the walls of text and for what is probably a bunch of stupid questions.

[idrougge]

Originally Posted by foob

1) Repairing/replacing the Fascia.

Basically, one of the clips that hold the fascia flush has snapped, specifically the one on the right hand side of the unit next to the floppy drive. This is majorly annoying, as it means even with all screws in place, the fascia sits apart and thus it blocks the floppy drive. Every time i insert/eject a disk i must squeeze the case together. Is there any sensible way to fix this without replacing the entire fascia?

Use a self-threading screw and some clever experimentation.

Originally Posted by foob

2) Updating the KS ROM (and finding the chips to do it)

Can i just buy a chip and swap it over? do reams of other things also need replacing? The ultimate goal of the KS upgrade is to enable a WB HDD install, and possibly for WHDLoad so when im 20 years older and my current set of floppies have died, theres still an option.

Just buy a chip and replace it using a flat screwdriver to extract the old one. Note the orientation of the old chip since the socket is bigger than the chip. No extra memory is required for OS3.1

WHDLoad will require more RAM than a stock A600 has left after booting from HD.

Originally Posted by foob

3) Joysticks / Controllers

Is it possible to make/convert a new controller that will work on an amiga (and a C64, preferably)? It seems to me that working controllers are becoming waaaay more expensive, especially ones in good nick. I've already bought a converter for a usb mouse that seems to work fine. Is it possible to do this for a usb joypad also?

You can get a USB adapter or a fresh Competition Pro joystick for C64/Amiga.

Originally Posted by foob

4) Are floppies restorable?

i don't actually know too much about why floppies are dying. i assume they're losing the magnetic properties or something. But, is it possible to restore them to working condition? Not really important, but i have a bunch of old official floppies of games that no longer work and now i have the external gotek on the way, ill have the ability to write fresh digital images. Ideally, it would be nice to write a working image back to the original disk for the software. Entirely cosmetic i know but its that level of nostalgia im hoping to re-create.

Often, disks are dying because of bad storage, causing mold to grow on the surface. These disks will eventually damage your drive and spread to other disks.

As a preserver, I'm not fond of "restoring" original floppies since alter on, someone might find inherit your disk and dump it as a bona-fide original when in fact it is a copy.
That said, most original game images can't be written back without using Kryoflux hardware. You'd have to settle for a cracked copy.
You already have the original floppies to look at for nostalgia. Keep them as such and play another copy.

Originally Posted by foob

5) Any way to convert the a/v output to something more modern, say vga or even hdmi?

Indivision ECS does exactly that.

[foob]

*EDIT*

sorry, asked about where to find stuff that i couldnt find on amigakit and turns out that i could, i was just looking on the wrong part of the website.

[idrougge]

Competition Pro: https://icomp.de/shop-icomp/en/shop/...pro-retro.html

If you're going to upgrade, you might just as well get a 3.1 ROM. There's no gain in sticking to 2.05.

[foob]

Well, that is actually one of my further questions (thanks for the original answers btw, i deleted that in the edit)


Since browsing for a new ROM to buy, i have come across these two links...

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/...products_id=96

and

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/New-Licens...gAAOSwAuZX1Y0O


What is the difference between the two, other than price? Is there even one?

[DopPie]

And get the thing recapped. Or face unexplainable incompatibility issues.

[Jope]

Originally Posted by foob

What is the difference between the two, other than price? Is there even one?

Both should have the exact same contents burned onto the chip.

[Daedalus]

Originally Posted by foob

3) Joysticks / Controllers

Is it possible to make/convert a new controller that will work on an amiga (and a C64, preferably)? It seems to me that working controllers are becoming waaaay more expensive, especially ones in good nick. I've already bought a converter for a usb mouse that seems to work fine. Is it possible to do this for a usb joypad also?

Converting existing controllers should be fairly easy - all you need to do is bypass all the additional USB or custom circuitry normally in a modern controller and wire the switched inputs directly to the relevant pins in a new cable. Moulded Megadrive extension cables are a good source of such cables, and a bit of messing with a multimeter and some soldering and you should have a "native" controller of whatever type you like.

If you don't wish to destroy a modern USB controller, the Rys Mk II adaptor will convert any standard USB controller into Amiga joystick or mouse inputs. It's available from AmigaKit

4) Are floppies restorable?

i don't actually know too much about why floppies are dying. i assume they're losing the magnetic properties or something. But, is it possible to restore them to working condition? Not really important, but i have a bunch of old official floppies of games that no longer work and now i have the external gotek on the way, ill have the ability to write fresh digital images. Ideally, it would be nice to write a working image back to the original disk for the software. Entirely cosmetic i know but its that level of nostalgia im hoping to re-create.

As was already said, sometimes they die because the media has rotted or delaminated. In either case, the media itself is dead and gone, and using it could actually damage your drive. Some people like to open the disk casings and replace the media with a known good disc from a donor disk*. An image can be written to it then with the original contents. Other people however don't like this because it's not original, so it's up to you. As mentioned though, writing copy-protected images can be tricky so depending on the game you might have to use images of cracked versions.

5) Any way to convert the a/v output to something more modern, say vga or even hdmi?

This is just pure futureproofing. I have an old bedroom CRT im using at the moment which is perfectly fine but its not gonna last forever. It would be far easier to replace it with an old LCD monitor (and way more space efficient). Is this feasible?

Yes, and there are a couple of options. The simplest is probably to buy an LCD TV that has RGB SCART in and get an Amiga->RGB SCART cable. This will give you about as good quality as you're going to get.

An LCD monitor in general won't show the Amiga's PAL or NTSC frequencies usually used by games, though some specific models do. If you can find one, a passive Amiga->VGA adaptor will work fine, just don't go out buying a monitor without making sure it works at 15kHz.

You can also get scandoubler hardware, which can be expensive but converts the native video signal into modern VGA frequencies. The Indivision ECS is probably the most current scandoubler you can get.

Finally, there are external SCART or RGB to HDMI converters that might be worth a look. Check for reviews before you buy though as the quality can vary wildly. Especially useful would be if you could find a review from another Amiga user...


* Yes, I'm using different spellings here. Disc is a flat round thing, disk is short for diskette

[foob]

Thank you for all the replies, very useful stuff!

As of today my gotek arrived (as did the cable to plug it into the external port, luckily!) and ive been spending most of the day getting to grips with it. It's actually far more useful than i thought it would be. At the minute, my priorties are basically fixing the fascia and replacing the joystick. I will most likely just buy a brand new competition pro if i can find one, as i know they will work the with C64 that i am also working on. I actually already have one that came with said C64 but its buttons have lost their haptic response (although the button itself still works) due to its sheer age (i bought it off a made whos had it for 30 years, and used it as a kid). Any ideas on how to restore or fix one?

Also, as for the fascia. Ill upload a photo when i get a chance. i'm not certain a screw would fix it.