Emulated PCMCIA, problem using PrepCard to format as disk?

[Old_Bob]

I've been fiddling around with this for the last little while and can't seem to get it going.

If create an appropriately sized HDF file, then add it using the A600/A1200 PCMCIA option set to IDE. The Workbench PrepCard utility seems to detect it just fine but when I try to "Prepare as DISK", it gives me an error message saying...

"Unable to prepare card: Error while writing changes"

Using it with the SRAM option set it shows up correctly as extra RAM so I can only guess that i'm not doing something right.

Has anybody else tried this? Did you get it to work?

B

[Toni Wilen]

Prepcard supports PCMCIA SRAM only.

[Old_Bob]

Originally Posted by Toni Wilen

Prepcard supports PCMCIA SRAM only.

So this simply doesn't work at all, then?

Or, is there another way to set up and use CC0:?

B

[Toni Wilen]

CC0: is SRAM only. You need 3rd party drivers for PCMCIA IDE support.

[thomas]

Originally Posted by Old_Bob

The Workbench PrepCard utility seems to detect it just fine but when I try to "Prepare as DISK", it gives me an error message saying...

"Unable to prepare card: Error while writing changes"

Using it with the SRAM option set it shows up correctly as extra RAM so I can only guess that i'm not doing something right.

Has anybody else tried this? Did you get it to work?

You have to boot without the PCMCIA card first, then press F12 and add it. Only then it is not used as system RAM and you can use PrepCard to reformat it as disk.

And you cannot have more than 2MB Z2 RAM, otherwise the PCMCIA card appears as write protected.

[Old_Bob]

Originally Posted by thomas

You have to boot without the PCMCIA card first, then press F12 and add it. Only then it is not used as system RAM and you can use PrepCard to reformat it as disk.

And you cannot have more than 2MB Z2 RAM, otherwise the PCMCIA card appears as write protected.

Thanks. I've just given this a quick try and the result for me here is the same.

Is the error message saying, in a typically round-about manner, that it's failing simply because of some write protection problem? Read/write is, of course, enabled in Hardfile Settings so I don't know what else to click on to enable it if that's the case.

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[thomas]

This is what I did:

- on the quickstart page select A1200 4MB expanded config with low compatibility, Workbench3.1 in DF0 and Extras3.1 in DF1
- go to RAM page and reduce Z2 RAM from 4 to 2 MB
- go to floppies page and move speed slider to turbo
- click on start
- run Extras -> Tools -> PrepCard (shows "no card detected")
- press F12, go to Harddrives page, Add Hardfile
- below "new hardfile" enter 4 MB and click on Create, save as sram.hdf
- change controller to PCMCIA SRAM and click on ok
- for me controller changed to PCMCIA IDE, so I had to open properties and switch it back to SRAM again
- click ok. PrepCard will now show "usable as system RAM".
- click on "Prep as Disk", accept "all data will be deleted".
- click on Quit
- after a few seconds an icon named Empty will appear
- select execute command from the menu and enter newshell
- enter
install cc0:
copy df0: cc0: all clone
copy df1: cc0: all clone
- press F12, go to floppies page, eject df0 and df1, click on Ok
- press Ctrl-Win-Win, it should boot from CC0.

[Old_Bob]

Originally Posted by thomas

- change controller to PCMCIA SRAM and click on ok

This is the setting I was getting wrong. I was thinking it had to be set to IDE in order to use it as a drive. With it set to SRAM, it works!

Which I guess was what Toni was trying to tell me in his first post, lol.

Thanks all.

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[alexh]

To use it as IDE I imagine you would have needed to use something like CFD?

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

[Tomislav]

Here is newest CFD 1.33:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/m22hbwr7r4...FD133.lha?dl=0

[idrougge]

Err, why isn't it on Aminet?