!!!My Sharp X68000 Project Update!!!

CU_AMiGA · 12 August 2011, 19:53

Hey Yo!

A while back i bought myself a Japanese Sharp X68000. I wont explain the whole thing in detail again here is the link for original info thread:

http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=54276

This thread is an update to the above project. Firstly a BIG BIG BIG THANKS to prowler for helping me out with this project! (cheers again buddy!)

I should mention this project has taken me 1/2 a year to achieve and has costed me way to much as it shouldve done - but at least its over now!

Right the idea of the update in this project was to replace the old SASI 30MB hard drive with a 1GB hard drive (or compact flash)

How is this done you may ask? Well i m not quite 100% sure how it works, but it involves reflashing the BIOS or something so that it can read SCSI formatted devices and beyond 30MB (upto 1GB i think). So a master disk with the BIOS SCSI reflashing program installed was needed. This was the first propblem i encountered. The Sharp X68000 uses 5 1/4 floppy disks as its media, and as i dont own any 5 1/4" floppy disk equipment, i had to call prowler to help me out. He kindly managed to setup the floppy disk with the program installed just fine. Here is a link where i got the resources from (and it ll probably explain it better as this whole thing is way above my knowledge!):

http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x..._master_floppy

Next problem was a had to physically mod the socket to the power cable that would provide the power to the SCSIDE. This was used to power the old SASI hard drive that was installed. As this socket was only 3 wires (and the SCSIDE used a 4 socket MOLEX floppy drive cable), i had to cut thes end socket off and put a floppy drive connecter in its place. Not too much of a hassle. After that came the most major headache! (and most costly!) This was a) getting a compatible SCSIDE interface, and a compatible 1GB compact flash card. Well for my SCSIDE, i ended up getting the confirmed working Acard AEC-7720U, see pic below:

http://gamesx.com/wiki/lib/exe/fetch...0:aec7720u.jpg

Before i bought the above, i did try the Acard AEC-7720UW SCSIDE, basically the same as the above apart from it was a 68 pin Ultrawide SCSI version. This didnt work however and so in the end i played it safe and paid a bit extra to buy the AEC-7720U which was already confirmed as working. Another tricky thing i encountered was where to mount this in the machine. I managed to get around this somewhat, by mounting it on the old hard drive mounting bracket. It is sort of a cobbled together job, but it was the best i could do!

Next problem was setting up the compact flash card to be compatible and work with the Sharp X68000 machine. I also wanted to do something extra, not just have it as a blank disk, but i also wanted to have the below disk image onto the compact flash card:

http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x...s_of_mdx_files

Basically its a hard file image with a load of Sharp X68000 games on and some music files (and player!)

This would make this project even all the more awesome!

But putting the image onto the compact flash card and getting it recognised by the Sharp X68000 caused some problems. Once again i didnt have the resources to achieve this so once again prowler stepped in and helped out. This took 2 attempts as the first time it was done, the sharp didnt recognise it at all. The second time formatting the hard file onto the compact flash card proved to be a better success. This was due to using a single slot CF card reader (rather than a 2 slot one like in the previous attempt) and formatting the 1GB compact flash in MASTER rather than SLAVE.

After prowler had redone the compact flash card with that image and i had gotten the replacement SCSIDE i finally had some success and the compact flash was finally recognised by the Sharp X68000!

I can now enjoy playing games from the compact flash card without having to bootup from floppy disks and the pain of disk swapping. More importantly it also saves the disk drives themselves from getting worn out. This is probably the closest the Sharp has to WHDload on the Amiga. You simply select you game with the cursor keys or for more demanding games, just type the exec in pure DOS mode. Another surprise on the hard file is a module disk player that is comparible to OCTAMED for Amiga, it even has some cool music from old computer games installed on there (check out pic of me playing Sonic 1 on MegaDrive!)

Anyway thats enough talk i hope you enjoy looking at the pics and following this thread! I belive that i could be possibly the only guy in the UK to have done such a feat for this lovely machine!

Enjoy!

CU_AMiGA · 12 August 2011, 19:54

Enjoy!

Amiga1992 · 12 August 2011, 20:03

Awesome!!!

CU_AMiGA · 12 August 2011, 20:14

Yo! Managed to sort out the picture problem! please see additional pics!

lopos2000 · 12 August 2011, 22:40

Nice project Well done.

Minuous · 13 August 2011, 07:41

I've been trying to get the X68000 game "Prostitute Maker" to run.
I've already ascertained that it is necessary to boot with both disks (1 and 2) in the drives. This gets me to a loading screen with a cat on it, however it then exits back to the OS a short while later with no error message.
Does anyone know how to get this game running?

Retro1234 · 13 August 2011, 10:24

Yo! Nice

abraXXious · 17 August 2013, 03:21

Hey guys,

I recently decided that having three pristine X68000 machines in my collection, but not being able to use them was a bit of a shame, so I am embarking on doing something with at least one of them.

The unit I would like to do something with is an X68000 Pro (black desktop case). I have the matching monitor, keyboard and mouse.

However, I do not have an old Windows 98 pc (nor do I want one) nor a 5.25" floppy drive. I can get 1.2mb 5.25" floppy disks quite easily, and a 1.2mb 5.25" floppy drive if need be, however it would have to work on at least XP.

The other two alternatives I have come across are to create a null modem cable and use software to transfer files from a pc to the X68000... however, again, I believe this currently requires an ancient Win 98 PC.

The last option is to go the same route as this thread has described - namely installing a newer scsi HD which can be made to work with the sasi interface, or a compactflash adapter on a scsi to ide adapter that can be made to work with the sasi interface.

I have several older scsi hds (1gb, 2gb etc) that may work. I also have a scsi to ide converter (will have to dig it out to find the name and model, but it is one that works well on Amiga scsi apparently). I also have plenty of ide to compactflash adapters and compactflash cards (most 8gb+ but I think I have a couple of smaller units).

Just wondering if someone experienced in this sort of thing would be able to help me through this process - happy to pay for their time.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks guys.

prowler · 17 August 2013, 20:52

Hi abraXXious,

As you will have seen from the opening post, I helped CU_AMiGA set up his X68000's BIOS and hard drive.

And yes, of course I am willing to guide you through the necessary steps to write a 1GB ready made X68000 HD image to a hard drive for use with your X68000 Pro.

It's been a fair while since I've done anything like that, so you'll have to give me some time to gather the information you will need.

CU_AMiGA wanted to keep everything under wraps until the job was completed, so we communicated with each other via PMs and disks were sent back and forth in the post.

However, that meant that the details of how the job was done never got posted in the forums, so that now you're unsure of what you'll have to do to set up your machine.

I will post a full procedure you can follow to set up your machine as soon as I have it prepared.

abraXXious · 18 August 2013, 05:12

Hi Prowler,

thank you very much for your help. As there is not a lot of information and help guides regarding the X68000 I am quite sure that others in the future will find your guide invaluable.

Again, thank you so much for taking the time to help.

12 August 2011, 19:53	#1
CU_AMiGA Banned Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: Exeter Age: 38 Posts: 970	!!!My Sharp X68000 Project Update!!! Hey Yo! A while back i bought myself a Japanese Sharp X68000. I wont explain the whole thing in detail again here is the link for original info thread: http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=54276 This thread is an update to the above project. Firstly a BIG BIG BIG THANKS to prowler for helping me out with this project! (cheers again buddy!) I should mention this project has taken me 1/2 a year to achieve and has costed me way to much as it shouldve done - but at least its over now! Right the idea of the update in this project was to replace the old SASI 30MB hard drive with a 1GB hard drive (or compact flash) How is this done you may ask? Well i m not quite 100% sure how it works, but it involves reflashing the BIOS or something so that it can read SCSI formatted devices and beyond 30MB (upto 1GB i think). So a master disk with the BIOS SCSI reflashing program installed was needed. This was the first propblem i encountered. The Sharp X68000 uses 5 1/4 floppy disks as its media, and as i dont own any 5 1/4" floppy disk equipment, i had to call prowler to help me out. He kindly managed to setup the floppy disk with the program installed just fine. Here is a link where i got the resources from (and it ll probably explain it better as this whole thing is way above my knowledge!): http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x..._master_floppy Next problem was a had to physically mod the socket to the power cable that would provide the power to the SCSIDE. This was used to power the old SASI hard drive that was installed. As this socket was only 3 wires (and the SCSIDE used a 4 socket MOLEX floppy drive cable), i had to cut thes end socket off and put a floppy drive connecter in its place. Not too much of a hassle. After that came the most major headache! (and most costly!) This was a) getting a compatible SCSIDE interface, and a compatible 1GB compact flash card. Well for my SCSIDE, i ended up getting the confirmed working Acard AEC-7720U, see pic below: http://gamesx.com/wiki/lib/exe/fetch...0:aec7720u.jpg Before i bought the above, i did try the Acard AEC-7720UW SCSIDE, basically the same as the above apart from it was a 68 pin Ultrawide SCSI version. This didnt work however and so in the end i played it safe and paid a bit extra to buy the AEC-7720U which was already confirmed as working. Another tricky thing i encountered was where to mount this in the machine. I managed to get around this somewhat, by mounting it on the old hard drive mounting bracket. It is sort of a cobbled together job, but it was the best i could do! Next problem was setting up the compact flash card to be compatible and work with the Sharp X68000 machine. I also wanted to do something extra, not just have it as a blank disk, but i also wanted to have the below disk image onto the compact flash card: http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x...s_of_mdx_files Basically its a hard file image with a load of Sharp X68000 games on and some music files (and player!) This would make this project even all the more awesome! But putting the image onto the compact flash card and getting it recognised by the Sharp X68000 caused some problems. Once again i didnt have the resources to achieve this so once again prowler stepped in and helped out. This took 2 attempts as the first time it was done, the sharp didnt recognise it at all. The second time formatting the hard file onto the compact flash card proved to be a better success. This was due to using a single slot CF card reader (rather than a 2 slot one like in the previous attempt) and formatting the 1GB compact flash in MASTER rather than SLAVE. After prowler had redone the compact flash card with that image and i had gotten the replacement SCSIDE i finally had some success and the compact flash was finally recognised by the Sharp X68000! I can now enjoy playing games from the compact flash card without having to bootup from floppy disks and the pain of disk swapping. More importantly it also saves the disk drives themselves from getting worn out. This is probably the closest the Sharp has to WHDload on the Amiga. You simply select you game with the cursor keys or for more demanding games, just type the exec in pure DOS mode. Another surprise on the hard file is a module disk player that is comparible to OCTAMED for Amiga, it even has some cool music from old computer games installed on there (check out pic of me playing Sonic 1 on MegaDrive!) Anyway thats enough talk i hope you enjoy looking at the pics and following this thread! I belive that i could be possibly the only guy in the UK to have done such a feat for this lovely machine! Enjoy! Attached Thumbnails Last edited by CU_AMiGA; 12 August 2011 at 20:11.

12 August 2011, 19:54	#2
CU_AMiGA Banned Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: Exeter Age: 38 Posts: 970	Enjoy! Attached Thumbnails Last edited by CU_AMiGA; 12 August 2011 at 20:13.

17 August 2013, 03:21	#8
abraXXious Registered User Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Mount Isa / Australia Posts: 48	X68000 Pro Scsi or IDE install Hey guys, I recently decided that having three pristine X68000 machines in my collection, but not being able to use them was a bit of a shame, so I am embarking on doing something with at least one of them. The unit I would like to do something with is an X68000 Pro (black desktop case). I have the matching monitor, keyboard and mouse. However, I do not have an old Windows 98 pc (nor do I want one) nor a 5.25" floppy drive. I can get 1.2mb 5.25" floppy disks quite easily, and a 1.2mb 5.25" floppy drive if need be, however it would have to work on at least XP. The other two alternatives I have come across are to create a null modem cable and use software to transfer files from a pc to the X68000... however, again, I believe this currently requires an ancient Win 98 PC. The last option is to go the same route as this thread has described - namely installing a newer scsi HD which can be made to work with the sasi interface, or a compactflash adapter on a scsi to ide adapter that can be made to work with the sasi interface. I have several older scsi hds (1gb, 2gb etc) that may work. I also have a scsi to ide converter (will have to dig it out to find the name and model, but it is one that works well on Amiga scsi apparently). I also have plenty of ide to compactflash adapters and compactflash cards (most 8gb+ but I think I have a couple of smaller units). Just wondering if someone experienced in this sort of thing would be able to help me through this process - happy to pay for their time. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks guys.

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12 August 2011, 20:03	#3
Amiga1992 Registered User Join Date: May 2001 Location: ? Posts: 19,644	Awesome!!!

12 August 2011, 20:14	#4
CU_AMiGA Banned Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: Exeter Age: 38 Posts: 970	Yo! Managed to sort out the picture problem! please see additional pics!

12 August 2011, 22:40	#5
lopos2000 Zone Friend Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: Cider is best In The West Posts: 1,238	Nice project Well done.

13 August 2011, 07:41	#6
Minuous Coder/webmaster/gamer Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Canberra/Australia Posts: 2,629	I've been trying to get the X68000 game "Prostitute Maker" to run. I've already ascertained that it is necessary to boot with both disks (1 and 2) in the drives. This gets me to a loading screen with a cat on it, however it then exits back to the OS a short while later with no error message. Does anyone know how to get this game running?

13 August 2011, 10:24	#7
Retro1234 Phone Homer Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: 5150 Posts: 5,773	Yo! Nice

17 August 2013, 20:52	#9
prowler Global Moderator Join Date: Aug 2008 Location: Sidcup, England Posts: 10,300	Hi abraXXious, As you will have seen from the opening post, I helped CU_AMiGA set up his X68000's BIOS and hard drive. And yes, of course I am willing to guide you through the necessary steps to write a 1GB ready made X68000 HD image to a hard drive for use with your X68000 Pro. It's been a fair while since I've done anything like that, so you'll have to give me some time to gather the information you will need. CU_AMiGA wanted to keep everything under wraps until the job was completed, so we communicated with each other via PMs and disks were sent back and forth in the post. However, that meant that the details of how the job was done never got posted in the forums, so that now you're unsure of what you'll have to do to set up your machine. I will post a full procedure you can follow to set up your machine as soon as I have it prepared.

18 August 2013, 05:12	#10
abraXXious Registered User Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Mount Isa / Australia Posts: 48	Hi Prowler, thank you very much for your help. As there is not a lot of information and help guides regarding the X68000 I am quite sure that others in the future will find your guide invaluable. Again, thank you so much for taking the time to help.

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