Software patches more more speed

[gary]

Back when I had a kickstart 1.2 machine I found a CLI program that increased the speed of floppy disk reads. It seemed to do this by temporarily disabling some other features of the system while the read was in progress (I noticed that moving the mouse pointer was slow and jerky while reading from floppy).

Can anyone recommend CLI programs that speed up the operating system (specifically for displaying large HAM6 animations on a 68000 machine) using similar techniques?

I'm already looking through Aminet and will try the various ROM patches but I was wondering if there are programs that allow disabling of floppy disk/serial DMA/interrupts to squeeze a little more grunt from the processor while those resources are not needed

[Miggy2TheMax]

sorry nothing that comes to mind gary, you've already probably have stipped down you boot up and used add21k and stuff like that... the main reason for my post is to admire your enthusiasm for squezzing as much cpu cycles out that 68000 as you can .. reminds me of me actually

[gary]

Haha. Yes I like to push this hardware if can - I like being able to play movies converted from todays AVIs on a 1987 computer (HAM mode is brilliant) despite the lower resolution/frame rate.
If I could overclock the thing I would

I found that the problem in my animation playback was due to the task priority. By changing the priority to be the same as the SCSI controller they play much nicer now. I've converted that 'junior/senior' video to HAM 3/4 screen but can only play it back at full speed with an accellerator (unless I start to remove frames).

[Amiga1992]

Originally posted by gary
If I could overclock the thing I would

Have you tried installing a 14Mhz 68000?

I've converted that 'junior/senior' video to HAM 3/4 screen but can only play it back at full speed with an accellerator (unless I start to remove frames). [/B]

Hey, that video can be converted to 64 or 32 colors without problems, I BET. Most screens have no more than 16 colors or less.

[gary]

Have you tried installing a 14Mhz 68000?

I would if I had one. What would I need? the processor and a new crystal?

Hey, that video can be converted to 64 or 32 colors without problems, I BET. Most screens have no more than 16 colors or less.

Yeah, thats what I thought - the animation seemed to be free of anti-aliasing. Maybe if the movie I downloaded was uncompressed I could use software to accurately convert it back to its original form (where they probably were using less than 32 colours for most parts). Once these things are compressed for playback (usually 16 bit colour depth) converting them down to anything under 256 colours produces strange results (at least from the software I've tried). Most of the PC software offers many nice video effects except colour reduction < 256 colours

Also there are fade in/out effects which may be better handled in with HAM as opposed to palette changing.

[Amiga1992]

I would load this up on something like After Effects, and export it as PNG frames. Then, I would process them all through Fireworks and reduce their colors to the MAX, one by one Im afraid. Then export as GIF and import this as a sequence into Ppaint or something.

This is how I've done some conversion, and this is the method that works best for me Fireworks is the best thing you can get to optimize a palette in Wincocks

As for the 14Mhz 68000... I think you just ahve to replace the old onewith the new one. But I am not sure.

[Miggy2TheMax]

Originally posted by gary
I would if I had one. What would I need? the processor and a new crystal?

[snip]

Actually all you'd need is just the processor as the amiga has a crystal which runs at 14.28Mhz. But you will need to do some soldering work.. bend one of the pins up from the 68000 (CLK pin) and solder a wire straight from the 14.28Mhz crystal straight into the CPU itself. Ok now before you get all excited on me and say .. thats easy! I have done this mod before and sadly it did not work for me. possibly because I could only get the P12 68000 which is rated at 12Mhz. Make sure you get the 68000 that is rated at 16Mhz.. can be hard to find, but there are ppl that sell them on the internet. There is a lot of documentation about this mod in aminet look in hard/hack path.

Now having described the DIY way to do it, you could always get an ICD Adspeed (have one) they work like a charm and are dog easy to install and operate, but can also be pricey and hard to find.

Hope this helps somewhat.. if you are interested in going ahead with attempting to drop a 16Mhz 68000 into your amiga drop us a line on how your going with that hack! cheers m.