The fake CD32 Classic

[Cobe]

Nothing spectacular, just few of mine

[quantum8]

Nice update, thanks!

[str0m]

I picked up another 8GB CF card to check this out but it's not good news for me

I have a CD32 with TF330 which came with a CF card and whdload/wb setup. I find a lot of the games black screen on loading. I have put the latest whdload on, removed any key files I could find, downloaded the latest slaves for a couple ie Chaos Engine and Rodland but still no luck. Put WB into non-laced mode as I was in hires-laced and I read somewhere that would trip whdload out but no difference.

So anyway, same issue with your image. Most games black screen on loading. Most have some disk activity then nothing. The odd one, Chaos Engine for example, the green power light goes dim. Rygar one attempt I saw the blue Loading text but all other times just black screen.

Some of the games work but most just give the black screen.

I don't have Winuae. Wondering if whilst it all works fine in that or say a 1200 with a 030, the CD32 with a TF330 is doing something a bit different and so not working. Perhaps someone could try Winuae with the CD32 preset but then change it to 030?

You can see Quantum8 has the same issue. I also had the menu corruption but not every time. It's very weird.

thanks.

[earok]

Workbench isn't on the image, so high res, laced etc shouldn't be relevant. It's meant to boot straight to the menu.

Are you copying the files on to a compact flash card, rather than imaging it?

Edit: Tried Chaos Engine on real CD32+TF328, works OK, it could be possible that there's some sort of 030 incompatibility as you say. But I don't quite follow why it's loading work bench, if it's cleanly installed on the card there should be no workbench, it should just boot the menu.

[str0m]

Sorry, this bit I was referring to the CF card which came with my TF330 "I have a CD32 with TF330 which came with a CF card and whdload/wb setup. I find a lot of the games black screen on loading. I have put the latest whdload on, removed any key files I could find, downloaded the latest slaves for a couple ie Chaos Engine and Rodland but still no luck. Put WB into non-laced mode as I was in hires-laced and I read somewhere that would trip whdload out but no difference."


I used w32diskimager with yours to a different CF card and it completed OK. As I get the same issue with most games on your image as with the one that came with my TF330 it has to point to a CD32+TF330 issue and Quantum8 has the same problem

[Cobe]

WB screen title bar during loading bugged me from the begining...

First I thought, ok I'll put black system-configuration like we do for cds.
I knew I wont be able to use -=quit to dos=- then but I thought I'll just boot
without s-s when I need dos. But to my surprise screen was all black. I always thought system-configuration is not read if you boot without s-s..

I tried messing around with palette.prefs but it didnt go..

So I made tiny prog "lgt" that loads wb palette from lgt.pal file
Copied black system-configuration to devs:
lgt and lgt.pal to dh0:
and added lgt before quit in -=quit to dos=- runme script

Maybe someone will find this useful too.
Archive attached.

[earok]

Originally Posted by Cobe

WB screen title bar during loading bugged me from the begining...

First I thought, ok I'll put black system configuration like we do for cds.
I knew I wont be able to use -=quit to dos=- then but I thought I'll just boot
without s-s when I need dos. But to my surprise screen was all black. I always thought system.device is not read if you boot without s-s..

I tried messing around with palette.prefs but it didnt go..

So I made tiny prog "lgt" that loads wb palette from lgt.pal file
Copied black systemconfiguration to devs:
lgt and lgt.pal to dh0:
and added lgt before quit in -=quit to dos=- runme script

Maybe someone will find this useful too.
Archive attached.

That's real cool, I might need to steal it if I make a third update. There's a handful of games on the release that have text screens (eg, with Lemmings I've included text instructions for using mouse or gamepad), where I'll either need to use lgt or just replace the text screen with a bitmap.

[Cobe]

Sure, use it freely if it suits you.

[supaduper]

Originally Posted by str0m

Sorry, this bit I was referring to the CF card which came with my TF330 "I have a CD32 with TF330 which came with a CF card and whdload/wb setup. I find a lot of the games black screen on loading. I have put the latest whdload on, removed any key files I could find, downloaded the latest slaves for a couple ie Chaos Engine and Rodland but still no luck. Put WB into non-laced mode as I was in hires-laced and I read somewhere that would trip whdload out but no difference."


I used w32diskimager with yours to a different CF card and it completed OK. As I get the same issue with most games on your image as with the one that came with my TF330 it has to point to a CD32+TF330 issue and Quantum8 has the same problem

Hey bud I have emailed you regarding the probs you are having and I should be able to help you out

**NOTE
Just to add this info here:

Regarding the TF330 there is a bug in V2 of the firmware and this means the DISABLE function does not work (Just remove the Jumper next to the IDE port to disable the TF330) , this disables the TF330 fom the CD32 and returns it to a stock 2mb CD32 which will allow you to run CDs or CDr collections as some do not like the TF330 FASTRAM
There is a V3 which should resolve this bug

Also earoks sd CD32 card compilation works fine on my CD32 with TF330 installed

[thairacerjp]

same here, my CD32 TF330 (wifi also ) , I really enjoyed (thanks supaduper and steven Leary ) , flashed V3 as soon as it was out and no problems at all, chaos engine working perfectly, earok CD too and all the games I have tested are ok.

Originally Posted by supaduper

Hey bud I have emailed you regarding the probs you are having and I should be able to help you out

**NOTE
Just to add this info here:

Regarding the TF330 there is a bug in V2 of the firmware and this means the DISABLE function does not work (Just remove the Jumper next to the IDE port to disable the TF330) , this disables the TF330 fom the CD32 and returns it to a stock 2mb CD32 which will allow you to run CDs or CDr collections as some do not like the TF330 FASTRAM
There is a V3 which should resolve this bug

Also earoks sd CD32 card compilation works fine on my CD32 with TF330 installed

[leeuwtje]

Hi Eric,


Last months I didn't have time for the amiga hobby. I didn't follow this great project, which looks very promising even tough there are many difficulties to overcome. Many people in this post want to try their own compilation, but I was wondering if that is such a good idea. Since it is your project, is it not better to centralise idea's here? I like to try this to on my tf328. If I may ask you, what is the recent status of the project now january 2021? There have been some updates to overcome difficulties, is it working good now? I agree that if a game is very difficult to fit in, better leave it and choose a robust set of games in the image. It is better to choose a set of working games instead of collector perfection and half working system. Very good job building this!

[leeuwtje]

update:

I flashed you img file today on a CF card. On my TF328 it runs fine. I tried a couple of games, and I couldn't find a problem so far. I will test some others later. So far I am impressed. Ofcourse on my stock CPU some games are too much asked, like alien breed 3D and stuff. But that is a challenge for people to buy your TF330 version! Very good motivation Sure, it is easy to start you asking for requests for the list, we all have our favorites, I will not be greedy. All right, maybe one thing perhaps, does this SimCD32 tool not work for CD32 iso's like disposable hero? The CD32 CD version music has a better beat, or can an amiga fan not like the game CD music for Amiga CD32?

With your work I think I would need a long IDE cable to be able to lead it outside the CD32. If I want to run my workbench CF card, I don't like to open up my CD32 every time to change cf's. Or is there another solution for that?

[leeuwtje]

For what it is worth, I found a nasty thing in 'Another World'. In a certain joystick combo, the game resets to the beginning of the game. That is weird, in other slave versions I don't remember this. Maybe it is in the WHDload slave version of the game?

Alfred chicken has weird lines when moving up in a level. This was already mentioned by someone i think.

[quantum8]

Originally Posted by str0m

Sorry, this bit I was referring to the CF card which came with my TF330 "I have a CD32 with TF330 which came with a CF card and whdload/wb setup. I find a lot of the games black screen on loading. I have put the latest whdload on, removed any key files I could find, downloaded the latest slaves for a couple ie Chaos Engine and Rodland but still no luck. Put WB into non-laced mode as I was in hires-laced and I read somewhere that would trip whdload out but no difference."


I used w32diskimager with yours to a different CF card and it completed OK. As I get the same issue with most games on your image as with the one that came with my TF330 it has to point to a CD32+TF330 issue and Quantum8 has the same problem

With a bit of help from Supadupa and a mate, I managed to solve the black screen and freezing issue for the games I wanted to play: I changed the CF adapter that came with my TF330 with an IDE to SD adapter and it now works perfectly with the games I was trying to play.


I still have the corrupted fonts issue on the main launcher but this is pretty minor.

[str0m]

Originally Posted by quantum8

With a bit of help from Supadupa and a mate, I managed to solve the black screen and freezing issue for the games I wanted to play: I changed the CF adapter that came with my TF330 with an IDE to SD adapter and it now works perfectly with the games I was trying to play.


I still have the corrupted fonts issue on the main launcher but this is pretty minor.

Interesting but weird. Supaduper had a look at my card and it ran fine in his CD32 yet I still have the black screen issues etc in mine. Perhaps it's some sort of timing related issue or power.

Can you point me to the IDE to SD adapter you bought please, thanks. Can I then use win32 disk imager or similar in Windows (sorry) to image my current CF card then write the image back to an SD one or do I need to use WinUAE to setup the partitions etc on the SD card first?

[quantum8]

One of my friends swear by them as he had loads of issues with various CF adapters too, but none with the SD ones. Maybe there's some in compatibilities with the amiga IDE implementation.
I got this one from Ali express, but there should be loads on ebay that are the same:
https://a.aliexpress.com/_m0zjaXp

And yes you can use an imager exactly as you do with your CF card. Just ensure the size you're writing to is the same size or larger.

[str0m]

Originally Posted by quantum8

One of my friends swear by them as he had loads of issues with various CF adapters too, but none with the SD ones. Maybe there's some in compatibilities with the amiga IDE implementation.
I got this one from Ali express, but there should be loads on ebay that are the same:
https://a.aliexpress.com/_m0zjaXp

And yes you can use an imager exactly as you do with your CF card. Just ensure the size you're writing to is the same size or larger.

Great thanks I will give one a go

[jotd]

Supaduper pointed me to the hama brand card reader. It works flawlessly, it's true (previous card reader corrupted my CF card)

mentionned here (by me ) https://retrocomputing.stackexchange...es/13432#13432

[str0m]

Originally Posted by jotd

Supaduper pointed me to the hama brand card reader. It works flawlessly, it's true (previous card reader corrupted my CF card)

mentionned here (by me ) https://retrocomputing.stackexchange...es/13432#13432

Got a Hama one on my desk although different colour


Hoping the SD adapter fixes my issues as there are so many games I want to play and a look through the menu before showed a great selection by earok on this one


thanks

[str0m]

quantum8 it worked! Still get menu text corruption but nearly all games worked so thanks for the tip! My CD32 clearly has some issues still, bad recapping I'm guessing as the sound went quiet after a couple of hours and super stardust gets a lot of gfx glitches which I've seen off CD as well but still a massive improvement

earok great compilation thanks! Spent a few hours on it last night, Rodland tune stuck in my head!

I did have issues trying to load Pinball Fantasies and Illusions, both gave the error in the photo. Could still be my CD32 though which clearly has capacitor/attitude problems lol