NTSC, PAL, and Games

Tempest 2084 · 01 February 2016, 05:38

I'm not quite sure where to put this, but since it has to do with the hardware on the Amiga I guess here is as good as anywhere.

I have an Amiga 2000 with KS 3.1 roms and an Indivision ECS board hooked up to a VGA monitor. I also have a switch installed that will supposedly switch my system between NTSC and PAL (it's normally an NTSC system). My questions are:

1. If I play a PAL game on my system without adjusting anything, will it play alright because of the Indivision board or will the system still being set to NTSC cause timing issues?

2. Does WHDload select the correct video/system type automatically or do I manually have to do it?

3. If I hold down both buttons on the mouse at startup and select PAL will that let me play PAL games on my system without problems?

4. Does my switch basically do the same thing as the mouse button menu l mentioned in 3?

Basically I'm trying to find the easiest way to play both PAL and NTSC games on my system without having to manually boot the system up into the correct mode since I may not know if ghe game is PAL or NTSC ahead of time.

TjLaZer · 01 February 2016, 07:15

1. Running a PAL game on a NTSC Amiga may or may not work unless you switch your system into PAL mode. Some games will just run in NTSC mode and work fine, but are chopped off on the bottom of the screen. Other games will flicker badly and have corrupt graphics, and others, will not work at all.

2. No, you have to enter the PAL tooltype to run a WHDLoad game in PAL on a NTSC system. If you run a NTSC game on your system you do not need to enter the NTSC tooltype, as that is your native mode.

3. Not always, but most of the time it will work. Some games, need to have a tool like BootPAL run, to get them to run in PAL on a warm boot. (Non DOS games come in mind for this one, ie games that do not boot to AmigaDOS, they start loading directly hitting the hardware)

4. It works better than the menu, as it forces the system to that mode, always. As on reboots it will always be in that mode, and games will always work vs what I mentioned in 3.

01 February 2016, 05:38	#1
Tempest 2084 Prototype Historian Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: SE MI / USA Posts: 420	NTSC, PAL, and Games I'm not quite sure where to put this, but since it has to do with the hardware on the Amiga I guess here is as good as anywhere. I have an Amiga 2000 with KS 3.1 roms and an Indivision ECS board hooked up to a VGA monitor. I also have a switch installed that will supposedly switch my system between NTSC and PAL (it's normally an NTSC system). My questions are: 1. If I play a PAL game on my system without adjusting anything, will it play alright because of the Indivision board or will the system still being set to NTSC cause timing issues? 2. Does WHDload select the correct video/system type automatically or do I manually have to do it? 3. If I hold down both buttons on the mouse at startup and select PAL will that let me play PAL games on my system without problems? 4. Does my switch basically do the same thing as the mouse button menu l mentioned in 3? Basically I'm trying to find the easiest way to play both PAL and NTSC games on my system without having to manually boot the system up into the correct mode since I may not know if ghe game is PAL or NTSC ahead of time.

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01 February 2016, 07:15	#2
TjLaZer Registered User Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Tacoma, WA USA Age: 52 Posts: 1,915	1. Running a PAL game on a NTSC Amiga may or may not work unless you switch your system into PAL mode. Some games will just run in NTSC mode and work fine, but are chopped off on the bottom of the screen. Other games will flicker badly and have corrupt graphics, and others, will not work at all. 2. No, you have to enter the PAL tooltype to run a WHDLoad game in PAL on a NTSC system. If you run a NTSC game on your system you do not need to enter the NTSC tooltype, as that is your native mode. 3. Not always, but most of the time it will work. Some games, need to have a tool like BootPAL run, to get them to run in PAL on a warm boot. (Non DOS games come in mind for this one, ie games that do not boot to AmigaDOS, they start loading directly hitting the hardware) 4. It works better than the menu, as it forces the system to that mode, always. As on reboots it will always be in that mode, and games will always work vs what I mentioned in 3.

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