Amiga questions you've always been too embarrassed to ask

[wiz12]

Originally Posted by Jope

Put the icon you like to envarc:sys/def_disk.info

Thanks that sort of works as the icon is changed but still ghosted, also I had to call it def_DF0.info rather than def_disk.info.

[Jope]

Do you have PeterK's icon library installed?

If so, you can disable ghosting http://eab.abime.net/showpost.php?p=...2&postcount=79

[wiz12]

Yes, I'm using PeterK's icon library and that worked, thanks.

[marcfrick2112]

What is the largest hard drive that can be used on an Amiga under OS 3.2? Is 1TB possible? My Amiga ISO directory (on PC) is umm, big...

[NLS]

Originally Posted by marcfrick2112

What is the largest hard drive that can be used on an Amiga under OS 3.2? Is 1TB possible? My Amiga ISO directory (on PC) is umm, big...

How come? You have non-existent Amiga ISO?
I mean if you have ISOs that are not shared, maybe share them?
The current TOSEC ISO Commodore folder is 406GB (and 1700 files).
It will take time to reach 1TB and I don't think we actually miss so many disks.

[Jope]

Originally Posted by marcfrick2112

What is the largest hard drive that can be used on an Amiga under OS 3.2? Is 1TB possible? My Amiga ISO directory (on PC) is umm, big...

Huge disks should work fine with 64bit disk access, but you'll end up having a ton of partitions, as the Amiga filesystems either don't support very large partitions (by today's standards) or will take more RAM to handle those large partitions than you can fit in the machine.

Another problem is filling up this disk when you dump your entire ISO collection to it. An old machine with slow buses, you'll be looking for quite a wait when copying data to it. :-)

[dreadnought]

What's the code/method to totally skip fighting guards in the castle in Indy Last Crusade? I seem to recall I read somewhere it's possible.

[marcfrick2112]

Thanks Jope, and others. Ok, I wasn't trying to mislead anyone, I don't have 1TB of Amiga ISOs, I honestly thought I was close, but I was hoping to have all my Amiga stuff, Programs, ISOs, and PDF's on an actual Amiga. Sorry, not trying to mislead anyone.

What is the max. partition size of AOS 3.2? I had an 8.5 GB hard drive on a A1200 power tower BITD, and remember it was a pain to get working.

[alkis21]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

What's the code/method to totally skip fighting guards in the castle in Indy Last Crusade? I seem to recall I read somewhere it's possible.

You need to press '0' on the keypad. But I don't remember if it works in the Amiga version.

[Jope]

Originally Posted by marcfrick2112

What is the max. partition size of AOS 3.2? I had an 8.5 GB hard drive on a A1200 power tower BITD, and remember it was a pain to get working.

It depends on the filesystem and the amount of RAM you have installed.

For PFS3, the normal limit is around 104GB, there is no large spike in RAM usage at any time. There are experimental modes for larger partitions (Toni reckons 412G might still be safe), but there are no guarantees of data integrity when you go past 104G.

For FFS it boils down to how much RAM you have installed. With 512 byte sectors, formatting/validating FFS takes 0.5MB of RAM per 1GB of disk. This will scale if you increase the sector size. Here's a quote from the FAQ:

A 500 MB partition with 512 bytes per block = 256 KB of RAM required
A 1 GB partition with 4096 bytes per block = 64 KB of RAM required
A 1 GB partition with 512 bytes per block = 0.5 MB of RAM required
A 64 GB partition with 512 bytes per block = 32 MB of RAM required
A 64 GB partition with 4096 bytes per block = 4 MB of RAM required

It won't use this much RAM in regular use, but I'm sure everyone who has ever used an Amiga with FFS volumes will have enjoyed waiting for validation at several points in their life.

Here's the FAQ, it has lots of other interesting info. https://aminet.net/package/docs/help/AmigaOS_3.2-FAQ

[droopy]

If I read a kckstart chip with the Eprom reader (Xgecu TL866II)


How do I use the file in FS-UAE and PiStorm ?


I guiess I have to convert the file (Byteswap) or something for use as a valid kickstart file for FS-UAE and can I use the same format for PIStorm ?

[Gryfon]

I’m unaware of a method like that using the ROM via EPROM and reader.

But there are some other ways to obtain a working ROM file for emulation. If your Amiga still works, you can use “Transrom” to download the ROM to an image. Alternatively you can get every ROM from 1.2 to 3.0 by buying Amiga Forever.

Originally Posted by droopy

If I read a kckstart chip with the Eprom reader (Xgecu TL866II)


How do I use the file in FS-UAE and PiStorm ?


I guiess I have to convert the file (Byteswap) or something for use as a valid kickstart file for FS-UAE and can I use the same format for PIStorm ?

[Daedalus]

Yes, you can byteswap the image and it should work just fine for an emulator.

[droopy]

Originally Posted by Gryfon

I’m unaware of a method like that using the ROM via EPROM and reader.


Thanx for the reply.


But there are some other ways to obtain a working ROM file for emulation. If your Amiga still works, you can use “Transrom” to download the ROM to an image. Alternatively you can get every ROM from 1.2 to 3.0 by buying Amiga Forever.

I own the Amiga forever licence and have some rom files.
What I would like to do is to read a rom chip with the Eprom reader/writer
The files I get are either .bin or .hex. They work fine for duplicating any rom in new Eproms.



I would like to use the .bin or .hex files to function as a .rom file in Pistorm and FS-UAE.


I have some special roms I would like to read and try out in the UAE and The Pistorm, but since I only have them in hardware form I need to get them as working files.

[Lord Aga]

Originally Posted by Jope

It depends on the filesystem and the amount of RAM you have installed.

For PFS3, the normal limit is around 104GB, there is no large spike in RAM usage at any time. There are experimental modes for larger partitions (Toni reckons 412G might still be safe), but there are no guarantees of data integrity when you go past 104G.

For FFS it boils down to how much RAM you have installed. With 512 byte sectors, formatting/validating FFS takes 0.5MB of RAM per 1GB of disk. This will scale if you increase the sector size. Here's a quote from the FAQ:


It won't use this much RAM in regular use, but I'm sure everyone who has ever used an Amiga with FFS volumes will have enjoyed waiting for validation at several points in their life.

Here's the FAQ, it has lots of other interesting info. https://aminet.net/package/docs/help/AmigaOS_3.2-FAQ

Do drives and partitions take CHIP RAM or FAST RAM?

[Jope]

Fast RAM is preferred.

[Thomas Richter]

Originally Posted by Lord Aga

Do drives and partitions take CHIP RAM or FAST RAM?

You mean the buffers you add with AddBuffers? They take RAM of type "BufMemType", which is indicated in the mount list or RDB.

[Lord Aga]

I mean when you connect a new floppy drive, hard drive... Without any setups or tinkering, which RAM will Amiga take that little bit from?

[NLS]

Originally Posted by Lord Aga

I mean when you connect a new floppy drive, hard drive... Without any setups or tinkering, which RAM will Amiga take that little bit from?

IIRC, the default is "anymem" which in turn is Chip first.
Except if you use the command "fastmemfirst" (or something - sorry it's been years) or edit bufmemtype for each entry.

[Daedalus]

Originally Posted by NLS

IIRC, the default is "anymem" which in turn is Chip first.
Except if you use the command "fastmemfirst" (or something - sorry it's been years) or edit bufmemtype for each entry.

"Any" memory uses the highest priority memory available, which is normally fast. It will only use chip if there's no fast RAM, the fast RAM isn't autodetected and not added to the memory pool when the device is mounted, or the device is set to use 24-bit RAM (e.g. Zorro-II DMA cards), and all the fast RAM is in 32-bit space.