A600 Kickstart upgrade = longer boot time!

[PowerPie5000]

I've just replaced the 37.300 rom in one of my A600's to the 37.350 version (Kickstart 2.05) and have noticed it now takes a few more seconds for it to reach the Kickstart boot screen! Is this normal? It now stays on the white screen for longer when i power up the A600

[FOL]

Originally Posted by PowerPie5000

I've just replaced the 37.300 rom in one of my A600's to the 37.350 version (Kickstart 2.05) and have noticed it now takes a few more seconds for it to reach the Kickstart boot screen! Is this normal? It now stays on the white screen for longer when i power up the A600

Thats fine, its just giving more time to detect slow HDD's.

Same thing happens when you for from KS3.0 to KS3.1 on an A1200. With 3.1 it takes like 40 secs.

[Photon]

40 seconds!?

Well, I guess it could, but I guess then you must have some CD-ROM spinup time or some large chain of devices attached FOL?

Yes, 3.0 might be slightly quicker, but my boot-time on A600 kick 3.1 is very quick. I did terminate the floppy drive, which saved ... 6-8 seconds or more? (See my other thread.) Also, I have fastram, which might help. And the only drive connected is the CF on the IDE port.

If you don't want to use a terminator, a simple non-installed Amiga formatted floppy inserted at boot time can save 2 seconds or so IIRC.

[alexh]

I believe if you put a disk drive or a terminator on the IDE port it will be faster. But I may be wrong. I've always had something fitted to the IDE in my A600

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/...roducts_id=831

[Loedown]

Originally Posted by alexh

I believe if you put a disk drive or a terminator on the IDE port it will be faster. But I may be wrong. I've always had something fitted to the IDE in my A600

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/...roducts_id=831

SCSI I have heard of for termination, but never IDE, what's the reason behind this, any ideas, Alex?

Paul

[alexh]

I don't think it is termination in the classic SCSI sense.

The normal boot sequence probably polls for an IDE HD for N seconds before defaulting to a different boot method.

I believe this device is a simple passive circuit which fools the software / hardware into detecting the connection of a HD. The software tries to 'enumerate' the HDD and fails. This exits the HD polling loop more quickly than through timeout and therefore accelerates the boot sequence.

But I could be wrong. It may be A4000 specific (hence it's name).

I think it was invented either here on over on Amiga.org so if you search these forums you'll find the thread all about it.

[PowerPie5000]

Thanks for the replies

My a600 with the 37.350 rom takes approx 12 seconds to reach the kickstart boot screen and my other a600 with 37.300 rom only takes about 5 seconds! It's even longer on both machines if i use a 2mb or 4mb PCMCIA sram card.

So it's nothing to worry about... I just thought maybe i had a dodgy rom chip

[Loedown]

Originally Posted by alexh

I don't think it is termination in the classic SCSI sense.

The normal boot sequence probably polls for an IDE HD for N seconds before defaulting to a different boot method.

I believe this device is a simple passive circuit which fools the software / hardware into detecting the connection of a HD. The software tries to 'enumerate' the HDD and fails. This exits the HD polling loop more quickly than through timeout and therefore accelerates the boot sequence.

But I could be wrong. It may be A4000 specific (hence it's name).

I think it was invented either here on over on Amiga.org so if you search these forums you'll find the thread all about it.

http://aminet.net/package/docs/hard/no4000ide

It should work on any Amiga, but as you said, it's a HDD bypass circuit.

Paul

[Jope]

Indeed, not an actual terminator like in SCSI, this one is merely a driver-fooling device.

[FOL]

Originally Posted by Photon

40 seconds!?
Well, I guess it could, but I guess then you must have some CD-ROM spinup time or some large chain of devices attached FOL?

I have nothing connected, just the mobo.

The first time I came across this I thought I killed my A1200. Then I figured out it was just delayed after leaving it on for about 40 secs.

It might be 40 secs for me, as I normally have mobo on their own, with nothing connected (not even a floppy). I have noticed when floppy aint connected it tries to talk to it and adds like 5 - 10 secs to boot even when HDD is connected. This is to be expected as there wouldnt be floppy terminators for sale otherwise, .

[Fingerlickin_B]

Originally Posted by FOL

I have nothing connected, just the mobo.

The first time I came across this I thought I killed my A1200. Then I figured out it was just delayed after leaving it on for about 40 secs.

It might be 40 secs for me, as I normally have mobo on their own, with nothing connected (not even a floppy). I have noticed when floppy aint connected it tries to talk to it and adds like 5 - 10 secs to boot even when HDD is connected. This is to be expected as there wouldnt be floppy terminators for sale otherwise, .

Ok, silly question time FOL.

What do you do with an A1200 that has no drives whatsoever connected?

That's a serious question too...I'm intrigued!

PZ.

[ck1200]

Yep i recently changed from 3.0 to 3.1 roms on the 1200, and there is as Fol say's around a 40 second delay or should i say 40 sec's of panic the first time around

[FOL]

Originally Posted by Fingerlickin_B

Ok, silly question time FOL.

What do you do with an A1200 that has no drives whatsoever connected?

That's a serious question too...I'm intrigued!

PZ.

Display testing of products, .

Originally Posted by ck1200

Yep i recently changed from 3.0 to 3.1 roms on the 1200, and there is as Fol say's around a 40 second delay or should i say 40 sec's of panic the first time around

Very true, . I never owned an A1200 before so didnt know about difference's (between 3.0 and 3.1) apart from I needed it for OS3.9.
I obviously know a hell of alot more now, .