Quantcast
Channel: Epsilon's Amiga Blog
Viewing all 215 articles
Browse latest View live
↧

Quartet on X1000

February 27, 2015, 2:30 am
$
0
0
Today I wanted to take a quick look at the recently released game Quartet for AmigaOS4.1 on the AmigaOne X1000.


Quartet is a game written by Photon Storm originally and ported to AmigaOS4.1 by Nick "root" Sommer. It is the first third party game released through AmiBoing (EntwicklerX) using their online highscore table structures.

The game is free to download. (the original version is still available for a small cost for iOS on Apple's App Store)

You can get the game from os4depot here.

Once downloaded an extracted you will see the following Quartet folder:

The nfo.txt file doesn't contain any information about the game other than some credits, so let's dive in!

When you run Quartet it immediately prompts you for your AmiBoing credentials to register your highscores on the AmiBoing server, and to download the latest high scores from other people playing the game from around the world. You can register a profile at amiboing.de

Note that the AmiBoing login here requires you to press Enter after each field is entered in:


You can click the option at the bottom to login in offline mode if you prefer it, or don't have an Amiboing profile yet.

Soon after the Quartet title screen appears:


From the main menu you can turn off the Music and sound effects and view the Credits:


The Highscore table is also on the Main Menu as an option:


Helpfully there is a How to Play option that shows you how to get started with the game:


Basically you are trying to form complete faces in each of the 4 squares by positioning pieces presented to you in the middle square into one of the available boxes.

Each piece fits in top left, top right, bottom left and bottom right positions within each square. If you put two pieces that are top left in the same square, you lose a life.

If you get all 4 face pieces within a square, you get a score for forming a "Face". If you can match 4 pieces of the same type then you get a much larger score for getting a "Full Face"

You have 6 lives to start with, but trust me when I say that they don't last long!

When the game begins slowly and gets faster and faster as you get more Faces completed - quick response time is the key to this game:


Given the fast nature of this game it is nice that the programmer included a Pause option!


Game Over comes quickly, and often in this game as you learn the ropes. It is quite addictive though, and I had to keep trying!


The global Highscore ladder provides extra motivation to try harder - I can't be last!


So I have another go - and another, and another:



And Game Over screen keeps coming over and over and over too!


Slowly I start getting better scores, and finally I am no longer last on the highscore leaderboard!


Quartet's graphics, music and sound effects are great and suit the game well.

The game runs in a window on the Workbench screen as below (click to expand):



Quartet is a lot of fun, free and recommended. I am glad to play a new game on my X1000 in 2015 - I look forward to more games this year!

↧
Search

Gotek Floppy Drive Emulator on Amiga 1000

February 28, 2015, 3:30 am
$
0
0
After a prompt by someone on IRC this week I decided to try to get my Gotek Floppy Drive Emulator working on my recently purchased Amiga 1000.


As I suspected before I started with this little mini project - there would be some tricks to get it working on an Amiga 1000 due to the need for the Kickstart disk before anything else could happen.

As regular readers of my blog would probably remember, last year I bought the Gotek Floppy Drive emulator and tried it out on my Amiga 600. That blog entry is here if you want to review it first as I cover the functionality of the Gotek in much more detail than I will here.

So, can I get it to work in the Amiga 1000?

To start with, I took off the case, which marks the first time I have opened the Amiga 1000 since I got it. Once open I took a look at the case cover inside, and it does have all the signatures on it as I had seen in pictures elsewhere! I was glad to see it (All photos in this entry can be clicked to be expanded):


Closer view of the signatures:


Jay Miner's signature and his dog Mitchy paw print are there too, of course:


Looking at the Amiga 1000 internals, it has a big protective cover, much like the Amiga 1200 had when bought new. Just like that cover this one was also a pain to remove - lots of screws:


Eventually though I got the cover off, exposing the main Amiga 1000 motherboard:


Some close up shots of the chips on the motherboard:


The inside is surprisingly clean considering it's age - it is 30 years old! The next close up shows the 68000 CPU, floppy drive cable and power cable.


Before we can connect the Gotek Floppy Drive Emulator to the Amiga 1000 though I have had to do some things first. Namely, copy the Amiga 1000 specific Kickstart 1.3 disk (ADF format) and Workbench 1.3 Disk (ADF format) to the Gotek USB stick.

As discussed in my previous blog post on the Gotek, there is a selector.adf program on position 000 of the Gotek which enables you to select disks to assign to each slot on the Gotek. However, this selector.df needs the Kickstart to be loaded first on the Amiga 1000.

This means we need to assign the Kickstart 1.3 ADF on the Gotek using selector.adf to do that.

However, this is not possible to do on the Amiga 1000 itself because once I connect the Gotek and disconnect the floppy drive, there is no way to load the kickstart disk needed to then load the selector.ADF!!

Enter my trusty Amiga 600 to save the day. I connected the Gotek to it first so I could configure the Selector.adf on it to use the Kickstart 1.3 ADF in Slot 001, then save it:


In case you are curious, in this shot of the selector.df on the Amiga 600 there is also the external scan doubler I use on the Amiga 1000:


As you can see below I have now assigned Kickstart 1.3 ADF in Slot 001, ready:


With that now done, I can now unplug the Gotek from the Amiga 600 - I no longer need the Amiga 600. I then connect the Gotek to the Amiga 1000 floppy drive cable and power as below:


Another view of the connection:


I make sure Slot 001 is selected and power on the Amiga 1000:


It automatically boots the kickstart 1.3 ADF from the Gotek and the next prompt I see is the Workbench 1.3 insert disk screen - fantastic - it works!



I then selected Slot 002 on the Gotek to boot Workbench 1.3 ADF which works well also:


Exciting stuff. I reboot ready for the next test:


I run a classic Amiga demo ADF from a different slot (003) on the Gotek - Micro Concept by Crusaders - a great music disk:


Some more demo ADF tests followed - how fantastic not to have to use floppy disks any more on the Amiga 1000!



Having established the Gotek works great on the Amiga 1000, I next needed to work out a way to keep it connected and still have the option to go back to the original floppy drive if I ever want to.

I found a longer Amiga floppy drive cable I had spare and ran it from the internal Amiga 1000 floppy drive connector outside through the right hand expansion port. I then used an external molex power source (used for powering IDE/SATA hard disks for USB connection) and used a molex to floppy drive power connector splitter.

This means the internal floppy drive is no longer functional - but I can always reconnect it again if need be.

This external setup is not perfect I know, but does allow me to put the case back on the Amiga 1000 and keep things reasonably tidy - I have no intention of hacking up the case to make it fit inside:


After I put my 512k expansion card back into the right hand side expansion bay, I found it performs a useful role of keeping the Gotek in position on top of the Amiga 1000, and also stops it moving around when using the buttons on the front of it:


And here is the Amiga 1000 all reassembled again, with the Gotek running and having just booted the Kickstart 1.3 ADF again:


I think this is a great addition to the Amiga 1000 and it will stay in place from now on:




I also tested some games by changing the Slot to 000 to use the selector.df to assign some of the many games I have on the USB stick to various slots on the Gotek:


I then reboot and select the Slot I want using the buttons on the front of the Gotek - here is R-Type booted up from the Gotek:


Katakis works great too:


Having the Gotek on the Amiga 1000 makes great sense!

After trying it on the Amiga 600 last year I couldn't see a use for it given I had a hard disk and accelerators, etc. On the Amiga 1000 it fits well, and works great! Recommended!

↧
↧

AEROS 3.5 on ASUS K52F Laptop

March 7, 2015, 5:55 pm
$
0
0
Today I wanted to take a look at AEROS v3.5, an AROS (AROS Research Operating System) distribution released on x86 PC's.



AROS is an Open Source effort to realise AmigaOS on standard x86 laptops and desktops.

Late last year I took a look at Icaros Desktop 2.0 (AROS) running natively on an Acer AspireOne laptop (here and here). I also displayed AROS running on the Acer AspireOne at AmiWest 2014.

There are a few variants of AROS around, much like Linux also has many variants. One of these variants is AEROS, which used to be called AROS Broadway.

The broad concept of AEROS (from my understanding) is to accept that the driver support of AROS (currently quite limited) and is not going to improve quickly. It takes a shortcut by using Debian Linux as the base (or Host) for driver support and then run AROS on top of it.

Amikit also works on a similar concept from AmigaOS3.x, except with a much more cutdown version of linux, bootable from a USB stick on any x86 PC. (it needs a copy of Amiga Forever to get it up and running)

This type of hosted distribution has the benefit of being able to run AROS on more PC hardware, leveraging Linux's greater developer base and much larger driver support for modern PC hardware.

Currently AEROS is distributed as an operating system for ARES Computer (who sell software and systems running AROS). The developers are numerous and most are listed here.

There is a AEROS Plus (for registered users) and standard AEROS available for free to the public. AEROS Plus is the latest version of AEROS, whilst the free version is a few versions behind the latest version.

The current free version of AEROS is version 3.5, which was released in 2013 and is available to download here as a torrent only - it quite large at 2.88GB. You will need a BitTorrent client to download it on a PC or Mac - I use Vuze on the Mac, but there are plenty of torrent clients out there!

It is this free 3.5 version of AEROS I will take a look at today.

For my testing I brought out my Asus K52F laptop, which is a pretty bog standard PC laptop. I use it to test new Linux distributions since all the hardware normally works with them - most recently I was testing ElementaryOS on it (which is very nice, btw).

The AEROS package is delivered as a DVD iso, which you will need to burn to DVD-R before you can start the installation. The DVD is bootable Live DVD, so you can test it without installing it on your system if you prefer.

Once you put in the DVD and it starts to boot, you get the initial Boot Screen:


The boot screen gives you the option to Boot into the Live DVD environment, the failsafe environment, test the memory in the system, or boot from the hard disk in the system:


I choose to boot into the Live environment, and after some time the AEROS Workbench appears (you can click to expand any of these photos):


A close up view of the Workbench reveals an InstallAEROS icon to install the AEROS system to your hard disk, which is what I want to do:


I can see that in this version Wanderer is still the default Workbench GUI, rather than DOpus 5.9 used in the newer Icaros Desktop 2.0:


So next I double click on the InstallAEROS icon to get started with the installation - almost straight away it warns me that "This is an advanced installer. Please use with caution" and confirms if I want to continue:


Next it warns me that I need to set up one install partition and one swap partition for the installation - the installer uses GParted for this:


Accordingly I then select the hard disk controller on my system - easy since there is only one!


Next I get the familiar GParted partition window from Linux. Because I had ElementaryOS installed on this laptop before, it already automatically created the partition map for me (as part of that install). So all I need to do here is to format the install partition:


Regrettably it seems that if you need help with the use of GParted you are on your own with Google, as the normal help guide in GParted appears to not be included in the package. I think it should be included as there is plenty of room on the DVD:


In any case, I reformatted the Install partition /dev/sda1 as ext4 format, as shown below:


The disk format commences once I click on Apply button in GParted:


Format done:


And here we are, ready to go:


When I close GParted the install continues - it asks me to select the install partition and the swap partition:



It then asks me for the filesystem type for the install partition - looks like I didn't need to format the partition myself after all!


It then asks where to install /home to - there is only one option since I only created one install partition:


Username and password information is collected next - this installation really is a typical Linux installer, which makes sense since it is Linux after all:






The installer then asks me for the hostname (Computer name):


Linux uses Grub to boot itself when you turn the computer on, so it wants to know where to put it. Since I only run AEROS on this system, I select the mbr (Master Boot Record). If you run multiple OS keep in mind that you will need to edit the Grub config to dual/triple boot if you desire it:


Asks me next about date/time being correct on the local computer and choose my location:



In a flashback to old school Red Hat Linux, I then get a terminal screen asking me to select which Locales to install...this part is not very user friendly, requiring arrow keys, space bar to select and tab key to navigate to the OK button to continue (no mouse input):


It then asks which Locale I want to be default - I choose EN_AU.UTF-8:


After the locales are installed, you get a final confirmation box that everything you entered is ok and you are ready to proceed. It would be nice to see a summary of what you did actually select since I certainly don't remember it all!


The installation to hard disk now proceeds:


Eventually the installation completes - this process took about 40-50 minutes in total (as a guide) - ready to reboot:


On reboot you get a reminder that AEROS is based on Linux (Debian), with the Grub boot menu showing Debian GNU/Linux boot option - shame you don't get the same AresOne Computer boot screen from the Live DVD:


When it finishes booting up you get the AEROS login screen - enter the username and password you entered from the installation process:


The AEROS Workbench then appears, looking the same as from the Live DVD:


At the bottom of the screen is a Application switcher which pops up when the mouse hovers at the bottom:


On the bottom right of the screen is an ARES Computer icon which is the QLaunch bar. When clicked it expands to show a number of icons which hide further submenus to select applications to launch:


You can change it to expand up, rather than across if you prefer in the Prefs section.

In the submenus I found a screenshot program, which allows me to take some nicer screen grabs from this point onwards, although it does have some issues - principally I can't find a way to make it disappear when screenshoting, forcing me to crop the right hand side or leave it in the shots...judging from other people's web screenshots they also hit the same problem.

The main QLaunch bar has the following icons - Power Off, Reboot, OtherOS (Emulators), SimpleMail, Internet (OWB), Chat, Classic (FS-UAE Emulation), Games, My Apps, Places (Documents, Music, Pictures, etc), Tools, Linux (programs), Prefs (Wanderer, Themes, and so on):



Here is a example of the submenus in the QLaunch bar in AEROS - here showing the OtherOS > Vice C64 icon shortcut:



It is also evident the mixture of Linux applications and AROS ones on the AEROS Workbench itself, with some common Linux applications (Chromium, FS-UAE, GIMP, WIFI config) able to launch from the AEROS Workbench on the same screen as the AROS applications.



Below is some AROS applications running on AEROS - HivelyTracker, DOpus 4 and a Shell (in the background):


Typical Drawer layout in AEROS - here showing the System: drive - you can use the back arrow to navigate back a drawer as you navigate through the drawers and can type into the address bar manually and Press Enter to navigate to a specific location:


Another view of the AEROS Workbench, this time showing the Hollywood based snapshot program on the right:



Here is the AROS Shell:



I took a look at some of the applications included with AEROS next.

OWB (Web Browser):


Thumbnail Image previewer:


SimpleMail:



A closer look at HivelyTracker:


I gave AROS MPlayer a go too - interesting thing I found is that when you insert a USB stick, the Linux side mounts the device and it pops up on a Linux window. If I close that and open the Removable Device icon on the AEROS Workbench, I can then access the USB stick contents from within AEROS - nice. 


I then put my terrible graphic design skills to the test in LunaPaint:


Janus-UAE and FS-UAE (with extra Amiga Forever files needing to be copied from their DVD first) are also available to emulate Classic Amiga systems to run old Amiga programs and games on AEROS - I didn't play around with this yet but I expect it would work similar to how it does on Icaros Desktop:


In AEROS, NoWinED is the editor included:


Next up I decided to try the AROS Vice C64 emulator, trying out a demo that was included with it that ran ok:



The MAME emulator:


Next I tried running a few AROS games, like 1941 Deluxe 1.0 (HunoPPC) and Open Tyrian, both included in the AEROS installation:




I also tried out ScummVM, running the included game Beneath a Steel Sky, which runs well:



AMC (Media Center software like XBMC on Windows/Linux/Mac) is also installed, albeit in demo mode - it needs to be purchased from ARES Computer here to unlock all of it's functionality.

I couldn't work out how to snapshot programs like AMC running on a separate screen to the AEROS Workbench screen (or linux applications running side by side with AROS) so I had to bring out the iPhone again, sorry:


The next two screenshots show Linux applications running side by side with AROS programs:


Linux application GIMP running in AEROS:


AEROS is certainly an interesting concept, trying to play to the strengths of Linux to make up some of the areas where AROS needs help, especially driver support and some common modern applications like GIMP, OpenOffice, Chromium, etc.

I was concerned that AROS would lose it's identity by hosting it on top of Linux, which it does not seem to do with AEROS v3.5.

That said, there is certainly room for improvement - AROS has always been a bit buggy (this is not AEROS specific) and several applications crashed on opening or while I was trying features out.



Fortunately by being hosted, rebooting the AROS environment within AEROS is very fast indeed as an actual reboot is not needed normally.

I wanted to play around with the themes to show the Icaros, MorphOS and AmigaOS style themes available. But I couldn't change Themes when I tried this out in AEROS - it kept asking me to insert the Theme: volume for some reason - here are the theme previews anyway:



I think AEROS would benefit from using a newer Linux build (probably the newer AEROS versions requiring registration do - but I haven't tried these yet).

A much simple install process would be also very welcome as it is a bit overwhelming if you have never installed Linux before. I have tried to show what you can expect and how to do the installation process for AEROS.


I will continue to follow with interest developments in AEROS and AROS too - hopefully it will continue to evolve and get better and better!


↧

Swamp Defense 2 for AmigaOS 4.1 on X1000

March 9, 2015, 3:51 am
$
0
0
Today I wanted to take a look at the recently released Swamp Defense 2, released on AmigaOS4.1 on my AmigaOne X1000.


Swamp Defense 2 is by Entwickler-X, the team behind the original Swamp Defense (which I reviewed in 2012 here), and countless other games for AmigaOS 4.1 in recent years.

A demo of the game is available to download from their website here, and the full game costs EUR16.99 and can be purchased for immediate download from their website.

Alternatively, you can also purchase Swamp Defense 2 on AmiStore for GBP10 for immediate download as below (click any photos in this post to enlarge):


You can also soon buy a physical boxed version with CD and manual from various Amiga dealers too!

I decided to purchase it from AMIStore on my X1000.

BTW if you haven't installed/used AMIStore yet, it is an App Store for AmigaOS 4.1 released in November 2014. I covered AMIStore in some detail here and here if you want to check out more about it.

Once purchased in AMIStore, I started downloading Swamp Defense 2 from my purchased items:


When download is completed, the installer then starts automatically:


Choose where you want to install the game:


Installation of files happens quickly:


And we are done!


Now I have the Swamp Defense 2 drawer with the following icons in it:


I run the Config program first to check out the options available:


From the Config program I can change the game to run in full screen or a window, and the screen aspect ratio, Sound card AHI selection, amongst others. I chose to run it in full screen 1920x1080 with 16:10 aspect ratio, and clicked on Save.

When I run Swamp Defense 2 itself, it initially comes up with the AmiBoing online profile login, which allows your progress and high scores to be submitted to an online global highscore table.


Once logged in, the main title screen shortly appears:


The Question Mark option allows you to see a quick guide on how to play Swamp Defense 2.


In summary the game is similar in gameplay to it's predecessor Swamp Defense in that it is 2D and viewed from above. It consists of a series of maps you need to complete, now divided into mulltiple zones, each with a number of maps to complete. This is very much like the popular game Angry Birds in zone concept. 

Each level has one clear route (generally left of screen to right of screen but does vary) which a number of different aliens take in separate waves. The route changes with each level. You need to stop the aliens from reaching the end of the route, which require you to place various people with different levels of weapons at key points along the route to shoot them. You can also attack with other weapons (new to Swamp Defense 2) that can be purchased with in-game money earned as you play the game.

You clear the first level when you have cleared 10 waves of aliens. The next level is 20 waves, and the difficulty of killing the aliens and the map strategy changes each time, providing quite a challenge.

You get money for each alien you kill, which can then be used to add additional people or upgrade the weapons people can use, depending on what kind of person they are. 

From the Main Title screen you can click the Shop icon to see what People and weapons can be purchased with your money:


As you can see, the upgrades have been enhanced substantially here for Swamp Defense 2, with the addition of extra bombs and weapons you can use during the game, in addition to the familiar people (called Towers in the game) from the original Swamp Defense:
.
Much like with Angry Birds, Swamp Defense 2 includes a Star earning system, that allows you to get extras along the way. Clicking on the Star icon on the Title screen allows you to see your progress to date:


For those all important bragging rights, you can also click on the Podium icon on the title screen to see how you rate compared to the global competition!


When you start the main game from the Title screen, you are presented with a map, which shows your current zone progress and which level is next to conquer - initially we are in The Swamp zone - if we have money we can click on the Shop icon to purchase weaponry and upgrades before we attempt another level:


You can see I have already attempted this first level and completed it successfully. It also shows the stars earned, and the option to select Normal or Hard mode (Hard mode needs to be unlocked - here it is). You can only attempt levels that are green, the others are locked and cannot be played until you complete the previous level that then unlocks the next one.

So let's see if I can do any better this time on the first level! As the game begins, I position two people, one that slows down the aliens by shooting them with some kind of pink glue, and two shooters.



Positioning of people along the route is crucial to how successful the kills are. People have a certain range that they can fire at the aliens and no further. For example, locating people inside a turn where they can twice at the aliens delivers better results than people positioned on the outside of a straight piece of the route where they can only fire once.


As each wave of aliens comes through, we get more money to afford to buy more people to defend the route. This can be done while the aliens are progressing through the level, allowing you to add extra firepower downstream if you find that you are not able to get all the aliens before they pass your last line of defence!


To position people, click on a valid location on the level next to the main route. Certain positions are not allowed - eg. in the swamp itself, on the far left and right of the map and where obstacles have been placed. When a valid location is selected, the people available to be purchased for the position then appear - the others are greyed out:


As this point I have made it through 7 waves of aliens of the 10 waves required to pass through this level. You can click on the 1x lightning icon on the top of the screen to speed up the wave advance so you can't move through the levels quicker (useful if you have everything positioned and don't need to add anything):


You can also upgrade the weaponry or remove a person from their position on the level during the game. By clicking on the person you get these options. You get a partial money credit that helps to buy another person. This tactic is useful when you want to replace a low end killer with a higher level one but have no spaces left to put them in on the level:


You have 10 lives to start with - every time an alien makes it to the end of the route you lose a life. The game ends when you have no more lives left:


My game is going well and I have reached the 9th wave on the first level now:


Last wave and the last alien is proving rather tricky to kill:


I didn't manage to kill the last alien, but only lost one life to complete the first level:


As the game progresses, it gets a lot harder - here I attempt the fourth level, a level I am still stuck on! This level has 20 waves, and my best attempt so far got my to Wave 17 - as you can see the Hard mode for this level is locked still:


This level is tricky as there are much less spaces to position your people initially (lots of positions that can't be used), and some of the enemies seem almost impossible to kill as the waves move on!


As normal I position my people for best effect in the level:


I could really use some of the extra weaponry but having trouble getting the cash needed!


Unfortunately things are not going well - starting to let too many aliens through:


When your lives get down to 2, it starts to pulse with a plus symbol in it - I believe it is possible to add extra lives if you have enough stars and money to buy it, but I don't regrettably!


The game over screen comes often, but this is definitely one addictive game - you can see the extra weaponry icons on the top right of the screen in this shot as I still have some left at this stage:


I can strongly recommend Swamp Defense 2 - the music and graphics are excellent, and the new features added into this sequel make it considerably better than the original game in my opinion!

The online scoreboard and addictive gameplay complete the package and definitely makes Swamp Defense 2 a worthwhile purchase!

It is really great to see new games for AmigaOS 4.1 in 2015!

Looking forward to even more games - but in the meantime, back to try level 4 again! :-)

↧

AmigaOS 4.1 FE Classic on FS-UAE 2.5.29

March 16, 2015, 2:34 am
$
0
0
Today I decided to install my AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition Classic onto FS-UAE running on my MacOS X Yosemite (10.10) Macbook Pro.
Last year I setup AmigaOS4.1.6 Classic on FS-UAE on MacOS X Yosemite for AmiWest 2014. 

With the release of the new Final Edition Classic version and the considerable updates to FS-UAE since then I thought it was a good time to get AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition Classic installed and running under emulation on my MacBook Pro. (which for reference is a Core i7 2.6 Ghz Late 2013 model with 16GB memory, Nvidia Geforce GT750M 2GB, and 1TB SSD)

I followed the procedures outlined on EAB's FS-UAE support forum thread here on how to install AmigaOS4.1 on FS-UAE. This is a very good guide indeed!

Some changes since I installed AmigaOS4.1 Classic on FS-UAE last year include several major upgrades to the WinUAE base build used for FS-UAE, the support of VHD (resizable) virtual hard disks, SFS0 hard disk partition support (enabling SFS0 hard disk installs to larger HD sizes), Tocatta Sound card support and more too!

Another change is the update of the QEMU PPC plugin to the latest 3.6 version here (at the time of writing) to use the latest development build of FS-UAE 2.5.29dev, available from here for Mac OS X.

Another new tool in Mac OS X is the VHD Creator tool that can be used to create hard disks that grow as data is put into them, rather than consuming all the space allocated straight away. You can download this VHD Creator tool from here. Once downloaded you get this program to create the VHD virtual hard disks needed for the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition Classic installation.



So let's get started with creating an AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition Classic setup using FS-UAE on Mac OS X Yosemite!

I will assume you have downloaded and run FS-UAE Launcher for MacOS X (you need to run it once to create the FS-UAE folder structure under Documents).

I also assume you have the QEmu 3.6 plugin and have put the legal Amiga Forever CD kickstart ROMS, Picasso IV ROM and Cyberstorm PPC ROM file into the correct places in the Documents/FS-UAE/Kickstarts folder.

As a reference my Documents/FS-UAE folder structure looks like this (before I put the latest QEmu 3.6 into the Plugins folder):



I then copy the latest QEmu PPC 3.6 plugin to the FS-UAE/Plugins folder, and archiving the old versions under a new sub-folder I called Older Version:




I used VHD Creator to create the virtual hard disk. when I run VHD Creator it prompts to specify whether you want a fixed size or dynamic:
Next, it asks how large you want the disk to be. If you were planning to format the disk as FastFileSystem (FFS) then 2048 is the correct value here. In my case, I am planning to use Smart FileSystem (SFS0), which allows me to specify a much larger disk - I chose 8192MB (8GB):
VHD Creator then asks for the name of the hard disk file - I called it AmigaOS4.1FE.vhd, and after that you press Create...
It then asks where you want to save it - make sure you save it in the Documents/FS-UAE/Hard Drives path:
After this step the program closes and the VHD hardfile is ready to be formatted inside the emulation later on...

Next we need to create an image (iso) of our AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition Classic CD, to be able to mount it in  FS-UAE. I used Toast 11 for this, but you can use whatever your favourite image creation program is on Mac OS X. Select the Disc Copy function.


Make sure to select Disc Image as the destination (select from the drop down list):


Once created it will prompt to save the .toast image file somewhere - be sure to save it to Documents/FS-UAE/CD-ROMS - I called the file AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition.toast:

Then from the Finder (I use Pathfinder as a superior Finder replacement) you need to rename the Disc image from .toast to .iso.




That done, now run FS-UAE 2.5.29 Launcher and we can start to configure.

In my case I have some configurations from previous setups - click on the New configuration icon (shown below next to where it says AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition) to create a new configuration, and title it AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition (or whatever you want to call it) - select Amiga 4000 (PPC/OS4) as the Amiga Model:

Click on the Hard disk icon to configure the hard disks. Add in the AmigaOS4.1FE.vhd we created earlier:


The hard disk is now added:

Next we go to the FS Amiga logo in the top left and select Custom Configuration... from the menu:


Then add in some lines to set the type of the hard disk to rdb, and optionally you can specify the location of the cdrom and hard disk here too (click to expand any of the pictures):

Then click on Close to close the window.

I went into the CD icon tab and added some additional iso's I created from the previous AmigaOS4.1 classic install from last year that contain some utilities and programs I want to install once the installation of AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition is done. You need to add these iso files to the CD-ROMS folder in FS-UAE to have them visible immediately when adding them in here:

Now I clicked on the Save button (next to the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition configuration title) to save the configuration (it shows a red arrow when you have made changes that have not been saved yet).




It will then  appear as selectable on the left hand pane:
 

 Now we are ready to launch the emulation - Click on Start to get underway - you can use the window/full screen button next to it to change if it runs in full screen or window mode:

Initially the CDROM will not boot in FS-UAE and you will get the Insert disk screen:


Use Function + F12 (if using a mac keyboard) to bring up the Emulator control menu as above, and select Reset Amiga > Soft Reset. Immediately press the ESC key to get the Cyberstorm PPC menu as below:
Select the SCSI button, then double click on the Unit 1 entry in the scsi device list as below:
The Unit 1 settings then appear as below:
We need to change the settings so the device can boot and is removable (rather than Auto-removable). Change the settings to what is shown below and click on Use:
Then click on Save to save the configuration:

The FS-UAE emulation should then boot from the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition Classic iso as below:
It will then reboot, all going well initialise the PowerPC plugin and then boot the CD into AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition:

Shortly after we get the initial Live CD installation screen:

First step here is to start the Hard disk Preparation utility option - select the cybppc.device in the window that comes up and then select Start:



It should prompt to initialise the hard disk and give you a screen similar to below - make sure the Total Disk Size field matches what you specified in VHD Creator tool and then click on OK - accept changes:

The AmigaOS4.1FE.vhd hard disk appears in the list along with the CD:
Select the AmigaOS4.1FE.vhd disk and then select Edit partitions and filesystems:
You may remember that I intend to use Smart File system (SFS) rather than the usual FastFileSystem (FFS). In order to do this, we need to install the SFS support to the RDB of the bootable hard disk - otherwise the disk will not boot.

To do this, click on Add, remove or edit filesystem option- you will then get the screen below:

Click on Add new FS option, and then select SmartFileSystem from the dialog box that appears and click on OK:
It will then prompt for filesystem parameters - we need to modify the DOSType field, as it is currently using FFS to use SFS instead:
To do this, we change the DOSType field to 53465300 and press Enter - this will then change the filesystem on the right side to SFS\00:
After you click OK you get the following screen confirming the additional SFS filesystem - click on Ok - accept changes:

We need to create a partition, so click on Add partition - It will create DH0 using the full partition space:
Click on Select filesystem/edit details button - you will then see the following screen:
 We need to modify the filesystem Type field from Standard filesystem (FFS) to SmartFilesystem (SFS\00):
Click on Ok - accept changes and you will then go back to the Hard disk partition screen:
You can see that the filesystem of DH0 is now SFS\00. Make sure Automount and Bootable flags are ticked, then click on Ok - accept changes.
Now click on Save to disk:
It will prompt if you are sure - select Yes, save:
It will then prompt that a reboot is needed. Select Yes, reboot NOW!:
The AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition Classic iso will then boot again to the initial Installation setup screen as before:
Set your localisations and keymaps option as you desire:
You can then click on the option to start the installation of AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition:
Choose DH0 as the destination:
It will then prompt to format the disk. I labelled the volume as System. Make sure you uncheck the Use Trashcan option and then use Quick Format:
When the format is done you can proceed with the installation to DH0:
I have skipped some screens here as many you just accept the defaults - however, do select Picasso IV as the graphics (not AGA), ensure cybppc.device is selected (it is selected by default) as you go through the install, and that the screen size as 1024x768@60 (48Hz):
A final confirmation of your choices appears before the installation proper begins:
Installation then proceeds - coffee time:
Installation is completed successfully!
Do not click on Finish on the last screen yet....
First, Press Function + F12 to bring up the FS-UAE menu and eject the AmigaOS4.1 final Edition iso as below - use cursor keys to navigate to the Removable Media, highlight the iso, and press Enter:
You now have the option to Eject - press Enter on it to do so. Then you can click Finish on the last screen to reboot the Amiga. (If you don't do this then the live cd will boot instead of the hard disk)

If it doesn't boot for you, make sure you check that the SFS file system is installed as I detailed above, the CD has been ejected, and that the hard disk is set to bootable.

The first time I did this I forgot to set the Bootable flag (!), so I just got the Insert disk screen and a non-bootable hard disk as shown below in the Early Boot Menu (press both mouse buttons when booting):  
I then mounted and booted the AmigaOS 4.1 final Edition Classic iso again (via Function + F12), ran the hard disk partition tool option and quickly fixed DH0 to be bootable and all good:

Success - it now boots AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition from the virtual hard file and presents me with the standard post-installation options screen!
I then mounted the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition Classic iso again briefly while I ran through the Extras installation:
Extras installation in progress - I just left out the PCI Catweasel drivers:
I now have a working AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition Classic setup on FS-UAE on my Macbook Pro
Next step will be getting the network card working on emulated system...which requires the ethernet.device driver from Aminet. Then Amistore, toccata support and more! But that is enough work for one day - I'll cover these in a future blog entry!

↧
↧

AmigaOS 4.1 Web Browsers in 2015 on X1000

March 22, 2015, 3:41 pm
$
0
0
Today I wanted to take a closer look at the Web Browsers available for AmigaOS4.1 in 2015, using my AmigaOne X1000.



I will take a look at:

  • Odyssey 1.23r3 (successor to OWB originally included in AmigaOS4.1) 
  • IBrowse 2.4 (included in AmigaOS4.1) 
  • NetSurf 3.3 
  • Timberwolf 4.01 (port of Firefox for AmigaOS4.1).


I should warn this article is quite image heavy. As a reminder, all images can be clicked on to enlarge them.

There has been a lot of development of Web Browsers on AmigaOS4.1 in recent years and I hope this will show just how much things have moved on in the past few years, thanks to the hard work of developers committed to improving web browsing on AmigaOS4.1.

The newest of these web browsers is NetSurf, with the latest v3.3 released this month (available on os4depot.net here). Unlike the other browsers it includes a nice standard Installer too:


You do need to create a folder for NetSurf manually though, as the installer does not create folder for you for some reason - I put it in SYS:Internet/NetSurf.

After the installation is completed you get the NetSurf folder


Here is the NetSurf browser itself and some of the other views in the program:


NetSurf Preferences:


NetSurf Hotlist, Global History and Cookies windows:




Odyssey 1.23r3 (released in December 2013) can be downloaded from os4depot.net from here,

I looked at Odyssey 1.23r3 previously on this very blog, right here.



Odyssey has a top sites preview in new tabs when opened allowing quick links to popular websites you recently visit!



Odyssey Bookmarks:


Odyssey can also Spoof itself as another Web browser to fool web sites that detect browsers for certain functionality:


Odyssey History can be displayed on the Sidebar:


Odyssey settings:



Timberwolf  4.01 (released in September 2012) can be downloaded from os4depot.net here. Timber wolf is a port of an old Firefox browser version to AmigaOS4.1. It is worth noting that it is prone to crashes and needs plenty of memory, like Firefox itself does.



Timberwolf implements the Firefox Add-Ons functionality, opening up a lot a different themes and extra functions in Timberwolf. I covered this in a lot of detail in previous blog entries here and here.




Timberwolf Preferences Window:


Timberwolf Library Window - showing History and Bookmarks:


This Bookmarks view can be seen as a side bar within Timberwolf as well:


You can also get more information about a particular webpage being viewed in Timberwolf:



IBrowse 2.4 (Released in 2006 as a commercial browser but provided free in AmigaOS4.1 as OEM edition) can be installed from the Extras Installer on your AmigaOS4.1 DVD.

IBrowse has it's roots firmly in Classic AmigaOS 3.X, having been the commercial web browser of choice in the mid-late 1990's on Amiga as the first (to my knowledge) to use tabbed browsing - I used it a lot on my A1200 at that time.



IBrowse has some nice features, although it is showing it's age with it's modern web technology support. It has a nice cookie manager, Global History and Hotlist Manager:





IBrowse also has a Password Manager function:


IBrowse Preferences:


IBrowse has a Spoof function to fool websites into presenting pages formatted for that browser - the list includes mostly old browsers though:


So, which one to use?

Rather than a long boring technical feature list comparison between the browsers, I decided to show the differences between the browsers visually, by visiting a list of common websites and capturing how they appear in each browser for easy comparison.

I also use a modern web browser (Safari) to capture how these same sites appear on Mac OS X Yosemite, the latest version of Mac OS X.

Let's get started!


Amiga.org

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)

IBrowse:


NetSurf:



Odyssey:


Timberwolf:



AmigaWorld.net

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)

IBrowse:


NetSurf:



Odyssey:


Timberwolf:



abc.net.au/news

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)
IBrowse:


NetSurf:



Odyssey: (Website displays well, video playback works on the site too)




Timberwolf: (Displays ok, but video playback on the site doesn't work)





Facebook.com/AeonTechnologyLtd

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)
IBrowse: (Cannot even connect as Browse doesn't support TLS encryption)


NetSurf: (Facebook displays, but no content displayed beyond the header and footer)



Odyssey: (Works ok)


Timberwolf: (Works ok)



Google.com

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)
IBrowse:


NetSurf:


Odyssey:


Timberwolf:


Safari: (Google search term - Amiga X1000 - Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)
IBrowse (Google Search term - Amiga X1000):


NetSurf (Google Search term - Amiga X1000):


Odyssey (Google Search term - Amiga X1000):


Timberwolf: (Google Search term - Amiga X1000)


Safari: (Google Images search term - Amiga X1000 - Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)

IBrowse (Google Images Search term - Amiga X1000):


NetSurf: (Google Images Search term - Amiga X1000)



Odyssey: (Google Images Search term - Amiga X1000)



Timberwolf: (Google Images Search term - Amiga X1000)




YouTube.com

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)
IBrowse:




NetSurf: (Cannot play videos)



Odyssey: (Displays well and video playback works - although page formatting a bit off in playback window)



Timberwolf: (Need to switch to HTML5 mode in YouTube.com/html5 to use - Video plays, but slow. Google login works for YouTube - only browser that does)






Dropbox.com

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)
IBrowse:


NetSurf: (Screen layout strange, logon fails)





Odyssey: (Login works, file uploads and view works)







Timberwolf: (Login works, viewing files works, but file uploading needs to use Basic Uploader to work)









www.aminet.net

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)

IBrowse:


NetSurf:



Odyssey:


Timberwolf:



amiga-news.de

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)

IBrowse:


NetSurf:


Odyssey:


Timberwolf:



ppa.pl

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)


IBrowse:


NetSurf:



Odyssey:



Timberwolf:




amiga-ng.org

Safari: (Mac OS X Yosemite - Reference)
IBrowse:


NetSurf:



Odyssey:



Timberwolf:




obligement.free.fr

Safari: (MacOS X Yosemite - reference)

IBrowse:


NetSurf:



Odyssey:



Timberwolf:




vimeo.com

Safari: (MacOS X Yosemite - reference)
IBrowse: (Can't open the website due to IBrowse not supporting TLS)


NetSurf: (Videos don't play)



Odyssey: (Videos play, but slowly if in HD)





Timberwolf: (Site does not display right and videos don't play)





I hope this comparison across multiple websites gives you an idea of what each web browser is capable of on AmigaOS 4.1, when picking a small selection of websites to view.



In my case I pretty much exclusively use Odyssey on my X1000 - it is the most compatible web browser for modern websites (and old websites), available for AmigaOS4.1 right now. This should be clear from the comparison screenshots above!

There is more work to do of course as web technologies continue to evolve and I certainly haven't covered it in great detail - just wanted to show what is possible on AmigaOS4.1 today.

Many Amiga focused websites continue to maintain old web code to remain backwardly compatible with Classic Amiga web browsers like IBrowse and AWeb (not covered here), which is helpful, especially for downloading Amiga files from Aminet and reading many Amiga news websites.

The reality is that the majority of modern websites have long adopted newer technologies to present web content to us that is incompatible with Classic Amiga web browsers.

I believe that we are in a far better place for browsing the modern web on AmigaOS4.1 than we were 3 years ago...HTML 5 support, CSS support, TLS encryption, Video playback on Youtube and Vimeo, Dropbox, Facebook Chat, Google Chat support and more is great to have on AmigaOS4.1 web browsers in 2015.

Many thanks to the developers for keeping things moving along! :-)

↧

AMIcast Podcast Episode 2

March 26, 2015, 7:38 pm
$
0
0
I was invited to participate as a guest on the recently launched English language version of the AMIcast Podcast, hosted and produced each month by Radzik.


I was very glad to participate in the podcast - a first for me - and talk about all things Amiga - both Classic and Next Gen. It was a lot of fun!

Radzik is making a great effort to make these podcasts in English and I look forward to listening to future podcasts!

You can subscribe to the AMIcast Podcast in iTunes on the Mac, Podcast app on iphone/ipad, or just listen online directly.

The podcast episode I am in is below (Episode 2), with download links including some of my music made around when I was part of the Amiga demo scene many years ago.

http://radzikpl.blogspot.com.au/2015/03/amicast-episode-2-epsilon.html

I apologise in advance for the music if it is not your taste!

The main website for AMIcast is here too:

http://amicast.ppa.pl/

I hope you enjoy this Podcast and listen to the future ones to come!

↧

Not Time to move to Windows 8

March 31, 2015, 7:25 pm
↧
Search

My X1000 no longer works

April 3, 2015, 1:20 am
$
0
0
Sad to say today I lost my X1000 trying to get a Radeon R9 270X working on it with the new Warp3D and Radeon HD drivers.


To save typing I covered my issues on the Hyperion support forum here:

http://forum.hyperion-entertainment.biz/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=2960#p33082

After updating the CFE bios (shown in the photo above) the X1000 is now totally bricked. I followed the instructions from A-eon to  flash the CFE to the letter (I have done it before) but the rom signature didn't match - I tried redoing the process 10 times with the same result. Then the power dropped out.

I then set the rescue jumper for CFE, but it doesn't let me boot the X1000 into backup CFE to fix the normal mode CFE for some reason. The system is now completely non-functional.

I feel completely stupid for trying steps I knew I didn't need to do - the CFE was the latest version anyway in my opinion, but was suggested that the CFE might have been bug fixed to fix a problem preventing the R9 270x from working under AmigaOS4.1 FE.

Can't begin to express my unhappiness and frustration with the last 24 hours.

Thanks to the good folks in IRC and Hans for their suggestions and input.

I know plenty of people have got their setups working well with the new drivers and cards too - I think I have just been very unlucky here.

Assuming it can be fixed by A-eon/AmigaKit it means sending it to the UK at my expense to be repaired at unknown cost and probably won't see it again for months. My motivation is very low right now.

So very sad. Some time away is needed methinks.


↧
↧

X1000 Troubleshooting and Repair Part 1

April 7, 2015, 5:45 pm
$
0
0

As covered previously, I am having big problems with my X1000 after a Flash upgrade - it no longer boots. I thought it might be helpful today to explain a little more about what I was trying to do and what happened, and the troubleshooting steps I did so far, as it may be of assistance to other X1000 owners when troubleshooting their machines in future.

I purchased a brand new Sapphire R9 270X with 4GB memory to run on AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition on the X1000 with the new Warp3D and updated Radeon HD 2.7 drivers. (click on any images to expand)


Here it is, installed in my X1000:


It is a large graphics card, needing two slots and two PCI-E power plugs to work:


On power on the X1000 Boot screen appears - because I have only one graphics card installed and not two, the boing ball is red rather than blue:


The new card booted into Ubuntu Remix on my X1000 fine, no issues. I also put it into my Core I7 PC and confirmed it works perfectly in Windows 7 displaying up to 2560x1600 on my 30" display so it definitely works correctly.

Model details:
Sapphire R9 270X 4G GDDR5 PCI-E DVI-I / DVI-D / HDMI / DP Dual-X OC WITH BOOST
Product: 299-1E271-B00SA
SKU# 11217-04-41G

Note that many people have been able to get this working successfully with no problems - I think it is down to the card I have.

On AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition, I have the latest 2.7 Radeon HD drivers, Warp3D purchased from AMIStore (shown below) and installed with the latest MiniGL installed from os4depot.net. I did all this before I installed the 270X graphics card in the X1000.



Normally my X1000 has a Radeon 5450 HD and Radeon RV730 installed, with monitors for each, plus the PCIGraphics monitor needed for dual display (all in dev/monitors). Screenmode is 1920x1080 for both cards.

To have the 270X installed, I removed the 5450 monitor from DEVS/Monitors, and copied the Radeon RV730 monitor and modified it to have Monitor name "Radeon", Tooltypes changed board name of "Radeon" and COMPLENGTH of 6. DDC auto detect is not used - all resolutions are supported by the LG 24" monitor connected to it and are 60Hz.

I confirmed that with that new configuration file I could still boot the X1000 with the Radeon RV730 card installed by itself - it uses the "Radeon" monitor, even if the Radeon RV730 monitor is present too!

I then added the 270X and removed the RV730. On power on the X1000 boot logo shows, the AmigaOS4.1 Boot screen appears, and then a strange blue Workbench screen appears:



The intro sound plays over the top of this screen, but the background, icons, mouse and keyboard cannot be used.

Looking at the screen, it looks like the same resolution as the AmigaOS4.1 boot screen, which I guess is 800x600x256. So I put the RV730 card back in, booted up as normal and changed the screen resolution to 800x600x256 and changed the gfx card back to the 270x again.

This time the X1000 boot logo, AmigaOS4.1 boot screen appear as normal, and then it gives me a similar wb screen to the one above, but this time not blue, but looks like the colours are right. However the background, icons, mouse and keyboard still don't work:


I then changed back to the RV730 and removed all wbstartup items but no change when I put the 270X back in. I also tried removing non-essential stuff from the user-startup too but no change.

I tried DVI and DVI-D connectors (as I have two displays I connect both on each boot so I can see) - the display issue is the same on both connectors.

It looks suspiciously like AmigaOS4 is unable to initialise the resolutions on the R9 270X graphics card above the default 800x600 of the boot logo.

I tried booting from the AmigaOS4.1 FE CD with the R9 270X - same screen comes up. I tried booting from another HD containing amigaos4.1.6 with 2.4 drivers and get same screen too. (looks more like 3.1 screen but same issues).

To my knowledge there has been no update to CFE since the dual display support was added in late 2012.

It was then suggested by the author of the Radeon HD drivers (and Warp3D) on the Hyperion Support forums to update the CFE with the version from the A-eon website. It was loaded onto a usb stick (which I am fairly sure was the same version that I already had).

The cfe.bin on the website does not have a version number or date of release shown, so it is impossible to know if it has been updated or not - I think this should be fixed to avoid confusion in the future.
 
Unfortunately the rom signature after flashing didn't match the A-eon cfe upgrade instructions of what should be there, no matter how many times I checked and double checked what I typed in (I have done it before). I must have retried 10-15 times without rebooting following every step carefully. After power off and power on, unsurprisingly it didn't boot.

Note that I don't blame the author at all - he was only trying to help me resolve the issue. I was just very unlucky.

I switched to the rescue jumper on the X1000 (never used it before) as below, to boot the backup bios but it doesn't boot either.


So no X1000 any more - completely bricked.

I tried my Radeon 9250 PCI, 5450 PCI-E, RV730 PCI-E gfx cards individually in the X1000 in both rescue and normal mode - no change. no screen comes up, no boot logo, no cfe. I outputted to VGA and DVI monitors to ensure if any output came up I would see it (the benefits of having two screens)

I used a 2GB USB stick to flash with as I know the cfe can't read the usb if bigger than that, and I don't have a smaller one. There were other files on the USB stick and perhaps that played a part - I don't know.

I am well aware of the importance of not rebooting if the flash doesn't work - I followed the instructions precisely and I have flashed the x1000 before successfully to enable the dual display.

I checked and rechecked and repeated the process multiple times. Others in the community have kindly checked the output from the cfe screenshot I put on my blog to confirm that I did so, the commands I did were right and that the numbers coming back from the flash were repeatedly wrong. I tried 10 times at least that I counted. Then the power dropped briefly - I didn't power off by choice.




The photo I took above is just before the power cut. I then switched the jumper to rescue mode, but in either mode I get the same non-booting system.

I got a null modem serial cable from a friend (shops were closed here for Easter long weekend). I tested it first on A4000t to Mac (with USB to serial converter) to make sure it works - it worked fine with the required settings set as used on the Amiga wiki for the Advanced Serial Debugging guide. Could transmit and receive data so the cable works.

Connected to the X1000 and Mac - no data. None, nothing at all on power on. In both rescue mode and normal mode. Not a good sign I expect... :-(

I was also asked about LEDS showing on the X1000 on power on. I took two photos of them - 4 LEDS are showing. Links to the photos are here:



That LED2 being lit is a bit odd. According to the A1-X1000 reference manual:

LED1 = general power supply fault
LED2 = CPU core supply fault
LED3 = SB600 power good
LED4 = CPU power good
LED5 = SB600 running

I then stripped the X1000 down to the motherboard and one ram stick as suggested - no change. Rescue and normal mode tested.

I bought a brand new CR2032 battery today and fitted it in the X1000 - no change. Rescue and normal mode tested.

I took my fully working Thermaltake 875W PC PSU from my Core i7 PC (only other PSU I can use) today and connected to the X1000 bypassing the original PSU entirely to power the motherboard - no change. Rescue and normal mode tested.


Original PSU reinstated and tested - no change. Rescue and Normal mode tested.

I also removed the CF card and tested - no change. Rescue and Normal mode tested.

For all tests I had the null modem serial cable connected to the Mac (115200, 8N1 and no checksums, no RTS/CTS and no XON/XOFF Set) and checking for any data output - no data outputted.

Still have the same 4 LED appear on the motherboard through all the tests above. I think we can discount the PSU, CF and battery at this point.

I have taken some close up photos of the x1000 motherboard below for Amigakit - note the hot glue in places was put there by Amigakit for transport to AU, not by me. You can also see the replacement battery I put in:




As Easter holidays is now over I have raised a ticket for the issue on Tuesday night (my time) with AmigaKit directly - I am now working with them directly on the issue and they have been very quick to help me out so far.

I want to take this opportunity to sincerely thank everyone who has put forward suggestions and ideas for me to try out, both on IRC and on the Hyperion Support forums. Your help has been invaluable.

Even though the problem is not yet resolved, by doing these various suggestions to troubleshoot has helped narrow down the potential causes.


Works continues still to troubleshoot my X1000 problem with AmigaKit, and I am sure there will be more updates soon in another part on how it is progressing. I am hopeful to have my X1000 back and running well again soon.

↧

My X1000 sent to AmigaKit and MorphOS temp replacement

April 18, 2015, 4:35 am
$
0
0
A quick update that after some working with the AmigaKit techs last week on troubleshooting, it has been determined that my AmigaOne X1000 board cannot be fixed here - it looks like a power issue possibly caused by the brief power outage while flashing the CFE but can't be sure yet.


It has now been sent back to AmigaKit in the UK for further analysis - hopefully the problem can be identified and fixed - I really want my X1000 back and working!

When pulling apart my X1000 to prepare the motherboard for shipping I took some photos of the board itself which I thought might be of interest:


Rear of the X1000 board:


Finally is a close up of the Varisys logo (they manufactured the X1000 board), with some signatures below that - like on the Amiga 1000 case (not sure who's signatures though!). There is also the "Keep this party going" B-52's reference, in line with all the original Classic Amiga motherboards having B-52's song titles on them too:


I am hopeful that the issue with the X1000 board can be identified and fixed so I can quickly get back on track with using the X1000 with AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition again!

Although it is just not the same, I have temporarily setup my MorphOS 3.7 Powerbook G4 in the X1000's place while waiting this week, as I can't stand the daily reminder that I can't use my X1000 anymore:


Resolution of the external TFT display under MorphOS is not great since it is limited to the same screen resolution as the Powerbook G4 display, which is not the same as the display can handle. The resulting image cuts the bottom off the screen (even with playing with screen positioning) and means I have to reposition the dock higher on the powerbook screen to see it on the TFT screen:


If someone knows a good way to fix that under MorphOS without losing the ability to use the screen on the Powerbook too, I am all ears!


For now, the MorphOS PowerBook G4 is my main NG Amiga to play with until the X1000 is hopefully fixed and returned to me soon!

↧

Amiga 1000 Comspec 2MB AX2000 with Kickstart 2.0 Beta

April 24, 2015, 10:18 pm
$
0
0
I finally received my 2MB Comspec AX2000 expansion module for my Amiga 1000 from Canada this week. I was very keen to try it out, and to finally try to run Workbench 2.0 on my Amiga 1000 with it!


The Comspec 2MB expansion module came with a utilities disk and a Workbench 1.1 disk:


The module also has a passthrough expansion connector, allowing me to connect other expansions to the Amiga 1000 without having to remove the memory expansion to do it - I plan to make good use of this feature later on:


I was surprised to see this was Made in Canada:


It was a bit fiddly to install since I run the Gotek floppy cable through the expansion slot also, but I managed to get it installed on the Amiga 1000:


Another look, showing the Gotek on top:


After booting the Kickstart 1.3 and Workbench 1.3 off the Gotek, I get the Workbench screen and the extra memory is now there:


I now have 2.5MB memory - I put in the Comspec AX2000 utilities disk into my external Amiga 1010 floppy drive to run the memory test program on it, which passed no problem:


Excellent stuff! But of course I couldn't stop there. As regular readers know I have already got a 512k expansion module on the Amiga 1000, which I removed to install this new 2MB expansion module.

Since the 2MB module has a pass through connector, I should still be able to use the additional 512k memory module as well!

I quickly connected it up:


Looks a bit odd, but fits well enough - a closer view:


After booting up again, I now get 3MB total memory - awesome! This memory is made up of the 256k original included memory plus the 256k front expansion memory module, 2MB external Fast memory module, and 512k external Fast memory module:


This makes for a very useful Amiga 1000 - with 3MB memory it should be able to run pretty much anything OCS that I can throw at it, including the memory hogging Eric Schwartz animations which I will try soon!

First though, there was an outstanding thing I wanted to try first. I learnt recently about the existence of a Commodore 2.0 Beta kickstart that works on the Amiga 1000!

I really wanted to try this out and luckily for me I was able to get hold of a Kickstart 2.0 beta disk. For this you need to boot Kickstart 1.3 first, then boot this disk.

The disk then soft kicks Kickstart 2.0 beta into 512k continuous memory space and then reboots into Kickstart 2.0 Beta mode! Very cool - and I had wanted to try it out. Unfortunately the old expansion module (512k) was not continuous 512k for some reason and didn't work.

I had high hopes using the 2MB Comspec memory module with the 2.0 beta disk:


The 2.0 Beta kickstart is being read into memory - excellent, didn't get this far last time I tried it with the old expansion module:


Kickstart has been loaded and ready to reboot below - I quickly change the Gotek to a non-bootable disk before the system soft reboots itself:


And voila! Kickstart 2.0 Beta on the Amiga 1000:



So next I rummaged through my drawers to locate my Workbench 2.0 disks, which I found eventually:


Because this is Kickstart 2.0 I can boot the real floppy disks from DF1: so I did so:


Workbench 2.0 loaded successfully and here are some screenshots of it running on the Amiga 1000:


I honestly had no idea you can even do this on the Amiga 1000 until recently - I always thought you were trapped with kickstart 1.3. Even in 2015, I can still learn new things about Classic Amiga systems!

On a close up of the Workbench screen you can see the 512k Chip memory (Graphics memory) and 2MB Fast memory. It is not 2.5MB memory as you might expect because the soft kicked kickstart 2.0 beta is using the first 512k of the Fast memory:


I was very glad to get 3MB memory now on my Amiga 1000, and to be able to try out Workbench 2.0 on Kickstart 2.0 Beta as well!

Now I need to find a hard disk expansion module for it - let me know if you have one in working condition :-)


↧

My SAM 460CR has arrived

May 3, 2015, 6:13 pm
$
0
0
With the problems with my X1000 still being worked on at AmigaKit/Varisys, the past four weeks have highlighted to me how much I miss having the X1000 around.

As an update my X1000 board is now been handed over to Varisys (who make the X1000 boards) to work out what is happening with it.

It also made it clear to me that I need a backup system to the X1000 in case it can't be fixed or if there is some other issue in the future. Hopefully it doesn't ever happen again, but it certainly woke me up to the possibility. Unfortunately my budget right now doesn't stretch to buying a backup X1000 - I wish it did.


So for the solution - enter the recently released SAM 460CR AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition OEM system!

I got it from Acube Systems online shop here and it cost EUR539.

I ordered one after my X1000 stopped working and it was clear it had to be sent back to the UK for repair, and not being clear when I would get the board back again.

While waiting for the Sam 460 to arrive I did have plenty of fun with my Amiga 4000D/060/Picasso IV running AmigaSys 4 with AmigaOS 3.9, which I dusted off to play with - I forgot how cool Eagleplayer is:


Can you use Eagleplayer on AmigaOS4? Looked it up via Google Sensei, and apparently not - no AHI redirect plugin for it. :-(

I used the A4000D to check out some of the latest AGA demos released at Revision 2015 demo party at Easter - certainly the winning Amiga 64k demo Reborn by Appendix was very cool:


Traktor's reimagining of old classic amiga demo soundtracks was good too:


I even took a quick look at ShapeShifter on the Amiga 4000 just "because I could":


Anyway, I digress - Amiga is certainly a lot of fun and time consuming, in Classic or NG form! :-)

The Sam 460CR system arrived quickly in Australia in just under two weeks, ready for set up:


The Sam 460CR is actually the Sam 460ex system ACube Systems was selling before, but with several components removed from the system board to reduce costs (hence 460 Cost Reduced).

Significantly the removed items includes the onboard video, onboard audio and nearly all the SATA ports, necessitating the purchase of a cheap Envy 24HT sound card and cheap 3114 SATA card with 4 SATA ports on it. I already had a Radeon HD video card I could use from the X1000.

The system is significantly less expensive than the X1000, making it a good entry level NG AmigaOne system for those keen to run Amiga OS 4.1 Final Edition. It will also soon be able to run MorphOS's upcoming 3.8 version on this system too, which will be interesting to try out when it is released.

For now, let's take a look at the Sam 460CR board - a small User Guide and AmigaOS4.1 Getting started manual is included in the box with the Sam 460CR board (all pictures can be clicked on to expand):


The User guide is important - you will need it! I certainly did!

A close up look at the Sam 460CR board, which already has the Backplate cover attached, ready for installation into any Micro-ATX tower case or larger:


As you can see the board has a PCI-e video card slot, a PCI slot and a PCI-E 1X slot - and that is all:


Another view:



Swinging the board around you can see the PPC processor, which runs at 1.1Ghz, with a fan that needs to be connected to a molex power connector in the destination case:


Here is the view of the backplate and the removal of the extra ports is quite evident here from the lack of ports available here - just network port, serial port (for debugging), and two usb ports, which are used exclusively for the USB keyboard and mouse you need to buy and connect to it:


I also bought the 2GB memory with it, which I quickly installed onto the motherboard:


Closer view:


Flipping the board over you can see the hidden SD Card slot on the back:


Apparently it is possible to install AmigaOS 4.1 onto an SD card installed in this slot - I haven't tried it:


Also included with the purchase is an OEM version of AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition for Sam 460, some SATA cables to connect a (not included) DVD drive and hard disk, and the extra sound card and SATA card I bought as I mentioned before:


Fortunately I have a keyboard, mouse, DVD drive and spare hard disk already, so we are good to go except that I need a case to put it all in.

So I went and bought a small Micro-ATX Thermaltake Versa H15 tower case, which includes a 450W power supply - cost AUD$75:


Here is some views of the Thermaltake case, fresh out of the box:


Rear view:


As with most modern cases, it uses easy to use slide off panels with hand tightened screws to secure/open, revealing the inside of the case:


This case has space for 2x 3.5 inch SATA hard disks, 1x 5.25 DVD drive, and includes 4 expansion slots, which is enough for what we need for the Sam 460cr.

First step is mounting the Sam 460CR into the case which is quickly done - couldn't find anywhere on the board to connect the rear fan though:


Backplate fits perfectly:


Next step is to consult the manual to confirm the pin allocations for power switch, reset switch, power led and so on:


Here is the needed J29 on the board for these plugs, with a "1" helpfully placed to make it easy to connect the case connectors for the various functions:



Something to remember though is that the HDD LED cable needs to be connected to the SATA Card jumper, not the system board since the hard disk is not directly attached to the motherboard.

Originally I had planned to use my slightly lower spec Radeon HD 5450 PCI-e card below:


Here is a closer view of the PCI-e sound card - very small indeed:


Once installed it looks like this:


Problem I found was that the Radeon HD 5450 card has just a heatsink and no fan to blow away the considerable heat, and it is positioned too close to the SATA card for comfort. I believe this would result in an eventual failure of one or both cards, so I changed the card to the Radeon HD RV730 instead.

Here is the Radeon RV730:


Here it is installed in the case, showing just how close the card is to the SATA card below it. In my view the fan on the graphics card in this system is essential:


Next was installed the hard disk - I took the old 1TB AmigaOS 4.1.6 hard disk from the X1000 case as I don't use this anymore since putting Final Edition on the X1000. As you can see below the guide rail installation for the new case is a lot simpler than the X1000 version:


Here is the hard disk being installed into the system:


There are some things to be wary of when using a hard disk that was used on the X1000 on a Sam system due to the different BIOS used - X1000 uses CFE, while the Sam 460 uses U-Boot. More on this later.

It is important to use the first two SATA ports on the SATA card - the first one for the DVD drive and the second one for the hard disk.

The system is now taking shape nicely:


Here you can see the cabling all installed and the DVD installed too, ready to close up:


Well, almost ready:


Ok, now it is ready:


Next I cleared away the MorphOS and Amiga 4000D system I have been playing with on the X1000 desk for the last two weeks and setup the Sam 460CR in it's place, using just one monitor instead of two I use on the X1000 usually:


When the X1000 is back I still have another spare screen, plus keyboard and mouse for the Sam 460CR too, so both can still run even then - hopefully the X1000 is repaired soon.

In the meantime I am ready for the first power on of the Sam 460CR system:


It can't boot anything initially as the Boot Device is looking for the wrong SATA controller. It is needed to change this by pressing Enter to enter U-Boot and change as below to 3114 SATA DVD to boot the AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition DVD:


Now the system boots from the DVD successfully:


As an aside in U-Boot you can also see a summary of the System information:


DVD is booting up the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition installer:



Great - we have arrived at the installation screen for Final Edition:


I go straight to the Hard disk partitioning as we have some work to do here before we can install AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition:


When editing the hard disk in the Media Toolbox, you can see the default X1000 partition layout I had previously.


I need to install the SLB boot loader onto this hard disk in order for it to be bootable on the Sam 460CR. This is very different from the X1000, which uses the BHD0 hidden partition with the boot loader on it.

To do this in Media Toolbox, we need to edit the RDB on the hard disk - you will notice here that there is a section called "AmigaOne boot code (SLB)" which shows that the A1 booter is not installed yet:


If we click on Install we can choose the slb_v2 booter:


Once this change has been written to the disk, then we can proceed with the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition installation. I formatted the HD0 partition first (when the option appeared) as Final Edition cannot upgrade a 4.1.6 installation - it needs to be a new install.

I have covered the installation previously in my blog so I want go through it again as it is the same:


Installation completed successfully:


What is different though is that after you remove the dvd to reboot the Sam 460CR we need to make some setting changes in U-Boot:


Press Enter to go into U-Boot and configure the OS Multiboot Options. Here we need to specify that we want to boot the 3114 SATA DVD first, 3114 SATA HD second, and USB third:


Don't forget to save the settings!


The Sam 460CR system now boots from the hard disk successfully and soon brings up the Workbench screen with the post installation tasks:


We need to configure the sound card and network connection - in my case I need the Envy 24 HT sound card driver.


Under AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition the network needs to be configured to use the onboard network port on the Sam 460CR:


Networking is setup and works straight away - great:


I then install the Extras on the system from the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition DVD, which I need to put back into the DVD Drive at this point:


I even found a place on the new case to put the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition sticker included in the OEM packaging:


Here is the Sam 460 CR system with the initial installation of AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition done:


I have found already that I have to unplug/replug the keyboard on cold power on once in AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition to use the keyboard - it works fine in U-boot so not sure why this is needed yet - it works fine on soft reboots or pressing the reset button on the case - just cold boots:


There is plenty more work to do putting my usual favourite applications and games on it - re-using the X1000 hard disk means I already have most of what I need on the Work (DH2) partition which I kept intact (it was my X1000 main hard disk until January 2015 when I changed hard disks for AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition).

Here is some in progress shots as I am working on getting the Sam 460CR up to scratch:


The work continues of course, and some music to help pass the time while working on reloading applications and setups:


It is not finished yet - since the last screenshot I have put QT and AmiCygnix back on as well, with plenty more still to come.

I am very happy to have an AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition system again while I am waiting for my X1000 to be repaired by AmigaKit.

It means that now I can try out some of the stuff I have been missing out on while my X1000 has not been working!

I won't be using the new Warp3D Southern Islands on this machine sadly, as I don't have a one slot pci-e R7 or above HD card to use in the Sam 460CR. The two slot gfx cards I have don't fit, as the SATA card has to be placed in the PCI slot directly underneath the graphics card on the Sam.

Once the X1000 is returned to me, I look forward to trying Warp3D then, and it should be much faster on the X1000 anyway.  I really hope to get the X1000 back soon.

In the meantime, the Sam 460CR should be great to use AmigaOS 4.1 again - I really did miss it!

↧
↧

Wings Battlefield Sneak Preview on AmigaOS4 and MorphOS

May 8, 2015, 6:55 am
$
0
0
Today I wanted to take a look at a sneak peak of the forthcoming game from Cherry Darling called Wings Battlefield. I tested this game on AmigaOS 4.1 final edition on my new Sam 460CR system, and also on MorphOS 3.7 on my Powerbook G4 laptop.


Wings Battlefield is planned to be released on AmigaOS 4.1 (Warp3D, Radeon HD Compositing), MorphOS and AROS too.

Cherry Darling previously released games for AmigaOS 4.1 (MorphOS/AROS too) which I have looked at before in this very blog, like VoxelBird, VoxelNoid, and Ace of Hearts.

Wings Battlefield is quite similar in many ways to an old Amiga game by Maxis back in the early days (1988) called Skychase, or indeed Cinemaware's Wings, but of course with modern graphics and many more features!


The aim of the game broadly is to fly a plane around a landscape trying to take out one or more enemy planes by shooting them down.

Each player has a set amount of fuel and plane strength, which diminishes depending on how many times you have been shot. Fuel also reduces more quickly when flying higher and doing acrobatic moves, which puts some strategy into the game also.

Here is the main menu screen:


It supports up to four players at the same time, utilising a split 4 quarter screen, three way and two way split screens to show them all at the same time on screen!

If you are just playing against cpu players, you can choose if they are visible via split screen or just show yourself in single player mode:

Quarter Screen mode:


Three way split screen mode:


Two player split screen mode:


Single Player screen view:


As you can see from the screenshots, Wings Battlefield's graphics are fantastic - it is wonderful to have a original game like this on NG Amiga operating systems.

This game on AmigaOS4.1 uses the Radeon HD Composition functionality in the latest Radeon HD 2.7 driver (Available on AMIStore) to achieve some impressive 3D game landscapes.

Cherry Darling dub this "Cherry Terrain" - a Composite 3D Engine they developed themselves:


There are plenty of settings you choose from to customise the game, such as music/sound fx, the number of rounds, number of players, the skill of the cpu players, and landscape details too:




You can also change the player names too, and assign unique controls to each player too:


You can even rotate the game screen if you have a suitable rotating monitor (I don't unfortunately):


Here is the High Score screen - hopefully I can get something decent on it:


Let's dive into a game now. From the main menu screen I get the options - I also found I was thanked in the credits of this game! It was a nice surprise - thanks!:


When you click on start you get the option to play just on this machine, play a LAN game, or join an existing LAN game:


I would love to test the LAN game functionality against my X1000, but without my X1000 right now I can't try it unfortunately. So I picked to start playing on this machine, and later in this post I will try the LAN game against the same game running on a MorphOS Powerbook G4 system!

I then get to choose the players, and whether I see the cpu players in cockpit on the game screen or not. I can also change the number of rounds that are played. A round finishes when you either destroy all the other planes or you are destroyed:


You can have up to 9 rounds:


I choose 9 rounds and four cpu players in cockpit - you can even choose the colours on each plane:


Once I click on start we start Round 1 and I get the 4 way split screen:


And game is underway - speed is perfect and smooth at all times:


With four players getting shot down is fast with 4 cpu players at first - I got better with each round, but in the first I was killed off very quickly indeed:


Round 2 - let's have another go:


This time I did better, shooting down one enemy plane - they crash spectacularly and their piece of the screen then disappears as the round continues:



One of the cpu players takes out one of the other ones:


Down to the last two, but I got shot down unfortunately:


As the rounds continue my skills improve (note you can use keyboard or joystick to control), and eventually I starting regularly winning each round:



At the end of the Nine rounds I am the winner!


You even get a congratulatory screen for winning:


And of course I am now on the high score table:


As nice as the four way split screen is, I was keen to try out the single player screen mode, so I played again for 3 rounds with 4 cpu players not in the cockpit:


The Single Player screen mode is wonderful and for me really shows off the quality of the Cherry Terrain 3D engine well:


Some more in game shots:


You'll notice there is a tree car freshener at the top of the cockpit that help orient the angle of the plane relative to the ground at the moment. It is useful as it helps your response times when dogfighting with the enemy planes - here I am banking heavily to the left:


I found the enemy plane (two actually) so off I go to shoot it down:


They split off as I approach so I focus on the green plane:


The quick reflex moves to avoid being shot down are challenging and fun too - makes you keep coming back to have another go:


I thought I was doing ok here and leading at the end of Round 2:


However in Round 3 I was destroyed early and lost the game:


I next tried a LAN Game, using my Sam 460 with AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition running the Wings Battlefield Compositing Version, and my Powerbook G4 running Morphos 3.7. This is the first time I have tried playing a LAN game using two Next Gen Amiga systems:


Close up of the MorphOS version of Wings Battlefield.


 Demo mode on both system showing the game running:



So to play the LAN game I setup the MorphOS machine with a different Player Name. You will need to put in your CD key for each machine that is connecting to a LAN game:


In the Map section you can change some game settings too:


I then need to put in the name of the LAN game so the other machine can connect to it:


I then hit Start, and it is waiting for connections:


I then choose the Join a LAN game option from the Sam 460, and specify the same LAN game name as I put into the other system and click Join:


The MorphOS system then adds the Sam 460 machine into the game:


So now we can hit Start since no one else will be joining into the game:


Here is the LAN Game in action on both systems - very cool indeed:



Given the difficulty in controlling two machines at once, killing the other plane was easy enough!


In this LAN game, progress score is now Sam 460 1, MorphOS 0:


As with the normal game, the LAN game runs up to 9 rounds, which is configurable of course.

I uploaded a YouTube video to show the LAN game in action:


Wings Battlefield is an excellent game and I am grateful to Cherry Darling for letting me have this sneak peak of the game.

The music, sound effects are good, and the graphics are fantastic. The gameplay is engaging, with the multiple players on one machine definitely making for an interesting dogfighting flying game!

The LAN gaming adds another dimension that is sure to be popular at Amiga meetings the world over.

It should be released soon, so keep an eye out for it!

↧

Adelaide Amiga User Group and Amiga 30 Meeting

May 12, 2015, 3:29 am
$
0
0
I have been busy for the past few weeks working on creating a web presence for the Adelaide Amiga User Group, which meets regularly in Adelaide, South Australia.


The site has now gone live! The web address to go to is:

http://adelaideamiga.blogspot.com.au

You can find all the information you need on when the meetings happen, the meeting location and how to get there. There is also a blog to show photos from the meetings and other interesting Amiga related topics too! There is also links to various Amiga resources on the web.

As a reminder the next Amiga meeting (dubbed Amiga 30) has been set as Monday May 25th, 2015. It is hoped, as part of the Amiga 30th birthday celebrations, to get as many different Classic and Next Generation Amiga systems as we can to the meeting!

If you plan to go then please leave a comment on amiga.org Adelaide Amiga thread here so the user group know who is definitely coming!

I will certainly be there, with plenty of Amiga's on display! I look forward to seeing some of you there too!

↧
Search

Dockies with AmigaOS 4.1.6 and Final Edition on X1000

January 25, 2015, 1:02 am
$
0
0
Today I want to take a look at some Dockies using AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition on the X1000.


So what are Dockies? Basically they are an interactive object that appears in an AmiDock toolbar on your Workbench screen. They can perform a lot of different functions as we will see.

By default, AmiDock has one Dock defined called MainDock, which is the one that appears at the bottom of your Workbench screen when you install AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition (or AmigaOS 4.1.6):


You can drag normal icons into the Dock to launch programs by clicking on them, or drag and drop files onto them to launch a file using the requested program. Eg. Dragging a music file onto AmigaAmp, a picture file onto Multiview or dragging a text file onto Notepad to edit it.

Dockies can provide interactive information above this basic functionality of icons in the AmiDock toolbar. Some like the Subdocks are well known to AmigaOS4.1 users already - for example the Extras and Internet sub docks shown below - which allow additional icons to be added to them (via drag and drop or through prefs) which expand when clicked on in a Dock (click to expand).


Some examples of more advanced dockies are the AmiUpdate Docky (which animates a processing animation when searching for updates for your system), TuneNet App Docky (which displays the current song being played and basic control functions in the dock like play, stop, rewind, fast forward):


The Mixer and NemoSound docky allow you to quickly control the volume levels on input and output of sound through the sound card in the X1000 from the Dock.

There are more too of course - I am just scratching the surface here.

In addition to the ones above, the Z-Tools suite of programs by Zzd10h (available for purchase on AMIStore) has a number of useful tools that uses various Dockies to place information about your system, network, and graphics card at your fingertips on the Workbench.

The Z-Tools dockies go one step further by supporting MiniDock mode of operation. This requires a little more explanation.

MiniDock mode means that the objects used are resized to a much smaller size than a standard AmigaOS icon size used in a normal Dock, making it possible to size a AmiDock Dock to fit snugly inside the Workbench Title Bar at the top of the screen (or elsewhere).

This is similar functionality to the Mac OS X Finder title bar, where icons are made available in a similar manner, unlocking extra information when clicked on. An example MiniDock I have setup in AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition is shown below (CPUDock is showing in this case - click to expand):



In the AmiDock preferences (available from clicking the down arrow and selecting Edit Preferences  - next to the Amidock default MainDock on the Workbench) you can add additional Docks, which you can configure for use in MiniDock mode.

In the example below I am adding a new Dock called TitleDock that I plan to use for the MiniDock icons in my Workbench title bar space - Below I have created the New TitleDock on the Left (Click Add to do this) and then added the various Objects (Dockies) I want installed in the Objects heading (again, click Add to add them in individually).


Note I have included Separator.docky dockies (which are in Sys:Utilities/Dockies) between each object for cleaner appearance in the Titlebar. This is not required, but I think it looks better with it - personal choice though!

Important thing if you want the toolbar to exist in the workbench Titlebar is to uncheck the option in AmiDock at the bottom of the Preferences screen above to Respect screen titlebar. This then allows Docks to be positioned in the titlebar - otherwise this is not allowed.

Moving on to the Layout tab for my new TitleDock, I then change some of the default options as below: no Snap to defined, and Dock is Borderless checked on. For the Orientation option, use Horizontal. Ensure Placement option is set to Always on top. In this tab, ensure the Dock has drag bar option is kept initially until the new TitleDock is positioned where you want it and saved - then remove it as below for a clean look. You can always put the drag bar back from this screen if you need to move it again because you added another dockie(s) to it:


Moving to the Appearance Tab, we need to ensure the TitleDock Icon Area option is fully transparent so it looks right on the titlebar it will be placed on top of, as below.


I didn't change the Misc tab but it is included for completeness:


Note that back in the Contents tab you can use the up and down button below the Objects section to move icons order around in the new Dock until you are happy with their location before hitting Save:


This is not the end of the configuration though. Next, we need to edit the Information on the individual Dockies - to activate MiniDock mode of operation - at the moment the icons will appear normal size until these next steps are done. For each of the Z-Tools docks, modify them as follows:

RamDock.docky, CPUDock, NetDock and GFXDock need MINIDOCK=ON and INFO_WINDOW_DISPOSITION=BW set in the respective docky icon Information > Icon Tab > Tool types section - which tells the docks to display the information for the dock just below the Workbench title bar and use MiniDock mode for the objects displayed in the Dock:


Note that after changing these settings - the resulting TitleDock may not be aligned as you want in the Title bar - it wasn't for me either. This requires a bit of mucking around with positioning on the screen with the drag bar enabled to get it where you want it. Once you have it where you want it - uncheck the drag bar option as mentioned before and Save it's position.

Remember also that the drag bar is included in the position of the Dock. When removed it shifts the dock that distance from the position you had before - allow for that when positioning prior to saving it without it so it is where you want it.

CPUDock is the first docky in the TitleDock that results from all the settings above - it shows the CPU usage as a percentage and current running tasks when the minidock icon is double clicked on:


RAMDock is the next one - showing detailed look at the memory used, free and total available, and a updated historical graphical view of the usage:


The GFXDock docky is next up, showing the current Graphics card screen resolution, memory usage and total available.


The NetDock shows the data uploaded/downloaded amount and speed, total uptime and the historical data transferred in graphical format.


I also added SmartDock.docky, which I downloaded from os4depot.net here, which allows you to report on the health status of your SMART enabled hard disk (assuming your hard disk is SMART enabled).

I configured it as below for my SMART reporting enabled Western Digital Hard Disk only - my other hard disk is not SMART enabled:



Below is the resulting TitleDock on my Workbench TitleBar with SmartDock added in:


Note that the time clock on the right is not part of the dock, but a separate program I run in my wbstartup called Digiclock (download from os4depot.net here). I positioned the TitleDock so it fitted nicely with it on the right hand side of the Workbench title bar and looks more integrated.

Here is the SmartDock extra information when moving the mouse over the icon in the TitleDock - click to expand:


I then added WinBar.docky (download here), utilising a new Dock I created in AmiDock preferences (similar to the above TitleDock (but using Vertical Orientation instead of Horizontal) to allow me to scroll through and select the active programs and screens from what is currently running on my Workbench - click to expand:


Here is a closeup view of the WinBar docky running on the Workbench - you can see that the DOpus 5.9 screen running on the other display is switchable from here with a simple mouse click:


I then moved the dock to the bottom right corner of the screen to keep it out of the way, but easy to get to when I want to easily switch screens or programs (click to expand):


Previously I had looked at the LittleBrother Docky too on my blog here under AmigaOS4.1.6, which is another example of an interesting docky, for live webcam views on your Workbench from sites around the world! This docky is now available as part of the Z-Tools Suite on AMIStore. The blog post I linked already covers the detailed configuration of Little Brother, so I just include some of the images of the setup here for interest of what it looks like:




There are plenty more dockies out there to explore, and investing some time in the readme for each dock is worthwhile, to get them working for you the way you ideally want them to!

Dockies can add a lot of functionality to the Workbench, with information and programs quicker to access, and more detailed information available too.

I hope this information is useful and inspires you to try out more dockies on AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition or 4.1.6 on your X1000!

↧

MorphOS 3.8 on SAM 460CR and Powerbook G4

May 16, 2015, 3:18 am
$
0
0
This week saw the release of MorphOS 3.8, so I quickly fired up the Powerbook G4 to upgrade to the latest version! I also could try out the new support in MorphOS 3.8 for the Sam 460Cr I recently bought - great stuff!


First, the Powerbook G4. I downloaded the iso from morphos-team.net and burned to a CD, and booted it by holding down "C" while turning on the Powerbook.


Here is MorphOS 3.8 booting from the CD:


Once booted I get the 3.8 welcome screen below:

Starting the installation, I choose to upgrade my existing MorphOS 3.7 installation on the Powerbook G4. I also have the Chrysalis Pack from an earlier MorphOS release installed already too:


When I select Update Installation I then see my existing MorphOS 3.7 installation discovered by the install wizard. I select it and click Update to get things started.

After some time the installation finishes, ready for reboot:


After rebooting, my system boots into the new MorphOS 3.8 with no issues - excellent!


Still haven't worked out how to change the language of the status bar at the bottom of the windows - oh well, eventually I'll sort it out.



The Preferences in MorphOS is similar to MacOS X in structure, quite different from AmigaOS 3.x and AmigaOS 4.x too:


For Powerbook and iBook owners, MorphOS has adjustable settings for laptop configurations:


As you can see there is no shortage of options:



You can also modify the behaviour of the laptop touchpad:



Next I wanted to try MorphOS 3.8 on the SAM460CR, now supported with the latest release of MorphOS. I decided to swap my AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition hard disk for a new one to avoid potential issues between the two, as they are not really intended to run in dual boot configuration on the same hard disk from what I have been told.


With the new hard disk installed, I put the MorphOS 3.8 CD in and choose to boot from it by pressing enter on boot to select a different boot device, and choosing the DVD: 

The boot loader for MorphOS on the CD then kicks in:


Here is MorphOS 3.8 now booting on the SAM460CR:


I did get a strange message below about bsdsocket.library error. If I close it and click on OK things continue though:


I then get the MorphOS 3.8 welcome screen:



Interesting to see the two MorphOS systems side by side at this point, both running 3.8:


I then kick off as a New installation and select the automatic partitioning, with 30GB for the System partition:


The install then works away..


Here are some screenshots of the system once installed, barebones with nothing else added (click to expand any of these photos):


It is a very significant effort to get MorphOS to support a new, currently available PPC system, so I am very grateful to the developers for their work in making it happen. The new support for Radeon HD cards such as the R730 I use in my Sam460CR is very welcome indeed.


As this MorphOS 3.8 system is currently running in demo mode, it runs for 30 minutes and then slows down, forcing a reboot every 30 minutes to encourage you to register MorphOS. The cost is EUR49.


At the moment there are some problems on the Sam 460CR version, with the speed with dragging windows (apparently due to the model of Radeon HD graphics card I am using), serious slowdown typing URL's into OWB and no sound support on the Sam 460CR (probably works on the EX which includes the onboard sound).

I don't really want to have to change graphics cards as it works perfectly under AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition and I don't really want to put in a slower card that is faster under MorphOS but slower under AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition....undecided what to do about it.

Hopefully these issues will be addressed soon via an update, and then I can register MorphOS 3.8 for my Sam 460CR.

I can't install the current Chrysalis Pack either, as it doesn't recognise the new MorphOS version and refuses to install. I assume a new one to support 3.8 is in the works!

I decided to run some graphics card benchmarks, since a GfxSpeed program is included in MorphOS 3.8. Here is the program:


Actually, I ran all the benchmarks. With only 30 minutes I got the results just as the limit was reached, so not sure if the last few tests are to be trusted. In any case, the scores it came up with are below - if you are not interested or don't understand the benchmarks (I don't know much either), feel free to skip past them as there is more unrelated stuff underneath the results!

Overall score is 3216:


Detailed benchmark info (no I don't know what any of it means - but thought some people might be interested!):











If someone else knows how this compares to other installations I would be interested - faster, slower, etc. Probably I should test it on my Powerbook G4 at some point too...

So, anyway, enough about benchmarks for now.

Next,  I took the opportunity to fix up the hard disk partitioning. Under MorphOS it supports SFS0, but not SFS2 file systems like AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition does. This means that the maximum partition size using SFS is limited to 128GB.

As my hard disk is 1TB, it means my current 30GB (System) and 128GB (Work) partitions are not even close to making the best use of the space available to MorphOS on my Sam460 CR.

In the Tools drawer is the HDConfig utility, which is the equivalent tool to HDToolbox on AmigaOS3.X or Media Toolbox on AmigaOS4.X - here you can see the current partition layout with plenty of free space:


If I click in the free space, the tool asks me how many partitions I want to create in the remaining space:


Trouble is though, that none of these sizes complies with the maximum 128GB limit of SFS0. It will let you create it anyway - 1 partition in my case of 773GB:


...But you will then be told it can't be that size:


So I resized it to 128GB, and created a few more partitions of similar sizes, and one small one (the size of the System partition DH0) to act as a MorphOS backup partition - note that the hard disk on the left now has a red background indicating I have made changes not yet saved:


There is still free space, but I think this allocation will do for the time being - I can always add additional partitions later on as needed - I then click on Save to save the changes to the hard disk. It prompts me to make sure this is what I want:


Now the partition setup is done:


Next I close this program and go back to the Tool drawer to run the Format program:


I then format each of the new partitions in turn - I am planning to use DH2 for Music, DH3 for Pictures, DH4 for videos, and DH5 as the MorphOS backup partition - don't forget to tick Create Icon (not ticked below) and use Quick Format:


Here is my completed hard disk layout, now available in MorphOS 3.8 for use:


I then backup my MorphOS DH0 partition to my backup DH5 partition:


After posting on MorphZone about my issues, I did find a potential solution (suggested by posters) to the sound issue, as there is a Envy24 MorphOS driver available here. It is not included on the MorphOS 3.8 CD as apparently it is not tested on the Sam460 CR.

I decided to download it and give it a go. It involves copying the AHI and Audio folders to the DH0:morphos/devs/ folder.


After a reboot it didn't show up in the Sound settings, but I have not given up - I tried copying the OpenPCI.library.elf (from OpenPCi Library on morphos-files.net) to the dh0:morphos/libs/ folder as was suggested as necessary to detect the sound card, but no change. Hopefully I missed something important that will get it working for me!

The Sam460 MorphOS build for me is still very much a work in progress right now, but I am glad to see MorphOS 3.8 now available on the Sam 460CR, a current, available PowerPC system that also runs AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition.

So, the Sam460CR offers the best of both worlds in being able to run both MorphOS and AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition on the same system!

I will cover more in a future blog entry as I play around with MorphOS 3.8 some more, but I have run out of time for today!

↧
↧

New Acube Systems Firmware for Sam 460CR

May 18, 2015, 5:35 am
$
0
0
Today Acube Systems released a firmware upgrade for the Sam 460ex and Sam 460cr systems and I quickly rushed to install it on my Sam 460CR. It is nice to get a new firmware so soon after buying the Sam system.


First here are some shots from the old Sam460CR firmware that came with the machine - initial power on:


Old U-Boot Preferences Menu:



 Old Boot Select Menu:



I was disappointed to find that they charged money for a firmware upgrade for a system. It is the first time I have ever had to pay to upgrade firmware on a computer.

That said, it was not that expensive, and I was keen to try it. So I coughed up the EUR9 (+Paypal fees) to buy it from Acube's online shop which is linked from their website here.

The features list for the updated firmware are listed by ACube as:

- new redesigned GUI with an 'amiga' style, enabled via Menu->Video Options->Console->Silent
- unified support for Sam460ex and Sam460cr boards
- support for USB EHCI, now booting from a SD card is very fast
- better support for USB devices
- removed 2 GB limit for USB sticks
- better compatibility with newer Radeon HD graphic cards
- introduced a new menu entry to change the x86 gfx BIOS emulator accuracy. If your graphic card
  show some visual problems on startup, try increasing the x86 BIOS emulator accuracy
- new DDR2 boost settings: read, write, read + write (up to 5% speed increase on reads and up to 
  10% on writes)
- DDR2 boost setup done from a new menu entry
- added support for old Permedia2 graphic cards, for 'history' reasons :-)
- added 'ping' command

- corrected a bug in the serial port GPIO configuration

Particularly of interest to me is the better usb support, memory boost, better compatibility with newer Radeon HD cards and the removal of the 2GB limited for USB sticks.

I then downloaded the lha archive as prompted, and burned off the included ISO, ready to go:


There are simple instructions to follow, but unlike the X1000 CFE firmware upgrade process, the Sam 460 firmware upgrade is very easy:


After it boots from the CD, you then press Space to start the firmware uprade:


And off it goes...first, erasing the firmware:


Then writing the new firmware:


Firmware update complete, ready to power off/on after removing the cd from the drive:


The new firmware looks very different indeed when the 460CR is powered on:



The U-Boot preference menu:


As mentioned in the readme included with the firmware software, there is an option In the Preferences Menu, Under Video Options > Console, to simplify the display to be a little more Amiga-like by changing the Console to from Verbose to Silent:



Here are some of the other U-Boot screens in the new firmware - the memory boost options, disabled by default:



It was a little disappointing for a paid update that no new multi-boot functionality was included. I particularly expected it to be possible to dual boot MorphOS and AmigaOS 4.1 with the new firmware but it appears mostly the same as before:



Last but not least, the System Information screen:


After changing the Console to Silent, a different boot sequence appears, which looks a lot nicer, packaging the AmigaOS4.1 initial kick layout file boot sequence into the firmware screen in a more integrated way:


I do like the upgraded look to the update firmware - the Silent option on the console makes it much nicer boot sequence too in my opinion - below is the initial boot of the AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition disk - other multi boot options can appear here also, but no idea how to add MorphOS 3.8 to it:




AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition still boots and works as normal after the firmware update:


MorphOS 3.8 also booted up after the firmware update - like the old firmware though, the nice boot menu for AmigaOS 4.1 is not visible when booting MorphOS...

I will play with it some more later on as I have limited time today, but wanted to show people what the upgrade firmware looks like and what to expect.

To be honest I had hoped for more multi boot options, preferably with a easy to setup multi-boot functionality for MorphOS 3.8 / AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition multi boot, and indeed Linux too.

The graphical touches to make the firmware look nicer are welcome of course. I still think this could  have been released as a free firmware update though.

Looking forward to the next update with multi boot support for MorphOS 3.8 and AmigaOS4.1 on the same hard disk or separate disks, and hopefully that will be free for people who bought this upgrade...

In the meantime though, thanks to ACube for their work in updating the firmware and new features - it is certainly an improvement.


↧

Dual Boot AmigaOS 4.1 FE and MorphOS 3.8 on Sam 460CR

May 19, 2015, 3:56 am
$
0
0
I finally got it working - Dual Boot AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition and MorphOS 3.8 now running on my Sam 460CR!


Above is the AmigaOS4.1 Final Edition running on the Sam 460CR, showing the MorphOS partition and Data partitions used by MorphOS. (Click to expand any pictures)

Below is the MorphOS 3.8 running on the Sam 460CR off the partitions shown above (MorphOS can't see the AmigaOS 4.1 SFS2 partitions):


The secret to getting this working was a tip off on the Amiga forums by Kyle (here) on how to boot from SDCard on the Sam460CR, in combination with the latest Sam 460CR/EX 2015-A firmware from ACube (shown in this blog here), which removes the 2GB restriction on SD Cards...It means I can install MorphOS 3.8 onto a large SDCard!

To get this working I opened the Sam 460CR case and installed a 64GB SDXC Card (stock standard - brand new):


The SDCard slot on the Sam 460 is mounted on the back of the board itself - here is the SDCard installed and ready to start work on it:


I first booted into AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition and prepared an additional SFS0 partition called Data on the SATA hard disk (size 101GB) to be used by MorphOS. It can then also be read by AmigaOS4.1 and so sharing data is easier (MorphOS can't read the SFS2 partitions created by AmigaOS 4.1)


I then format the partition:


I then booted the Sam 460CR from the MorphOS 3.8 DVD and ran the HDConfig tool in the Tools folder.


We use this HDConfig tool to delete the existing SD Card partition, install the Amiga RDB (instead of default MBR), and then prep the SDCard as a DOS/07 (FFS LNFS) partition, using the full size of the SDCard, called DH0.

Note: I tried using SFS0 for the partition rather than FFS LNFS - it doesn't boot. So I stick with FFS LNFS.

The reason to do this ahead of the MorphOS installation, is to avoid drive partitions and names being created (like System: and Work: that MorphOS uses on automatic install) that conflict with the AmigaOS 4.1 partitions already in place on the hard disk (In AmigaOS 4.1 it already has two partitions called System: and Work:).

Here is the prepped SDCard in HDConfig, ready to save:


I then formatted the drive using the MorphOS format tool, and then installed MorphOS on the SDCard using Manual partition size, and selecting the partition I created earlier.


Installation completed:


After the install to the SD Card is complete, I show the completed install on the SD Card partition MorphOS, ready with all the required files:


I can then remove the MorphOS CD and reboot the Sam. 

At this point I press Enter when prompted by U-Boot, then select in U-Boot to boot the USB HD (which is the SDCard slot in the Sam 460).


It then boots MorphOS 3.8 on the Sam460CR from the SDCard! Success!


To boot AmigaOS 4.1 Final Edition I just let the system boot as normal - it will then boot the hard disk.


As a test I then removed the hard disk, so that only the sd card remained. It won't boot at all without the hard disk, as the hard disk has the SLB_v2 needed for the Sam to run. 

I guess you could install the SLB onto the SDCard if you didn't want to use a hard disk at all - haven't tried it yet though, and not really a priority for me.

Anyway - goal achieved! I can now dual boot MorphOS 3.8 and AmigaOS 4.1 final Edition on the Sam 460CR. No more opening the case to swap cables around! Fantastic!

I guess the next target is to triple boot Linux on the system using the former MorphOS SATA hard disk - another task for another day!


↧

Gotek using External floppy cable on CDTV

May 23, 2015, 8:10 am
$
0
0
Interesting thing I bought recently on Ebay is a external Amiga floppy disk connector plus cable with integrated floppy drive power supply that can be used to connect a Gotek floppy drive emulator to an Amiga!


For those with Classic Amigas with Workbench 2.0 and above, this is excellent as it means you don't have to open your case up to install the Gotek - it simply plugs into the external floppy drive port and choose to boot from this device in the Early startup menu.


I previously showed the Gotek hooked up to my Amiga 600 and Amiga 1000 using the internal floppy drive connector - opening the case and going into some detail on the operation of the Gotek so I won't repeat myself again here - click the Amiga 600 and Amiga 1000 links for more info!

But today, I am using the external connector on the CDTV to use the Gotek! This is because, unique to the CDTV, the external floppy drive IS DF0 and bootable on Workbench 1.3 without modification internally!

Here is the Gotek drive with USB attached, and the external floppy cable with power:
 

This is my standard CDTV, connected via AV to a TV screen (looks like a computer monitor I know but it is actually a TV with a tuner in it and remote control):


Here is the Gotek all connected up, ready to plug into the floppy connector on the CDTV - I love the simplicity and the fact a separate power source is not needed for the Gotek with this setup. Just plug in and go:


Here is the Gotek now plugged into the CDTV:

 
First power on and we boot into a Classic Amiga game - Katakis:



It works fantastic - I recommend picking up the external connector if you have a Gotek drive. I assume it will work well with a HxC floppy drive too, but not tested.

Since I had the CDTV on, I couldn't resist loading up the Psygnosis Commodore Demo CD - very cool:


Unless you have a CDTV or emulate one, chances are you missed out on this rather interesting CDTV only CD - there are a few that were only released on CDTV:


I plan to bring the CDTV and Gotek setup as above to the Adelaide Amiga 30 meeting on Monday night, so if you are in Adelaide please come along to the meeting and you can see it in the flesh and try it out yourself!

↧
Viewing all 215 articles
Browse latest View live
Search