GVP HD+ for Amiga 500

[straycat]

Hi everyone, new to the forum but been following the site for a while

I have been fortunate to pick up a GVP HD+ (sidecar) from eBay recently (I had a nice surprise when I unexpectedly found it was already populated to 8Mb onboard). My A500 has Kickstart 1.3 and the GVP was probably running on an A500+ previously as it's asking for 2.04 or higher when I try to boot from it.

I'm now deciding whether to upgrade up Kickstart or find an install disk to reformat the drive for 1.3. Does anyone know where I can pick up a install floppy for the drive (or a generic disk that'll do the job). Alternatively I can go for Kick/WB 3.1 with the install disk included in the set. Apart from the obvious compatability advantages of a newer Kickstart are there any advantages with using the hard drive?

[Ilwrath]

Apart from the obvious compatability advantages of a newer Kickstart are there any advantages with using the hard drive?

Well, essentially, the compatability advantages of the newer kickstart ARE the reason to upgrade to the newer kickstart.  There isn't very much software that is HD installable that works under kickstart 1.3.  Personally, I'd go for the 3.1 for it.  3.1 has almost identical backward compatability as 2.04 had, plus it supports all the newer things you want, like WHDLoad, etc.  :-)

An AmigaDOS 1.3 system booted off a hard drive is a great novelty, and boy does it fly...  But it's not very helpful to actually doing or playing anything.  There's hardly anything that can be run that way, outside of Workbench 1.3, itself.

[straycat]

If Kickstart runs very few things from the HD that's a good enough reason for me to upgrade.

WHDLoad certainly looks attractive

Thanks for the useful advice!

[DoogUK]

i have the install disk, if you need a copy i can mail you the adf.

[straycat]

DoogUK wrote:
i have the install disk, if you need a copy i can mail you the adf.

@DoogUK:

Yes this would be very useful - it will be good to have the install disk as another option, even if I do move the Kickstart up

[DoogUK]

PM me your email adress and i will mail the disk image to you.

[straycat]

@DoogUK:

Cheers for the offer, I since discovered an ADF when hunting the net, but thanks all the same