How to create a fast (but stable) OS3.9 AGA setup

[amigadave]

Okay guys and gals,

this thread and the one about work being completed on an unofficial BoingBag3 have motivated me to stop working on my current A3000 and A3000T projects and go back to my A1200/060/256mb Fast RAM & Blizzard SCSI.

I have just finished tearing it down to remove the 4gb hard drive and replace it with an 8gb Compact Flash card and IDE to CF adapter.  The CF is now partitioned and formatted and I have installed AmigaOS3.9, but not the BoingBags 1 & 2 yet.

My question is, do I start at the beginning of this thread or should I install the unofficial "BoingBag 3" and then come back to this thread and install what is suggested here?  Also, are there starting to be some conflicting alternative suggestions in this thread for what are the best patches and programs to install to get the best and fastest AGA Amiga setup?

Here are my complete specs for my system:

Late model A1200 - Oct 12th, 1995 stamped in ink inside the case top
Rev 1D4 Motherboard
Blizzard 1260 rev. II w/SCSI module and 256mb RAM
8gb CF card on internal IDE header via IDE-> CF adapter
IndivisionAGA 1200 connected to a 19" CRT
current display settings are 1440x400 w/64 color Workbench, but will look at 1024x768 HighGFX when I get it downloaded and installed
External Zip250 & CD-ROM connected to Blizzard SCSI module's external connector
Subway USB controller w/registered Poseidon stack & 4 USB ports (2 back & 2 side of case)
New AmigaKit floppy drive (bought at AmiWest 2009, thanks Matthew)
Wireless Network card for Miami Deluxe & IBrowse2.4

I think that is everything?

Advice on how to make this an ultimate and fast as possible AGA AmigaOS3.9 machine will be greatly appreciated.

Old-time Amiga user > then long time Amiga collector > now enjoying being an active Amiga user again.

[amigadave]

I am glad that BoingBag 3 has motivated people to use more their Amigas!

All recomendations are good, the choices you make should really depend on your point of view and Amiga usage. It is allways a good policy to try out things out first, and then decide based on results you get.

By the way, you ´ve got a very nice AGA setup!

PS: Has anyone tryed CybergraphX 4.x AGA driver on a 68k? How does it perform?

I have the CybergraphX 4 CD here, so I can install the driver and let you know what it looks like using my IndivisionAGA if the two are compatible together.

The reason I asked my question is I, like many other returning Amiga users missed out on that period of time when most of the third party patches and improvements were being created, discussed and tested, so I have no knowledge of them except the recommendations I can get from other users who were active at that time and over the years have kept up with each new development for the Classic Amiga models and last improvements for OS3.9.

It is very easy to install something and screw up a perfectly good OS installation and it is sometimes hard to reverse such screw-ups.  I had just such an occurrence this morning and I still don't know exactly what was the cause of the problem that took down my A1200.  This was also a reason for me to take apart the A1200 and switch from the 4gb hard drive to the 8gb CF card as the 4gb hdd would no longer boot.  I think it was the BoingBag 1 or 2 ROM updates, so I have not installed BoingBags yet until I read more in these threads.  I was hoping that someone with a Blizzard 1260 and IndivisionAGA would chime in and offer to tell me what setup he/she is using and which patches, programs and utilities I should install to match their fast AGA setup.  I am too tired and busy to keep using trial and error method, but that is what I will do if there is no easier way to get where I want to be.

[amigadave]

I am sorry that my setup doesnt match your own, so i could help you out. But i am sure some Amiga user over here will be willing to give you a helping hand.

By the way, backups are a good habit that will save you more than half of those headaches!

Good luck!

Yeah, I am booting now from a ZIP100 optical disk, so I did have a backup.  I am just anxious to get this done as quickly as possible so I can get back to a couple of other Amiga projects that are in pieces all over my kitchen table, the pool table and the game room coffee table and floor.

I was hoping when I saw the thread that someone had put everything into one neat package that I could install as easily as OS3.9 itself and just tweak a couple of settings to match my setup and be done with it.  The idea of installing one component, testing, backing up and then repeating the process for the next component, when there may be 20 to 30 (or 50) different components required to be updated, added or patched is a very time consuming prospect for me.

Oh well, it will be worth it so here I go.  I am going to start with a completely clean install of OS3.9 but can anyone tell me if I should, or should not check the "Install ROM updates" check box when running the BoingBag1 and BoingBag2 updates since I have a Blizzard 1260 accelerator board?

Edit:  My old configuration of OS3.9 was on the hard drive when I bought this A1260 system and probably had BoingBags 1 & 2 already installed, but I installed them again to start the process of following the BoingBag3 installation instructions just in case they weren't installed.  Then, when I connected a USB flashdrive to one of my USB ports on the Subway my A1200 crashed and it could not reboot, cold or warm.  Something was screwed up and I was not sure what it was.

[amigadave]

Yes as I said in my original post, install BB1, 2 and 3 first (although BB3 is now 'growing').



Nice specs, yes HighGFX 1024x768 in 64 colours should run very well on your setup.

Have you thought about ditching the IDE (blanking it off) and using an external SCSI HD?

What about a power supply for that lot?

Hey NovaCoder,

I understand the instructions to install 3.9, then BoingBags 1, 2 & 3 in order, but I am still having problems.  I am using an 8gb Compact Flash card in an IDE to CF adapter, connected to the A1200's IDE controller, because I wanted to reduce heat above my IndivisionAGA display enhancer.  Also, the CF card is twice the size of the 4gb hdd I was using.

I have the CF card partitioned into 5 partitions. 1st one is bootable for the OS3.9 and is about .9gb in size, 2nd partition is also bootable and the same size for use as a backup boot partition and this is the one that I am doing all of my experimental BoingBag3 installs onto, the remaining 3 partitions are all about 2gb (a little less) and they are labeled Work:, Play: and Extra: for containing programs and data.

I have been very careful in my installation proceedures, but I must be missing something, some step that I have missed, because I keep coming up with the same errors, which I will list exactly below.

At the end of BoingBag3 the instructions say to alter the startup-sequence, so here is a partial listing of my startup-sequence showing exactly what I have tried.  (this is at the top before anything else)

IF Exists C:IDEFix
      C:IDEFix
Endif

;BEGIN BoingBag3
SYS:C/LoadModule L:FastFileSystem L:RAM-Handler L:Shell-Seg DEVS:scsi.device Libs:icon.library Libs:workbench.library NOREBOOT
SYS:C/SetPatch SKIPROMMODULES filesystem,icon,ram-handler,scsi,shell,workbench QUIET
;END BoingBag3

The original setpatch line has been removed from the script.

Then I turn off the computer and wait for 5 to 10 minutes, or on one attempt, I waited all night.  Then I coldboot and get these errors.

"Loading DEVS:scsi.device failed: object not found"
"LoadModule failed returncode 10"

So, I then boot into my other boot partition and remove the "DEVS:scsi.device" part of the LoadModule line and also remove the "scsi" part of the SKIPROMMODULES line and reboot.  Then I get this error.

"Loading filesystem failed: object already exists"
"LoadModule failed returncode 10"

So I then boot into my other partition again and remove the "L:FastFileSystem" part of the LoadModule line and the "filesystem" part of the SKIPROMMODULES line and reboot.  I then get this error.

"ram-handler version 44 already resident"
"Loading ram-handler failed: object already exists"
"LoadModule failed returncode 10"

So, I again reboot into my other boot partition and remove ..... you get the idea.  This time when I reboot, there are no error messages and I get all the way to the Workbench.  I have used the "Find" feature to look for scsi.device on my system and it does not exist, but is mentioned in my "DEVS:NSDPatch.cfg", "DEVS:NSDPatch.cfg-BB3.9-1", and "DEVS:NSDPatch.cfg.BB39-2" as well as being listed in the icon files of some other DOS drivers like DEVS:Storage/DOSdrivers/CD0:, etc.

I find it hard to believe that others have not come across this same problem, since I am using the same BoingBag 1, 2 and 3 installation scripts as everyone else, but I for some reason don't have any scsi.device installed on to my system anywhere.  The problem with the RAM-Handler and FastFileSystem modules not being able to be loaded by LoadModule is also puzzling.

I have not transferred my "log-files" from my Amiga to my PC, or I would attempt to attach them to this posting.

HELP!

P.S.  I just unarchived IDEfix97 from my aminet CD's and took a look at it and it appears to be an old fix that has been superseded by newer fixes for TD64 being added to systems to allow >4gb devices.  I wonder if I install it, if it will fail to install due to the missing scsi.device, or if it contains a version of my missing scsi.device and could fix part of my problems.

What could be more fun that working on my Amigas on Christmas Eve? (well, probably a lot of things, but I really want to figure out creating a fast and stable OS3.9 A1200/060)

Edit:  @NovaCoder, I do have a 150watt PSU running my A1200 and I would not want to blank off the internal IDE and use an external SCSI hdd instead of the internal 8gb CF card.  It is my understanding that the Read/Write to and from the CF should be faster and my efforts are to get the fastest stable AGA OS3.9 install that I can create.

[amigadave]

@NovaCoder

Very impressive and great job!  It's nice to see this instead of just another "use OS 3.1 post" when asking about how to speed up 3.9.

Questions:

* Looks like your bootup time is considerably faster than my 1200's CF card.  I was wondering if you could post your startup-sequence so I could compare.

* I have the B1260 card as well and I am not using blizkick because I thought the card does this ROM->RAM mapping automatically if the jumper is set.  A little confused on this.

-- edit: I wish we had a central site or main FAQ that this kind of great info.  One of the most frustrating things for returning Amiga users (like myself) is trying to find info on the net.  My knowledge had stopped at ks2.0 and this has been the biggest hurtle for me.
So many really old FAQs that have dead links or outdated information.

Hey Moto, looks like our A1200's are very similar in their specs.  Would you be interested in sharing notes on how we are progressing with setting up fast AGA OS3.9+BB1+BB2+BB3 installations?  My A1200 includes:

Blizzard 1260 w/scsi module + 256mb FastRAM
8gb CF card on IDE to CF adapter
250mb external SCSI ZIP Optical Drive (scsi unit = #5)
external SCSI Compaq CDROM drive (scsi unit = #3)
PCMCIA wireless network card from AmigaKit + EasyNET software (but I use Miami w/DHCP)
replaced floppy with new one from AmigaKit in Oct., but need to rework eject button
IndivisionAGA connected to LG 19" CRT (monitor is old and might have issues, looking for cheap LCD to replace it)
Subway USB controller w/Poseidon
Cocolino 9pin to PS2 Wheel Mouse adapter + 3 button wheel mouse
Digital to Analog Joystick adapter + Logitech Wingman
150watt PSU to run it all

[amigadave]

IDEFix won't work with most CF cards, that might be your problem, check this thread for more details.

Also as per my original post, you would benefit from using BlizKick.

Per my post, I have not installed IDEfix, I have just located it and unarchived it to look at what it had to offer.  So IDEfix can't be my problem, unless OS3.9, BoingBag1, BoingBag2, or BoingBag3 have installed it by default.

I still don't know how scsi.device is being loaded or where it is being loaded from, as I cannot locate it anywhere on my hard drive, I mean CF card.

Is it loaded from the KickstartROM?  Is it created on the fly during the boot process from an archived file on the CF card?  I do not know the capabilities of the AmigaDOS "Find" function to know if it can search inside of archived files too.

I don't know how to extract the scsi.device from the "resident files" to use with the LoadModule program.  As I have said before, I have not installed anything other than the OS3.9, BoingBag1, BoingBag2 and BoingBag3 using the installation scripts provided with each.

So, Minuous, where am I going wrong?  Does the BoingBag3 installation script only work on A3000 & A4000 computers?  Is it my Blizzard 1260 card that is the problem?  I am lost and don't know which step to try next.

If LoadModule is not the answer, I would need an alternative for installing patched files and moving things into FastRAM instead of ChipRAM to free up my ChipRAM and to hopefully speed up the operation of my A1200.

As always, any and all suggestions welcome.

[amigadave]

Resident in the ROM, however, the Boingbag 1-2 process, updates the scsi.device, it detects what amiga you have, and updates the scsi.device thereafter ( look in the amigaos rom update file and theres a scsi.device-1200-600- 2000-3000 & 4000 & 4000T. You can use ROMSPLIT and or REMUS to _extract modules_ and build a rom, however, the shell-seq i believe, need to be pached to be put on a rom again. ROMSPLIT will allow you to extract and patch, the scsi.device patch is important. Good luck. Use http://aminet.net/disk/misc/check4gb.lha to check if your currently good on the scsi.device, there is also a patch, for the scsi.device in tlsfmem, this has been updated and its on aminet, and i believe mentioned in this post. http://aminet.net/package/driver/media/SCSI4345p anyway

Thanks Mike, I knew it had to be something like that, but did not know for sure what it was.  So, if I understand you correctly, the AmigaOS ROM Update extracts the scsi.device and patches it then loads it into resident memory for use by the system.  It appears that the BoingBag1 and BoingBag2 AmigaOS ROM Update files would do the same thing.  My DEVS directory has;

AmigaOS ROM Update
AmigaOS ROM Update.old
AmigaOS ROM Update.BB39-2

The .BB39-2 file is exactly the same as the active ROM Update file, so I would imagine that the .old file is the original OS3.9 file, or the BoingBag1 ROM Update file which replaced the original OS3.9 ROM Update file.  Not sure why the BoingBag2 install script would leave a second copy of the ROM Update file in the directory, but it does not matter.

My point in all of this is to point out that contrary to what I thought, after installing BoingBag3 there is still more work to be done to complete getting an up-to-date OS3.9 installation finished.

I thought that after running the recently created BoingBag3 install script I would have a finished installation that I could further enhance with some of the other suggested programs, patch files and utilities, if I wanted to, but not because I had to.  At least on my system, that is clearly not the case.

I am not complaining, I appreciate all the work that has gone into the Unofficial BoingBag3.  I just want it's authors to know what I have experienced so they can use the information to further improve BB3, or place notes with it that will help other users in the future.

I think I am really close to understanding what I am trying to do to get everything updated, patched and hopefully stable.  I am going to attempt to build my own custom ROM file and use one of the ROM kicker programs to load it at boot time.  I don't have the equipment to burn my own EPROM chips to replace the 3.1 Kickstart ROMs in my A1200.

I guess there must be legal reasons that nobody has yet started to create custom Kickstart ROM chips for various Amiga models with all the latest and greatest patched files contained in them.  It would be nice if Hyperion would allow this to be done by anyone with the skills to do it, as a gift to the community.  There could be competing different flavors of OS3.9 Kickstart ROMs out there to pick and choose from with different Kickstart ROM builders bragging how their ROMs are better than so-in-so's ROM chips and telling everyone why their ROM chips are the best.

It may no longer be clear who owns the rights to the Kickstart ROM chips and who can legally produce new ones, or say that new ones cannot be produced.  Shame it is that way.

To everyone working on the Unofficial BoingBag3 project, please keep up the great work.  This is a great service to the Amiga community and I am sure that many users will benefit from your efforts.

[amigadave]

>The install seems to go okay, but the two lines that are supposed to be added to the startup-sequence make it so I can't boot off that partition anymore as it stops with error messages.

Can you please send me your old S:Startup-sequence that was working for you. Which hard disk partition can't you boot from? Do you use an IDE splitter? Is your AmigaOS ROM Update the original OS3.9 one or the BB2 one? What error message are you actually getting?

>Also, can you explain to me why my system has no scsi.device after a clean OS3.9 installation?

Not really, without looking at the logfile, because it works here... :-(

You might try changing the "scsi" in the setpatch line to "scsi.device"...

I have had some success getting the updated OS3.9+BB1+BB2+BB3 partition to boot by removing some of the LoadModule commands and letting SetPatch do it's thing on those parts of the ROM files, so I am hesitant to start over yet again and I think I am going to try to adjust what I have if possible (using BlizKick).  The first two times through BB3 I checked the A1200 checkbox, but the last time I did a clean install, I left the "Other" check box checked.  This might have made some difference, but none that I have noticed yet.  I have never seen any scsi.device copied to Devs: during any part of the OS3.9, BB1, BB2, or BB3 installs.  I now have install logfiles for each step along that path that I will send to you if I can find an email address for you.  I don't know how to send attachments with PMail here.  I will also send you my old Startup-sequence file, but I don't know if that is going to help any.

I have BlizKick downloaded and have been reading through it's guide.  Is there any advantage to using LoadModule over using the parts of BlizKick that do the same functions?  If I can master BlizKick, I think I will try to rip my 3.1 ROM image, split it into modules and then reassemble a patched ROM image and map it to Fast RAM using the Blizzard MapROM feature and instructions within the BlizKick guide.  I am hoping to get it so it will not have to reboot twice, but will still be able to run Shapeshifter or Fusion and will boot as fast as possible and run a stable, patched OS3.9 system as fast as is possible.

This has turned out to be more work than I thought it was going to be, but I don't mind as the goal will be a rewarding experience to use.  I am sure that it must be something I am doing wrong during the installation process of OS3.9, and all of the BoingBags, but I don't know what it is yet.  I should have run all of them in Expert mode I guess, so I could have seen and controlled more of what was being installed.  I did not see any instructions for BB3 that recommended that the clean install of OS3.9 and BB's 1 & 2 should be installed using Expert, or even Intermediate mode instead of Novice mode.

If your email address is not easily available here or elsewhere, send it to me so I can send you my log files and startup-sequence.

Thanks for the offer to look at them and to try to help.

Edit: @Framiga, the results are scsi.device 43.43 and I meant to say that I have no scsi.device copied into my Devs: directory, not that I don't have any scsi.device at all.

[amigadave]

Yep that's what I do, just use BlizKick instead of LoadModule and build a BB3 ROM to be copied to FASTRAM on startup

Okay, I finally was successful in installing OS3.9+BB1+BB2+BB3 and added the lines to my Startup-Sequence without any errors showing up after a cold restart.  Hurray!

I don't know why this is true, but it only worked after I used Expert mode in the Installer program of BB2 and BB3.  The missing scsi.device DID finally show up copied to my DEVS: drawer so it could be loaded with LoadModule into Fast RAM.

I did add one thing to the lines that are suggested to be added to the Startup-Sequence.  Before the command "NOREBOOT" at the end of the LoadModule line I added the command "FAST", after I read the guide for LoadModule a little bit.  Maybe it was an unnecessary addition and the LoadModule command puts everything into Fast RAM anyway, but I added it anyway and I think I got about 200k of Chip RAM back after my next reboot after doing that.  Since LoadModule is now working, I am not sure that I will switch to BlizKick, unless someone here can give me a good reason to do so.  I still might use it to build a custom ROM file on this A1200/060 if I can understand the advantage of doing so over the LoadModule method.  I want to learn how to use it anyway as I have a 4mb KickFlash board I am thinking of using on my A4000T and will need to build a Kickstart ROM file for it in the near future.

I also looked at the speed optimization suggestions and unarchived the PatchFor020+ files and read how to use it.  It is not for the faint of heart and certainly not an easy install as you have to manually run the patch on what ever files you think it might provide a speed increase for.  There is a list of which ones it should help and directions on how to use it, but I am not sure it is worth the effort, so I would appreciate any comments from those that have used it about how much of a speed increase they have noticed, or have test results of how it has worked on their systems.

Before I started my latest install of OS3.9 plus all the BoingBags and extras, I downloaded SFS and changed the file system on the partition I have been using to test these installs of the OS and BB's and I think that just that one change has made a very noticeable difference in performance.  I think I will now change the file systems on all of my partitions to SFS, or I might dig out my copy of PFS3 and try it on my other boot partition instead of SFS to later do some speed comparison tests between the two boot partitions after I get one boot partition set up just the way I want it I am going to copy it over in it's entirety to the other boot partition, sort of a mirrored boot partition to use as a backup in case one of them becomes corrupted (which is not supposed to happen on SFS, or PSF partitions).

I am enjoying working on this A1200/060 more than I thought I would.  After working with a fast and very nice looking and full of extras Amiga emulation using Amikit on a Quad Core 3.0GHz PC, and running MorphOS2.4 on my 1.5GHz G4 MacMini, I did not think I would enjoy OS3.9 on an 060 A1200 without a 24bit graphics card as much as I am.  The challenge of getting the most out of this old hardware is very rewarding, even though I have spent a lot more time on it than I had planned and still have many more hours to spend before I have it finished, but I am getting closer and can see the light at the end of the tunnel now.  I have to test it on at least one more monitor to determine if my IndivisionAGA is faulty, as I have not been satisfied with the display's stability so far, either using NTSC monitor driver, or the HighGFX driver, but I hope it is just that the two old CRT's that I have tested it on so far are on their last legs and that it is not the IndivisionAGA, as I have heard nothing but great reviews about it from friends who have them too.

Edit: @Mike, I used to run MacOS7.5.3 on my A2000/030@33MHz and it didn't seem to bad for the time. I am pretty sure I had it using my PicassoII graphics card, which I am sure helped it a lot.  Back in the day (hate that term) I could brag to my two sisters who were Mac users about how I could run MacOS7.5.3 faster than they could while still running AmigaOS and Windows on my Bridgeboard all at the same time.

@rvo_nl, I don't know what speed test software to use after I get everything set up the way I want it, but hope someone here will give us both some suggestons.  I know that sysinfo has gotten lots of bad  reputation for being inaccurate, so maybe sysspeed will be a better choice.  I have no experience with AIBB, so can't say anything good or bad about it.