Amiga 600 CPU

[Pat the Cat]

There isn't that much else in an A600 keyboard to fix?

[Pat the Cat]

You could try cleaning the membrane.. not by hoover or brushing chremicals on it.

Just lifting it out and shaking 25 years worth of hairs, tiny grit particles etc might fix it.

Got to be gentle with these. No creases, no heavy pressure. There's a few videos on youtube on cleaning and fixing rather than replace, just search on "Amiga keyboard membrane". And if you've got to change the membrane anyway it gives you a little practice with handling membranes.

Oh yeah, you can now get fast RAM expansions for the A600. With 2MB of chip RAM WHDLoad becomes viable route to some games working. Not a Furia but definitely a step up and reasonable price;-

https://amigakit.amiga.store/product_info.php?products_id=12696&currency=GBP

[Pat the Cat]

There was an onscreen keyboard tool called Oskey. Let you click on key icons and then cut and paste what you had typed.

I've searched for it on Aminet, can't find it. Might have been on a Fred Fisk dick or possibly Amiga Format coverdisk,

Definitely worked on 1.3 and 3.0 so should work on 2 as well. If you find it, let me know,.. New thread time!

[Pat the Cat]

amr.rumpigs.net/amiga_format_coverdisks/af011_1990_06_d011.zip

It was indeed on an Amiga Format coverdisk (no commercial software on that one, fully PD).

If you got a key that doesn't work you can still get it into applications. Won't work with games though.

Name was OSK, that's why I couldn't find it.

[Pat the Cat]

CF0 goes in Devs/storage, not just devs. CC0 isn't used.

It should mount partitions up to 2GB without alteration. How big is the sd card?

Up to 16gb you have to have a sector size of 4096, over that you need 8192. You change it by editing the CF0 file in a text editor.

This is down to the way that Windows formats Fat32 (and why most people stick to 2GB partitions on fat32 partitions).

If you get an icon for CF0 but it shows as Ndos, trying formatting it from the Amiga side.

EDIT: Devs/Dosdriverv is indeed the correct place, not Devs/storage

[Pat the Cat]

CF0 goes in Devs/storage,

You mean DEVS:DOSDrivers
(alternatively SYS:Storage/DOSDrivers, but then requires manual mount)

But you can really have the dos driver mount entry files anywhere, and double click them to mount the device. It also works to put them in wbstartup...

Yes I did. On an A600 with Workbench 2.04, there are no such drawers. I think 2.1 onwards use them, if not 3.0.

Trekj, check the version of compactflash.device that you received on floppy.

Version compactflash.device           <- Typed into a shell window

sd card-compact flash adapters are only really supported in latest version 1.33 from aminet. You may have been sent an earlier version on the floppy disk.

[Pat the Cat]

Then with WB2.1, you should have a Dosdrivers drawer inside Devs, and that's the best place to put CF0.

Also remember you can only have so much RAM on an A600 for the PCMCIA to work, and you must have V37.300 or V37.350 for PCMCIA to work too.

That particular revision of Kickstart is displayed on the "insert floppy" boot screen.

EDIT: Video here of how Windows format command sets up sector size according to card capacity;-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bikbJPI-7Kg

[Pat the Cat]

CF0 is a text file, a mountlist entry.

CF0.info is the icon file for it.

The idea being if it's in Devs/Dosdrivers drawer, the partition gets mounted automatically when Workbench loads.

It's very much a case of having most recent compactflash.device AND Fat95 filesystem handler to use sd cards in compact flash adapters.

If it isn't in Devs/Dosdrivers, you have to double click on the CF0 icon to mount the drive and get access to it.

[Pat the Cat]

That sounds positive.

You know the PCMCIA slot can send and receive data OK (because Prepcard can see the card details at least).

You know that CF0 is finding the file handler for Fat32 and the device driver (although it might be too old to handle sd cards in an adapter).

I reckon you might have a problem with c/h/s values not matching up between the sd card and the entry for CF0.

You can either try editing the sector size in CF0 with a text file editor on the Amiga, or use Windows Commander to set up a 2Gb partition on the sdhc card and then formatting it with Windows (Default max for CF0).

You know it's working when you can "List CF0:" in a shell or click on the disk icon in Windows (magically appears on Windows).

The card shot be hot insert too, you can plug it in after Workbench has finished loading, Obviously never unplug it while it's being written to.

EDIT: ExFat partitions definitely won't work with fat95 file system handler.

[Pat the Cat]

Oh my. Broken a few pins in my time. Takes a little rractice to get used to sorting them out properly.

I've heard of Easy-ADF but never used it. Very likely it defaults to 512 byte sector size.

Here's what CF0 looks like (without the comments);-

FileSystem    = l:fat95
Device        = compactflash.device
Unit        = 0
Flags        = 0
LowCyl        = 0
HighCyl        = 0
Surfaces    = 1
BlocksPerTrack    = 1
BlockSize    = 512
Buffers        = 20
BufMemType    = 1
BootPri        = 0
Stacksize    = 4096
Priority    = 5
GlobVec        = -1
DosType        = 0x46415401

I've Bolded the line that selects sector size - 512 bytes is default (good up to 2GB partition size).

2GB up to 16GB you have to change that up to 4096 bytes, 16-32GB it has to be 8192 bytes.

A text editor program like EDIT or Memacs should let you edit the CF0 file. Esc then x to save changes if I recall correctly.

EDIT Devs:Dosdrivers/CF0      <-typed into a shell if you don't have Memacs on your syste should give you a text file editor at least.

There's also a switch you can try setting on the icon to try to get non-compliant cards to work (in the readme of compactflash.device are the details, you can check them at aminet).

[Pat the Cat]

Thanks, wasn't sure what you got with 2.1.

[Pat the Cat]

I regret I have no info on sector / cluster size for FAT partitions done in Linux.

Never needed to, Linux can mount Amiga hard drive partitions natively.

Only up to 4gb though, old school fast file system.

That would be a way to get latest compactflash.driver on your Amiga. The downside is unplugging the thing from inside the Amiga. Not too handy for a long term solution.

[Pat the Cat]

What do you mean by Amiga Pi Drive?

[Pat the Cat]

Glad to hear it.

With 4mb fast RAM, 2mb chip RAM, should run most WHDLoad games. Non-AGA ones I mean.