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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: irishmike on March 23, 2006, 05:27:29 PM
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Hello all:
I am planning to upgrade my A3000 to the hilt in the next month or so. With that Idea I plan to buy OS 3.9 and wanted to make sure I had the 1.3 ROMs (I believe) or whatnot. Since I can not get into the system right this moment... needs keyboard and mouse first.... I was wondering if you could tell visually?
Please note my other post on getting to the mainboard... The Roms are under that shelf too.
Any help is appreciated!
Thanks, Mike
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Just disconnect any hard drives and take out any floppies and wait for the boot screen. It will say the ROM version there.
BTW, you need 3.1 ROMs for OS3.9.
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Cool Thanks.
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Go into Workbench and goto the Workbench menu and select About. This will tell you what ROM you have installed.
A3000 Kickstart 3.1 ROMs (http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=284)
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Not entirely correct - the Kickstart in use might be loaded (Superkickstart or softkicked) - important for an eventual CPU upgrade.
Hold down both mouse button while switching on. If the boot menu gives you the choice of 1.3 and 2.0 you've got an old Superkickstart machine (actually 1.4), absolutely good for standard use, but incapable of running an 040/060 and some other hardware.
Otherwise, deactivate all bootable hard disk volumes and start the machine. The Workbench screen will show the actual ROM version (like adolescent wrote, but without disconnecting the drives). Amigakit was also right, but that way you'll see the ROM in use - everything that matters if you're not planning to upgrade the CPU. :-)
BTW: what's the price for the ZIPs from Magnetic Systems? (NYC?)
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irishmike wrote:
Since I can not get into the system right this moment... needs keyboard and mouse first....
this 2 mouse buttons advice looks like useless in this case
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:roll: I actually overlooked that, thanks - but without mouse and keyboard pretty much everything is useless....
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@zack67
The price is $29.95 USD per 4 MB from Magnetic... given how hard it seems to aquire these chips, I am thinking of buying 4 MB at a time once a month until I am maxed at 16MB... that will be 3 times for those keeping score.
They seem ok on most items as if you go the ebay route, you'll end up paying that and maybe more.
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You really should not buy memory in stages like that as you may not get to buy the rest, and opening/closing the A3000 case can be a pain. I would just buy the memory and do it one time and be done with it. Just my take on it. You also want to get 3.1 ROMs while you do this, while you have it open. Check to see if you have a ROM Tower or not and get the appropriate ROMs. Good luck!
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TjLaZer wrote:
opening/closing the A3000 case can be a pain
Definitely! The amount of stuff that has to be removed to get to the right hand side of the motherboard is a complete pain!
And I can never get the case's screw holes to line up properly afterwards, so I don't bother putting the outer screws back in any more!
- Ali
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$29.95 is a pretty decent price - not a bargain but fair. Forgot to ask whether they're static column, since those are slightly faster with the onboard 030 but harder to get (I've got 12 MB SCs and am still looking for the last 4 MB - mixing static column and fast page is not recommended).
Good luck with upgrading. Be careful with those ZIPs, the legs are very easily bent or misplaced.
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I totally agree that putting in the ram in stages may be a pain, but my wallet says that this is how it is going to have to be :-) I may wait to have the whole thing up and running until I have all the parts, but I may decide that 4MB is enough too. Don't think the programs I want to run require more than 1 MB Fast RAM.
But if I have to do it in stages, that is precisely how it will progress. I have been a Technician for over 15 years and though new to Amiga as a platform, not too intimidated by taking the machine apart and putting it back together too much. Also 97% sure no rom tower
I do appreciate all the suggestions and if the means to do all the ram at once and the ROMs (assuming they are not already 3.1) then I will make that decision then.
Again appreciate all the help :-)
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irishmike wrote:
I may decide that 4MB is enough too. Don't think the programs I want to run require more than 1 MB Fast RAM.
i have 8mb on and os3.9. with some patches running at boot time i end up with 4mb just to boot the os. i don't know why but my a3k looks like more ram hungry than my a1k2 :crazy:
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@amije
Good Point, so I will have 8 mb if I upgrade with 4 but I should maybe do 8 then.
@everyone
I have determined that I will need the 3.1 ROMs, it is at 2.x according the bootup of workbench.
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I guess it depends on what you want to do with your Amiga - if you're after more RAM to increase speed, you may find it better to get a basic accelerator (though these can be expensive) and expand that.
- Ali
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well honestly I plan to play all my favorite Sierra Games on it right now, but I have other plans for a BBS (for preservation -- see post about my project in General Amiga) but I haven't decided if I may buy another A3000 for the BBS and use this one for the games... I really missed Kings Quest, Space Quest and Leisure Suit Larry :-)
So I just want those games to run smoothly, though on the PC side (back in the day) the more graphics ability and RAM you had, the better they performed :-D
But the AmigaOS is so much smaller than MS-DOS so it probably won't be as bad as that was. But that was one reason for maxing out the Chip and Fast RAM.
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What you could do it get the 4MB RAM and ROM, install it and use it, then when you get the other 12MB install that. That would be fine. You will see what I mean when you do the initial upgrade.
To line up the screws is wasy. Place the A3000 face down on a padded surface like a clean carpet, then press down hard while inserting the screws and screw them in. It may be a little tough but it can be done. (I would not do that until you get the final stuff in though)
Good luck with your Amiga 3000. It is a great machine. Just make sure you remove the battery and clean up the board if it even hinted of a leak. The Amber is in that area and will cause video problems or worse.
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irishmike wrote:
well honestly I plan to play all my favorite Sierra Games on it right now, but I have other plans for a BBS (for preservation -- see post about my project in General Amiga) but I haven't decided if I may buy another A3000 for the BBS and use this one for the games... I really missed Kings Quest, Space Quest and Leisure Suit Larry :-)
So I just want those games to run smoothly, though on the PC side (back in the day) the more graphics ability and RAM you had, the better they performed :-D
But the AmigaOS is so much smaller than MS-DOS so it probably won't be as bad as that was. But that was one reason for maxing out the Chip and Fast RAM.
I know what you mean, I played most of those Sierra Adventures too on the Amiga. But I'll have to admit, they're just (not even well-done, if you just look at other point&click adventure, like the LucasArts ones) ports of the PC-version, with a turned-down color-palette (for the "newer" ones, like KQ 5 and SQ 4). They don't really make advantage of the Amiga hardware, and since 1993 Sierra didn't even made Amiga-conversions anymore. I don't know why :-( )
But I'm not saying you're better off with the PC versions, since then you'll need a DOS-emulator to get them working :lol:
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Yes indeed, I feel the DOS emulation route or the like is a real pain and of course building a Pentium (1) level machine and running DOS is of course an option, but the games are a lot harder to get than the AMI versions. I understood that the sound was actually a little better on the AMI (and Macintosh) than the PCs were.
The other part of most emulators are they run too fast for the Sierra games and cause nifty errors.
So I think I found my ideal for that :-) Even if they don't take full advantage of the hardware... like most ports from PC ever did ;-)
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The sound was slightly better, although the music was mostly a direct port from the Yamaha OPL-2/3 MIDI-Synthesis (what most Soundblasters and clones used).
But if you'll ever need the PC-versions, maybe this site comes in usefull, unless you're after the original packages... (It also has LucasArts abandonware by the way):
EDIT:
Abandoned Games Room (http://www.agamesroom.com/page/list/sierra)
By the look at that site again, it's too bad a lot of those didn't make it to the amiga, like Gabriel Knight... :-(
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adolescent wrote:
Just disconnect any hard drives and take out any floppies and wait for the boot screen. It will say the ROM version there.
BTW, you need 3.1 ROMs for OS3.9.
I'm so glad I logged in to check things tonight and found this thread. I recently got an A3000 off of eBay and have slowly been relearning what I forgot over the years since my 1998 break with the Amiga (I had a LOADED A3000 back then - I mean 18MB + Picasso IV + 32X CD-ROM loaded). I thought I had a 1.4 ROM machine because it's a 6.1 motherboard, and the ROM chips look to be flashable, and are labeled AMD. They have paper covering the wafer windows with handwriting on them that is virtually falling off because the glue is so old (I put tape over them to hold it on).
Well, I decided to unhook the drive tonight since the 2 mouse buttons always brought me to a boot menu that did NOT offer 1.3/2.0. Low an behold, they are 3.1 ROMS! I'm not sure if they were fabbed by the previous owner or just an early version, but to me, it's a score. I had been contemplating buying set... good thing I procrastenated :)
BTW, is there any way to tell what version a kickstart FILE is? Another of the reasons I thought my machine had a 1.4 ROM was because the HD is labeled WB_2.x (although 3.x installed) and there is a kickstart file in the DEVS: directory - I had thought THAT was loading 3.1, but knowing it's not even loading now makes me wonder what it is.
Thanks!
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Cool sounds like you have 3.1 ROMs! Score!
Well if the kickstart file is 256k it is Kickstart 1.x, if it is 512k it is Kickstart 2.x or 3.x. You could use a hex editor to view the file, or better yet copy it over to a PC and run WinUAE with it! :-)
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Does anyone know how I can tell if they are genuine 3.1 ROMS or if the previous owner burned them from an image? As the labesl that were fallingoff of them were hand written and there is the window showing the wafers, I'm not sure.
However, the serial # on the motherboard is 199, so I guess it could be possible that at some point in its life, this one was a development machine and could have received a first batch of 3.1's?
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If there is a window they are EPROMS and were burned from an image.
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Well, I bought my A3k ROM kit from a dealer - whom I really trust - and they were EPROMs, too. Investigating on this, they told me that only the very first batch were PROMs (no masked ROMs were produced at all for A3k), everything they got after that were EPROMs. So there seems to be no sure distinction...
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Zac67 wrote:
Well, I bought my A3k ROM kit from a dealer - whom I really trust - and they were EPROMs, too. Investigating on this, they told me that only the very first batch were PROMs (no masked ROMs were produced at all for A3k), everything they got after that were EPROMs. So there seems to be no sure distinction...
What do your chips look like? I wonder if they have the AMD codes on the cip also like mine have?