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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Software Issues and Discussion => Topic started by: commodorejohn on December 07, 2012, 11:47:44 PM
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My A1200 is running ClassicWB. It runs well overall, but I've been having issues with a lot of programs that just don't seem to want to run at all; they'll open, and then they'll crash and bring up the "Suspend/Reboot" dialog (most commonly with errors #80000004 and #8000000A.) I'm trying to figure out why this is; I've seen some threads on #80000004 mention memory errors, but it happens constantly with some software (MidiTracker, Camouflage, ADoom, yinyangband) and never with other, more CPU and memory-intensive software (iBrowse,) and it's always in the initial start-up - these programs never get so far as to even open a window - so I doubt that. Is there a good trace tool I can use to at least get an idea of where the problem is?
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Sounds like a software issue to me -have you tried a fresh setup on another disk?
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No, I don't really have a spare at the moment, and I'd much rather not kill all that time on a fresh install if I can figure out the problem on my existing setup.
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Maybe your IDE Max Transfer is set wrong (I dont know to correct mask from memory), try to load some of your problem programs from floppy to see if you have the same problem.
I had similar problems with my A600 when upgraded to ACA630.
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I recall similar issues too with the 600 I owned. It would randomly crash and give errors. turned out the Max transfer wasn't set right.
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Okay, loading MIDITracker from floppy resolved it, so I'm going to hazard a guess that the max-transfer theory was correct. Any idea what I should set it to? Does it depend on the device? (It's a CF-to-IDE adapter.)
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should be 0x1FE00 but this has to be done when setting up the partitions I beleive. Also when you have put the value in make sure to hit enter as i forgot to do that on several occasions and it would revert back to the default.
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should be 0x1FE00 but this has to be done when setting up the partitions I beleive. Also when you have put the value in make sure to hit enter as i forgot to do that on several occasions and it would revert back to the default.
Technically, you can validly change the value for the partition anytime.
The problem is, the setting affects writes. So, every file written to that partition while the value was incorrect (every single file, in this case) stands a chance of already being corrupt. So, basically, you're looking at a complete reinstall. Boo. =[
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That's really weird, because there's plenty of stuff I've written to it that's been just fine. :/
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The max transfer affects large file transfers and writes, this is what I have figured out anyway and might not be 100 percent accurate. So if the app is doing lots of large file operations it might cause it spaz out. I am sure this is down to a bug somewhere in the controller that affects newer drives. This bug never materialised when doing single file transfers though.
When transferring stuff within winuae to the cf I had no probs. once the cf hit the Amiga that's when the bugs hit. Hence the need to set the max transfer to avoid issues.
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The only time UAE touched this thing is during the initial install by the guy I got it from. Everything since then's been transferred on floppy or CF, or downloaded from Aminet. I really don't get why, if it affects large file transfers, iBrowse and some other large files haven't been a problem...?
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Dunno then. Although I am pretty sure you can view the setup anyway without making adjustments to the drive. Wouldn't hurt just checking and making sure that the max transfer isn't the cause.
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Okay, interesting. I discovered that my larger general-storage partition had been created with a Max Transfer of 0xFFFFFF, which I remember doing because the previous owner thought it might improve the speed from a CF card, but he wasn't sure - guess I should've researched it a little further! I never touched the system partition, so that had the Max Transfer set correctly, which explains why a lot of software wasn't having problems.
Happily, setting the Max Transfer correctly on the storage partition seems to have resolved the issue, and the software in question loads without error, so it looks as if I won't have to do a total wipe + reinstall :)
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Excellent! Glad it got resolved in the end.
If I remember correctly the max transfer 0x1fe00 forces the controller to split large operations into 128k chunks. Thus avoiding the bug.
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The IDE in A1200/A4000 can only transfer chunks of under 64k kinda like C64.
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The IDE in A1200/A4000 can only transfer chunks of under 64k kinda like C64.
It's PIO so the IDE controller can cope with any size, the problem is the drive. Some can only do 128k and some can only do 64k. SCSI drives don't seem to suffer from the problem.
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SCSI drives have had a decent Inquiry mechanism from the very beginning...
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I dunno, I have an A4000T that has never cared what the max transfer was on any CF media, nor SD for as long as I have owned it. It runs OS 3.9 and 4.1.6 without issue. Go figure. :D
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@DanBeaver
Does "Doesn't care" include setting your maxtransfer above 128K?
All these years I thought there was a 64K limit!
Everyone always says when you get read/write errs to set ur maxtransfer to a little less than 64K and *poof* bobsyeruncle!
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As psxphill correctly pointed out, the 128K limit is due to a bug (=bad/unclear specification) on many drives. There may be other limits - some SCSI HBAs have 64K DMA limits in hardware.