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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: trixeo on May 16, 2013, 09:33:14 AM

Title: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 16, 2013, 09:33:14 AM
Is there or has there ever been a kickstart switch for A3000? I have the 1.4 ROMS but would be cool to have the 1.3/3.1 combo.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: Zac67 on May 16, 2013, 07:24:05 PM
You could combine two switches for a 500/2000 - but for what purpose? You can softkick any Kickstart you like with MMU help. Ditch 1.4 and put in 3.1.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 16, 2013, 08:46:14 PM
Quote from: Zac67;735223
You could combine two switches for a 500/2000 - but for what purpose? You can softkick any Kickstart you like with MMU help. Ditch 1.4 and put in 3.1.
I did not realize the built in softkick still would work when changing kickstart? I thought that was a feature of that 1.4 ROM only. Guess I can try myself, I have a 3.1 kit waiting for me at the post office =)
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 16, 2013, 08:48:38 PM
BTW, is there a hardware 1.3 ROM for A3000?
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: Zac67 on May 16, 2013, 08:56:17 PM
You can either use the 1.4 ROMs to kick 3.1 (just use in place of 2.1) or replace with 3.1 ROMs and use a Kickstart utility when you want anything else (I think I used zkick (http://aminet.net/package/util/misc/zkick301) in the old days).

A pretty simple Kickstart detection in S:startup-sequence can be used to branch to the appropriate Workbench installation so you get the same behavior (and more) as with the 1.4 ROMs.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 16, 2013, 09:03:06 PM
Quote from: Zac67;735228
You can either use the 1.4 ROMs to kick 3.1 (just use in place of 2.1) or replace with 3.1 ROMs and use a Kickstart utility when you want anything else (I think I used zkick (http://aminet.net/package/util/misc/zkick301) in the old days).

A pretty simple Kickstart detection in S:startup-sequence can be used to branch to the appropriate Workbench installation so you get the same behavior (and more) as with the 1.4 ROMs.
Yes, I know this, but I'd rather have it hardware-wise. Maybe I'll try to get hold of another Datic Kickstart Switch, I have one for my A500. But then I need to get hold of a 1.3 ROM for A3000, if there even is one.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: mfilos on May 16, 2013, 09:04:35 PM
Afaik there is 1.3 (34.5) for A3000.
Normally you can use 2x27C400 EPROMS (=2x512KB=1MB) and burn a dual Kickstart 1.3 (512KB) + 3.1 (512KB) to them.
Ofc they need to be dissected but nothing difficult with Remus.

Then in order for changing the banks you'll need to use a dual 3way switch with first couple going to +5V (with a resistor of 4k7) the second couple going to Pin1 of both EPROMS and third couple to GND.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 16, 2013, 09:16:51 PM
Thanks for the answer! I need to buy a EPROM burner :)
No, I think I'll stick to cleaning up battery acid and recapping ;)
Interesting though.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: magnetic on May 17, 2013, 02:04:45 AM
Quote
A pretty simple Kickstart detection in S:startup-sequence can be used to branch to the appropriate Workbench installation so you get the same behavior (and more) as with the 1.4 ROMs.

And how do you do this in detail please?


Guys I have an a3000D i'm restoring and it has the 1.4 kickstart roms. The HD died so can someone please please give me a guide on how to get 3.1 installed on the machine softkicked? (I have the 2.04 install and kickstart disks that came with the machine. ) I'm confused how to make the magick happen :)
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: freqmax on May 17, 2013, 02:12:04 AM
Detection is easy, use a program written in C that plainly just "peek" into kickstart memory and does a checksum etc.. memcmp( *memptr, "Kickstart v1.4",14) etc..

I would, regarding the ROM v1.4 simple replace them. v1.4 just seems like a pain in the ass in most aspects for an A3000 machine.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: magnetic on May 17, 2013, 04:08:51 AM
I dont want 3.1 roms i want to soft kick into 3.1 and be able to softkick into 1.3 as well. Any help is appreciated
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 17, 2013, 07:31:39 AM
Quote from: magnetic;735276
I dont want 3.1 roms i want to soft kick into 3.1 and be able to softkick into 1.3 as well. Any help is appreciated
I got an A3000 w/o HDD so all I did was boot with a WB-disk, set an old HDD up with HDToolbox, named the partition WB_2.x and placed a 3.1 kickstart named kickstart in WB_2.x:Devs/
If you need 1.3 then I think you need to create a second partition for that, called WB_1.3 and place the 1.3 kickstart file named kickstart in WB_1.3:Devs/
I think I recalled reading somewhere that once you boot into eg. 1.3 with this setup, the WB_2.x partition is hidden and the other way around.

EDIT.
If you don't have a HDD at all you need a superkickstartdisk. The only one I have is a 1.3/2.04 floppy. You need to put that in when booting when you're at the kickstart choice sreen. If you do not have this disk and no HDD the only kickstart you can boot is 1.4 by clicking the invisible "close" button on the kickstart choice screen in the top left corner.

The kickstart is stored in RAM so it will get reset to 1.4 even if you loaded 1.3, 2.04 or 3.1 before, once you cold boot it again. The best way is to get a new HDD for your machine, they're not expensive and there's plenty of them on ebay. I just bought a FastATA MK-VI 4000 CF/SATA so that I can use new SATA-disks or CF-card instead of the noisy old SCSI.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: magnetic on May 19, 2013, 04:01:14 AM
trixeo

Thanks man. The 3.1 kickstart image is on the 3.1 disks? Im lucky i have the original a3000 2.04 superkicstart disk. And do have a scsi drive. The name  WB_2.x is that the volume name or the disk name? tia
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 19, 2013, 11:06:04 AM
No they're not. I got mine on a disk that came with my A3000, named "Kickstart 40.70 A3000" which also included maprom and maprom.doc. As I understand it though the most stable version is the 40.68 where the only change to 40.70 is the scsi.device (v40.12 to v40.20). I wanted the 40.68 so I grabbed it from Amiga Forever with Amiga Explorer and cut and pasted the extra "bonus-code" that A3000 needs into a new 40.68 kickstart-file.
I bought and installed 3.1 (40.68) hardware kickstart now from Vesalia, which did have badly slapped on labels. I miss though to have the option to boot directly into 1.3 like I do with my A500 and a kickstartswitch.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: magnetic on May 20, 2013, 02:39:32 AM
Quote from: trixeo;735475
No they're not. I got mine on a disk that came with my A3000, named "Kickstart 40.70 A3000" which also included maprom and maprom.doc. As I understand it though the most stable version is the 40.68 where the only change to 40.70 is the scsi.device (v40.12 to v40.20). I wanted the 40.68 so I grabbed it from Amiga Forever with Amiga Explorer and cut and pasted the extra "bonus-code" that A3000 needs into a new 40.68 kickstart-file.
I bought and installed 3.1 (40.68) hardware kickstart now from Vesalia, which did have badly slapped on labels. I miss though to have the option to boot directly into 1.3 like I do with my A500 and a kickstartswitch.


Hi I have Amiga forever latest version and i have the physical 3.1 amiga os disks. So what do I need to do to get this kickstart file? How do i make it or where is it located? Thanks a lot.  What is the "bonus-code" btw?
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: trixeo on May 20, 2013, 05:27:47 AM
First of all, the roms in AF are encrypted, so you need to load them into a WinUAE-enviroment and extract it either with a command in the enviroment or connect Amiga Explorer to it and get the kickstart out. Load the exact same version in WinUAE as you have already a superkickstart of. Then you can do a byte by byte comparison with the superkickstart you have. I opened them up in Funduc Software Hex Editor for example. An ordinary 512k ROM ends with offset 524287=0x7ffff bits=00011111 unsigned B:31 (1f). Last four bits: "00:1e:00:1f". Now open up the superkickstart version of the same version and go to the same offset. You will find the "00:1e:00:1f" in that too, however that's not the last line in it. The rest following it until the end is the "bonus code". I just used that bonus code and cut and pasted it into a 3.1 (40.68) at the end of it. The resulting file should be 526 572 bytes.
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: magnetic on May 25, 2013, 04:13:29 AM
Wow after I do all that I can go get a job at Cern.. thats a little too much for me to do :( i'm not that smart. Do you still have the ones you made?
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: magnetic on June 02, 2013, 02:09:42 AM
*bump*
Title: Re: Kickstart switch for A3000?
Post by: royalcrown on June 02, 2013, 07:08:29 AM
3000D, nice. Picking up some amigas later today myself. maybe we can swap restoration tales :)

Quote from: magnetic;735265
And how do you do this in detail please?


Guys I have an a3000D i'm restoring and it has the 1.4 kickstart roms. The HD died so can someone please please give me a guide on how to get 3.1 installed on the machine softkicked? (I have the 2.04 install and kickstart disks that came with the machine. ) I'm confused how to make the magick happen :)