Amiga puzzle - disconnected worlds! help?

[AmigaBruno]

The Gotek drive certainly works on any Amiga as a replacement for the internal drive df0: . Unfortunately, most games and demos seem to be written for an Amiga A500 with Kickstart 1.3, OCS, and 512K chip RAM, so this means either using Relokick, Skick, Degrader (on Amiga Format coverdisk disk 38), or WHDload. The first three can be booted from flopply disk or ADF file, while WHDload requires a hard drive installation of the software itself, as well as files to run each game or demo from hard drive, including telling each game or demo what version of Kickstart, which chip set, and how much memory of what type is required. My A1200 has recently been crashing a lot with my Gotek drive.

To install WHDload files for each game and demo, you need to copy them onto your Amiga hard drive. This can be done either with a USB CF card reader to plug in to a PC, probably running an emulator, or with a PCMCIA CF card reader to copy the files from the PCMCIA slot to your Amiga hard drive.

[AmigaBruno]

The Gotek drive certainly works on any Amiga as a replacement for the internal drive df0: . Unfortunately, most games and demos seem to be written for an Amiga A500 with Kickstart 1.3, OCS, and 512K chip RAM, so this means either using Relokick, Skick, Degrader (on Amiga Format coverdisk No. 38), or WHDload. The first three can be booted from floppy disk or ADF file, while WHDload requires a hard drive installation of the software itself, as well as files to run each game or demo from hard drive, including telling each game or demo what version of Kickstart, which chip set, and how much memory of what type is required. My A1200 has recently been crashing a lot with my Gotek drive.

To install WHDload files for each game and demo, you need to copy them onto your Amiga hard drive. This can be done either with a USB CF card reader to plug in to a PC, probably running an emulator, or with a PCMCIA CF card reader to copy the files from the PCMCIA slot to your Amiga hard drive.

[AmigaBruno]

"WHDLoad only reads "slave" files..."

The Megademo2 WHDLoad version that I downloaded has a Megademo2.Slave.asm file in the Install/Src/ folder.... but it's only 6k.

There are no files large enough in that WHDLoad "version" to suggest the whole demo content is there...

what am I missing?

AFAIK, here's what you do, although I haven't actually managed it myself yet, but I hope to achieve it later this week with a PCMCIA CF card reader and a new USB CF card reader.

You are missing the file or files which make up the actual demo itself. You have only got its custom config files written by a WHDload user. You could download the files for the demo by searching for "Amiga downloads" or "Amiga downloads ADF" (without quotes).

The files you've got already just allow the demo to be loaded and run from hard drive, may load a particular Kickstart ROM image, and tell the Amiga how much RAM of what type it should have, as well as which chipset to use.

There are some videos about WHDload on YouTube, but they're mostly about installing a pre prepared HDF image file. These files may be missing particular games or demos you want.  

The easiest way to run most games and demos now seems to be a Gotek USB floppy emulator connected as df0: to an A500.

Once more, the pieces of software to make older software run on an A500 Plus, A600, A1200 or some other model (apart from the Kickstart boot menu) are Skick, Relokick, and Degrader (Amiga Format coverdisk No. 38). My Amiga A1200 has been crashing a lot, as well as displaying corrupted logos, bobs, or sprites, blank red or yellow screens, even after running the boot menu followed by one of these pieces of software.

[AmigaBruno]

Whdload looks for .slave file.Some games are unpacked and
have Data directory while others have diskimages but those
are not ADFs.

If I was looking for Whdload games I would Google "whdload games
download".Maybe you can find some games that way If anyone
thinks this is a bit too much I won't mind my post being edited.

You are looking for zip files that are mostly about 1-3 Mb large.

It looks like I accidentally posted my last reply without reloading the page since yesterday!

Thanks for this information.

[AmigaBruno]

I hope to do all of this later this week, possibly starting today.

I have used various emulators with CF cards, but I'm worried in case one or another emulator won't read a CF card. I most recently used FS-UAE under Linux on a PC I built which only has Linux installed.

I'm using Workbench 3.1, while Oldsmobile_Mike was using 3.9. I hope it works exactly the same way.

My USB CF card reader didn't seem to work anymore, after trying two CF cards, although I only tried them under FS-UAE, so I bought a new USB CF card reader and a PCMCIA CF card reader from eBay just to make absolutely sure I can get files onto my CF card. I'm waiting for them to arrive. I hope this doesn't prevent me getting ready for a night out. Perhaps I should buy another CF card as well just for copying files from a PC to an Amiga CF hard drive without removing it. I also hope to read my data from a CF card which will no longer boot or be recognised on my A1200.

I also hope all this will enable to finally transfer my artwork onto the Internet. So far, it's all been stuck on Amiga formatted floppy disks and CF cards. I've never connected my Amigas to the Internet, because I feel that if I did, then they could just become more Internet connected terminals, then I might use them for that a large part of the time. When I used Amigas as my only computers, I used to connect to BBSs some of the time, but I never upgraded enough to connect to the Internet. I used to visit cybercafe's where I saved webpages and files to MS-DOS formatted floppy disks, then read them back on my Amiga with CrossDOS, but now I can't even remember how to use CrossDOS anymore! Also, I don't currently have a PC with a floppy drive, but I do own one with a motherboard that supports a floppy drive. USB drives aren't 100% compatible and probably wouldn't work for the purpose of reading DSDD MS-DOS format disks created on an Amiga, while an Amiga floppy drive may not be able to read DSDD MS-DOS disks formatted on a USB drive either.

[AmigaBruno]

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand finally!!!!!!!!!!!! =) =) =) =) =)

Thanks to everyone who helped out there... that was quite an ordeal!!

How I've missed the smooth scrolltext... can't do that on WinUAE

Nor the "Swedish Meltdown" from the demo below (see pic) - seems to crash WinUAE (some whacky video overscan stuff going on)

THANK YOU EVERYONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm glad you've succeeded in your goal. I can even read Swedish, German, Danish, and Dutch scroll text.

As for my latest news, a USB CF card reader arrived yesterday. I inserted my old CF card which I can no longer boot my A1200 from and the A1200 can't even detect it, then I plugged it into a Pentium 4 HT CPU computer running Linux Mint 17.1 "Rebecca".

I found I got different readings for what the device or card was called depending on which USB port I plugged it into. I only had the FS-UAE emulator and couldn't find another emulator to download. I found that FS-UAE recognised it but wouldn't boot from it, default to a floppy df0:. It showed the card as about 4Gb and half full, but didn't show any files on it, no matter how I changed the options such as Show all files, as Icons, etc.

I also tried under the Linux Mint desktop and the formatter GParted. It appeared as a 2.1Gb device on the desktop, while GParted said something like 2Gb, but 4Gb used and that the format was FAT32, but I had formatted this card some time ago as Amiga FFS with 3 or 4 partitions. I don't know what this all means, but it doesn't encourage me to try reading my new card from Amigakit, which was preformatted with WHDload installed. All I did with this card before was trying to read it in a USB CF card reader which has worked in the past. It couldn't read it, so I tried to plug it back into my A1200 and bent a pin on the CF IDE adaptor.

I hope someone can suggest whatI can try next with my old CF card. Meanwhile, I'm waiting for a PCMCIA card reader to arrive.

[AmigaBruno]

RAWdic is a command which is supposed to convert an NDOS ADF image into a format that can be used by WHDload. I've tried it recently and got an error message saying something like the files wasn't in AmigaDOS format!

I have got my PCMCIA card reader now, but then I found out that my current laptop doesn't even have a PCMCIA slot. It was an older laptop, now broken, which had one. I would also have to install some files onto an Amiga formatted CF card before my Amiga A1200 can recognise it. This means removing the CF card from the Amiga and putting it into my new USB CF card reader. I hope this won't corrupt the new CF card, which is what seems to have happened to the other one.

If all of the above doesn't work, then I'll just give up and buy a device with WHDload as well as lots of games and demos preinstalled, then I'll never attempt to install any more onto it. This device may be called a "disco duro", but I can't tell you where to find it, because of the Copyright Police.

[AmigaBruno]

Corrupted your CF card? If you can't format it anymore it means the partition has been lost that is all. Re-create a partition and re-format (quick).

What I mean is that I had the older CF card formatted and partitioned as FFS with 3 or 4 partitions. They were called Workbench, Work, Art, and Games. I originally planned to install WHDload on it, but I couldn't work out how. I wanted WHDload, as well as applications which run from hard drive. I didn't want to keep swapping between two CF cards to have this. I created and stored a lot of data on it, but unfortunately I didn't back up all of it. I don't want to reformat it, I want to retrieve my data.

[AmigaBruno]

As mentioned in the topic http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=69677 , I've been busy setting up reading my CF card and mounting a Windows XP Downloads directory, which is now done.

After that, I started downloading from pages such as http://whdownload.com/games.php?name=h&sort=0&dir=0 , but of course these don't contain the original games.

I'm not sure, but I assume I should look for these games wherever I usually find them, but that they must be original versions, meaning that it shouldn't say CR in the description. As for whether they can be ADF or must be DMS, I'm still not sure about that.

[AmigaBruno]

SUCCESS! After several hours of downloading, unarchiving and transferring some files on my old Windows XP based desktop PC, I had what looked like some WHDload installation files for several games, but not the games themselves, apart from a couple of exceptions. None of them have the extensions ADF or DMS, though. I didn't put them in directories such as A, B, C, etc.

After all of this I tried clicking on all of the very small game icons, which seemed to be designed especially for WHDload and I was surprised to see them get as far as the WHDload registration nag screen. After that, I got error messages, which were usually that it couldn't find a Kickstart 1.3 ROM image. I think some of these games are capable of running from floppy disk without a 1.3 ROM though.

I didn't always try the games in alphabetical order, then was pleasantly surprised to find that Eye of Horus, Bloodwych, and Advanced Ski Simulator all ran! Eye of Horus had been cracked so the player didn't have to input anything from the manual, though.

Now I'm totally exhausted and looking forward to a good night's sleep! Later today I plan to install the Kickstart 1.3 ROM image which I think is on my Amiga Forever DVD and an accompanying file which is either on a WHDload site, and/or on Aminet.

[AmigaBruno]

Well you need Kick 1.3 but it has to have correct name.

Names as follows (in devs:kickstarts) :

KICK33180.A500
KICK33180.A500.RTB
KICK34005.A500
KICK34005.A500.RTB
KICK40068.A1200
KICK40068.A1200.RTB

These are from A500 and A1200 , all games will work with them.
Size of A500 ROMS is 256 Kb and A1200 512 Kb.Amiga forever has
encrypted Roms , I have no clue if they will work.

Few more hints : You need extra memory to run games in WHDLoad.
That can be cause of problem.Original games can hardly be found in
ADFs , you need IPFs and a way to get them on floppy.

Unfortunately, although I already knew I needed the files above ending in A500 and A500.RTB, I'm not sure where to get them or how to install them. Recently, while using FS-UAE or WinUAE, I copied some ROM files over from my Amiga Forever DVD, then they complained that the ROM key file was missing. I found and copied another file called rom.key on that DVD, then it worked. I've also got a copy of SKick with three ROM files on an ADF, which enables some software loaded from my Gotek USB drive to run on my A1200.

Actually, I've now found out what to do with the Amiga Forever DVD as explained on http://www.whdload.de/docs/en/need.html

I've already heard that some games need more than 2Mb to run under WHDload, but eBay sellers say that there are ways to "bypass the OS" to get round this. I assume that I just need to press Ctrl D to stop Workbench loading, followed by a few commands such as DIR ALL , CD , etc. Apart from this, I haven't installed that RAM hungry launcher (iGame?) or "Classic Workbench". I'm seriously considering buying some extra RAM very soon, which may be in the form of the new ACA 1221 accelerator.

As for IPF files, I don't think I've ever heard of them before, so I'll have to investigate.

[AmigaBruno]

When dealing with WHDLoad forget about ADF's or dms files... Each install is different, some retain the whole floppy images whilst others will utilise directories and files for the game data (dependent on the game).

As for the anti-piracy code booklets or code wheels etc, AFAIK all WHDLoad game installs have been programmed by their respective authors to remove such protection (to save us typing crap in and mucking around with code wheels).

http://whdownload.com/

The above site DOES contain the game/demo in its entirety. I have no idea why you keep saying it doesn't!

If you're running an A1200, you'll need 2mb fast ram or more in the trapdoor. I recommend 4mb minimum though. What would be nice is 8mb fast ram and a faster cpu, such as...well, any really...

I didn't think we were allowed to post links to copied games on here. Anyway, it didn't look to me like the actual games were included, except where I saw some files which were 880K.

Some games are already running and I've seen lists of games which will run in 2Mb. I'm planning to buy a RAM upgrade/accelerator soon.

[AmigaBruno]

Oh for the love of...

http://bfy.tw/1WUO

And just stick them in Devs:kickstarts, as already mentioned above.

Of course, I knew there were Amiga Kickstart ROM images out there, but WHDload expects to have ROM images of specific versions and names. I haven't got a list in front of me, but I don't think all Kickstart 1.3 ROMs are the same version. For most purposes users only need to consider if the ROM is 1.2, 1.3, 2.04, 2.05, 3.0, or 3.1 though. They're all listed on http://cloanto.com/amiga/roms/

The link I posted later on in my message gives details that users can copy the images from an Amiga Forever DVD and then rename them, so long as the version of WHDload is at least 16.5. Fortunately, my pre installed version is later than 16.5. The system ROMs can be a bit difficult to find but are in Amiga Files\Shared\rom

AFAIK I just have to copy one of two of these Kickstart ROM files, as well as the rom.key file and the mysterious .RTB files from Aminet, then a lot of other games will run.

[AmigaBruno]

I can now tell  you that I've transferred lots more games, selected either because I played them before, or they sounded interesting, under WinUAE and tested them under WinUAE.

I found out that most of the games wouldn't run in 2Mb RAM. Almost all of them will run in 4Mb RAM, but I found that Dungeon Master 2, Eye of the Beholder 2, Galdregon's Domain, and Bloodnet wouldn't  run even in 4Gb.

I also found out that my Kickstart 3.x A1200 ROM image is invalid!

I feel like playing around with SKick and various ROM images, which may then run ADF files from my Gotek USB drive.

I now plan to buy a RAM upgrade for my A1200, but I don't know how long one of those ACA 1221 accelerator cards would take to arrive because I don't know how many people have ordered one already. This means I'm not sure what kind of RAM upgrade to buy.

[AmigaBruno]

Try playing around with the "Preload" option in WHDLoad.  You might be able to save a little bit of memory that way.  Also boot with no startup-sequence, etc.  But you probably already know that, already.  

I've just read about the "Preload" option, which I assume comes under Information for each game's launcher icon, so I'll try that. Booting with no startup-sequence only seems to give me a full screen Amigashell window with a 1> prompt. I thought the next stage would be navigating to the WHDload games, but it didn't seem to work. I don't think it knew about WHDload at all. Typing LoadWB after this does bring up the Workbench, but doesn't allow me to run these games either.