CD0 device running but the CF card is not appearing

[superfrog76]

Hi guys

Trying to find out how to run the CF card via PCMCIa port.

I've the adapter in, running ClassicWB EX, turned on the machine but the partitions on the card do not appear.

The CD0: is running; if I use Opus, when it switch on CD0 it says that the disk cannot be recognized...which I do not understand, since I have formatted the disk  in the amiga (it also has one WB bootable partition).

Do I have to initialize somehow the CF card to be used with PCMCIA adapter? I assumed that it would be recognized without issues, once I format it as amiga FFS.

Thanks!

[superfrog76]

Gah, sorry...I did a bit of confusion.

So classicwb should have it already? I see in the devs only pipe and CD0

Tried to use prep card, and when I select to prep the card as disk, I get a write error....which makes me think that probably I need the 2 archive that you mentioned.

This card was used before as my hard disk on the CF IDE adapter; I've formatted it as such, since I thought that I could then use it to just move files from the computer to the Amiga, but it seems that I need to format it again first.

Thanks! Trying it now

[superfrog76]

So, strange enough, I have the fat filesystem in L, and also I have the card device in Devs, but there is no CF0... Not sure if the guys at ClassicWB missed that or there is some reason for it.

Have to open the amiga now, to retrieve the CF card; so I can plug it to my computer and download the 2 lha archive.

BTW is there an easy way to make CDs for the Amiga? I would rather have these file on a cd, and avoid to have to take apart every time the miggy I made a CD and a DVD and neither can be read from the Amiga (it says "the disk is not a dos disk, when I try to do a cd0:....I use Toast, since I have a mac).

Installed the CF0 from the archive on aminet; but still I see no CF. When I try to use opus to go to CF0: I get an error saying that there is no card in CF0:

What am I doing wrong?

[superfrog76]

I've found that too with ClassicWB Too, at least v27, not tried v28 yet. You could maybe use a 720kb formatted floppy to transfer the file from your PC to your Amiga?

Also, I've used the Amiga 911 Bootdisk before, that has support for compact flash plugged into an adaptor in the PCMCIA Port, and Fat95 too so it's easy to transfer onto a blank drive for example, without opening the case

Robert.

Thanks Robert, but it would take me days to move the files with a floppy; plus I don't have a floppy on my pc

So far I had no luck at having the cf card recognized at all...the prep card utility won't prepare it as disk; I've formatted it as Fat and still the Amiga won't see it, and even if I use the hdtoolbox I see it but it recognize it as "unknown"; the auto recognition does not find the right parameters so I am quite confused...it is a 4 Gb Kingston, which should be compatible.

Where do I get this Amiga911 boot disk?

[superfrog76]

CF0 in ClassicWB is where it belongs, with the other "optional" drivers; System:Storage/DOSDrivers.

Just click it when you need it, or for permanent use drag the CF0 icon into Devs/DOSDrivers.

Well, if you know where it belongs... I went on the site and read every page and there was no mention about where the cf0 was.

I have dragged it in DosDrivers, so I have it ready at boot, but still no luck.

Once you have CF0 mounted, you should be able to use prep card right? Should I format it on the pc?

[superfrog76]

Just make sure that it is in ISO9660 format. Mac HFS might work depending on the Amiga CD file system used. AmiCDFS and CacheCDFS should be able to read HFS IMHO.

Packet writing (formatted CD-RW or DVD-RW) won't work.

UDF won't work, too.

Thanks Thomas; so plain ISO9660 should work...gotta check which settings are used by Toast, otherwise I have to restart in bootcamp and use either Nero or Alcohol.

Thanks!

[superfrog76]

You shouldn't use prep card, this is for preparing SRAM cards as fast ram for example.

You should format your CF card on your PC as FAT32, note not all CF cards are compatible with PCMCIA on Amiga, what brand CF do you have?

Doh, good thing that I have asked then! I was formatting it as disk, since prep card has 2 options: as ram and as disk...first time using it, sorry.

It is a Kingston 4 Gb CF card; was purchased at Amikit (it is what they sell with the IDE adapter), altho I also have a 8 Gb Sandisk, I use both as hard drive with the IDE adaptor.

[superfrog76]

Hey Matt; thanks for the reply

So the CFcard on the PCMCIA connector will never be an Amiga formatted card,but it is a PC formatted card...I was missing that piece of info

So, I have a 8 Gb, which is my main drive on IDE, and a 4 Gb kingston from amikit, which is the card that I had before as internal HDD.  I am planning to use the 4 GB as PCMCIA volume, so I can move data between computers (altho with all this hassle, I am almost convinced to get a network PCMCIA card, but it would take days to copy few GB lol).

This is so far what I have found, using classicwb advsp on my real amiga:

1) the card is in the slot, formatted from my pc as fat32; I have cf0 in dev, nothing appears/gets mounted

2) if I issue a mount cf0: I get an error (already mounted)

3) if I issue a cf0: I get an error that the disk is not dos

4) I have used the "check 4gb" utility, which is in classicWB, and I can see cf0 as compact flash device, version 1.27, type fat1 (3.11); which makes me think that the card and adapter are working correctly.

The card is formatted, but I can't access it at all; not sure what am I doing wrong here T_T

[superfrog76]

Eureka!

MAgnetic was correct.

So the whole story is this: the CF from Kingston, sold by Amikit, does NOT work as PCMCIA card; I did everything humanly possible to make it work.

Out of frustration, I have restored ClassicWB on the Kingston 4 Gb, and formatted as fat32 the Sandisk 8 Gb: as soon as I put it in the slot, it was correctly mounted.

I can read onto it; which is awesome! Now why one card works as IDE and not as PCMCIA card is a mystery to me (I was reading about SCSI commands in the firmware of the card, which are not present in some newer card...but makes no sense, since both cards are new, altho the Sandisk works and the Kingston doesn't).

I just assumed that since Amikit sell it, it would be compatible with both PCMCIA and IDE, but it is not the case.

I love you guys, I can finally close the case (pun intended )

[superfrog76]

It could still be something in your setup, what's your location? There might be someone near who can test your card on a known working system?

I think I remeber having to download and copy cfd.device from Aminet into Devs: on some of my ClassicWB Installs.

Robert.

I would exclude it Robert...I had the exact version of classicwb on both cards; but when I plug the Kingston, no luck; while the other one works like a charm.

I've done the same exact steps, the CWB version is the same, which I copy from WinUAE to the CF card, plus I tried with a fresh install of WB 3.1, adding the cfd and the fat package...no luck with the Kingston.

To me is OK if one of the 2 works I just finished to restore the image that I had before on the 8 Gb, and the miggy is happily running games out of the 8 GB card

I am in USA-CA btw

[superfrog76]

Kingston 4Gb standard card works flawless here,its what I use for back-up data in PCMCIA slot.

If you have all the files in the correct place and it still does not work,then it maybe something to do with motherboard reset. Here the card appears regardless of what file system it is using (just quick format).

You could insert card after you have booted in workbench to see if it appears. Here I do not have this problem as I have the hardware reset which allows most PCMCIA card(s) to be swapped without soft reset.

 I also have tri-colour LED for PCMCIA port which makes it easier here "card detect" and "card enabled".

"standard" is quite a generic term....each memory card has different controllers and memory vendor, even in the same brand and model; so I would not be surprised if our memory cards are totally different inside

If I would be the one doing something wrong, then the Sandisk shouldn't work, but instead it works fine while the Kingston does not.

I am curious to know if there is a software that reads the internals of a memory card and gives you details about the brand used for the chip, the firmware and such, so we could compare.

Where did you got the 3 led for the pcmcia port? I never noticed that there is one

[superfrog76]

The kingston cards are known to be flakey. i dont know if they have bad firmwares or it was a quality control issue on some. I ran into problems with them years ago and now avoid them like the plague(at least the 4gb non pro version with he flower)

That's the one that I have....the one with the flower...I wish I knew earlier, I would avoid the purchase

[superfrog76]

I have 4Gb kingston CF card the one with the flower and it works here.

There is a smart way to update firmware which I have done here when one of my card went faulty.

It involves a external SCSI PCMCIA reader and two identical cards. I went into the hard drive set-up the part where you read the firmware from a working card. After reading a working card before I saved it I swap it for the faulty card. Note I had to swap the card very quickly "and I mean very quickly" then press save.

I had to swap the card very quickly as the faulty card would lock-up the computer regardless of which PCMCIA slot I used A1200 or external reader.

Faulty card is still working fine up-to this very day.

This procedure does not work in A1200 PCMCIA slot.

It may be possible that the card has a different firmware to start with?

Your method to swap the cards may resolve the problem temporarily, but I wonder if it may cause troubles at one point...with the cheap prices of the cards nowadays, if one won't work I think that it takes less hassle to just get another one, which seems to work most of the times (like Sandisk, from what I can see in many posts).