Amiga IDE>CF setup assistance please!

[RedWarrior]

Hey guys- I'm currently navigating a world of pain trying to get some old hardware up and running. I think I've had this same set of questions for about 10 years... I think I got it working once, but that was a long time ago and this is way harder than I remember.

I'm just trying to get my CF card formatted via WinUAE for use in my 1200 classic machine as a HDD... I've managed to get the card to show up as a drive, but cannot format it via workbench or HDToolbox or HDinsttools so far... Both of those tools fails to detect the drive, despite it showing up in Workbench...

I've tried running as Administrator and adding -disableharddrivesafetycheck to the Winaue shortcut... not making any difference. I've tried setting the card as IDE/SCSI/and a few variants, but nothing seems to work. What's the trick?

I thought maybe this should be easy by now, given all the WinUAE updates over the years, but I'm naive like that.

If you can point me to a definitive thread for this kind of info or offer some assistance here that would be much appreciated!!
Thanks heaps

=)

[RedWarrior]

---------------------------
WinUAE message
---------------------------
":FNK TECH USB CARD READER  1.00 "

Block zero write attempt but drive has one or more mounted PC partitions or WinUAE does not have Administrator privileges. Erase the drive or unmount all PC partitions first.
---------------------------
OK  
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Does this mean anything to anyone? I"ve removed the drive letter and unmounted as best as I can in Windows... definitely running as administrator... :-/

Also- what is "diskpart"?

[RedWarrior]

Thanks guys!! Getting to this stage it feels like I've been blindfolded in the back of a car... no idea how to get here again! So many chance variables...

Currently navigating the SFS filesystem and figuring that bit out.... (recommended or not?) A1200 - mostly intended for running demos/Octamed music/and 1.3 oldschool games...

I'm sure I'll be back with more questions soon, but wanted to say THANK YOU very much for helping me to this point! This really is a niche hobby...

=)

[RedWarrior]

Oh boy oh boy! It worked.... I think... now to go fish out a machine from the garage...

The little rubber feet on my 1200s are all decaying and leaving sticky crud on every surface... is there something I can do to stop them being so gross? Or do I just remove them completely? This isn't really a crucial question.... just chatting =)

[RedWarrior]

oh crap. Hadn't heard of PFS... Benefits? I just want this thing to work properly. It doen't need to be lightning fast.

My poor little a600 is crapola these days- I tried this kind of project about 10 years ago- checksum errors every time it boots... probably a filesystem issue? Maybe too hard to bother with...

[RedWarrior]

Ok... How might one determine if the IDE bus works on a given A1200 system? The little LED lights up on the IDE/CF unit, but nothing happens.

It's not clear which way the pins are supposed to go, or if I had the unit upside down... but I've tried different sides & different jumper settings... but the CF IDE (hard drive) doesn't show up as a boot device (which I'm guessing is kinda necessary?)


This machine didn't boot from its previous hard drive, so maybe there's an IDE problem rather than the old drive being toast...?

Input welcome- this sucks... =)

[RedWarrior]

Tried a different machine... new error.

Is there anything that tests one's patience quite so much I wonder... :~(

Odes this make sense to anyone? =) Thanks in advance

[RedWarrior]

Yeah my floppy drives have this awesome new "disk-shredding" feature that I haven't been able to turn off. Kills floppies.... WinUAE my only hope.

I'm in the midst now of trying to install pfs... and this picture let me know that others have trodden this path before...

[RedWarrior]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHhahahahahahahahah!!!!!!!!!!!!!



I never imagined such a sh17ty looking desktop could bring such a sense of achievement!!!