Guide: How to make OS3.x faster and more efficient. (Updated)

[mr_a500]

@AmigaMance

Nice list. You mention just about every speedup patch I use.

A couple points:

It's good you said not to use FBlit if you don't have AGA. On my ECS Amiga, it actually drastically slows down everything (about half speed).

SystemPatch works fine for ECS Amigas. I recommend people use the NOINTUITION option, otherwise some applications with custom filerequesters (DigiPaint3, DSS3) will screw up and/or crash. Also use the -loadseg option or else xvs.library will have problems and Zoom (screen magnifyer) will crash.

Although I use smart refresh in MUI, I wouldn't recommend any smart refresh programs. Every single one I tried caused annoying screen corruptions.

[mr_a500]

Load the handler to a hex editor, search for disc and replace c with k. Carefull not to touch anything else.

Ah, I see you're also into binary modifications. That's what I like about old software - if you don't like the text, just grab the old Hex editor and change it.

[mr_a500]

PS: Btw, mr_a500, i can't reproduce your problem with SmartWB (if this is what you were using) on AGA and CGFX screens. I don't know what causes it on your system.

I tried many different smart refresh programs years ago (SmartWB included) and they all caused corruption in window background images.

I've been testing SmartWB again for the last couple days. Usually everything works fine, but twice I saw the same window background corruption. It happens a lot less often than before. I think it's a problem with icon borders because the corruption is an occasional shifting of the background image around icons. I use WB 3.1 and have my icons borderless (no stupid box). Before, I was using NewIcons to remove icon border, but now I use Birdie. This could be the difference.

Are you using WB 3.9? Maybe the new icon format in WB 3.9 fixes this problem.

[mr_a500]

Advise:
-Load a good anti-virus at startup. (Youll see lots of warnings due to patches, but its a question of tweaking them. - I have no warnings.) - NO SPEED LOSS (IF 1=decrease AV priority.)

Why? Amiga is not like Windows where you can get a virus just from being online, viewing an image or document. The only way you're likely to get an Amiga virus is if you're testing lots of unknown floppies or downloading Amiga software. If you use Voodoo-X & xad.master to extract archives, it can automatically check for viruses if you've got xvs.library (don't need an anti-virus running).

There's no need to waste RAM running an anti-virus program every time at startup.