PAL amiga in US, help!!!!

[Ilwrath]

re: Hardware NTSC/PAL- (I grabbed this from some old website)
No, but if you're really motivated, you can rig this up. My thanks to Tetsuo Oda and Byron Montgomerie, who provided the information that connecting pin 41 of the Alice custom chip to ground causes the A1200 to default to NTSC, while pulling this pin high (disconnecting it from the motherboard and connecting it to +5V through a 4.7k resistor) will make the default power-up state PAL. I would point out that making a modification like this on a surface-mount chip is difficult at best.

As for the Amiga booting in the wrong mode...  Why not use Degrader to force it into NTSC, though?  Go early boot menu (both mouse buttons, hit space to get NTSC), then boot no startup, run Degrader with options 60hz + 60hz System and select "Survive Reset".  Poof, the Amiga reboots as an NTSC one until you cut the power.  You can then cleanly play games that require autoboot/reboot.  Should get 95% or more working.

As for composite losing color...  I don't know why that would happen to you... unless you have the composite output hooked to a wrong input on the TV.  (Some TVs use separated lum/chrome input, instead of the single color composite)

[Ilwrath]

@Rigger-
Hmm... So it is.  My apologies for not attributing to Warren Block.  I bow to his knowledge on quite a few Amiga hardware things.

[Ilwrath]

@TonyW-
The changes listed should be all the A1200 needs.  As I understand it, the rest of the frequencies are generated by the chipset, so that's why a simple pin on the Alice should do the trick.
Of course, it's far from a simple change, and I still don't know why you wouldn't just USE DEGRADER???  Unlike the early start menu, Degrader will work with almost all games, as it physically tricks the hardware.... I use it to get real PAL mode on an NTSC A1200 all the time.

@Rigger-
Yes, Warren's A3000 and A4000 FAQs help out quite often when I am working on a machine.  They are the best references, by far.