**Need Setup HELP** with Classic Amiga 2000 HARD DISK (Bridgeboard)

[Raffaele]

@ Wbrejnia

Now we have some scenarios:

Scenario A

1) Boot Amiga from floppy and run PCDISk

2) it initializes Bridgeboard ad activate ISA Slots

3) PC boots from PC Floppy A. or B:


Scenario B:

1) Boot Amiga from floppy and run PCDISk

2) it initializes Bridgeboard ad activate ISA Slots

3) PC boots from C: partition on Hard Disk mounted on ISA Controller

Does it or Are there any issues?


Scenario C:

1) Boot Amiga from Floppy, Initialize Bridgeboard, Initialize Amiga HD DH0:

2) Floppy movs all System to Amiga Hard Disk (running but no booting)

2) On Amiga Hard Disk or other Amiga Partition RAM:, Df0:, etc., you can put Virtual C. File and make PC boot from it.

It should be made visible to PC with an option of JDisk (if I remember well)


Scenario D

1) Boot Amiga from floppy and run PCDISk

2) it initializes Bridgeboard ad activate ISA Slots

3) PC boots from C: partition on Hard Disk mounted on ISA Controller

4) JDisks make Amiga aware it exists virtual partitions files JF0: JF1: Etcetera upto 7 on PC Hard Disk partition C:


Scenario E

1) Boot Amiga from floppy and run PCDISk

2) it initializes Bridgeboard ad activate ISA Slots

3) PC boots from C: partition on Hard Disk mounted on ISA Controller

4) JDisks make Amiga aware it exists virtual partitions files JH0: JH1: Etcetera upto 7 on PC Hard Disk partition C:

5) Amiga can transfer system from Floppy to JH0: as Dandy says, just as like any other Amiga real Hard Disk DH0: but it requires some time to boot and make all virtual partitions JF-X: visible back to Amiga side

6) Amiga will use JH0: As any normal real Hard Disk for the entire time of the session (remember it requires partitioning and formatting).


Scenario F

1) Boot from Gotek Floppy Drive Emulator

2) Gotek ADF 1 virtual Amiga Floppy boots the Amiga computer, initializes Bridgeboard with PC Disk and activate ISA Slots so then PC Hard Disk becames visible

Unfortunately Booting from Gotek does not makes the CF Card visible as an Amiga Hard Disk. It mounts upto 999 Floppy drive images ADF visible to Amiga as if were 999 separate floppies each of one visible at a single time...
So you csan only boot from ADF 1 and then mount and make visible files present on another ADF like when Amiga prompts INSERT DISK Name_XXX.

So then...

3) You can put Virtual C: partition on a file on ADF 2 or above numbering SLOT on your Gotek virtual drive, but you have to do lots of assigns and joking with inserting/removing virtual floppy ADF and made right instructions to JDisk command.


If you want to use your Amiga-PC in a different way, please explain better what you want to do.

[Raffaele]

Part II:

Original by wbrejnia:

*** IS THE autoBoot feature in Kickstart 3.1 a problem for Bridgeboards?
You will have to try if KS 1.2 makes a difference...

I would definitely try at first to get it all working properly with v1.2 and later try it with v3.1 ...

WARNING!


Bridgeboard Software works well with Kickstart and Workbnch 1.2, 1.3, and if I remember well, it works also with Kickstart 2.0.4.

It has some issues with 2.1 and does not work at all with Amiga Kickstart and AmigaOS 3.0 and 3.1 (could generate lots of Guru Meditations at any moment)

I don't know why Commodore abandoned Bridgeboard users at their own destiny.
Any other firm like ATARI or Apple had had acted seriously for their users supporting bridgebard software for at least 10 years.

Unfortunately advancement of Amiga, transforming original OS from Disk labeled "Workbench" to proper AmigaOS made Commodore assuming Bridgeboard are no longer useful and deprecate them, not developing any software updates valid running with 3.0 and 3.1.

What a Pity.

I remember my bridgeboard Amiga buddy Giuseppe was forced to bought a Multikickstart card with 3 roms space, putting Kickstart 1.3, 2.0.4 and 3.0 kickstart versions on his A2000.

When he wanted using Bridgeboard he booted from 1.3 or 2.0.4.

When he wanted modern Amiga system he booted from 3.0 kick rom.

[Raffaele]

"Pure bit not set" errors are due to the fact many DOS commands were made reentrant in 2.04 and sequent versions of AmigaOS and can be made resident in memory.
As long as 1.2 does not support attributing "p"ure bit flag to the commands, thus it feels a bit astray, but nothing that could harm your system or Bridgeboard.

JanusHandler not running error IMHO is simply due to the fact system must load other libraries first, and initialize JanusHandler only in the end. PCDisk should be as one of the last commands to be run by the system.

Try put it in the end of Startup or put some delays as void cycles in the Startup in order to give your system  enough time to let all libraries and Handlers being loaded.

It could be also possible that some resident commands performed operations that are needed by Bridgeboard.
Make explicit calls to these commands before PCDisk is executed by Startup (you must be sure for example all Assigns were performed by real command existing phisically in "C" directory and not by "resident" command ones).

[Raffaele]

I am starting wondering if your 8088 BIOS that it is so antiquated is afflicted by Year2000 bug so it sometimes causes conflicts when loading filesystem, or MBR.

I still own a 486DX2 clocked at 66MHZ and I never experienced problems of BIOS as it is enough modern it stores infos with correct MMDDYYYY format system, but I encountered problems with ancient computers storing date in MMDDYY format.

[Raffaele]

** WOW !!! ***  Many of my 3.5" Floppy GAMES I thought the were AGE-CORRUMPTED are now working

When I was going thru my box of Original GAME disks, many of them were not working (INSTANTLY CRASHED the Amiga)

I was considering Formatting them to use as empty disks!! (since I thought they were bad)
Glad I left them alone.  They are working with the KICKSTART 1.2 (I recently read that some games won't work on higher kickstart ROM).  I have a bunch.

Super Cool, my Game Collection has just doubled.

Will be able to load up that GOTEK with some (Rare Games) if some of they are not available for Download.

I suppose that trackdisk.device (and DiskHandler resource?) has (have?) been changed and heavy patched during AmigaOS evolution.

[Raffaele]

This is not helpfull. You must have at least 68020 cpu. How have you setupped your bridgeboard software?

I have :

1. A2000 with 68030, ks 3.1 and Commodore 8088 bridgeboard (lattest bios)

Works, but time to time it just disappears. Couldn't setup up hard disk partition for it. File hard disk works just fine.

Have you tried disabling 68030 at boot menu and run Bridgeboard software only with 68000 standard CPU?

No updates on testing yet.  
Really busy setting up everything for a clean start, having all the tools I need to stop the fumbling.

At this point got myself setup with (Clean/Reliable Floppies) AND:

1) Win95-PC with Internet (for downloading)

I hope Win95 is being protected behind reliable Firewall and modern Antivirus still supporting that ancient version OS! O_O

[Raffaele]

Not sure what you mean 68030 vs 68000.  How do I that.

Yes I have a firewall, actually two Firewalls, but why would I worry about that OLD OS.  I'm trying to get DOS6.2 working !  But I guess it is safer with no network.

You said your A2000 is equipped with 68030 and Kickstart 3.1.

Try if Bridgeboard hangs up at loading PC MBR when running on 68030.

Kickstart 3.1 Boot Menu has feature to disable mounted Cards 8and also 68030)

So you could test if Bridgeboard works better with standard 68000 present on your machine.

[Raffaele]

Looking at the first page of this thread, sysinfo says 68k and picture inside case I dont see a accelerator..    OP was talking not too long ago about the topic of accelerators but I dont think he has one..  just a standard 68k.

Whoops! I answered to utri007 and Wbrejnia at the same time, believing also Utri has problems. Wbrejnia answrered me and I assumed he was Utri, so I answered him trying disabling 68030... ^_^

[Raffaele]

Starting to move forwards toward finishing project.

The XTE ISA Patch never worked, hoping for another that will work

What's interesting, is the Hard Drive is working perfect (Other than auto booting).   After many reboots, it mount on the 8088 6.2 Dos each time.  
That RLL parameter (Precomposition 128), low level format may have done the job to wake up old Magenetic Material.

So I trust the RLL drive to start installing the final DOS applications, and will install Windows 1.2 for fun.

Need some help on a couple of annoying items.

2)  This one is annoying.  I know about the keyboard file maps, peeks at them.   But when I go into PC 8088 Emulation.   My "\" doesn't work.  It works on the amiga side.    Hard to copy files on the DOS side without that working.   Is there a good tool to fix this?

To obtain national keyboards in MS-DOS you must have two commands on your floppy and add one line to config file called Config.sys and one line to Autoexec.bat (that is the corrispective to S:Startup-Sequence in Amiga).

Commands are Country.sys and Keyb.com. They should be present on DOS floppy that makes PC startup.

First parameter is country, followed with codifing of kind of alphabet.
Latin alphabet is the most common and its codenumber is 850.

Here are codes for nations. USA is obviously 001. For my country Italy country code is 039.

To add correct parameters for my keyboard I should add these parameters to file Config.sys with a text editor.

COUNTRY=039,850,C:\DOS\COUNTRY.SYS

And I should add this command to file Autoexec.bat:

KEYB IT

Here follows the list of main country codes.

http://wwwcdf.pd.infn.it/AppuntiLinux/a2860.htm#almlanchor17140

Here is the list of keyboard two digit codes:

http://wwwcdf.pd.infn.it/AppuntiLinux/a2860.htm#almlanchor17159

If you want to know more about Config.sys and Autoexec.bat read this document. It is in italian, but it may be Google translated and you can find useful infomations about MS-DOS commands and parameters at startup.

http://wwwcdf.pd.infn.it/AppuntiLinux/a2860.htm

Now that you are aware of it, you can found similar info pages in English or your native language.

[Raffaele]

In the document that I suggested you to read, I found some informations on command DRIVEPARM (drive parameters) that I never recall I ever used in DOS times, as I just barely dealt with Config.sys except to edit keyboard parameters and RAM memory EMS parameters, move all memory in the space out 640KBs and obtain 704KB for DOS instead than usual 640KB. It may be useful for you to make hard drive (sectors, cylinders) being correctly initilized by MS-DOS.

[Raffaele]

USEFUL HINT

In MS-DOS just as like in Windows, if you are typing, despite of the keyboard you are using, you may add any character of the standard ASCII sequence by simply pressing and holding ALT on the keyboard followed by numeric keyboard insertion from 0 to 255.

ALT+126 obtains for example tilde character "~".

[Raffaele]

Anyone have any info on Bridgeboard BIOS Rom Upgrades?

The Lo-Tech Flash ROM chip matches the ROM chip on the Bridgeboard.
If I can get a  copy of the Upgrade ROM image, I can have it installed for testing purposes

- (Proof that it will it work to fix IDE/Flash-Drives).
- Possibly fix the C: drive boot issue too.

If BB BIOS Upgrade works, that would be a big improvement.

I will not touch Bridgeboard Bios as I think it is heavily patched to functioning with the dual environment.

However in the PDF file (Amiga Training Course) that was suggested some comments above, it is stated that it is a Phoenix Bios.

https://computerarchive.org/files/co...ing_Course.pdf

There is no info stating it is a standard BIOS, so be careful.

[Raffaele]

USEFUL HINT

In MSDOS when you want to copy files from a disk to another and you have only one disk mechanic you can use command COPY with this parameters

Copy A: A:

And you will be prompted to insert origin and destination disk when necessary.

Copy A:\command.com A:

Copies file command.com from origin disk to destination disk that requires be put in mechanic at request prompt.

On some advanced bios roms I found also this trick:

Copy A: B: even if you have only A: Mechanic

It worked the same as Copy A: A:

but it is very rare to found such useful trick implemented.

Also invoking disk B: at prompt let you use a second disk as there were two drive mechanics.

B:

Changes work directory to disk B:

You will be prompted to insert another disk.

I remember it worked for me on a couple PCs I used at University and in an office.

On the vaste majority of bios roms it caused an error.


[EDIT]

Take care of the fact I made suggestions using my memory recalls and integrating it with documents I found online. Some of my suggestion may be prove being false in the end, as my memory can be faulty.

[Raffaele]

I am just online reading Bridgeboard Manual from site http://www.traumstation.ch that was linked some comments above.

At Chapter 4 pag 19 (and forward) manual stated how to make a PC Hard Drive recognized by Bridgeboard.

You must enter Bridgeboard Setup Utility with ConTRoL+ALT+ESCape three fingers keys sequence, and it has to be run at full PC screen (that can be invoked with Right Amiga + F)

You must move to Hard Disk 0/Hard Disk 1 invoice.

It will open a Table of Hard Disks recognized by the Janus, and you must  navigate with PageUP/PageDown keys to choose the correct drive geometry or the one that match closest your drive geometry.

Entry 40 for Hard Disk 0 and Entry 42 for Hard Disk 1 will allow you to insert manually the parameters.


Entry 41 for Hard Disk 0 and Entry 43 for Hard Disk 1 will read parameters right straight from Hard Disks electronics.


I think that this is the trick to make both your RLL disk and CF Card being recognized by Bridgeboard at the same time

Both RLL Drive and CF Card are mastered by their controller cards, so you must invoke latter two paramters 41 and 43 in the Bridgeboard Table of Hard Disks from Setup Utilility Screen.

Hewre is the link to manual:

http://www.traumstation.ch/hardware/Commodore/Amiga/A2286-A2386%20Bridgeboard/BridgeBoard%20Manual.pdf



[EDIT]


Also I find an important parameter from Bridgeboard Utility Screen called BIOS SHADOW.

You may find instructions at Chapter 5 page 38 of the manual.

When enabled it loads PC BIOS in Upper Memory to make it act with more speed. Check if it is enabled/disabled.

It may be the cause your Janus BIOS sometimes is not loaded in memory.

[Raffaele]

(Retro Computing Device) What is it?  What's inside? (Challenge)



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Looks like something from the 90's.. reminds me of something that either SGi, Sun or Digital would bring out.....  at first I wanted to say SGI but no funky colours, logo or unique shapes.

Yes it has 1990's design and it is modular on the front just as like japanese engineers preferred design for electronics. It recalls me of Sharp X68000 but it is not Sharp X68000.

Maybe it is some graphic station for Television Titling, and GFXs like Truevision Targa, or maybe it is some mainframe for engineering CAD in automobile or aereonautics industry just as you suspected.

Can you made some close photos of the rear to check if there were engraved names of the connector ports?

Have you tried to post these photos on a Retrocomputing forum? You may have better chance of find what it is.

[Raffaele]

Raffaelle,

Oh, I wish what you say worked.  That would be perfect.
I tried the CTRL-ALT-ESC many time before.
IT DOESN'T do anything.
Maybe part of my Keyboard map problem.  But I think not since CTRL works, ESC works and ALT works.

I think that is for higher Bridgeboards 386/486 that were made with newer BIOS.  That is why I keep thinking upgrading my Rev 3.5 Bios.

I HAVE A 8086 Bridgeboard, not the 386/486.

** IF SOMEONE HAS A 8088 Bridgeboard and they try CTRL-ALT-ESC at BIOS Boot **

I went to AmigaResource.cx and I checked for Manual PDF file. Manual is common to Bridgeboard 8088 and 80286, and yes!

As you said, from some hints (Chapter 5 page 45, it is stated that 286 "has special Setup Utility".

Unfortunately so it seems that the Setup Utility is available starting from 286 Bridgeboard.

Any more idea's

From the same manual it seems that 8088 card should recognize automatically any hard drive controller xt card inserted into bus slot, so I dunno what is the problem.

I starting supposing that you must do installation with original DOS 3.3 disks provided with Janus XT Board and forget for a certain time the idea of using DOS 6.22.

Once you have setup BB and HD properly then you may think to made all updates to software.

A2088/A2286 Manual is available here:

http://amiga.resource.cx/manual/A2088-A2286.pdf

Appendix E (page 71) describes how to instal phisical Hard Drive to PC SIDE.

Somewhere in the manual I also read that installing real PC Hard Disk voids Autoboot from Autoboot PSEUDO Boot Drive into Amiga side. That could be another hint why you failed boot from autoboot virtual disk in your past tests.

It is stated in Appendis B page 58.

As long as it says to use FDISK command provided with Bridgeboard disks I think that this could be a clue to use 3.3 MSDOS Original Disks, and it stated clearly to set the partition as Active.

Maybe something changed from DOS 3.3 to 6.22 in FDisk command that may add some different sequences strings/hex-characters magic numbers in MBR to make an active partition.