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Offline ukbillTopic starter

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Bought an A1200 again... but struggling..
« on: October 18, 2006, 09:37:47 PM »
Hi, I'm new to this site and have spent a couple of days browsing trying to find clues to solve the problem I have to no avail.

Me and my son bought an Amiga 1200 with about 50 boxed games from a car boot sale on Sunday thinking I could show him what old gaming was all about!  I previously owned a 1200 just after they came out but like a prat sold it years ago.

However on getting the machine home and setting it up only about 50% of the games load.  This has left me confused completely - if it had been 100% I'd know I'd bought a dud.

eg. I can load Frontier Elite II (thank god!), Trivial Pursuit,Syndicate and Bart vs The Space Mutants (much to my sons delight) but other games like SWOS, Sim City 2000, Total Recall, Lure Of The Temptress and The Chaos Engine won't load.  I mostly get the Error code 8000 000B although with SWOS get 8000 0004.  

Can anybody give me any clues as to what the problem might be?  Disc drive?  Discs faulty?  Chip unseated or loose floppy cable?  I'm quite happy to open the machine up but wouldn't mind some guidance into where to look once open.

Another problem I have is that I can only use the RF lead not the yellow video and white and red audio out sockets - I would have preffered to use them but they don't appear to give out a signal - do I have to do anything to switch the output to these?

Driving home on Sunday I had visions of setting up a nice games corner and maybe trying to upgrade it with a hard drive but at the moment I'm just getting frustrated !!

Any help would be greatfully received.

many thanks

Bill
 

Offline ukbillTopic starter

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Re: Bought an A1200 again... but struggling..
« Reply #1 on: October 19, 2006, 07:23:33 AM »
Thanks for the responses.  I checked the expansion slot and there is nothing in there.

First thing I did when we started getting loading problems was get the air duster out! (I also collect vinyl records so one is always handy!).  Then I bought a floppy disc cleaner off ebay and tried that last night before posting!  Seems I was at least on the right track anyway....

It would appear that we've got a whole lot of dodgy disks here then - maybe the last owner had them stuck away in a loft for years.  Not sure what the humidity down here in South Wales but its always bloody raining!!

I think I'm gonna try buying another copy of a game that's failing and try that then take it from there!

many thanks again for the help....

Bill
 

Offline ukbillTopic starter

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Re: Bought an A1200 again... but struggling..
« Reply #2 on: October 20, 2006, 07:48:31 PM »
First up, thanks to all for the responses - very impressive to see people willing to help a newbie!

I hope to fit a hard drive at some point however reading the docs for WHDload has left me a little confused.  I presume this is a program for the amiga however how do I get that program onto the amiga?  I thought that pc formatted discs were incompatible to amiga floppies due to size.  Is winuae of use here or do I need to set up a network link between the pc and amiga?  

Maybe there is a step by step guide somewhere on the net to both adding a HDD and setting up WHDload??

My overwhelming feeling at the moment is one of disappointment tho that a lot of those old games we bought, nearly all boxed with manuals btw no longer work probably due to someone leaving them in the attic for years.....

Bill
 

Offline ukbillTopic starter

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Re: Bought an A1200 again... but struggling..
« Reply #3 on: October 20, 2006, 08:54:55 PM »
Thanks for that - I do have the OS discs - what I'm missing is the manuals - I think they will be my next purchase followed by a hdd and cable and then a lead to put it through a spare monitor rather than the old portable telly!

We tried a few more of the games we got with the machine tonight with a better yield.  We're now at about 15 working, 20 not working and 15 to try!

Bill
 

Offline ukbillTopic starter

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Re: Bought an A1200 again... but struggling..
« Reply #4 on: October 20, 2006, 09:30:07 PM »
So if I take the earlier option of the PC formatted floppy or this option plus install a hard drive with WHDload then I still have to buy an accelorator card and extra memory to get the games to work?

And to think I told the wife to just lend me a few quid to get the stuff at the car boot!!   I just bought the manuals off ebay - with this extra stuff it could get expensive  :lol:
 

Offline ukbillTopic starter

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Re: Bought an A1200 again... but struggling..
« Reply #5 on: October 22, 2006, 06:09:20 PM »
Thanks for all the advice.

I'm pretty sure its not incompatibility issues as I can remember playing SWOS on my old A1200 (I think!) and Sim City is A1200/4000 only.  Maybe the case with Lure Of The Temptress - I seem to recall this was incompatible but could be wrong.  I won't throw the non-loading games out tho - at some point I'll buy an A600 or 500 as well and if they load on that then I'll know its the floppy drive I guess.

I've taken a 4Gb hard drive out of my old laptop today and ordered an ide cable.  Took the A1200 apart last night and gave it a good clean in preparation for the install later this week.

I also ordered the set of manuals so that I can learn how to use the machine for more than games again!

If the hdd install and format is successful I'll take a look at WHDload and get my head around that.

Once again thanks to all of you who've given me help and advice this week - much appreciated.

Bill
 

Offline ukbillTopic starter

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Re: Bought an A1200 again... but struggling..
« Reply #6 on: October 27, 2006, 10:32:13 PM »
Thanks to JJ for some off forum help I'm now looking into installing a HDD.

I've now pretty much sorted the games into work and don't work piles.  I tried to copy the SWOS disks using xcopy to see if the copies would work and the first disc came up with a virus (lamer?).  Its my guess at the moment that perhaps this is the reason why others don't work but I havn't had the chance to test this yet.

At present I've got stuck in the worlds of Frontier Elite II but if i'm honest that was probably my intention when I bought it at the car boot sale!

It's brought back great memories playing on the amiga again and thanks to everyone who's posted helpful comments here.

Bill