AmigaKit's 4GB CF IDE HDD Question...

[giZmo350]

Hi all, I recently purchased an AmigaKit 4GB CF HDD. It's awesome of course and the setup is real easy. I made a big mistake when I installed OS3.5 and would like to reinstall. I noticed that by holding the left mouse button at boot up I can bring up the original install routine again. My question is, will the OS be reinstalled cleanly or just over-written? Has anyone else tried this? The CF card came with SFS and I really don't want to format the partition and lose all the goodies the came with the AmigaKit CF Card HDD. Plus I don't even know how to reformat SFS.

The mistake I made the 1st time was NOT installing the Internet components with the install and then applying BB1 & BB2. I can't get ethernet to work at all and reading endless posts I discovered that by doing what I did messes things up and the IP stack won't install correctly if you go back & install the Internet components AFTER BB1 & 2.

I remember going thru the whole install for OS3.9 when I first got my AT A1200 from AmigaKit and was on the Internet in no time flat with Genesis. I really like OS3.5 better though... so another question I have is... Can I proceed thru the whole OS3.5 install with Internet components and then (before applying BB1 & 2) use my OS3.9 disk to install the updated iBrowse and Genesis components without messing things up? And then install BB1 & 2?

BTW, the A1200 that I use ethernet with has a Subway USB card and, of course, gives me a message that no IP stack is running - which I never noticed until I went to install the Internet components (like a year later).

Also, I just got a Netgear MA401 Wireless Card which I updated the firmware for WPA/WPA2 encryption. Do I need to install the Prism2 software for that or can Genesis take care of everything that is needed? I've been trying to get the wireless working for about a week! I have another Subway USB and I guess I could use that with ethernet and one of those ethernet to wireless adapters if I have to but I really don't want to give away a brand new Subway USB! Has anyone recently installed a PCMCIA wireless card with WPA/2 that could give me some exact procedure? I've already been thru the guide a hundred times over at AmiBay which just doesn't seem to work right.

I ask because I recently bought another A1200 for a friend that resides in an assisted living home and they only have wireless for the residents. My friend loves the A1200 and asked if I could set him up. I'm having a dickens of a time with the wireless as I made the same mistake with the Internet components during the install as I made with my machine. Also, I can't believe the conflicting information on the Amiga forums on how to setup wireless & WPA/2! But that's for later! :crazy:

Anyhoo, the new AmigaKit CF HDD is in this A1200 I bought for a friend and I would like to get OS3.5 reinstalled (possibly wireless working too) tomorrow as it's my one day off and the machine is here at home. Thanks for any help!

[Lurch]

I've installed the internet pack after BB1/BB2/BB3 and BB4 ;-) Actually I've even installed the internet pack then reinstalled BB1 to BB4 again which also worked fine :-)

I bought the exact same card, you need to install Prism2v2 which installs a the wireless command into user-startup.

You will need to edit wireless.prefs under envarc:sys as per the WPA example in the readme. The default one it makes with the install doesn't work :-)

If it's working you should get a blinking led the a solid led on the card. Load up genesis wizard and select the prism device and leave pretty much everything as default.

Some routers you'll need to manually enter in the IP details, so pick something in your subnet range and make sure the gateway is your router.

One thing I've noticed is I have to use Genesis to go offline to disable the wireless card if I want to play some WHDLoad games as they wont load :-)

Sorry don't know the answer to the other questions as I don't own an Amigakit cfcard setup.

You can always use WinUAE to backup the card :-)

[Lurch]

Oh and my 1200 wouldn't detect anything in the PCMCIA slot until I had CardPatch and CardReset loaded in the startup-sequence.

[giZmo350]

Thanks for your help Lurch! Well, after 11 hours I still can't get this wireless card to connect. I've tried everything. I already had CardSet and CardPatch 'cause I have AmigaKit's PCMCIA CF adapter thingy. I installed Genesis from AmiNet, edited out Miami in the user-startup, reinstalled the Prism2v2 driver (what's killing me here is I can't open the installation and usage section of the manual for Prism2 - I get a message that states "couldn't open Install" - the other sections of the guide open ok) reapplied BB's but still can't connect. It seems like it wants to and I don't get a DNS failure from iBrowse.

Then I thought I would share the MacMini connection (MacMini is sitting right next to me) set for an open network with no encryption - I connected my Win Laptop right away to that but still no miggy connection there either.

Then tried to share the Win Laptop connection (Intel My WiFi and all that did was screw up the Intel Internet sharing connection CRAP). I got to reading why Intel's Internet connection sharing screws up after you turn it on and off a few times and it seems to be a nightmare for everyone!)

Like Lurch said, Prism2 creates a file during installation that stores, a prompted for, SSID and encryption key and also creates some sort of lengthy code. I might also guess that the wireless channel is in here somewhere too? I guess the one thing at this point that I can't sort out is the wireless.prefs file 'casue I can't open the installation and usage section in the manual! I tried to find the Prism2 manual on the web without luck.

I tried a bunch of other stuff too but my brain is fried at this point. I need to be able to read that Prism2 manual somehow or maybe someone could explain exactly what i need to modify in that wireless.prefs file... that would be great. Maybe also how your user-startup is configured?

I'm going to take the MA401 card back to work tomorrow and verify it connects to a WPA2 router (thought I already did that) and try again next Sunday! :crazy: Thanks for any help all!

[Lurch]

All you need in wireless.prefs is :


network={
   ssid="SSID NAME Here"
   key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
   psk="WPA2 Key Here"
}


Make sure you are using http://aminet.net/package/driver/net/prism2v2

Also comment out anything mentioning prism2 in the startup-sequence and user-startup before you install it.