Format Amiga HD in PC?

[neofree]

I have Amiga Forever 6.0, does the Amiga Explorer allow me to read Amiga HD's in my PC? If so, could I format with my OS3.9 CD on my PC in Amiga Forever?

[Linchpin]

Is it win98?

[neofree]

it can be.. currently xp

[neofree]

BTW, not sure I made this clear. After I format the HD with OS3.9 I would take it out and put it in my A1200.

[MiAmigo]

The older Window Oses (98, NT) will let you format a floppy at 720K, which Amigas with Cros-Dos installed can read and write to. Also, if you have the oft-named and ever popular (but wildly expensive) 'catweasel' you can do all that and more, in both machines.

[stewjw]

I've not tried this method myself but this link should help:

http://www.amigaforever.com/kb/3-108.html

[neofree]

Ah.. you can read/write 720k in XP too if you put tape over the High Density hole.. not all drives will format this though.  there's a couple other tricks..like it works fine when you boot to the XP Startup disk you make by right click on floppy and selecting format.. then when you are booted to it, you can run DOS programs that will access it fine... i used to make 1581 disks for commodore 64 this way fine.

However, I have NO BOOT DISK whatsoever.. no bootable partition on a HD, no bootable amiga disk.. nothing

I *ONLY* have OS3.9 CD

[DrBlue]

Are you just trying to format your hard drive for Amiga use?

I recall a disk called something like 'HD Toolkit' which was available from many PD houses and worked kind of like a windows startup disk and allowed you to format and partition your drive.

An easier option may be for you to create an Amiga bootable floppy with 'Format' on it. This is easier than taking your Amiga apart removing the HD and then putting it back in.

You can create an 'Emergency Disk' with 3.9. If you could find these disk images on the net and put them onto 720k floppy you may find them very useful.

[neofree]

Dont think that will work. The Emergency 3.9 disk is based on your configuration, but I'm sure a simular A1200 might work... But, I have no way of burning the image as it will most likely be 800K, not 720k.  I know fully how to handle the situatoin IF I could get into workbench, but i cant

[MiAmigo]

neofree wrote:
BTW, not sure I made this clear. After I format the HD with OS3.9 I would take it out and put it in my A1200.

Oops, sorry. Just re-read your original post. For some reason, I got the idea you were referring to a FD, not an HD. No advice there, I'm afraid!

[neofree]

not a problem, someone is just gonna send me a bootdisk. thought this was worth a shot.  after looking at amiga forever in more detail it seems not possible anyway.  i do wonder though if there is a way to read amiga FS in windows or linux... (by physically taking HD out of amiga and putting into PC)

be interesting to know

thanks,

neofree

[Thomas]

I have Amiga Forever 6.0, does the Amiga Explorer allow me to read Amiga HD's in my PC? If so, could I format with my OS3.9 CD on my PC in Amiga Forever?

Amiga Explorer is a networking tool. It allows you to access your Amiga drives from the Windows desktop if your Amiga is connected to the PC by either a nullmodem cable or ethernet.

To format your Amiga HDD on the PC, you don't need Amiga Explorer, only Amiga Forever. WinUAE, the emulator used by AmigaForever, is able to read and write Amiga harddrives on WinXP or Win2K. Just open the configuration, go to the harddrives page and click on "Add Harddrive". When your Amiga HDD is connected to the PC, you should be able to select it from the list.

Beware of connecting an Amiga HDD to a Win98 or WinME PC. These Windows versions will destroy the Amiga data on the drive.

Bye,
Thomas

[InTheSand]

Hi,

neofree: it might be worth taking a look at the "AFFS" package in Linux (Amiga Fast File System) as this should allow mounting of Amiga hard drives under Linux (read-only though).

You'd probably need to recompile your Linux kernel as none (other than the Amiga native Linux versions) are likely to come with that preinstalled.

Regards,

 - Ali

[alphonsus]

WinUAE should do the job - if you can get a booting environment quickly. However it can be picky about picking up drives that aren't already amiga formatted.
Amiga Forever, being based on WinUAE, should do it as well, but I don't have a copy and so can't tell you.

[DonnyEMU]

Have you tried with AROS?