Compact flash or Hd???

[Phoenix]

Just dusted off my 1200 which has been storage, Ive noticed the hd is getting noisy so was thinking of replacing it with a  CF card. I have few questions,

1) Is it possible to copy my drive contents directly to a CF drive(the machine already had the hd installed when I purchased it.)

2) The machine has a 68030/25 with 4mb card not sure on the make, will this cause any issues?

3) Speed wise will there be much off a difference between the HD and CF card?

Thanks

[A4000_Mad]

Hi,

1. Yes it is by putting the CF card into an adaptor and then into the PCMCIA slot (but see the answer to question 2)

2. Some accelerator cards can stop the PCMCIA slot from working. However, there is nothing to stop you from removing the card to do the transfer if that were the case and you are using a Workbench that doesn't require additional RAM If I recall correctly, you can check if your PCMCIA slot is working by switching on your A1200 while keeping both mouse buttons held down. This will take you to the 'Amiga Early Startup Control' screen. Choose 'Boot Options...' and if you see CC0 in the 'Select Boot Device' list then you should be ok as CC0 is the PCMCIA slot .

3. The CF card will be much faster

:pint:

[Phoenix]

Hi,

1. Yes it is by putting the CF card into an adaptor and then into the PCMCIA slot (but see the answer to question 2)

2. Some accelerator cards can stop the PCMCIA slot from working. However, there is nothing to stop you from removing the card to do the transfer if that were the case and you are using a Workbench that doesn't require additional RAM If I recall correctly, you can check if your PCMCIA slot is working by switching on your A1200 while keeping both mouse buttons held down. This will take you to the 'Amiga Early Startup Control' screen. Choose 'Boot Options...' and if you see CC0 in the 'Select Boot Device' list then you should be ok as CC0 is the PCMCIA slot .

3. The CF card will be much faster



:pint:

Thanks for the advice, I have notice the PCMIA card readers for CF cards on ebay(for amiga) are supplied with a disk, any ideas what is on the disk?

Can I use the standard IDE to CF adapters that are available on ebay?

Thanks again.

[Cammy]

Those ripoff kits on eBay and other online stores provide you with a floppy disk containing these two freely available files:

http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/fat95
http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/cfd

These work with PCMCIA CF and SD card readers. The IDE adapters should also work provided they're 44pin (40pin ones need an additional adapter), but some models don't seem to work with the HDD LED, so it will be loading and saving without indication on some adapters.

[Daedalus]

The disk those adaptors come with have some sort of driver (probably cfd.device) for the compact flash adaptor. By default the PCMCIA slot can only access cards up to 4MB in size, so the 4GB cards which are common won't work without the extra driver. (there's a little bit more to it than that, but you get the idea.) Install that driver on the hard drive of the Amiga and that'll do the trick. A 4MB expansion card in the underside slot of the Amiga shouldn't stop the PCMCIA slot from working, but if it does, you can always take it out temporarily. Once it's set up as a hard drive then, any IDE -> CF adaptor should work, just make sure it's the type for a 44-pin 2.5-inch IDE connector and not for the 40-pin 3.5-inch type.

http://www.amigakit.com have ones for sale which are sure to work...

[A4000_Mad]

Those ripoff kits on eBay and other online stores provide you with a floppy disk containing these two freely available files:

http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/fat95
http://aminet.net/package/disk/misc/cfd

These work with PCMCIA CF and SD card readers. The IDE adapters should also work provided they're 44pin (40pin ones need an additional adapter), but some models don't seem to work with the HDD LED, so it will be loading and saving without indication on some adapters.

Hi again,

Cammy is spot on there

Those kits are for transferring stuff between you PC and your Amiga. The CF card stays FAT formatted and you would download the files Cammy has listed for the Amiga to be able read it.

Ideally, you could have an Amiga formatted CF card on the IDE port as your hard drive and a FAT formatted CF card on the PCMCIA slot for getting games and stuff to and from your PC :cool:

:pint:

[Daedalus]

Yep, Cammy beat me to it there... However, if you're gonna be using the CF card as a hard drive with the contents you put on via the adaptor, you don't need fat95 and you should install the CF using HDToolbox and a standard Amiga filesystem so it can be used natively.

Of course, then having a 2nd CF card formatted for the PC will make transferring between the two quite painless...

[Phoenix]

Thankyou for all your replies, I havent used HDToolbox before so fingers crossed that I don't make a mess of the job! Can anyone recommend a compatible make/size that works well?

It's really great to find this forum to be a friendly place  still!

Thanks again !!

[A4000_Mad]

Can anyone recommend a compatible make/size that works well?

It's really great to find this forum to be a friendly place  still!

Thanks again !!

The Transend 4GB CF card works well for me

This place is just as friendly as it has always been, but we've all gone a little bit more ........  :insane:

:pint:

[Daedalus]

Thankyou for all your replies, I havent used HDToolbox before so fingers crossed that I don't make a mess of the job!

Well, once you use the correct device you can't really mess up that much, seeing as the CF is already blank and the worst that can happen is that you wipe it... So just make sure to set HDToolbox to use cfd.device in the tooltypes of its icon (I think it's DEVICE=cfd.device but could be wrong) and that should be it.

Two things to note though:

1) I haven't tried this myself so can't guarantee it will work.

2) Once you install the CF with an RDB and an Amiga filesystem, the Amiga thinks it's a hard drive and won't really like it if you try to remove it while it's still powered up. Best to switch off power before you take it out...

[Phoenix]

Might try this procedure on my spare a1200 1st, just in case.. :-D

Cheers

[amigakit]

Welcome!

For file transfer between PC and Amiga, archiving and backup there is EasyADF PCMCIA Transfer Kit:
http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=440

There is also available a 4GB CF Hard Drive, prepped and formatted ready to go with OS-Install software which guides you through the setup of the hard disk:

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=883

[Cammy]

Just follow Daedalus' advice and see how far you get...

[xzerix]

I bought an IDE to compact flash converter from eBay... There was a set of instructions on how to set it up using WinUAE on the PC which I followed, but as far as I can tell it's just as easy to plug it in (making sure the red end of the ribbon cable is to the BACK of the Amiga case, not the front, which caused me no end of problems) and just run HD Toolbox from your 3.0/3.1 Install Disk as-is - the card gets treated just like a Hard drive.
 
Does anyone know if any of these dual IDE-CF adapters (i.e. one which takes two cards) work on an Amiga? I'm getting brave now and considering two 4Gb cards
 
Oh, and I can second the comment about the Transend 4Gb card - that's the one I use. Lovely.
 
-Peter.

[Phoenix]

Just follow Daedalus' advice and see how far you get...

Will do, it's a hobby and not the end of the world if I mess it up! The only thing that really concerns me is the existing internal HD is backed up!

Cheers