Ditch OS3.9?

[neofree]

Hello,

I have an Amiga 1200 with a 40mhz 030 CPU, 8 meg Fast RAM, running OS3.9.  The catch is I don't have Kickstart 3.1 ROM's, instead I am using SKick to load KS3.1 into RAM.  I don't mind this, but when I boot up I only have 1.1 megs of Chip RAM left.  It seems rather slow to boot up and a little slow after it's running.  I tried booting OS3.0 on a floppy, and it ran much faster.

My question is, is the 1.1 meg of Chip mem the problem?  I know it sounds bad, but if I get real Kickstarts, will it really make a huge difference?  

Also, does anyone know how to get SKick to load into Fast Memory?  It has the flag, but says the memory is not available when I try it.  I have a GVP A1230 II Turbo+ board.

Also, does anyone know if I can make Genesis work in USA?  It dials and connects and then gives error about unable to connect via PAP.  Well, my ISP doesnt use PAP.  Infact, here in the USA, I've never seen an ISP that uses it, and I've used many ISP's.  I don't think it is a custom here in USA.

With the slowness, and the Genesis problem, I am thinking of just going back to WB3.1.  Unless I really would benefit by purchasing Kickstart 3.1 ROM's.  Which I can't get right away, as $40 USD is too much for me now.  I know most of you would say just get them because you're supposed to have them... But if I'm not going to see a drastic speed increase, I may just ditch OS3.9.

Comments?

Neofree

[Nick]

Hehe. We had this talk yesterday. Yes it would. More ChipRAM most certainly is good. More ChipRAM is always nice! The more the merrier! Get rid of that silly software. Hardware is always faster than software. Thats why they put the ROMs on the motherboard in the first place :-)

[Ryu]

Hi, I wonder if you will ever shut up going on about this. Buying 3.1 roms will give you a spead increase, because by the looks of it your loading the rom into chipram, which is slow on the old access, If it could go into fastram it would be a lot quicker, but lets face it the GVP card sucks in many respects. I have a little A1200 with OS3.9 installed, it used to softkick to 3.1 roms but now it has real roms in, I saw no speed increase, but that was becuase I was softkicking to fastram in the first place, the Blizzard 030/50 mkIV totally rules the 030 acc market for the A1200 without a doubt :-)

[neofree]

Yeah but $40 USD? Geez. This is just a retrohobby for me.  Do you know how I can load Kickstart into Fast memory?

Neofree

[Nick]

@RYU

Yeah I`ve got a spare Blizzard030 and they do kick butt. Well for an 030 anyway.

[blobrana]

Hehe, you can never have enough speed...

if you need the speed then go for os3.1...that is what i use on my amiga...Most of the OS3.9 additions can be replaced with (better?) third-party software.
But i have os3.9 on my WinUAE setup just for the visuals and third party incompatability...

But i would say that it would be a lot better to invest in 3.1 roms  (in the future) or just as cheap to buy a secondhand a1200 (with 3.1?)...

[neofree]

Well, I think I'm just gonna try and get KS into Fast mem.. If that doesnt work, just ditch OS3.9...

I've come to the conclusion that fast mem is not available when booting with no Startup-Sequence.  If I try to run other programs that require it, it also says that it has not enough fast memory.  This is why SKick is not finding Fast memory to boot KS3.1 into.

So the question is, How do I turn on Fast memory before I run SKick?

Neofree

[Lando]

Actually a ROM that has been softkicked into RAM (even chip RAM) is faster than accessing the ROM itself - RAM access time is much faster than the time it takes to access the ROM chips.  Even though my A4k has 3.1 ROMS I still use blizkick to stick them in RAM (and fix many of the bugs in the 3.1 ROM).

Can't see why it would relocate the ROM to chip ram though - maybe your chip ram is being eaten up by something else - what screen mode and colour depth is your workbench in?

[neofree]

I am running 640x200 at 256 colors.  But I dont think chip or fast mem is being eatin up by anything because I put SKick as the *first* think in Startup-Sequence.  I think the problem is that my fast memory is not working until something else turns it on, someone suggested I may need to run SetPatch first.  Haven't tried it yet so am not sure yet.

Neofree

[neofree]

No I don't think SetPatch is going to work. I was reading about what it is, and it says it needs V40 ROM to execute and will load Amiga ROM Update.  So 3.1 ROM needs to be loaded already.

So I still need a way to activate Fast Memory before running SKick....

Neofree

[starbird80]

neofree wrote:

Also, does anyone know if I can make Genesis work in USA?  It dials and connects and then gives error about unable to connect via PAP.  Well, my ISP doesnt use PAP.  Infact, here in the USA, I've never seen an ISP that uses it, and I've used many ISP's.  I don't think it is a custom here in USA.

Funny, both the ISP's I've used my Amigas with did use PAP/CHAP authentication.  I tried Genesis (demo) and got it to work OK with Earthlink but went back to Miami (registered).  I'm at work now but could check my Genesis settings and see if I have any pointers as to what I might have done differently.

[neofree]

I looked and looked.. but found no settings to disable PAP...  Earthlink may use PAP, but I've never tried it.  Most ISP's in the US dont use it.  I will probably just use Miami.  It works fine.

Neofree

[blobrana]

Yes, a ROM that has been softkicked into RAM (even chip RAM) is faster ...(who doesn`t do that?)
Hehe, what i was saying was that the OS3.1 was FASTER... :-D

[blobrana]

Wow, dude!
A bit strong there, but true, ...hehe. :-D

[neofree]

blobrana: dont get your last post.. oh well.. i agree os3.1 is faster, but i wanna try and get ks3.1 into fast ram..


Does anyone out there know how to get my fast memory turned on when booting without Startup-Sequence?

Neofree