Several question regarding CD32

[DyLucke]

Hi there guys i was an A1200 user long time ago who fled to the PC back in late 90's however i kept an eye to the
system using WinUAE, some months ago i decided to get
back some amiga machine and decided to get a CD32 bec
i always wanted one. However now i was wondering
if is there any way to make it boot using a CF card?
Any kind of adapter?
Where could i find a good guide in order to create my own CD32 compilation discs?
And finally, would an A4000 keyboard fit in the CD32 keyb plug?

I guess i would need to buy an A1200 back hehehe, i miss
thar tiny and cute machine.

Thank you.

[AJCopland]

It probably is, what you'd need though is something like sx32 that plugs into the back of the cd32 and adds various upgrading abilities. That would let you use a 2.5" IDE Harddrive, to use a CF card you'd just need a IDEtoCF adapter and those can be found on ebay quite cheaply.

Andy

[DyLucke]

Yep yep i knew there's an SX32 expansion that gives the
chance to equip HDD drive plus coming with a 030 25mhz,
plus giving you all the ports a 1200 has and equip memory.

There's also an SX-1 that allows part of that stuff,
however these Paravision devices are REALLY difficult
to find, specially SX32.

SX-1 has several issues regarding fitting the expansion
port, not taking in consideration is the ugliest expansion
ever made, plus is even bigger than the CD32 itself (or close to).

My question regarding an hypotetic CF drive is about any
kind of adapter that could come directly from the CD32 board
meaning to be connected to the IDE controller for the CDrom.
But i dunno if that idea is possible nor if someone made such a device.  :-)

Maybe it's an stupidity. Heheh
Thaaaaaaaaanks

[motorollin]

Yes as Andy said you just need a CF to IDE adapter. They're very cheap and will allow you to use a CF card just like a hard drive on an expanded CD32 (or any Amiga with an IDE interface). Just search eBay for "compact flash IDE" and you'll find loads.

Edit -
Sorry just re-read your post and realised what you're asking. No, I don't think you can do that. It might work if you could make a mountlist pointing to the device and mount it, but it certainly won't boot from it.

--
moto

[DyLucke]

Hmmmm so i do assume i need my CD32 to have an expansion
attached in order to use a CF-IDE adapter...

Damnit! SX32 is like impossible to get and
expensive as hell...  :crazy:

Maybe i would go and get some A1200 instead
the SX32, later i would think about expanding that A1200.

I thought CD32 was IDE itself and used Akiko to control
the IDE interface plus some chunky to planar processes.
Nobody thought about some adapter using the IDE built-in
interface?? Maybe this is to ask too much.  :lol:

[motorollin]

DyLucke wrote:
I thought CD32 was IDE itself

It is. But AFAIK the CD32 ROM cannot boot from a hard disk attached to the internal IDE interface.

DyLucke wrote:
Nobody thought about some adapter using the IDE built-in
interface?? Maybe this is to ask too much.  :lol:

I think it would require a change to the CD32 ROM.

--
moto

[motorollin]

Hmm, ok there might be a way. I think the CD32's CD drive is on cd.device unit 0. Assuming there is a standard IDE header on the board and you are able to access a slave device through cd.device unit 1, you might be able to create a bootable CD32 disc with a startup-sequence which mounts the hard drive on cd.device unit 1 (if it's not automatically mounted), then assign SYS:, C:, S: etc to the hard drive and then execute S:startup-sequence (which would execute the startup-sequence on the hard drive). You would obviously then have to have the CD in the drive to make it boot.

I have no idea if that would actually work. It's just an idea.

--
moto

[DyLucke]

Got it. So CD32 can't just boot HDDs.
:-)

I guess i'll need to finally buy one A1200
Any good store online to buy adapters and
hardware related to the amiga in general?
Aside "Amigakit.com"... is the only store
i know. (I live in Spain EU)

That's more or less the way it works motorollin,
i saw a guide a time ago but i lost the link it
was like some "how-to-for-nerds" guide :-P

You would need to create the cd like a boot
HDD plus later use an utility to inject some
CD32 code to the iso in order to make it bootable
for the console.

Damnit, i lost that guide link.... SNiF


Thank you guys.

[motorollin]

This page details how to create a bootable CD. I haven't actually tested the instructions so I don't know if they actually work.

http://acdldp.emuunlim.com/bootablecdr.shtml

--
moto

[DyLucke]

YES! That was the one motorollin. Thanks-a-lot.  :-D