Amiga puzzle - disconnected worlds! help?

[paul1981]

"Ready to run" in what sense? I've downloaded these... I couldn't get anything useful to happen.

That would indicate a software issue with your Amiga then. These files once unzipped contain an already installed game or demo. There is the icon for the game or demo to double click to load it.
Perhaps on the ones you tried they needed kickstart files that you may not have in your 'DEVS:Kickstarts' drawer. Or, some games/demos may need a 68020 or above (sorry, can't remember what Amiga you're trying to run these on).

[RedWarrior]

I think the reason I'm banging my head against this brick-wall is that I really want to have some sense of a reliable procedure to work across all the adfs I have... I'm quite set on replaying the games as I had them on floppy disk- not just "any version"

I'll try these again and see if I can swap out some files somehow...

[AmigaBruno]

RAWdic is a command which is supposed to convert an NDOS ADF image into a format that can be used by WHDload. I've tried it recently and got an error message saying something like the files wasn't in AmigaDOS format!

I have got my PCMCIA card reader now, but then I found out that my current laptop doesn't even have a PCMCIA slot. It was an older laptop, now broken, which had one. I would also have to install some files onto an Amiga formatted CF card before my Amiga A1200 can recognise it. This means removing the CF card from the Amiga and putting it into my new USB CF card reader. I hope this won't corrupt the new CF card, which is what seems to have happened to the other one.

If all of the above doesn't work, then I'll just give up and buy a device with WHDload as well as lots of games and demos preinstalled, then I'll never attempt to install any more onto it. This device may be called a "disco duro", but I can't tell you where to find it, because of the Copyright Police.

[paul1981]

RAWdic is a command which is supposed to convert an NDOS ADF image into a format that can be used by WHDload. I've tried it recently and got an error message saying something like the files wasn't in AmigaDOS format!

I have got my PCMCIA card reader now, but then I found out that my current laptop doesn't even have a PCMCIA slot. It was an older laptop, now broken, which had one. I would also have to install some files onto an Amiga formatted CF card before my Amiga A1200 can recognise it. This means removing the CF card from the Amiga and putting it into my new USB CF card reader. I hope this won't corrupt the new CF card, which is what seems to have happened to the other one.

If all of the above doesn't work, then I'll just give up and buy a device with WHDload as well as lots of games and demos preinstalled, then I'll never attempt to install any more onto it. This device may be called a "disco duro", but I can't tell you where to find it, because of the Copyright Police.

Corrupted your CF card? If you can't format it anymore it means the partition has been lost that is all. Re-create a partition and re-format (quick).

[AmigaBruno]

Corrupted your CF card? If you can't format it anymore it means the partition has been lost that is all. Re-create a partition and re-format (quick).

What I mean is that I had the older CF card formatted and partitioned as FFS with 3 or 4 partitions. They were called Workbench, Work, Art, and Games. I originally planned to install WHDload on it, but I couldn't work out how. I wanted WHDload, as well as applications which run from hard drive. I didn't want to keep swapping between two CF cards to have this. I created and stored a lot of data on it, but unfortunately I didn't back up all of it. I don't want to reformat it, I want to retrieve my data.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

I really want to have some sense of a reliable procedure to work across all the adfs I have.

Yeah, this is an Amiga. That's not going to happen!  Trial & error, man. Trial & error.

[AmigaBruno]

As mentioned in the topic http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=69677 , I've been busy setting up reading my CF card and mounting a Windows XP Downloads directory, which is now done.

After that, I started downloading from pages such as http://whdownload.com/games.php?name=h&sort=0&dir=0 , but of course these don't contain the original games.

I'm not sure, but I assume I should look for these games wherever I usually find them, but that they must be original versions, meaning that it shouldn't say CR in the description. As for whether they can be ADF or must be DMS, I'm still not sure about that.

[AmigaBruno]

SUCCESS! After several hours of downloading, unarchiving and transferring some files on my old Windows XP based desktop PC, I had what looked like some WHDload installation files for several games, but not the games themselves, apart from a couple of exceptions. None of them have the extensions ADF or DMS, though. I didn't put them in directories such as A, B, C, etc.

After all of this I tried clicking on all of the very small game icons, which seemed to be designed especially for WHDload and I was surprised to see them get as far as the WHDload registration nag screen. After that, I got error messages, which were usually that it couldn't find a Kickstart 1.3 ROM image. I think some of these games are capable of running from floppy disk without a 1.3 ROM though.

I didn't always try the games in alphabetical order, then was pleasantly surprised to find that Eye of Horus, Bloodwych, and Advanced Ski Simulator all ran! Eye of Horus had been cracked so the player didn't have to input anything from the manual, though.

Now I'm totally exhausted and looking forward to a good night's sleep! Later today I plan to install the Kickstart 1.3 ROM image which I think is on my Amiga Forever DVD and an accompanying file which is either on a WHDload site, and/or on Aminet.

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

You need the Kick 1.3 image in your DEVS: directory to get past that error message.  And if by "very small game icons" you mean "they look like little squares", that's because they're "NewIcons"-style icons.  To view them correctly install the Peter K. icon library.

[Blizz1220]

Well you need Kick 1.3 but it has to have correct name.

Names as follows (in devs:kickstarts) :

KICK33180.A500
KICK33180.A500.RTB
KICK34005.A500
KICK34005.A500.RTB
KICK40068.A1200
KICK40068.A1200.RTB

These are from A500 and A1200 , all games will work with them.
Size of A500 ROMS is 256 Kb and A1200 512 Kb.Amiga forever has
encrypted Roms , I have no clue if they will work.

Few more hints : You need extra memory to run games in WHDLoad.
That can be cause of problem.Original games can hardly be found in
ADFs , you need IPFs and a way to get them on floppy.

[AmigaBruno]

Well you need Kick 1.3 but it has to have correct name.

Names as follows (in devs:kickstarts) :

KICK33180.A500
KICK33180.A500.RTB
KICK34005.A500
KICK34005.A500.RTB
KICK40068.A1200
KICK40068.A1200.RTB

These are from A500 and A1200 , all games will work with them.
Size of A500 ROMS is 256 Kb and A1200 512 Kb.Amiga forever has
encrypted Roms , I have no clue if they will work.

Few more hints : You need extra memory to run games in WHDLoad.
That can be cause of problem.Original games can hardly be found in
ADFs , you need IPFs and a way to get them on floppy.

Unfortunately, although I already knew I needed the files above ending in A500 and A500.RTB, I'm not sure where to get them or how to install them. Recently, while using FS-UAE or WinUAE, I copied some ROM files over from my Amiga Forever DVD, then they complained that the ROM key file was missing. I found and copied another file called rom.key on that DVD, then it worked. I've also got a copy of SKick with three ROM files on an ADF, which enables some software loaded from my Gotek USB drive to run on my A1200.

Actually, I've now found out what to do with the Amiga Forever DVD as explained on http://www.whdload.de/docs/en/need.html

I've already heard that some games need more than 2Mb to run under WHDload, but eBay sellers say that there are ways to "bypass the OS" to get round this. I assume that I just need to press Ctrl D to stop Workbench loading, followed by a few commands such as DIR ALL , CD , etc. Apart from this, I haven't installed that RAM hungry launcher (iGame?) or "Classic Workbench". I'm seriously considering buying some extra RAM very soon, which may be in the form of the new ACA 1221 accelerator.

As for IPF files, I don't think I've ever heard of them before, so I'll have to investigate.

[paul1981]

When dealing with WHDLoad forget about ADF's or dms files... Each install is different, some retain the whole floppy images whilst others will utilise directories and files for the game data (dependent on the game).

As for the anti-piracy code booklets or code wheels etc, AFAIK all WHDLoad game installs have been programmed by their respective authors to remove such protection (to save us typing crap in and mucking around with code wheels).

http://whdownload.com/

The above site DOES contain the game/demo in its entirety. I have no idea why you keep saying it doesn't!

If you're running an A1200, you'll need 2mb fast ram or more in the trapdoor. I recommend 4mb minimum though. What would be nice is 8mb fast ram and a faster cpu, such as...well, any really...

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

Unfortunately, although I already knew I needed the files above ending in A500 and A500.RTB, I'm not sure where to get them or how to install them

Oh for the love of...

http://bfy.tw/1WUO

And just stick them in Devs:kickstarts, as already mentioned above.

[AmigaBruno]

When dealing with WHDLoad forget about ADF's or dms files... Each install is different, some retain the whole floppy images whilst others will utilise directories and files for the game data (dependent on the game).

As for the anti-piracy code booklets or code wheels etc, AFAIK all WHDLoad game installs have been programmed by their respective authors to remove such protection (to save us typing crap in and mucking around with code wheels).

http://whdownload.com/

The above site DOES contain the game/demo in its entirety. I have no idea why you keep saying it doesn't!

If you're running an A1200, you'll need 2mb fast ram or more in the trapdoor. I recommend 4mb minimum though. What would be nice is 8mb fast ram and a faster cpu, such as...well, any really...

I didn't think we were allowed to post links to copied games on here. Anyway, it didn't look to me like the actual games were included, except where I saw some files which were 880K.

Some games are already running and I've seen lists of games which will run in 2Mb. I'm planning to buy a RAM upgrade/accelerator soon.

[paul1981]

I didn't think we were allowed to post links to copied games on here. Anyway, it didn't look to me like the actual games were included, except where I saw some files which were 880K.

Some games are already running and I've seen lists of games which will run in 2Mb. I'm planning to buy a RAM upgrade/accelerator soon.

The games which are running will be the ones that don't use the Kickstart files.

[AmigaBruno]

Oh for the love of...

http://bfy.tw/1WUO

And just stick them in Devs:kickstarts, as already mentioned above.

Of course, I knew there were Amiga Kickstart ROM images out there, but WHDload expects to have ROM images of specific versions and names. I haven't got a list in front of me, but I don't think all Kickstart 1.3 ROMs are the same version. For most purposes users only need to consider if the ROM is 1.2, 1.3, 2.04, 2.05, 3.0, or 3.1 though. They're all listed on http://cloanto.com/amiga/roms/

The link I posted later on in my message gives details that users can copy the images from an Amiga Forever DVD and then rename them, so long as the version of WHDload is at least 16.5. Fortunately, my pre installed version is later than 16.5. The system ROMs can be a bit difficult to find but are in Amiga Files\Shared\rom

AFAIK I just have to copy one of two of these Kickstart ROM files, as well as the rom.key file and the mysterious .RTB files from Aminet, then a lot of other games will run.