Amiga Thread.

[ClockworkCoder]

Thanks @TrashyMG, I do believe they are a reputable company. Suspect its at customs here too.

 

[ClockworkCoder]

Well, the 8MB expansion arrived, and it works perfectly. I also got a new IDE/CF adapter via Ebay, which was actually from this shop:

https://retroready.one/collections/...200-internal-cf-adapter-no-ide-cable-required

The guy who runs it was really helpful, and even also sent me an ADF containing Compact Flash and "FAT95" drivers for the PCMCIA slot on the Amiga 1200, which work perfectly (recognised a "vfat" formatted SD card, see bottom). He also reminded me that an 8MB expansion won't work with the CF adapter, so I needed to remove the jumper to take it back to 4MB to enable it.

An issue, I'm hoping to you guys may be able to help with is transferring files between Linux and my A1200, using an SD Card I'm using in a Compact Flash adapter.

I can read & write files to it (a FAT32 formatted 1GB SD card) using the Amiga, but when I attempt to do so on my laptop, I get the following:

>> sudo  mount -t vfat -o umask=000 /dev/sdc1 ~/mnt/usbstick
<< 20:00
>> ls usbstick
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/¬¬¬¼«»»│.╢╢╢': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╥╓┌▄▐ßπτ.Ωφ∩': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╥╥╥╥╥╙╙╙.╥╙╙': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/║╗╗╗║╣╖╖.╢┤▓': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╛╛╛╛╛╜╗╗.╗╣╖': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╧╤╥╥╥╙╙╙.╙╙╥': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╧╧╬╬╬╧╧╧.╧╤╙': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/Ω∞εεε∩∩±.≥≥≥': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/πππß▐▐▐▄.┌┘╫': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╥╤╧╤╥╥╥╙.╙╙╥': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╛╜╗╗║║║╕.╢╡│': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/¬¼«¡½¡»».»▒▓': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╧╤╙╙╙╙╥╤.╧╧╧': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╬╬╬╧╧╧╧╧.╬╨╥': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╢╢╢╡│││▒.»▒│': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/πß▐▐▐▌█┘.╓╘╥': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╛╛╛╜╗╗╗╣.╢╢╢': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/»»»»»»»▒.▓┤╢': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/││││▓▒»».«░▓': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/▓▓▓│││││.│││': Input/output error
ls: cannot access 'usbstick/╥╙╙╒╓╓╓╒.╙╙╙': Input/output error
»»»»»»»▒.▓┤╢  ╢╢╢╡│││▒.»▒│  ╧╧╬╬╬╧╧╧.╧╤╙  πß▐▐▐▌█┘.╓╘╥  ╗╗║║║╜┐┐.┐┴├  ╞╞╞╞╞╞╞╞.╞╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╦╦╩╩╩╔╟╟.╟┼├  ∩∩∩φδδδδ.ΩΦµ
││││▓▒»».«░▓  ╥╙╙╒╓╓╓╒.╙╙╙  ╬╬╬╧╧╧╧╧.╬╨╥  πππß▐▐▐▄.┌┘╫  ╗╜╛└┬├├├.├├├  ╟┼├├├├├├.┬┬┬  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╩╦╦╦╩╔╟╟.╟┼├  ∩φδδΩΦµµ.µµµ
║╗╗╗║╣╖╖.╢┤▓  ╥╤╧╤╥╥╥╙.╙╙╥  ▓▓▓│││││.│││  Ω∞εεε∩∩±.≥≥≥  ╗╜╛┴├┼╞╟.╟╟╞  ╟┼┬├├├├├.┬├├  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╩╩╩╔╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ΩΩΩΘττττ.τσπ
╛╛╛╛╛╜╗╗.╗╣╖  ╥╥╥╥╥╙╙╙.╥╙╙  ¬¬¬¼«»»│.╢╢╢  ┐┐┐┐┐┴┬┬.┬┬┬  ╞╞╞╞╞╞╞╞.╞╞╞  ╟╟╟╟╞┼├├.├├├  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╩╩╩╩╩╔╟╟.╞┼├
╛╛╛╜╗╗╗╣.╢╢╢  ╧╤╙╙╙╙╥╤.╧╧╧  ¬¼«¡½¡»».»▒▓  ┐┐╛╛╛╛╛┴.├├├  ╞╞╞╞╞╞╞╞.╞╞╞  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ¬½½½½⌐ªª.ªºº
╛╜╗╗║║║╕.╢╡│  ╧╤╥╥╥╙╙╙.╙╙╥  ╥╓┌▄▐ßπτ.Ωφ∩  ┬┬┬├├┴┐┐.┐┐┐  ╞╞╞╞╞╞╞╞.╞╞╞  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╟╟╟╟╟╟╟╟.╟╟╟  ╢╢╢╕║║║╝.╛┐┐  δΘτττσππ.ππΓ

I've tried slightly different methods of mounting, like (results are the same):

sudo mount -t msdos -o uid=$USER /dev/sdc1 ~/mnt/usbstick

And this is how I formatted it:

sudo fdisk /dev/sdc
sudo mkfs.vfat -F 32 /dev/sdc1

As I mentioned - I couldn't see any files I had put on the SD card on Linux when on the Amiga, and when I put files on it from the Amiga, I got the results above.

I hope someone may be able to point me in the right direction; I know I'm doing something stupid here, but just don't know what it is yet.
[doublepost=1563084726,1563084451][/doublepost]One additional thing. While I was searching for any answers online, I found that Linux can, in theory, natively support AFFS which could mean that I could read / write files in their original format. However, this doesn't appear to be compiled in the kernel I use (Manjaro Arch Linux)

 

[FBnil]

Try a fsck on the disk from your Laptop? Did you properly unmount/eject your floppy/usbstick?

Can you give me the uname -a of your laptop? (what distro are you using? Is it a current one?)
Maybe try a bootable Linux from CD and try reading it from there?

What about your usb in a Windows machine, and let windows checkdisk it?

did you try fat12? doc
And this page talks about mkfs -F ufs but I'm not sure if that is a format both the Amiga and your laptop can handle. From: https://amigaunix.com/doku.php/tips-tricks

Try a smaller USB stick? Maybe another USB stick does work?

There is a website that says:
mkdosfs /dev/sdXX -s 128 -F 32
Windows users can format with file explorer, select FAT32 and set the allocation unit size to 64K.

And maybe it might sound stupid to try, but mkdosfs has an -A for atari version, maybe it also works for Amiga AND on your laptop?

----
Long filename-ish

The bug you see on screen is what I saw once. That fat only could handle 8.3 sized filenames, then Windows linked entries together to make longer filenames possible, but this corrupted the last two characters from a 8.3 filename, and machines that did not understand kept displaying the "filename" until a \0 null was found. But for this bug, you would see the start of your filenames, and in your example we see junk.

The Amiga allows long filenames (31 bytes long, by default, there are options with longer names) and your laptop doesn't know about that encoding?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiga_Fast_File_System

-----
What do you get on the USB stick?

try copy the partition to a file with dd, then reading the file with a hexeditor (or the unix command strings if nothing is available):

dd if=/dev/sdc1 of=MYDISK.img bs=1M conv=noerror

Do you see "fat" data at the beginning? (fat begins with the directories, not with the data)

For this method to be more readable, you can remove entropy from your disk, for example, when just formatted on your Laptop, fill your empty space with zero:
cat /dev/zero > ~/mnt/usbstick/justafile ; rm ~/mnt/usbstick/justafile


Make files with names like AAAAA and BBBBBB and try to find them with the hexeditor, maybe Amiga has a weird ASCII encoding?

If you can not find a hexdump, here is a perl one:
https://github.com/dreinhold/hexdump/blob/master/hexdump.pl

On debian systems, you need to "apt-get install bsdmainutils":
$ dpkg-query --search `which hexdump`
bsdmainutils: /usr/bin/hexdump

 

[ClockworkCoder]

Thanks for your suggestions @FBnil

Try a fsck on the disk from your Laptop? Did you properly unmount/eject your floppy?

It's not a floppy, but an SD card that I'm accessing directly on my laptop, and through a compact flash adapter via the PCMCIA port on my Amiga. I always unmount it from Linux, although I'm unsure how to do the same on the Amiga.

Can you give me the uname -a of your laptop? (what distro are you using? Is it a current one?)
Maybe try a bootable Linux from CD and try reading it from there?

>> uname -a
Linux alex-pc 4.19.56-1-MANJARO #1 SMP PREEMPT Wed Jun 26 03:35:21 UTC 2019 x86_64 GNU/Linux

As I mentioned in the original post, it's Manjaro (Arch Linux), fully updated. Not sure what you mean about booting from CD - it's only the SD card that I'm having issues with...

What about your usb in a Windows machine, and let windows checkdisk it?

I don't have any Windows machines I'm afraid.

did you try fat12?

Thanks, I will try that.

Try a smaller USB stick?

It's a 1GB, although as I mentioned, it's being recognised as a Compact Flash card on my Amiga. Not sure if I have anything smaller...

I feel that it's something I'm doing wrong in the preparation of the card (it seems to me that the Amiga, and Linux are recognising the same SD card as different formats), but lack the specific knowledge what I should be doing differently. On second glance, I might have been wrong about affs not being available, although I'm not sure if / how I should use it in this case either though.

 

[rSl]

maybe http://www2.nslu2-linux.org/wiki/pmwiki.php?pagename=HowTo/MountFATFileSystems
helps?

There is, however, one big problem with the simple mount command. With no arguments mount will make an arbitrary choice (depending on kernel configuration) of the method to represent the long file names on the Linux system. This will either cause many characters to be replaced by ?, resulting in different files with the same name, or it will cause the case insensitive file name matching which the vfat module implements to not work.

The mount command to fix this depends on the local character set you want to use, it will be something like:

mount -o codepage=850,iocharset=iso8859-1,utf8 /dev/sdb1 /mnt

good luck!

 

[TrashyMG]

Hmm don't usually have any problems moving files on my FAT32 formatted USB stick between my Linux and Amiga boxen. I'm typically running vanilla AMD64 Debian on my systems.

 

[pmprog]

So there's a shop link to guage intrest in the Vampire 4 Standalone
https://www.vesalia.de/e_vampirev4sa.htm

I was tempted to ditch the Ultimate64/C64 Reloaded mk3/MEGA65 for the Vampire4... but there doesn't seem to be a case for it, and I'm not particularly keen on having a bare PC exposed.

 

[TrashyMG]

@pmprog,

I've seen a bit forum/facebook group posts of the apollo team members that have test units already with fairly nice cases. The few designs I've seen are either laser cut wood or acrylic, one metal one. One of the guys I've seen with a case is Edu Arana who runs an retro hardware store ( https://www.arananet.net/pedidos/ ) with a good chunk of Amiga related things for sale, so likely he would sell his case design there. I'm sure something will turn up on thingiverse as well eventually.

If I find myself with some extra money, my plans for the V4 standalone was to try and make a small portable out of it.

 

[pmprog]

@TrashyMG thanks. I guess it depends how much extra a nice case costs though. The V4SA already seems quite expensive, especially when I'm trying to work out how much use i think it'd get.

 

[TrashyMG]

@pmprog - yeah it's pricey for sure, I feel I'm happy with the two V2 vampire accelerators in my classic Amigas and still have an A500 stock setup. Not sure I will even get a V4 at all.

 

[TrashyMG]

Looks like my Checkmate A1500 case shipped today, that had to be the smoothest executed Kickstarter campaign I've ever seen...

 

[TrashyMG]

So my case is in, but haven't touched it yet as I'm still waiting on the SFX power supply to come in.

I have a few goals with the case project, this will be replacing my A2000 as my primary Vampired Amiga setup, As I'm trying to save space and the Checkmate case is considerable smaller.

• It will have the V2 Vampired A500 and the OMAP5432 EVM devboard in the case.
• Removable storage accessible externally.
• OMAP5 devboard reset and power buttons brought to the front.
• KVM like feature to allow use of the same keyboard and mouse
• Vampire HDMI + Amiga RGB through a single output ( Will need to integrate my HDMI + Scart to HDMI converter box )
  
• Maintain a real Amiga Floppy drive
• Have the USB Blaster programmer for the vampire available in the back port to allow programming of the Vampire of development cores that are not in their normal Self executable format.

So this will be a pretty odd janky project of electronics, 3D printing and such. The video output and switching may be a fairly involved project, for example to keep it clean I may need to tap into the RGB traces on the A500 motherboard, wire it directly to the HDMI + SCART to HDMI scaler/converter... which I'll likely need to hack a part, Luckily I have a spare one.

First step I did yesterday was prep the A500 Motherboard, Replaced the 30+ year old electrolytic capacitors. I installed the chipram expansion and the USB keyboard adapter that hijacks the keyboard signal from the CIA chip, which will allow me to use a regular compact USB keyboard.

 

[rSl]

cool project!

 

[TrashyMG]

Part II of my adventure...

Well the A500 Motherboard slid in nicely, got the vampire V500 V2+ in, Floppy Drive fitted nicely. However just a few snags, The Individual X-Surf-100 Ethernet card doesn't appear to be working with the A500 in the zorro II expansion adapter. Tried known good driver setup from my A2000 and think it must be related to the lack of DMA buffering due to the lack of the Buster chipset found on the A2000, I was told this shouldn't be an issue as I'm running a single card, but perhaps that isn't the case. What is odd the RapidRoad USB controller that fits into the expansion header on that Ethernet card works fine. I've pinged a few forums to see if anyone else is experience this, but not getting much out it so far. I'm not totally in the lurch, there is a solution on the vampire V2 expansion header using an SPI to ethernet module, shown in the picture below.

The other issue I'm facing deals with the keyboard, the fancy compact mechanical keyboard I picked up and bought special MX cherry Amiga buttons for doesn't seem to be recognized by the little CIA chip USB keyboard adapter. I do have a small keyboard that does, but it's not mechanical. other issue I've noticed It looks like it has a UK or EU English layout and I need to figure out if this thing can change regions, but it lacks any bit of documentation.

Power supply comes in tomorrow, so I can prob at least close the case until I approach dealing with the OMAP5 devboard side of the project.

 

[levi]

To identify the difference between a US and a UK keyboard layout, there are a couple of differences but it's mostly the same. Between US and US, the biggest different is shift+3 generates a pound symbol, and the @ symbol and the double quote are switched over. The hash key that exists on shift+3 in US variants shift on to the pipe key, and pipe leads a merry dance around the keyboard also moving the tilde and other keys onto an extra key that splits the left shift. If you're actually using a US keyboard with a UK layout I would just try shift+3 and see what you get. The most common non-UK european layouts do weird things especially to the QWERTY row, so if you've got a french AZERTY keyboard or a German QWERTZ keyboard test the relevant keys to work out what you've got.

What is the OMAP5 devboard side of the project, out of interest? I don't think I've heard about that yet.

 

[TrashyMG]

Well the issue is I get a ' instead of the hash, but no combination of key presses give me a hash symbol. changing layouts in the OS seem to reverse the issue, I get a hash symbol, but lose the other. Currently I'm lacking any information on the USB keyboard adapter that hijacks the keyboard input from the CIA chip, it was an Ebay purchase from Poland... I'm digging through google now.

What is the OMAP5 devboard side of the project, out of interest? I don't think I've heard about that yet.

Outside of wanting it to coexist in the same case not much. I do want to make a Custom KVM switch so I don't need to run two sets of keyboards, mice and monitors.

 

[TrashyMG]

Well Just a quick update, I should mention I can get a USB keyboard to fully work when plugging it into the RapidRoad USB controller, only issue is it only works on Workbench, if I load up any floppy or WHDLoad game, USB stops working until I exit back into Workbench.

 

[rSl]

yay for progress!

 

[TrashyMG]

A few posts on facebook and Individual Computer's forum and I got Stephen Jones and Jens Schönfeld collaborating on looking into the issue along with some people complaining about running ACA accelerators in the same adapter.

https://forum.icomp.de/index.php?thread/675-a500-checkmate-a1500-zorro-adapter-issues/

 

[TrashyMG]

I guess the Apollo Team (group behind the Vampire accelerators) will also be at Gamescom this year for those who are headed that way.

http://apollo-core.com/knowledge.php?b=1&note=21731&z=spBDMH

@EvilDragon maybe check them out, they have a similar experience with making custom hardware with a community base.