• Commodore Free, Issue 54 - Part two

    From Stephen Walsh@39:901/281 to all on Tue Oct 11 21:22:44 2011
    , with adjustable settings witch makes it more or less compatible.

    Soldering: one wire to SHARP to make turbo loaders compatible. Now I'm preparing short commercial lot, so anybody? See also thread here: http://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?t=18575

    The price depend on your interest, It will be around 50 Euro (43 £), as you see its 2Mhz only and runs on a C64c

    Registers
    TDC registers occupies area of $d02f - $d031.

    $d02f (read only)
    contains $f0 value.

    $d30 (read write register)
    Bits (3-7) - DMA control (reserved for TDC-F always zero)
    Bit (2) - VIC IRQ bust control
    '1' VIC IRQ controls possibility to use max. CPU clock. Set VIC IRQ to turn
    mode on and set $d019 to disable max frequency.
    Bit (1) - max. frequency mode on TOP/Bottom border.
    Bit (0) - 2 MHz mode without c128 screen bug.


    Coders section 2MHz FSB mode
    In this CPU speed all instructions are twice faster than in normal mode with
    exceptions:
    - access to VIC/SID registers.
    - CPU get caught in reading or writing to SID or VIC during BA low (bad line).

    How to calculate speed?
    For example STA $d020 takes 4 cycles in 1MHz=4ms, in 2Mhz mode it takes 2ms or 3ms. 3ms is then CPU write cycle is then VIC have AEC signal low so is not possible to write to VIC registers. No good? Compare it with 20MHZ speeder ;) Command NOP takes 1ms and cycle exact routines are easer now.

    4MHZ FSB mode
    In this mode CPU can do all instructions four times faster with the same exceptions as above. Command STA $d020 takes from 1ms to 2ms, or in view of
    CPU from 4 cycles to 7 cycles.
    Warnings in this mode:
    * refresh of DRAM depend on you.
    * you can't change $01, this register is too slow in CPU, you should set it
    before e.g. in 1Mhz or 2Mhz mode

    $d031 (read write register)
    Register read, hardware version ($D1 - version 1)
    Register write, 8-bit covox output .


    *******************
    AMIGA SD DRIVE
    *******************

    You may well have seen these before but while board I was looking on eBay and trawled this device. Here is the information take from the sellers comments.

    -AMIGA A600 A1200 A4000 SD SDHC MMC TO 44 PIN HD ADAPTER
    -HAVE A SOLID STATE SD Secure Digital CARD, SDHC or MMC WORKBENCH FOR YOUR
    AMIGA A600, A1200 or A4000
    -PCB IS PERFECTLY DESIGNED TO FIT THE AMIGA’S 44 PIN IDE CONNECTOR
    -PROVIDES A BOOTABLE MEDIUM ON SD CARD THAT ACTS LIKE A REGULAR HARDDRIVE!

    SILENT AND FAST AMIGA!
    This adapter allows you to connect a Secure Digital memory card to an IDE interface (like the one present in the Amiga 600 and Amiga 1200). The SD card can be used just like any ordinary hard disk drives, this includes the installation of a (bootable) operating system.

    FEATURES
    SD and SDHC memory card slot
    44-pin IDE interface to connect a 2.5" IDE cable
    Power supply via IDE interface
    Bootable
    Hot swappable
    Dimensions: 53 mm x 42.3 mm

    http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AMIGA-A600-A1200-A4000-SD-SDHC-MMC-44-PIN-HD -ADAPTER-/150655326550?pt=UK_VintageComputing_RL&hash=item2313c1d956


    ************************
    New articles on Obligement
    **************************

    The following articles have been added to the website of the French
    Amiga/Morph OS magazine Obligement (http://obligement.free.fr ) during the
    past months :

    - July/August 2011 news.
    - Articles from Amiga News 101 (May 1997) to 104 (September 1997) : review of
    PC-Task 4.1, review of MBench, review of Personal Paint 7.1, review of
    Directory Opus 5.6, hardware : SyJet, hardware : Surf Squirrel, Report : The
    Amiga at Satellite et Télévision, etc.
    - Report : NASS 2011.
    - Interview with Jason McMullan (AROS 68k developer).
    - Interview with Edgar Vigdal (Deluxe Galaga developer).
    - Interview with Massimiliano Tretene (from 2000, Maim & Mangle developer).
    - Interview with Bill Buck, Raquel Velasco and Petro Tyschtschenko (from 2002). - Review of Sqrxz 2.
    - Review of Classic Workbench.
    - File : the ordered dither in printing on AmigaOS 68k.
    - Hardware : cooling a Radeon 9800 Pro.
    - Tutorial : presentation and configuration of ANAIIS 1.02.
    - Tutorial : recover files from a damaged SFS partition.
    - Tutorial : utilization of Kryptos.
    - Tutorial : presentation and utilization of Amiga911 Maker.
    - Special quiz about the Efika 5200B.

    Article in English:
    - Interview with Jason McMullan (AROS 68k developer).

    Rendezvous on http://obligement.free.fr for this nice reading.
    All translations are welcome. Please contact David "Daff" Brunet for more info.


    *********************
    MAIL ORDER MONSTERS
    *********************

    http://www.mailordermonsters64.com/
    Mail Order Monsters is a three piece music and video performance group, celebrating the sound of the Commodore 64 computer. They use a range of (custom) hardware to produce the SID sound like multiple keyboards and percussion controllers, Midibox, HardSID, Messiah, and real Commodore 64 computers. In total they use 23 SID chips (6581) on stage. They will do a live show at the Artprize 2011 in Ah Nab Awen Park, Michigan, United States on 21, 23 and 30 September.


    ***********************
    REGENERATOR 1.2 RELEASED
    ***********************
    REGENERATOR 1.2 by n0stalgia
    Regenerator is - an interactive dissembler for C64 binaries. Regenerator will load any standard C64 .PRG file (or VICE snapshot) and disassemble it. There are a few options you can choose to change the output and a few tools to make the output look better and more useful to programmers. Although other tools do the same this one is designed to be easier to use.

    You will need .net 3.5 (or 4.0) runtime. Download it from Microsoft’s website.
    http://www.microsoft.com/net/download

    Regenerator makes files that are compatible with 64tass. However you might
    need to uncheck the "Use Illegal Opcodes" option since 64tass chokes on
    illegal opcodes.

    New in version 1.2 (compared to 1.0):
    - You can turn Auto-Merge of Text/Data blocks that touch each other on/off
    - You can Manually Merge Text/Data blocks that touch each other
    - You can set any true type font as the display font now
    - There is a new default font used for display (hopefully better and more
    readable)
    - Regenerator can prefix '~' to operands which must be compiled as 16 bit even
    though their higher byte is 0. This feature is supported by 64tass 1.47 that
    is included in the zip file (it also has other bug fixes done by me).
    - A lot of minor bug fixes and annoyances squashed


    http://pc.sux.org/tomcat/Regenerator12.zip


    **********************
    AmigaOne X1000 booting
    AmigaOS4.1 Update 3
    **********************

    News from Trevor Dick of A-Eon

    Chris Follett, AmigaKit's lead technician, has produced a quick video of the AmigaOne X1000 booting to AmigaOS4.1 Update 3. Chris apologized for the quality, but he only had time to run off a quick video in between setting up and testing Nemo 2.1 motherboards. He has promised to produce another video showing AmigaOS4 running various demos when he has more time.

    AmigaOS4.1 Update 3 booting on AmigaOne X1000 http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=GB&v=c1a_8SUTi6k

    Although you need to be authorised to see the video

    Trevor Dickinson


    ***************************
    Timberwolf Progress Update
    ***************************

    News from amigabounty.net

    http://www.amigabounty.net/?function...4&historyid=53

    --- CrashWrite 2.0
    * Origin: --:)---- Dragon's Lair BBS ---(:-- (39:901/281)