#Workbench 2.04 ??
26 messages in this thread
Have had a flyer in the mail from CREATIVE EQUIPMENT out of Miami,
Florida. It offers a Workbench 2.04 upgrade (Kickstart Chip and Workbench)
for Amiga's A500, A2000, A2000HD, A2500 and A3000 at a price around $100.00
QUESTION: Is this the OFFICIAL Commodore upgrade, which I thought includes
the new Denise chip ?
Anyone know ???
Regards……… Hilary.
The Denise chip is not included in the upgrade.
Steve
Hilary,
Yes…it's probably the official upgrade, NO, the ECS Denise is not
part of 2.04, nor is it needed to run 2.04. ECS Denise is a separate item,
no idea on the cost…I suspect in the neighborhood of $60 to $80.
You do need the 2.04 upgrade to take advantage of the ECS Denise.
ALSO, I do not believe the 2.04 ROM chip for the 3000 has been
released yet…so that part of their flyer is probably wrong.
And finally, for 2500 owners, you will NOT be able to use 2.04 with
the A2620/30 until you upgrade the ROMs on the A2620/30 with the -06
versions. Those ROMs list for $33 and should be available by the end of
the month.
Don
When you order a MegAChip from the Grapevine Group you can buy an ECS
Denise for $35. I don't know what the regular price is.
Leslie,
I'm looking at the December Grapevine ad…it shows the ECS Denise
at $39.95 if bought with a MegaChip. By itself, it shows a tenative price
of $54.50.
Don
Ooops. Sorry about that. I meant to say the ECS Denise was $40 with the
purchase of MegAChip.
Don, you can indeed use 2.04 with 2500. It's just a hair slow on bootup,
that's all.
Paul
–pt–not seattle– 😉
Paul,
The vast majority of 2500's out there have ROM's on the A2620/30
cards that are incompatible with the 2.04 ROM. You first need to upgrade
the A2620/30 ROMs before the 2.04 ROM will work. The disk based 2.04 works
just fine of course.
Some recent 2500's already have the -06 ROMs in them, so they'll
upgrade no problem.
For those of you wondering if you already have the -06 ROMs in your
2500, there's a very easy way to find out:
1. Reboot holding both mouse buttons down.
2. Keep holding the mouse buttons down when the 68000/680×0/UNIX
boot screen pops up and hit SHIFT M
3. Release the mouse buttons and you'll enter the ROM monitor.
4. Type "version"
If you've got the upgrade ROMs, you'll see "01/05/91". If you
don't have the upgrade ROMs, you'll enter a terminal emulator and see
nothing. You'll have to reboot to get out of the terminal emulator (or at
least that was the only way I could get out of it).
Also note the above date…if you bought your 2500 before 1991, you
couldn't possibly have the -06 ROMs unless you've had the accelerator
worked on and the ROMs were replaced then.
Don
Don,
The 2500 doesn't really need the 06 ROMS to run 2.04. Just copy the 2.04
ROM to a file on your hard drive and then abort the boot and transfer to
the psuedo ROM on disk.
This is the temporary method that works fine until Commodore can start
catching up (again) with anticipated high demand.
Some users have been confused by the information that only disked base
2.04 can work with A2620/30. Just make your own disk based version ! 🙂
Thanx for filling in the gaps, Don.
Paul
–pt–not seattle– 😉
Wanna run that by us again …. How can you run a disk-based V2.04
ROM image on an A2620 booting from 68020 mode? Can't be done Ace.
Paul, either I didn't say it right or you didn't read it right. I have been
doing exactly as you said, every day, couple times a day, Ace 🙂 Works
like a charm.
Paul
–pt–not seattle– 😉
Paul,
I suggest you take a look in AmigaUser (where we are now) libraries,
section 12 for this:
[72017,753]
26X0_F.LZH/Bin Bytes: 5937, Count: 19, 06-Nov-91
Title : NON-ROM fix for 2620/30 2.0 kickstart
Keywords: 2.0 2620 2630 HAYNIE ROM
This will make 2.0 work with a B2500 without rev6 roms. I got this from
Dave Haynie of CBM. Note you must have setcpu for this to work. So good
luck.
I downloaded it, and it looks simple enough. You will need SetCPU 1.6.
Basically, you put the 2.04 rom in your machine, boot in 68000 mode, copy
the rom image to a file (the program supplied makes the file on sys:).
Then you could go ahead and install 2.04 workbench. When the 2.04 install
is completed and confirmed (in 68000 mode), modify your startup sequence as
follows (right at the top):
version >NIL: exec.library 37
IF WARN
SetCPU KICKROM sys:kickstart2.04
; should never get here…
ELSE
execute s:Startup-2.0
ENDIF
After the modifications, go and put your 1.3 ROM back into the machine
(yes, remove the 2.04 ROM). With the 1.3 ROM back in the system, you can
boot up with your accelerator again, so SetCPU will be able to load the
2.04 ROM image from SYS:, and re-boot with a copy of 2.04 in 32 bit ram.
Of course you don't want to boot in 68000 mode, since you will have a 2.04
WB and 1.3 ROM, so things won't be too complete!
I haven't tried this out yet, Paul. No 2.04 upgrade yet, though may have
it by the end of next week (CBM Canada has brought 500 copies of the
enhancer into Canada and my dealer has ordered six copies – the first one
is mine). Don't know if I want to do this, or just wait until I get the
2620 ROMs. IF I don't wait for the 2620 ROMs, may have to configure so I
can boot into 2.04 or 1.3 WB so I can keep running AVT – don't want to do
this, but may have no choice besides not upgrading to 2.04 until AVT gets
upgraded.
73, Kelly
Yeah … that's fine with a V1.3 ROM, but noone's been saying that. They
have all implied it is done with a V2 ROM installed. That file in the LIB
didn't say anything about swapping ROM's.
Cheers, Paul (WA1OMM)
Paul,
Dave Haynie was very clear in the afore mentioned file that he was using an
B2500 with old roms on the accelerator and 1.3 ROM. If you do not want to
swap out your 1.3 roms temporarily, then you could always find a machine
with 2.0 roms (dealer??) and get the rom image from there. Save opening up
your machine and swapping roms twice. I still think the best way is to
hang tight until the 2620/30 roms are available and do everything at once.
Hmmm I wonder if it is 2.0 KS or 2.0 WB that causes the problems with
AVT….
73, Kelly
[ continuation ]
in 68000 mode, this is possible. Install the ROM in the system, boot with
the two mouse buttons down, select 68000 mode. Since all A26x0 resources
go away with 68000 mode, you should properly boot into 2.0. From here, run
a program that downloads 2.0 to a file, something like this would work in
C:
#include <stdio.h>
void main(int argc, char *argv) {
FILE *f = fopen("sys:kickstart2.04","w");
char *r = (char *)0x00f80000L;
if (!f) {
printf("Can't get file or RAM\n");
exit(10);
}
fwrite(r, 0x80000L, 1L, f);
fclose(f); }
Now, you need SetCPU and some changes to your Startup-Sequence. What you
end up with are two startups, the boot startup that gets you into 2.0, and
the real 2.0 startup. It goes something like this:
version >NIL: exec.library 37 IF WARN
SetCPU KICKROM sys:kickstart2.04
; should never get here… ELSE
execute s:Startup-2.0 ENDIF
Anyway, you get the idea. With this in place, and 2.0 installed on your
boot disk, you should be able to reset and boot straight into 2.0 under
'030 control. It's not as fast a reboot as straight from ROM, but that's
still the way I run 2.0 on my office A2500, as I've been too lazy to update
the A26x0 and kickstart ROMs. I actually have 1.3 on the boot partition,
2.0 on a different partition; an artifact of the 2.0 testing days, I never
use 1.3 any more. My "ELSE" clause above uses my BindNames program to push
the 2.0 environment over to a different partition before calling the
Startup-Sequence for 2.0, and it used to have an "Ask" command that let me
choose whether to boot 2.0 or not.
Anyway, that's my workaround, and it's proven. Still, I recommend the ROMs
if you're doing much rebooting, since they'll be faster.
-Dave Haynie
Cheers, Paul (WA1OMM)
Dunno what problems exist with AVT. It works fine for me although some of
the buttons disappear.
Cheers, Paul (WA1OMM)
If you don't mind clearing up one bit of my confusion, after you
install the ROMs and make the disk based 2.04 kickstart you have to
put the 1.3 ROMs back in? And just how do you 'abort the boot and
transfer to the psuedo ROM on disk'? Please clear up this fuzzy
head. (Not to mention the 2500 sitting here with 2.04 ROMs in it and
keeps booting into the monitor.)
Yes, put the 1.3 ROMS back in. Then you assign your new "BOOT area" as the
disk based image. Preferably hard drive.
Good luck,
Paul
–pt–not seattle– 😉
Thanks for the reply. It took some playing, but the 2500 is coming up in
2.04 just fine now. Probably isn't the 'approved method', but functional.
Paul, what in the heck are you talking about? 🙂
"just copy the 2.04 ROM to a file on your HD and then abort the boot
and transfer the pseudo RAM on disk"
Can you expand on that? I have a friend who is in this fix, and I'd sure
like to know how he can get this fixed. Thanks….
BTW, I haven't seen anyone comment on how ironic it is that Commodore
finally releases 2.04, but all their earlier 68020/30 board customers can't
use it till the upgrade to the dang 6.0 ROMS or such. Geez…. didn't they
have any machines around West Chester that they had this problem with?
Didn't they maybe think, "Hey, maybe we better order a large supply of the
6.0 roms *now*, cause they sure will be popular later!"
Frankly, I think they should just automatically have sent all dealers
plenty of the roms, so that the fix could be done at same time as the 2.04
upgrade. Or maybe just included the roms in the upgrade kit to start with?
What's a little silicon? Save the beaches? 🙂
–jp–seattle–
JP,
The -06 ROMs should be available by the end of this month. They
already exist…it's just that right this moment, they're on backorder.
Don
John, sorry for not explaining it better. You have to install the 2.04 ROM
into tour 2500. Copy the ROM into a file and put this file in a easy place
to get to. Put the 1.3 ROM back in and re-boot. Now instead of booting off
DF0: or DHx: you go to the next device in line for "boot search" which is
the name of your file ( copy of ROM ):).
For some dumb reason I can't get into my s: directory, but you use
SETCPU before bindrivers. I'm not positive but the template for "SETCPU ?"
showed how to give the new designated Boot start location. I can't remember
if I copy the ROM (binary file) to 32 bit Ram or hard drive but either will
work.
Now when you boot up the startup sequence will choke for a second, try a
new boot , and then see your new "designated Booter".
Bing, Bang, Boom- Now you can play with every 2.04 thingie, it's just a
hair slow.
Paul
–pt–not seattle– 😉
OK, the procedure you explain sounds much like the kickit procedure I'd
used earlier (and haven't A3000's used that all along?). Maybe now that
2.0 is 'official' Commodore is okaying it for regular accellerated A2500
use too. Thanks.
–jp–seattle–
Don,
I think you may have saved me from buying the wrong ROM: but let me
confirm what I infer from your remarks to Hilary. I had a stock A2000 and
upgraded with an A2620 accelerator card. Am I to understand that a
different WB2.0 ROM is needed from what would have been the case if I had
not had the A2620 inserted?
Tom,
NO…the OS ROM is the same; however, because of the A2620, you
must also get new ROMs for your A2620.
Also, be aware, until you put the new ROMs on the A2620, you'll
either have to boot in 68000 mode (thus be slow and lose the extra RAM on
the A2620) or you'll have to stick with the 1.2/3 OS ROM you currently have
in your Amiga.
The new A2620/30 (they both use the same ROMs) ROMs should be
available by the end of this month or early next month.
Don
You're better off buying it from a reputable dealer. Mine was 10 bucks
cheaper and came wrapped in "Commodore Rainbows." In other words, the REAL
product is less than the one you have doubts about! Tim