Amiga Computing - Commodore Is Awesome

unfortunately, as standard there is no way
to add things to this menu in Workbench
- another over sight by Commodore.
The startup-sequence and user-startup
scripts are found in the S directory hidden
on your Workbench disk. You should not
change you startup-sequence and do not
have to touch the user-startup except to
remove entries. To modify these files you
need to run a text editor, and the simplest
way is to open a shell and type Ed s:userstartup.
This will then load the standard
text editor with the user-startup file.
S.! would think this means you have an
error on your WB3 disk and not the disks
you are copying to. If you are going to be
constantly copying to one disk then it is
inevitable you will get some sort of disk
error. The only way to fix this is to get
hold of a file recovery program. One of the
best is Disksalv - version 2 is shareware
and is available from any decent PD house
- or the more up-to-date version 3 is a
commercial product but does provide
more comprehensive tools.
Another disk tool worth getting hold of
is Rear. As you are constantly copying,
deleting and moving files on your disks,
the free room on the disk gets split up
Into small sections and can make disk
access very slow. Reorg reorganises your
disks so all your programs are stored in
the most efficient manner.
6. Not only should you consider the
amount of RAM you have, but also storage
space and processor speed.
The most commonly used programs
such as Wordworth and Final Writer now
need several megabytes of space along
with the normal Workbench files, libraries
and devices. This all adds to you needing
a lair bit of storage space, the only real
answer being a hard drive.
When it comes to RAM. you can never
really have enough. You do not actually
say what you plan to use your Amiga for,
but if it is for word processing then adding
another 2Mb will be enough. The thing is,
accelerators are so cheap nowadays that
it is worth considering getting one instead
of a plain RAM board, and as most appli-.
cations are aimed at the base Al200, any
speed increase is always very noticeable.
D CONCERNS
I have recently decided to join the CD-ROM
revolution and would like a few questions
answered.
The unit I am considering is the Power
Computing quad-speed CD-ROM, if I can afford
it. I currently have an Al200 with a 120Mb hard drive,
4Mb Amitek Hawk FastRAM expansion with no FPI! and
two external floppy drives. I would like to know if the
drive will work with this setup and if the later addition
of a 33MHz FPU would have any effect on the system.
Additionally, I also have access to an A15043 running
Kickstart 3.1.
This machine has a GVP HC8 hard drive/RAM board
with an external SCSI connector. Would it be possible to
use the CD drive with this machine if a suitable cable
could be obtained.
Mark Henderson, West Midlands
ELUCTANT RENO
Following your review of the Reno CD drive I rushed to
purchase one. Having eventually connected the CD-
ROM drive to my Al200, after some problems receiving
the correct gender changer, I placed the installation
disc in DEO, only for the icon to appear as
DFO:???. On closer reading of the directions I see that
one has to be running Windows in order to operate
the CD-ROM drive.
I was under the impression that Workbench, as
the operating system of the Amiga, made having
Windows unnecessary. Do I now have to purchase
Windows or is there a way of operating
the CD-ROM drive from Workbench?
Indeed, is Windows compatible with the
Amiga 1200? If it is necessary to have
Windows, I would have thought that
you would have made thi5 clear in
your article.
M Fleming, Surrey
You seem to
have got your
wires crossed
a little
here. To solve
your main problem
you need to get hold
of, but should have
received with the
Reno drive, the AmiC0-
Handler software. This is
because unless you have
Workbench 3.1 you do not automatically
have the software that will make your Amiga
recognise the CD drive. This software provides the file
syste m tha t will a llow your Amiga to re a d a ny C D drive R e n o drive ma ke s a good choice for a C D drive
connected via a SCSI interface.
Once you have got hold of the AmiCDHandler software
you need to install it. This is much easier than it may sound because you install the software using a standard
installer script. All you have to know is the name of your SCSI device - if you are using a Squirrel this is squirrelscsidevice
- and the SCSI Id number of the Reno drive - this can be set on the Reno drive itself. Once this is done
you can run the device driver and the wonderful world of CD awaits you.
I think I should clear up a little confusion you are having about Windows. I would guess the disk that came with
the Reno drive was a HD PC disk that the Al200 cannot read which is why the DRI:???? icon appears. Windows is
the operating system written by Microsoft, and it comes in a number of flavours - the most commonly used being
Windows 95 for PC IBM compatible computers - and you are right in thinking Workbench makes needing
Windows unnecessary, and also that Windows is unavailable for the Amiga. If Windows 95 was available for the
Amiga you would need an Al200 with 16Mb RAM, an 040 processor and a 1/2 Gb hard drive, and even then it
would not do anything more than Workbench already does.
As far as I know the Amitek board will
work fine with 4Mb of RAM, in as
much as any of the RAM expansions
work fine, as long as only 4mb of RAM
is used. Normally, if plain RAM expansions,
not accelerators, have more than 4Mb the PC
slot is made redundant as the RAM expansion uses
the same address space as the PC slot, so the
processor cannot access the PC slot.
This does not effect accelerator boards as they use
their own address space which allows them to
access much more memory than a standard Al200 -
up to 128Mb.
Adding a FPU should also have no effect on the CD
drive, but you do not need such a fast FPI/ because
using a 13MHz chip on a standard Al200 will only
give you a slight speed increase over using a 20 or
AMIGA COMPUTING
MAY 19 9 6
" Sma ll. porta ble a nd pe rfe ctly forme d. The
• alp
4Mhz version. Data is still supplied and taken from
the WU at 14MHz so a faster FPU is standing idle
much of the time.
To get the CD to work with the GVP interface you
will not only need the correct connection but also
the correct software, If the machine has the full
Workbench 3.1 software then there is a CO DOS driver
supplied with it. To adjust this for use with the
GVP board you need to drag it from the storage
drawer over to the Devs DOS drivers drawer. Pop up
the information requester and change the Unit entry
to the SCSI ID of the CD drive, and change the device
driver name to that of the GVP device drive - this will
probably be something like gvpscsialevice. Once
everything is connected up you can double-click the
DOS driver icon and the CD drive should be
available.
45