User avatar
Shot97
Detroit, MI, USA

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 11:39 am

No matter what, I would say Degrader is an essential tool that anybody running Workbench 1.3 needs to have, period. Hell, perhaps everyone needs to have it, it could certainly give 1200 users a more authentic non WHDLoading interface.

It's not just the PAL/NTSC modes that it switches, but it does that quite well and it's my primarily purpose for using it. Simply is no excuse for anyone with a PAL machine to be playing NTSC games in PAL mode when such a tool exists... and likewise it would be best for NTSC machines to play anything designed in PAL over in Europe to switch to that mode, even if it does play in NTSC mode. This stuff is art, respect it and do your best to play them in the proper modes.

Besides that, there are switches to boot the machine using no fast memory. Many older games would Guru if you had more than 512k in the system. You can disable fast memory inside of Workbench, but then you'd have to launch the game using a shell, this provides autobooting for the game. You can autoboot your systems with fast memory and give it a true 1mb of chip ram, which will make quite a few of the later games a bit faster and less resource hungry, as well as making applications run less sluggish. You can disable floppy drives or reassign the drive letters.

The program itself can be put onto your hard drive, and then you can use Directory Opus to give it an icon and then run it from Workbench, or you can put it on a floppy. Some things can be done without a system reset, but mostly I'd say to reboot it and have it keep the settings. When you keep the settings it will survive multiple resets until you actually turn the machine off.

Absolute must have piece of power user software in Degrader.

User avatar
Shot97
Detroit, MI, USA

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 11:49 am

If when you 're first loading Workbench, when the command line pops up, if the window for that screen covers the entire 4:3 screen, then you're in NTSC medium resolution. If the window is only a certain amount down the screen with a bunch of blank space below it, you're in PAL mode, regardless of what Sysinfo says.

I mean there might be something else that goes into it all, because indeed; Certain games like The Three Stooges will have issues on anything but a 100% made in the U.S.A. machine, but we're talking 2% of games I'm thinking, and even then there are ways around it most of the time. I'd be curious to know exactly what it is about 100% U.S. machines that causes these problems... I wonder if it's not even Agnus and something else causes it... I would have thought my problem was just the Degrader software having issues with a small percentage of games until you came with your story of the Phoenix Board itself having issues... Now it makes me think Degrader does everything just fine, or at least it does everything as well as your board does with switching the modes.

The true test would be to hook up a toggle to the chip itself, then see if it still has those issues. It really is odd, though. I always figured that's why Sysinfo reports my Amiga as being PAL even if I booted it into NTSC mode... Just because Sysinfo knows about the true status of that one pin and so reports it falsely. Makes me wonder if that one jumper on your Phoenix acts in a similar way to Degrader. May not completely cut off access to that pin.

User avatar
McTrinsic

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 12:30 pm

Hi,
one post I found over at a1k.org. It's German so you might want to try a translator. You still might get the gist anyways.
Auf die Bezeichner würde ich verzichten,die sind nicht sehr diszipliniert von Commodore benutzt worden,die BBoah-Liste könnte man noch um ca. 30 Typen an 8372er und 8375er erweitern was aber niemanden was bringen täte.

Die Partnummer ist da besser für geeignet weil sie sich am Bonding orientiert und somit eine echte Unterscheidung ermöglicht!

Und da sollten:

8372AB und 8372B

318069-03 (Startet als PAL)

und

8375 teilweise auch 8375VBB

318069-19 (Startet als NTSC)

gehen,da beide ICs im A3000 ab Werk verwendet wurden.

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 12:59 pm

This is what it translates into:
I would dispense with the identifiers, which are not very disciplined by Commodore been used, the BBoah list could be extended to about 30 types of 8372er and 8375er but which would bring anybody what.

The part number is better suited because it is based on the bonding and thus allows a true distinction!

And there should be:

8372AB and 8372B

318069-03 (Starts as PAL)

and

8375 partly also 8375VBB

318069-19 (Starts as NTSC)

go, since both ICs in the A3000 were used ex works.
I do think it would be nice if there was a more definitive list. What I quoted from MegAChip (DKB) gives us two more, and seems to go against what was quoted from a1k.org.

I might have more info on that here in the next few weeks, though. We’ll see.

Either way this is a high class “problem”.

I think the Phoenix is so picky that even though I can get it to display in NTSC mode it’s strangley still upset about something on the software side. I think I might try degraded in it next to see if there is any difference.

User avatar
Bulletdust

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 1:50 pm

I wouldn't totally trust Sysinfo, there's a number of things it misreports.

I was going to ask what frequency the monitor was reporting (50/60Hz), but then I remembered that you're running a 10804S....

I wonder if the frequency of the PSU has anything to do with it? What PSU are you using, the Australian one or the US one? (bearing in mind that Australia runs 240v, not 120v - So be aware).

Gawd, in comparison it was so easy configuring my NTSC C64 to PAL...

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 5:00 pm

If when you 're first loading Workbench, when the command line pops up, if the window for that screen covers the entire 4:3 screen, then you're in NTSC medium resolution.
After changing the jumper setting, this immediately happened. I no longer saw (to my mind) the squashed WB loading screen where the screen wouldn't fill the 4:3 space - at least, it wouldn't fill it until Workbench loaded it. For some reason, if you're in PAL mode, the startup-sequence loading screen gets squashed.

Today I flipped over to KS/WB 2.0, put in the Extras disk and fired up the "ScreenMode" program. That's one thing I wish 1.3 had. I don't miss it but it would have been handy during this exercise.
IMG_3594.jpg
ScreenMode utility in WB 2.1

And I can confirm that SysInfo is wrong. It reports a PAL Agnus, but Workbench itself sees only NTSC modes when my jumper is set to NTSC. Crazy!
IMG_3595.jpg
The Phoenix is indeed in NTSC mode in all its glory.

So, this is where things get strange. And I have to simply chalk it up to the Phoenix being an "odd bird" in general. She's cool, don't get me wrong. But high-maintenance, unpredictable and quirky!

She's set to NTSC.

Test #1: I insert "The Immortal" which is a floppy disk-only game (2 disks). And, you are not allowed to use an accelerated Amiga. BUT you have to have at least 1 MB of RAM. Up to this point I've only been playing the game on my un-modded NTSC A1000. Runs great on that machine.

Technically, the Phoenix is 2MB (1 chip, 1 slow) but when I put the Boot disk in and go for it the game stops loading after a couple of minutes. It just goes quiet and unresponsive. It doesn't do this in my stock 1000. This was originally one of the first signs that something strange was going on.

Test #2 Emerald Mine: a great little game made in Germany in 1987 that works with NTSC machines perfectly - it boots off the FDD. I loaded it up and it was completely fine.

Test #3: Double Dragon - a fun brawler that previously only worked on non-modded/non-accelerated machines running 1.3. And it worked, too! So I was glad about that but found it a little confusing when compared to The Immortal. Could the Phoenix simply need more RAM?
DD3598.jpg
Double Dragon worked just fine, just like my bare-bones stock NTSC A500. A good sign.

Test #4: a PAL game. In the past if I tried to load Shinobi up on my stock 1000 it would never get past one of the original intro screens. This time it did! I was able to play the (awful) game! How the hell was a PAL game running on this Phoenix in NTSC mode? Made no sense.

Test #5: The true PAL test: Speedball 2. Previously it never worked on any of my machines EXCEPT the Phoenix in PAL mode. It was as PAL mode as PAL mode could be.

So I loaded it up and... it froze exactly where it did on all of my other NTSC machines.

The Phoenix does indeed seem to behave a lot like it should in NTSC mode. SysInfo is wrong. And the Phoenix even played one PAL game that it simply shouldn't have. But it also didn't play one NTSC game that it should have! At the end of the day, I've decided I'm going to hook up a switch to that jumper, which will allow me to flip between the two modes, which should cover 99% of what I throw at it. The other 1%? It'll remain a mystery. This should let me play the most games possible across the board. There's still that issue with The Immortal which I don't understand, but frankly no Amiga plays all Amiga games. The Phoenix should play more than most. That's where things are. If I can whittle down the stupid 3D printed FDD eject button, I should be pretty set.

If I could add a tiny bit more RAM I think the Phoenix will be done. But that'll be for another day.

User avatar
Shot97
Detroit, MI, USA

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 5:10 pm

With The Immortal; Definitely give Degrader a try. It has a bunch of memory configuration options that just might be the ticket. Winter Games was an example of a game that refused to run unless I made the memory mode perfect in Degrader. It even has an "AGA Fix" online... Which does not give it AGA graphics, it simply allows it to work on newer machines... Mess with those Degrader settings, might get it to run.

User avatar
Bulletdust

Posted Thu Feb 01, 2018 8:50 pm

This is actually very interesting! :)

User avatar
McTrinsic

Posted Fri Feb 02, 2018 2:14 pm

Today I tried to find the post where someone reported to have used a 8375 Agnus for 2MB Chip.

But the search function on a1k.org is almost legendary crap.

I'll try some more.

User avatar
Zippy Zapp
CA, USA

Posted Fri Feb 02, 2018 4:55 pm

This thread is loaded with good info.

Wiki has a breakdown of the various Agnus chips. As you discovered the 8372A chips are indeed capable of NTSC or PAL. As are the 8372AB that came with the A3000. After that it seems, even though the chips have the same series they have different versions for NTSC and PAL.

Glad you got it locked into NTSC. Awesome job.

That is one thing I like about the A1200/A4000. Early Startup menu and boot PAL or NTSC. To bad they couldn't have figured this out in the beginning.





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