Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!comp.vuw.ac.nz!virtue!canterbury.ac.nz!chem194
From: chem194@canterbury.ac.nz (John Davis, chem dept, Uni of Canterbury)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: PAL screen with HD, help!
Message-ID: <1990Sep28.174909.9260@canterbury.ac.nz>
Date: 28 Sep 90 10:38:40 GMT
References: <1380001@hpujsda.HP.COM>
Organization: University of Canterbury
Lines: 55

In article <1380001@hpujsda.HP.COM>, kasahara@hpujsda.HP.COM (Hiroyuki Kasahara) writes:

> I am using Amiga500 and SupraDrive 500XP now.  Before I got a hard
> drive, I always used PalBooter to get a PAL screen.  But when I tried
> it with hard drive,  SupraMount program caused an error and the drive
> was not mounted.
..
> Any help is appreciated;  thanks.
> 
> Hiroyuki Kasahara (kasahara@hpujisa.yhp.hp.com)
> ---

Well, I've got a program that _may_ help. I had a look at things like
PALBoot, and whilst they work well, I realised that they were no-go
with anything that used it's own boot block ( like many games ), and
also wouldn't work with most HD's (as they don't use the bootblock).
 
Anyway, what I came up with was a program that wedges itself into
memory (on the coldcapture and coolcapture vectors) and gives you 
a menu on re-boot, allowing you to choose screen mode as PAL or NTSC,
and also whether to disable all auto-config devices (this will make your
hard-disk invisible to viruses - helps for peace of mind). Hence every time
you boot you can just select PAL. with a click of a mouse button.
 
Of course, the _first_ time you power up the machine it's not going to
work, so you'll have to boot one and run this, then reboot, but after
that you should be fine ( barring total system reboots ).
 
Anyway, it's in an archive called BootMenu.lzh, and you can find
it in /incoming/amiga on Abcfd20 (xanth II) now. I apologise for
not e-mailing a uuencoded copy direct, but email costs _way_ too
much out here for that. If you haven't got access to FTP, well you
could always ask some kindly sole in the US to get it and email it 
to you.
 
Another alternative would be to simply pull the 500 apart and
do the mod to make the Amiga a PAL machine (if it's a rev6 board
that means just shifting one jumper, on older machines you
need to actually pull the agnus and bend out one pin, or cut a 
rather fine trace on the mother board ). The route you take
(software or hardware) will depend on which you feel happier with
(actually, if you do go for the hardware route, fit a toggle
switch on the pin, as that way you can quickly choose screen mode -
PAL is best for most things, but NTSC is handy for a lot of games
to help prevent aspect ratio distortions )

cheers...John

-----------------------------------------------------------
| o  John Davis - CHEM194@canterbury.ac.nz               o |
| o  (Depart)mental Programmer,Chemistry Department      o |
| o  University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand o | 
| o                                                      o |
| o  co-sysop AmigaINFO BBS,1200/2400 baud CCITT,        o |
| o           24 hours a day, ph NZ +3-3371-531          o |