Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!convex!egsner!pfloyd!greg From: greg@pfloyd.lonestar.org (Greg Harp) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.multimedia Subject: Re: CDTV titles on an A500? Message-ID: Date: 4 Jun 91 02:54:14 GMT References: <1991May31.093712.47965@cc.usu.edu> <1991Jun3.054319.10135@news.iastate.edu> Organization: The Environmental ProJection Agency Lines: 38 In article <1991Jun3.054319.10135@news.iastate.edu> taab5@isuvax.iastate.edu (Marc Barrett) writes: > One thing that concerns me, though, is the likely problem of >compatibility with the CDTV. I've mentioned this before, and got no >responses at all, so I will try again. > > The CDTV uses a modified 1.3 ROM. The 1.3 ROM is 256K, however the >CDTV uses a 512K ROM. The extra 256K is filled with system software >specific to the CDTV. This 256K of software may not be present on an >Amiga with the Commodore CD-ROM drive, and certainly will not be >present on an Amiga with any other CD-ROM drive. There are other >features of the CDTV that also may not be present on an Amiga with >a Commodore CD-ROM drive, but the extra 256K of ROM is the most >important one. > > How is this problem going to be solved? Obviously there is a great >potential for CDTV software using some of the routines in this extra >256K, and any software that does so may not run on an Amiga with the >Commodore CD-ROM drive and will not run on Amiga with the Xetec CD-ROM >drive. It's very likely that the extra routines are simply new libraries that are part of the CDTV ROM. These libraries could be installed in the LIBS: directory on an A500 and things would work fine. The other stuff (special startup, graphics data for the CDTV display, etc) will probably be able to be worked around. At worst, something similar to ZKick could be used to cause the Amiga to reboot under the CDTV version of the ROM. This would be sort of a brute force method, but it should work. I'm sure that compatibility was an issue during the design of the CDTV. Therefore, I'm not worried... -- greg@pfloyd.lonestar.org----greg@pfloyd.UUCP----convex!egsner!pfloyd!greg chemist: n. Someone who wastes computer time on number-crunching when you'd far rather the machine were doing something more productive, such as working out anagrams of your name or printing Snoopy calendars or running life patterns. May or may not refer to someone who actually studies chemistry.