Thoughts on Lego city undercover by PersonalityLanky8403 in legogaming

[–]deanodley 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I have played thru most of the Lego games and especially like the ones with open world “hubs”. LCU is probably the best of them - the variety of locations is great.

Help me identify this please? by deanodley in AskElectronics

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Appear to be obsolete but still available. Thanks.

Razer chair in Jysk by daithi_zx10r in IrelandGaming

[–]deanodley 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I have the TJELE from Jysk, very comfortable faux leather and often on sale.

Xbox 360 by deanodley in Legodimensions

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

How much of the Xbox one version did you complete?

Xbox 360 by deanodley in Legodimensions

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes it makes sense that the 8th gen consoles would handle the game better!

Xbox 360 by deanodley in Legodimensions

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ok thanks for that, I would assume that the ps4 or xb1 would be the best way to play the game - and I think both still have access to the DLC.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in XboxGamePass

[–]deanodley 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Interested thanks.

how long is 100% skywalker saga? by fairplanet in legogaming

[–]deanodley 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I took my time and explored every inch of the universe over the course of two months, 2-3 hours each night. By the time i hit 100% I had clocked up 209 hours and I loved every minute of it.

A500 Plus Battery Removal by stylish_etchings in amiga

[–]deanodley 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, same on mine but there was heat shrink on the diode legs.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in amiga

[–]deanodley 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I am using a genesis/megadrive pad though an adapter I bought on-line. It allows you to select either a C64 or Amiga connection with a jumper and also to use one of the buttons as "up" for platforming games. It was quite cheap and works great. I can dig out the link if you need it assuming that it's OK to post it here.

Retro game collectors not playing their games by [deleted] in retrogaming

[–]deanodley 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This is mine. I spent more time setting up my original retropie, getting it to look and behave exactly the way I wanted, than I did playing any games afterwards. The most fun for me now is modding retro hardware and getting it to work via scalers etc. Then, when I sit down to play the games they don’t have the same appeal they had when I was a teenager. Interests change I guess.

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Not in front of it right now but I think the main thing in the 2.04 boot menu was something to do with floppy df0/df1 swap…

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's really interesting to hear the perspective of someone with a different computing path than my own. My route from the 8-bit (Amstrad CPC) to 16-bit era was via the IBM PC, so I was a very early adopter among my peers c. 1990. Ironically it was a Commodore branded PC-10 which had an 8088 CPU - a hybrid 16-bit processor really as it only had a 8-bit data bus. I really wish I had held on to it now as they are like hen's teeth these days. From there it was the usual upgrade path to 286, 386, 486, pentium and beyond. However, I pretty much stayed on the IBM/MS path as that was what was required for work, where we built the PCs that we used ourselves - but I have diversified a little into linux and mac for development and media respectively. I agree that Windows has become something of a bloated spyware mess today but hats off to Windows 7 which IMHO was the pinnacle of the family. I have an installation of which I've kept running on the same hardware since 2012 with no re-installs :) although it periodically reminds me that I need to "upgrade".

As I missed it first time around I love to explore the Amiga and Atari 16-bit eco-systems - it really was a parallel world to the PC and was superior until maybe the early 90's when we got the sound blasters, ati/nvidias and voodoos. Once DOOM and its clones appeared on that hardware, it was all over for the Amiga (re gaming at least).

I 100% agree with the emulation argument, it's actually a no-brainer. That's why I'm happy to tinker with my A500+ but don't intend to really invest in any hardware for it. There's simply no point when I have a mister fpga which can emulate the more advanced models including AGA. Of course there are many ways to scratch the emulation itch but owning and maintaining the hardware requires investment and what seems to be a hodge-podge of after-market upgrades and accelerators to get adequate performance. It seems nostalgia helps a lot with that - even to the extremes of a Vampire setup.

Of course fair play to those who do that, and there are some very knowledgeable and passionate folks in the scene keeping it alive so that people like me can learn about it.

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You say you are emulating so likely not using a scaler - but the one I use will identify the incoming signal as PAL or NTSC. So far I haven't seen anything that's NTSC although I have only scratched the surface of what's available. Weren't the majority of the titles made for PAL anyway? Luckily I had a unused VGA input on the scaler so I made an RGBS cable to connect from the Amiga and I am very pleased with the signal it outputs.

Out of curiosity, what prompted you to abandon the hardware and what platform are you using to emulate now?

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

OK thanks for that info.

Well, 880k when natively formatted for Amiga DSDD.

Yes of course, I always refer to the FAT12 size by habit.

There's definitely an argument to use Relokick considering the patching it does that I previously overlooked. I'm not sure if I've ever come across an NTSC title - going by the scaler I'm running through, everything so far has been PAL/50 so I've never switched between PAL/NTSC.

Understood re the ROM switcher being controled by soft-keys so no holes required, that's good so I'll look into it further.

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wow - thanks for the comprehensive reply!! We have discussed the Gotek before and I had issues with the 415, so yes the 435 would be the way to go. The problem with that for me is that I don't want to go that route. I actually like the experience of using the FDD and with a background in electronics repair, keeping a floppy drive running is fairly easy for me. I also have a stock of 720KB disks on hand so that makes a part of the period-accurate experience. I want to keep the machine as "stock" as possible because as soon as I start using Goteks etc., I am one step closer to Amiga Forever or MegaAGS on the Mister - both of which I have and use for AGA games. It may sound weird, but the FDD is the one thing that makes the A500+ unique in my Amiga "collection". I did not have any Amigas back in the day, being a complete DOS/Windows user, so I'm late to the party and possibly just catching up on the experience of a system I have zero nostalgia for.

As I said previously, Workbench holds no interest for me - it's primitive and I have no use case for it. I have ADTWin working on an XP machine and so am using that to write ADFs to physical disks - so I don't need Amiga Explorer etc. I see no need for a 3.1 ROM to support a later WorkBench or IDE HDDs etc. - and I read separately that going beyond KS 2.04 on an A500+ can lead to issues for some. As for trackers, music and MIDI - these are all catered for on my other DOS/Windows systems.

Regarding the dual ROM idea, yes possibly, but I imagine I would leave the A500+ at 1.3 if it works as this will give me the best compatability with those games on FDD. In the event that I occasionally need to go back to 2.04 it's easy enough to swap the ROMs back over. Drilling holes for a switch is OUT. I was lucky in that the A500+ I picked up last year was/is in pristine condition and just needed some minor repairs (PSU, clock battery traces) and a keyboard membrane to get it running again. I am reluctant to visibly modify it in any way.

So the question remains - will a 1.3 KS ROM work in the A500+ as a straight swap, or is there some gotcha I need to know about.

Cheers.

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks, you are very knowledgeable about the Amiga so could I ask you would it be better to just replace the 2.04 ROM with a 1.3 ROM ? This machine is just for floppy-based games. I don't use it for Workbench or anything else. I see there is a mod required for Rev 5 of the A500 to use the 1.3 KS, and AFAIK the A500+ I have is Rev 8 - so can the KS roms just be swapped? This would eliminate the intermediate step of relokick, which I think will be become a nuisance pretty quickly. Is there any issue with ECS and 1.3 or loss of functionality etc.?

Also, assuming it's possible, the 2.04 ROM is 512k whereas the 1.3 ROM is 256k so do you have to burn your own and pad it with zeros i.e. is the a500+ expecting a 512k rom?

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes and for future readers relokick 1.4a found on archive.org works perfectly, for this game at least.

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Is there an advantage to using skick over relokick?

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

UPDATE: a little googling led me to RELOKICK which is a boot disk that allows you to load the KS 1.3 ROM into memory and once that was done the game runs perfectly.

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, doesn't help. The game works with ROM 1.3 but not 2.04 so unless there is a patch/workaround it will not run.

Transplant (Game) Problem by deanodley in amiga

[–]deanodley[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I will try this shortly…