LAP - Workbench 3.1 HDD Installation

The start of this installation is much easier. With the 3.1 rom and Workbench 3.1, you can easily format the disk. Start the procedure in exactly the same way as with 1.3. This time you get to name it first. Call it System again, in the New Volume Name box. You also want to tick the Trashcan, Fast File System and Directory Cache boxes. The international mode one will select itself. This is OK. Hit format a couple of times and it will get started.

Now run the Installation utility on the install disk. It should auto detect your System: hard disk and choose to install there. That's what we are after. Don't bother with printers and choose your language and keyboard appropriately.

It will then prompt you to insert the other disks in turn.

The most efficient way to install Workbench is to use all 4 drives (we set the config file to allow us to do this). You want to load the disks as follows:

df0:Install
df1:Workbench
df2:Locale
df3:Extras

When it asks for 'Fonts', use the GUI to change the drives to the following:

df0:Install
df1:Fonts
df2:Storage

Technically, we could now stop, and say that we have installed Workbench 3.1. After all we have reached the same point as Workbench 1.3. However, Workbench 3.1 can support a replacement graphics drivers, so lets install that now as well. The drivers let us use higher screen resolutions that the standard Amiga - hopefully native to our display.

As has become customary there are some dependencies, and we need to download these. Very basically, they are a program for uncompressing the downloaded archives and one for installing software.

umount -v /media/amiga
sudo mkdir /media/lfs 
sudo mount -v -t ext3 /dev/disk/by-label/amiga /media/lfs 
cd /media/lfs/sources/amiga

wget http://aminet.net/util/arc/lha.run
wget http://uk.aminet.net/util/misc/Installer-43_3.lha
#wget http://aminet.net/driver/video/Picasso96.lha
wget http://guide.abime.net/wb3.1/files/Picasso96.lha

You may need to retry a couple of those. The aminet system is not always available. Once these are downloaded boot to the Amiga Key and shift them to the ~/amiga/shared folder:

cd /sources/amiga
mv *.lha ~/amiga/shared
mv *.run ~/amiga/shared

Now, run the Amiga 1200HD:

uae -G -f ~/amiga/A1200HD.uaerc

And open a shell window. I should point out at this stage that I am mostly following the excellently presented and written guide here. You should absolutely follow those instructions, which have been painstakingly researched, and carefully presented with step by step illustrations of every possible dialogue box that you may face. Contrast with with my instructions herein which mostly consist of copying and pasting text from LFS and BLFS while making puerile comments about package names, and raging incoherently as a result of my own, painful, limitations. What follows is but a summary of the Green Amiga Alien's excellent advice.

lha is the main amiga archiving program. Think 'tar'. Install it as follows:

protect Shared:lha.run +e
Shared:lha.run ram:

The first command changes the settings of the program lha.run which is on the Shared: device to allow us to [e]xecute it. The second executes the file. It directs the output to ram:, which is the ramdisk.

Copy ram:lha_68020 C:lha 

A number of programs pop out, compiled for particular CPUs. We are using a 68020, so copy that one to [C:] (where system programs live) and call it [lha]. Next we are going to use the new lha to uncompress and install the installer program. This will let us install the other packages that are following shortly.

lha x Shared:Installer-43_3.lha ram:
Copy ram:Installer43_3/Installer C: 

Picasso, as mentioned, is the native Amiga driver for the graphics card we are emulating. After it is installed we should get loads of new graphical modes to suit our modern screen.

lha x Shared:picasso96.lha ram: 

We are finished with the shell for a little while. if you now double click on the ramdisk you should see the Picasso folder. Open it up and run the setup program. You can answer 'yes' to most stuff. When asked about where to put the support files, choose system:storage. You then go to System->Prefs->ScreenMode, NOT Picasso96Mode. Choose a uaegfx: mode that suits your monitor's resolution.

This worked, but I got pointer trails which stuck around on the screen. I re-formatted the hard disk, reinstalled Workbench and installed the version of Picasso96 from the Green Amiga Alien's guide. I didn't get any trails with that version. I am not sure what the difference is, so I have left a command to download the aminet version above, but commented it out so pasting it to the command line will not do anything. Solving why one works and another does not is a an unsolved problem for the time being.

You can also add the A1200HD machine to the Openbox menu in the same way as with the A500HD. Under the menu-id="euae-menu" section we added last time, you would add in:

<item label="A1200HD">
<action name="Execute"><execute>/usr/bin/uae -G -f ~/amiga/A1200HD.uaerc</execute></action>
</item>

Pop this in before the line at the end of the "euae-menu" section:

</menu>