@ChrisH

Hmmm... Try lowering your MTU, maybe the network is corrupting something because SMB is sending packets that are too big. I con't remember exactly where the setting is, but there's a Microsoft KnowledgeBase article about it. It involves editing your registry anyway. Your router (if you're using one) should also have this setting somewhere in the advanced settings. IIRC Samba has this setting in its config file, and it may be accessible through the SWAT system, but failing that, Roadshow should have the setting somewhere too. I've solved a lot of problems with networks by lowering this value - some of which involved shared drives, file transfers over a certain size etc. Using a value of 1400 should be safe and not degrade performance noticeably.

@ChrisH

Hmmm... That's interesting, cos I'm pretty sure there's a Blitz mention in the credits - though I'll have to check that out. It's possible I guess that the original Total Wormage was in Amos/assembler or whatever, but wasn't Worms the result of a Blitz Basic programming competition? I guess he could have rewritten it from Amos to Blitz for the competition...

Thing is, that Blitz has the inline assembler too, meaning that menus, file access and other non-critical parts can be written in Basic, then you can switch in and out of assembler for the time-critical parts. There's no reason it couldn't be done under Blitz, though I'll admit on Gloom that I'm only going on vague memories...

@ChrisH

It's not a DMA issue is it? I suppose you'd probably see it in other areas too if it were, but maybe try disabling DMA on your drives and see if that helps - SAMBA is gonna put pressure on the network and the drive at exactly the same time, so it would be the best conditions for getting DMA errors...

@Chris

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I still haven't managed to get Payback68k running properly on 4.1. It starts up fine, but the keyboard controls are all screwy, making it totally unplayable. The WarpOS version plays properly but of course there's no sound...

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It works fine but graphical glitches mean that you can't see your energy bar properly. Doesn't completely ruin it, but it's a shame all the same.

@ChrisH

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Worms, WormsDC and Worms CD32 were all written completely using Blitz. Not just the prototypes/early demos, but all the commercial released for the Amiga. Gloom (the Doom clone) was Blitz too, as were all the Skidmarks games. I'm sure there are plenty others, just can't think of them for now.

Blitz - especially in its current form of AmiBlitz3 - is a very capable language. It fully supports using commands like Blit shape, Playsound etc. for easy use of objects loaded from disk - though this way of doing things is generally slow. Thanks to the ongoing work of Wanderer and all those guys though, it also supports doing things the "real" way, i.e. using structs, pointers and OS calls. It really does take the best of both worlds and put them in the same place.

@OP
I dunno. It sounds to me like you're not looking for a programming language, but more for a construction kit. There were some of these years ago, where you wrote simple scripts and tied them to objects/actions - maybe they're still around somewhere? Personally I found them way too restrictive...

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I would imagine a fair bit of work would be involved in adding context-sensitive menus, so what about just having a feature where holding down shift or control opens a link in a new window? Most other browsers do that with shift, even if they don't advertise it as a feature...

@Rob

Ooh, that's a good point! You can click cancel on the "Intuition is attempting to reset the screen..." message and it'll carry on. That's probably the best bet!

@lilwindsor

Yes, I'd say it's just the screenmode - how did you check the signal on the capture card? Are you sure it can handle PAL? What do you mean by "messed up"? The screenmode is easily changed but of course you can't save it as it's a CD.

Starting from the shell is actually pretty simple - you can get away with simply typing LoadWB and then EndCLI - and that will get you enough functionality to carry on with, and will use whatever screenmode is selected in the Chipset section of the early startup screen.

@lilwindsor

Hmmm... Is it an NTSC machine? I guess the screenmode prefs are saved on the CD to be PAL, as they had to pick one when building that Workbench up. The early startup screen settings don't let you boot in NTSC? You could always boot a very minimal Workbench by hand using the "Boot with no Startup-Sequence" option, making some assigns and running LoadWB...

@Snuffy

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I have to agree with Snuffy. Every manufacturer of every device will have issues, it's all about what you tolerate against what you get from it. I use an Epson printer for photography work because, basically, I've yet to find any other priter that can compete with it in terms of print quality or longevity. It's an Epson R1800. It's expensive to run with its 8 separate inks and rolls of paper, but I haven't had any hardware issues with them. As a contrast, we use HP Business Inkjets in work and they're constantly dying on us - some not recognising new cartridges, some going out of alignment, some just mechanically jamming. They get replaced under warranty, but we're now looking to move away from them. Besides, they were bloody slow, chewed through ink - even using up ink if you lifted the lid for example (why on Earth?) and were as expensive to run as my Epson without any of the advantages.

I'd absolutely love to see Payback working on my A1. It's such a shame as it's one of the best modern Amiga games! I've found that the WarpOS version works fine but without sound, but the 68k version doesn't work for me. It appears to run but the controls seem to be totally all over the place, basically meaning I can't shoot or enter a car. It would be amazing if it could be revived. Perhaps the author doesn't have his Amiga any more, or his Amiga is broken? Then maybe someone could loan him a Sam for a while, seeing as they seem to be getting common (in Amiga terms anyway)

@sundown

In short: no. Haven't seen any sort of patch or setting for doing that I'm afraid...

Hello all,
I've just released a long-time-coming update to Amitunes, my music library management application. It's still not finished, but it's pretty usable IMHO at the moment :) It's aimed at medium spec classics, mainly for MAS players and such, but can be used under OS4. In the future I plan a better GUI and more functionality for high end Amigas...

Download it here and let me know what you think - good or bad!

Clicky!

It's mainly intended for use on my own MP3 player jukebox, a project I've been working on for quite a while now but is nearing completion.

Thanks for trying it out

I have to say that it's looking a lot better now fonts-wise, doesn't look as much like an "alien" application any more... Thank you, and keep up the great work!!

@goody

Hmmm... Maybe it's a protocol or something, like Soundblaster. you could get a card not using the Soundblaster chipset but following the protocol, and thus working with Soundblaster drivers...

@abalaban

Are the disks perfectly readable on the PC? I can't imagine too much could be wrong with the IDE device if it works fine for CD-ROM etc. Are you sure that the Zip supports the DMA/PIO setting on that channel? Have you tried setting it to PIO-0? I think if a disk is busy when it is removed (as it would be if there are "stuck" locks on it), it is normal for this sort of behaviour. The icon remains, and Workbench doesn't see a need for a second icon when the same volume name is inserted into the same drive...

@vodkasoda

Hmmm... Well, if it won't do anything when a floppy is entered, I'd be a little worried about it. First thing to try though is disconnecting the hard drive and any other add-ons, then see if it'll boot. Does it boot any other disks, games for example? If you can get it to boot Workbench with the hard drive connected, you can download HD setup tools to partition the drive, and after that it's basically a case of copying over all your Workbench disks.

Ooh, sounds interesting - I'll see if I can make it across for that one :)

Hmmm... I thought you listed the install floppy in the list of disks you found? Oh well... It's not that hard to make an install disk anyway. Not sure what might cause it to stop booting but if you disable all the partitions in the early startup menu it should just boot from floppy as if there were no hard drive installed. At least that will rule out issues with the floppy drive/controller.

@vodkasoda

LOL, fair enough :) It's just unusual to find another Amiga user in Ireland! Anyway, the machine hanging when you try to delete something sounds worrying to me... Could be some sort of hard drive corruption. Is it just those files, or can you not delete any files at all? Is there any hard drive activity when it freezes? Is the HD LED on constantly, flichering or off? A reinstall could be a good idea, formatting a hard drive can clear a lot of those issues. The CD being checked mightn't mean much as most CD drives will spin up a disc and read its TOC simply on receiving a reset signal or powering on. If no CD icon appears on the Workbench I'd be pretty sure the drivers either aren't there or aren't set up properly. It is normal behaviour for an Amiga to check the floppy drive and any other loaded drives for bootable disks, and then carry on loading workbench if none are found. To be honest it sounds like a fresh install would be a good idea, especially when you're not sure of what patches etc. might be installed.