** 2 pages Q&A / 1822 words **

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** Q **

SCSI chains

Many people have told me it is possible to chain up to seven devices using the ICD Link cable. I have only ever managed to link a maximum of two, these being a hard drive and a CD-ROM.

** Italics on **
Name supplied
** Italics off **

** A **
In my experience the Link can handle up to six devices. However compatibility between devices can be problematic, especially if you are using older SCSI drives/CD-ROM. In theory SCSI devices can be connected in any order but in practice they cannot.
On my ST using a Link, I have four 40Mb Rodime drives in a case with an old Toshiba single speed CD-ROM. Even though the drives were from the same manufacturer, one refused to work unless it was the first device on the SCSI chain.
Try setting up your devices independently first then, when they are all working separately, add them to the SCSI chain one at a time. If you encounter a problem, move the problem device to the start of the chain and try again. If that fails move it to the end of the chain.
Make sure each device is supplying termination power to the termline for the Link. The Link 2 can handle parity or no parity, but if parity is enabled for one device, enable it for all drives.

** B on **
Mike Grove, via Usenet
** B off **

** LINK2.JPG here **

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** Q **
CIX mail switching

I've recently upgraded my CIX Conferencing account to a CIX-OUT one and want to collect my email from the Internet side using NEWSie via the local access number. How do I arrange this?

** A **
You first need to go manually online with CIXComm and type the following at the M: prompt
** NP on **
M: <go forward_toggle>
** NP off **

Don't type the "< >" characters! You should then get a message like this:

** NP on **
<Your mail will now be forwarded to your Internet mailbox>
** NP off **

To change back to collecting mail via Cixcomm/Cixread do exactly the same again. You'll get a similar message saying mail will be forwarded to the conferencing mailbox.

You'll also need a suitable CIX-OUT script for STiK/STiNG/Connect (Derryck Croker has a suitable STiK script, email: derryckc@cix.co.uk).

To use NEWSie to access your mailbox you need to set your preferences as illustrated. Enter your CIX-OUT password (not your conferencing one) and your personal CIX email address then save your settings.

** Italics on **
Mike Kerslake/CIX Support
** Italics off **

** NEWSIE1.GIF here **
** NEWSIE2.GIF here **

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** Q **

Can of worms!

** BL on **
1) The manual I got with MagiC 5 was for MagiC 4, and isn't very thorough, the file CMD.DOC appears to be ASCII but isn't and, in German, covers PRINT.TTP, CRASHDMP.TOS, DUMP.TTP, LABEL.TTP, FC.TTP, SPLIT.TTP and some other utilities which were not included in package such as EXE2BIN, KILLRAM, ASTOWORD, WORDTOAS. Do I need these programs and what are they for?

2) There are other utilities including VFATCONF.PRG, WBDAEMON.PRG, LIMITMEM.TTP, MEMEXAMN.TTP, ADDMEM.PRG, HARDCOPY.PRG, MAGXBO32.PRG, ROMDRVR.PRG, XMEN_MGR.PRG, AES_LUPE.APP... which have little or no coverage in the manual or TXT files. What are they for and what should I do with them?

3) How can I replace the MagiC file selector with UIS3 or Freedom?

4) Is there any alternative support route to contact for user   support, updates, or advice regarding MagiC, NVDI, Kobold, and   HDDriver?

** Italics on **
Mahn Davis
** Italics off **

** A **

1) None of these files, with the possible exception of PRINT, are required with MagiC. They appear to be utilities which MCMD.TOS, the command-line utility. The missing files you mentioned are also not required for MagiC. Here's a rough guide to what each program does:
** BL on **
* CMD.DOC is a First Word Plus file - you can print it out using IdeaList or display it in 1stGuide.
* PRINT.TTP is an Epson-compatible print utility used by MAGXDesk to print from the desktop. It's configured via Options> Preferences> Utility> Output.
* CRASHDMP.TOS displays the last exception error number (bombs in MagiC).
* DUMP.TTP dumps file to screen in hex, ASCII or C.
* LABEL.TTP adds, changes or deletes disk labels (volume names).
* FC.TTP is a simple file comparison utility.
* SPLIT.TTP splits files, presumably to split them across floppies.
** BL off **

** SMU.GIF here **
** Caption **
Start Me Up! and other applications require XMEN_MGR to display sub-menus
** end **

2) Here's another rundown:
** BL on **
* VFATCONF is described in the README on your MagiC 5 master disk. It's used to set which partitions allow long filenames. Long filenames offer both advantages and disadvantages, make sure you understand these before making any changes.
* WBDAEMON is a write back cache utility, and there's a brief described in the manual. If you power off before the cache has written to disk you can lose data and we don't recommend anyone uses it.
* LIMITMEM is not required since MagiC 2 and can you can ignore it.
* MEMEXAMN reports to screen the ownership of every block of memory in your system. If you don't understand the output you haven't got a use for it!
* ADDMEM is MagiC's version of FOLDERxxx, the TOS 40 folder bug fixer. This may already be handled by your hard disk driver (HDDriver/ICD) in which case you don't need it.
* HARDCOPY, we don't know for sure, it appears to be some sort of print utility.
* MAGXBO32 should be used instead of MAGXBOOT if you run OUTSIDE, the virtual memory program, on a 68030 machine or higher.
* ROMDRVR is a driver program for the ROM (Cartridge) port and is probably required for the FMC clock cartridge.
* XMEN_MGR enables sub-menus to be accessed in programs which use the sub-menu routines introduced by Atari in TOS 4 (AES 3.30 and higher). Later HiSoft releases use these routines. It's worth putting a copy in your auto starting applications folder.
* AES_LUPE and the other software are example apps for use under MagiC's multitasking environment. Run them to see what they do (not much in general). Each have German DOCs so if you're interested use Ruftrade to translate them. Floppyshop also have a MagiC utilities collection which might be of interest.

3) UIS simply goes in the AUTO folder and is called every time you'd normally get the file selector. Freedom v1.15 needs an AUTO folder driver, FFSEL.PRG, and FREEDOM.APP copies to your auto starting applications folder. The distribution includes full English DOCs. Freedom 2 is currently only available in German.

4) Realistically, the best support is to have an experienced user take you through the whole process. The ideal place for face to face free advice is your local User Group. For day to day problem solving nothing beats being on-line.

** Bold on **
Harry Sideras
** Bold off **

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** Q **

Imagecopy unpalatable?

I cannot get Imagecopy 4 to display a normal colour picture. It displays files in negative colours. Nothing in the program seems to make any difference yet it prints perfectly. Imagecopy 3 and all my other colour applications, display fine. I'm wasting time swapping between utilities like FastGIF and GIF View simply using Imagecopy as a print engine which is frustrating.

** Italics on **
John Ash
** Italics off **

** A **

** IMGCPY_D.GIF here **

I can't imagine what could be causing the negative colours problem. However, there are a couple of things you can try in Imagecopy. Firstly, you can reverse the colours of any image with [Control N] (Edit> Invert in the Image menu). The other thing to try is changing the palette option from BIOS to VDI in the Options> Screen> Display dialog. This takes the colours from the VDI palette instead of directly from the BIOS, which may well make the difference.

** B on **
Jeremy Hughes
** B off **

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** Q **

Power Supply

I enjoyed Derryck Croker's review of the MagnumST memory board but it occurred to me Derryck may have overlooked one small detail because his machine is built into a tower and I suspect he's using a replacement power supply. I think the board will draw too much current to run from the internal power supply. The solution is to remove the built-in power supply and run the machine directly from an external power supply.

** Italics on **
John Ash
** Italics off **

** A **

My tower system does indeed use a PC PSU which also powers lots of other goodies however nothing in the DOCs suggests the standard power supply isn't up to the job. You could use an external power supply but a simpler solution if anyone is running many extras from the standard power supply is to fit an uprated Best Electronics replacement power supply - these are available from most UK suppliers or the Best Electronics stand at most Atari shows.

** B on **
Derryck Croker
** B off **

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** Q **

Emulation woes

Many thanks for your answer to my letter in AC#6. I have now tried Edith Pro and used Idealist to do the printing and it works perfectly on the Lexmark printer. The printer itself also works perfectly on an STe using the driver for an HP Deskjet 500C so problem solved!

I have a problem configuring PaCifiST. So far I have only managed to get a couple of disks to load and work properly. I still keep going back to my Atari STe to run anything I really want to use.

** Italics on **
C Ayres, London
** Italics off **

** A **

PaCifiST is really designed to run Atari games and includes options to create special disk files to run auto-booting floppies from files on hard disk. If you want to run cleanly programmed GEM apps you're probably better off trying TOSBOX or Gemulator or [SHOCK HORROR] sticking with your real Atari machine!

** B on **
Joe Connor
** B off **

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** Boxout **
** Tip **

CD-ROM speed factor

If you're picked up an old CD-ROM drive and don't know how fast it is (x2, x4 x8 etc) try this rule of thumb. Disable any cache software, look for a giant file on CD, copy the file to your hard disk, and time how long it takes. Single-speed CD-ROMs copy at roughly 150Kb/sec so you can deduce the speed factor of your drive from that.
Another clue is to look at the model number, for example, an AppleCD 300 CD-ROM is x2 speed.

** end boxout **
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** boxout **
AC7 Report

The FPU_FIX disassembly listing on Reader disk has a mistake in it:

** NP on **
15      dbeq d0,l1          ; wait for idle
Should be:
15      dbeq d0,l3          ; wait for idle
** NP off ** 
Probe House player, on the AC#7 Reader Disk, is programmed in Pure C and also fails on a 68000+68882 equipped machine. FIX_FPU can also fix this program.

** Italics on **
David Leaver, via email
** Italics off **
** end boxout **


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** Boxout **
Tearing your hair out?

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** BC on **
"Atari Computing Q&A"
65 Mill Road
Colchester
Essex
CO4 5LJ
England

Email: editor@ataricomputing.com
** BC off **
** end boxout **