Re: problems with fta demos

[spec@vax2.concordia.ca (Mitchell Spector)]

In article jturner@tartarus.uwa.edu.au (Joseph Turner) writes...
>
[snip]
>.. So I wait. But eventually after about 1 minute, the disk stops going
>around. So I try rebooting again,... and gues what it says, please check
>the disk drive. Well when I FIRST start trying to run the demo, the sound
>of the disk working sounds VERY like it is formatting, you know the slow
>increase in speed as the head goes out(or in). So it seems like it formats
>the disk. This problem seems REALLY weird. 

    Most likely that is the sound of the entire disk being read (each 
track) while being spooled into the IIgs's memory.  FTA's Modulae did 
this; rather than continuiously access the disk throughout the demo, it 
would simple place a copy of itself entirely into RAM and then automati-
cally eject the disk when done (many people commented that was a cool 
effect at the time :)

    For this reason alone, you require at least a full 1.25MB (1280K) of
memory installed.  The ROM 3 with its 1.125MB (1152K) is short by just 
enough where the demo will fail to load, although I doubt this is your
case since the demo normally reports that fault.

>   Well I am using a ROM 1 and a unidisk. Any ideas???? 
                                  ^^^^^^^
    Ah, there's the source of your problem. Most FTA demos (and most in 
general, including NFC demos) are hard-coded to run from an Apple 3.5
drive connected to the Smartport. The UniDisk 3.5 is an intelligent
device, which often doesn't get along with hard-coded demos (due to the
way it transfers data differently).  You'll want to borrow a platinum 
Apple 3.5 drive, in fact I'd recommend it in general since it reads
data _much_ faster than a UniDisk 3.5.

>This seems REALLY weird. And this is ONLY for programs from FTA. I haven;t 
>got any of there programs to work.

    You may run into certain copy-protected software titles that get
upset or confused when encountering a UniDisk 3.5, so it's not just
European demos. Again, I recommend you purchase a used Apple 3.5 drive
if you don't already have one, they're very affordable and sell for
under US$35. I personally kept an old Apple 3.5 connected directly to
my GS's Smartport, even though I have a SuperDrive setup that more or
less can fully function as an older 800K GCR device. There's quite a
number of old demos, original disks and whatnot that are hard-coded to
run from it only.

Mitchell Spector
spec@vax2.concordia.ca