[comp.sys.amiga] A500 memory expansion & hard disk games

mike@trilby.UUCP (mike) (06/22/89)

I have a 500 with a 501 memory adapter and a CLtd SCSI. I meg is no longer
enough. What memory expansion options do I have. I would prefer internal
but wonder about the power supply. Any help would be appreciated.

Also now that I have my hard disk I would like to put some games on it that 
DONT require a reboot every time. A list went by a while ago but at the
time I didn't have a hard disk. If someone could drop that list in the
email to me I would appreciate it. 

Thanks

Mike
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mike Hammond       killer!trilby!mika!mike  -or-  uunet!edsews!trilby!mika!mike 
"I can't be overdrawn!!! I have checks left!!!"

disd@hubcap.clemson.edu (Gary Heffelfinger) (06/27/89)

From article <134@trilby.UUCP>, by mike@trilby.UUCP (mike):
> Also now that I have my hard disk I would like to put some games on it that 
> DONT require a reboot every time. A list went by a while ago but at the
> time I didn't have a hard disk. If someone could drop that list in the
> email to me I would appreciate it. 

I don't have a list, but when you find it, add these two:

SimCity  --- Yes, the very same CHIP RAM hog that the net's been talking
about for a few weeks.  It runs pretty well from the HD.  Requires that
you have the original disk in a drive at startup time to use as a
key-disk, but I can live with that.  They actually had HD's in mind in
their installation instructions.

Prospector (in the Mazes of Xor)  ---  This one caught me by surprise.
It is protected only by look-up-a-word-in-the-manual which is done only
once right at the start.  They also had HD's in mind.  No ASSIGN's are
necessary to get it to run.  It appears to multi-task quite nicely and
doesn't eat up tons of memory.  A more detailed review will follow in
another posting.


Here's one you might like to avoid.  I was lucky that I could take it
back to the store.  (Traded it for Prospector.)

Test Drive II ---  It is flashy.  It even looked sort of fun.  I was
thrilled when I read in the manual that they too had made provision for
HD's.  So I write protected the *original* floppy, and started the
system per the manual.  (From a CLI, after booting my normal system,
with all drive partitions mounted.)  The game pauses and says "Disk is
write protected, try again."  THEY WANTED ME TO UNPROTECT THE ORIGINAL
DISK!!!!  Grumble.  I did it, 'cause I wanted to try the game.  I started
the install.  It copies the car and road data onto your HD as a so
called, "play disk".  

Then I tried to run it.  Har.  First, even though
you've created your play disk, it still loads large portions of the
package from the original (write enabled) floppy.  Gronk.  Gronk.
Okay, main menu comes up.  Now you must choose the intuitive, "install"
option again to switch "play disks" and tell it to look at your HD.
Icky, but acceptable because it still has to load a quite bit of car
and track info.  So I played "merrily" along for about an hour. The game
is not too bad, but I think they should've spent more time play-testing
it on a hard disk system.  I had at least 5 gurus in that hour.
I expect better than that, so back to the store it went.  Just
as well, really, since I thought their copy protection and "play disk"
method are dreadful and should be soundly condemned.  I think they crippled 
an otherwise fine looking game.

Is someone compiling a list of commercial games that behave well and run
from a hard disk?  If not, I volunteer.

Gary



-- 
Father of Kathryn Leigh Heffelfinger ------ disd@hubcap.clemson.edu
          ^^^^^^^ ^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^
10 lbs, 3 ozs, 22 3/8" and 6 weeks of love.