[comp.sys.atari.st] Upgrading to TOS 1.4 yourself

jfbruno@rodan.acs.syr.edu (John Bruno) (06/14/90)

I just got finished upgrading my 1040ST to TOS 1.4 with a 6 chip ROM set I 
got for $80US from Toad Computers (301) 544-6943. The only real pain is that
there were no instructions on which ROM chips to put where. I called Toad
Computers (they were still there and answering phones as of 6:30 pm!)
Apparently, each chip is supposed to have a white sticker stating which ROM
socket it goes into (L0, L1, L2, H0, H1, or H2). The problem is, my set only
had one chip with a sticker on it, it said "L1". Toad had never heard of this
happening, so I had to experiment. This is how the chips go:
+---------------------+
|LO2 C300638-002A     <
+---------------------+
+---------------------+
|LO1 (C300639-002A??) < (This one had the sticker, no corresponding part #)
+---------------------+
+---------------------+
|LO0 C300640-002A     <
+---------------------+
+---------------------+
|HI2 C300635-002A     <
+---------------------+
+---------------------+
|HI1 C300636-002A     <
+---------------------+
+---------------------+
|HI0 C300637-002A     <
+---------------------+
Front of the computer here. 

No soldering was necessary.

As far as the differences between 1.4 and 1.0, all I've noticed so far is that
the "About Gem" dialog box has a color scrolling rainbow fuji symbol (hence 
the name "Rainbow TOS"), you can hit Ctrl-Alt-Del to warm boot (add right 
arrow key to cold boot), you can move files instead of copying them by holding
the Ctrl key down as you move the icons, the file selector box has drive 
selector buttons.

I bought the set because the disk access routines are much faster (I've heard)
and I'll soon be getting a hard drive. Graphics might be a little faster also,
but I haven't really played with it enough yet to notice.

Hope this is of help to someone.
---jb