AmigaOS 3.2.3 clean install from PCMCIA SD/CF card

This guide sets up an Amiga A600 from scratch with a bootable internal CF card attached to its internal IDE interface. The steps are broadly identical for an A1200, but these have a PCMCIA hardware bug that can prevent cards being reinitialised on reboot without this fix.

The described method only requires a working floppy drive, and assumes you have purchased a CF/SD card PCMCIA kit which includes a bootable Workbench floppy with PCMCIA support. Various eBay sellers offer these kits. No WinUAE emulator, and no CD-ROM drive required.

Prepare install media

With your system's original Kickstart ROM that can boot the PCMCIA floppy...

• Put ADFBlitzer onto your PCMCIA transfer SD/CF card, along with Install3.2.adf from the Amiga OS 3.2 CDROM.
• Boot the PCMCIA floppy
• Open the transfer SD/CF card and right-click -> Window -> Show -> All Files
• Use ADFBlitzer to write Install3.2.adf to a floppy. Make two copies in case you get something wrong during this process, which will avoid you having to swap Kickstart ROMs once again.
• On your modern computer, extract the entire AmigaOS3.2 ISO to your transfer SD/CF card
• Register an account at Hyperion Entertainment using your CD key, and download the 3.2.3 update. The prior updates are not needed. Extract and copy to the transfer SD/CF card.

Add PCMCIA storage support to Install3.2 boot floppy

• Power off and physically install the new Kickstart 3.2.3 ROM
• Boot the Install3.2 floppy
• Open this disk and right-click -> Window -> Show -> All Files
• Now delete ActivateCDROM, L/CDFileSystem, and Storage/DOSDrivers/CD0
• Insert and open the working PCMCIA floppy and right-click -> Window -> Show -> All Files. Use the RAM disk as an intermediary to:
  • Copy Devs/DOSDrivers/CF0 to Storage/DOSDrivers on the Install3.2 floppy
  • Copy Devs/compactflash.device to Devs on the Install3.2 floppy
  • Copy L/fat95 to L on the Install3.2 floppy
• Reboot from the Install3.2 floppy, with the PCMCIA transfer SD/CF card inserted. If you have an A1200, do a cold boot here to guarantee that your PCMCIA card initialises.
• Double-click on Storage/DOSDrivers/CF0 to mount the transfer PCMCIA SD/CF card (it will not auto mount because S:Startup-sequence does not instruct this)
• Now you have a bridge to get files to your Amiga using KickStart 3.2.3

Hard disk (internal CF card) boot partition setup

N.B. I tested using PFS3 filesystem for both boot and data partitions and found PFS3 to be slower at opening drawers full of icons (Prefs) than FFS with directory cache. On a 68000 we need all the marginal gains.

• From the Install3.2 floppy, open HDTools/HDToolBox. The internal CF card will be detected, but will present as 'Unknown'
• Change drive type -> Define new -> Read configuration -> Continue
• Save changes to the drive and reboot
• Use HDToolBox to create a 512MB bootable Standard File System partition with device name DH0 with Fast File System, Directory Cache, MaxTransfer of 0x1FE00 and Mask 0xFFFFFFFC, Blocksize of 512. Be very sure to always hit Enter after each change to ensure it is recorded by the UI.
• Quick format the new volume in Workbench

Install AmigaOS 3.2

• Open Shell
• The installer expects a specific volume name which is not a valid FAT volume name, so we must make an assign (replace the second argument with the path to your installation files):

  assign AmigaOS3.2CD: CF_CARD:AmigaOS3.2CD
• Open AmigaOS3.2CD:Install/Start Here
• Open your choice of installer from the Install drawer on the Install3.2 floppy. Select both English British and English languages, so there is a fallback if the British localisation is incomplete. Decline GlowIcons as they are far too slow on 68000.
• Once AmigaOS 3.2 is installed, boot from DH0:

Add PCMCIA storage support

Although the OS native CrossDOSFileSystem supports FAT32 and LFNs it seems very RAM hungry, so we'll stick with fat95.

• From the Install3.2 floppy:
  • Copy DF0:Storage/DOSDrivers/CF0 to DHO:Devs/DOSDrivers/
  • Copy DF0:Devs/compactflash.device to DHO:Devs/
  • Copy DF0:L/fat95 to DH0:L/
• If necessary, run a608mcfg to switch from 8MB Fast RAM to 4MB, to enable PCMCIA
• Reboot (cold boot if using an A1200)

Update to AmigaOS 3.2.3

• From the PCMCIA transfer SD/CF card, run the AmigaOS 3.2.3 Update by double-clicking to mount the file ADFs/Update3.2.3.adf
• Once that floppy image is mounted, launch the installer from the Install folder, ensuring to select the Expert User option. It seems to fail during a scripted file copy when Novice User is selected. Once again select both English British, and English as installed languages.

Hard disk (internal CF card) data partition setup

• Use DH0:Tools/HDToolbox to add a new partition type. Browse to the unpacked pfs3aio filesystem driver file, which will copy it to the drive RDB. Set the DOSType to 0x50465303. Version is 19.2 which is derived from the driver file.
• Create a new partition of type PFS\03 to span the rest of the drive with device name DH1 with MaxTransfer of 0x1FE00, and Mask 0xFFFFFFFC, Blocksize of 512. This partition can be larger than 4GB.
• Save the changes to the drive and exit to Workbench
• Reboot
• Quick format this volume from the Icon menu

Additional customisation

• Copy NoClick to DH0:WBStartup
• Install WHDLoad_usr_small to C:
• Copy a608mcfg to C:
• Copy Kickstarts to DH0:Devs/
• QuitKey=$59 in S:WHDLoad.prefs (F10 to exit all games)
• In Prefs, set Locale, set Overscan, in Input set keyboard layout, in IControl set windows 'can move off-screen'