Conference hydra::amiga_v1

691.0. "noKLICKstart" by CGOU01::DREW (Steve Drew) Tue Sep 08 1987 18:37

    Thought this might be of intrest. This is a USENET article posted
    a couple of days ago. (I have access to a UUCP unix machine).

*** This note contains an UUEncoded executable (short).
    
    /Steve.
    
    
Article 6656 of 6663, Fri 09:36.
Subject: noKLICKstart
Summary: Peace,quiet, and empty drives.
Keywords: Kickstart,patch,WCS,click,trackdisk.device,Kickstart V1.3
From: [email protected] (Bryce Nesbitt)
Path: calgary!alberta!ihnp4!ucbvax!HOSER.BERKELEY.EDU!bryce
Organization: Tubular Transport, Inc.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Date: 4 Sep 87 15:36:43 GMT
Sender: [email protected]

Empty drives on the Amiga make a clicking noise.  With one empty drive in a
quiet room it is annoying.  With two it gets on the nerves.  With three it
drives one up the wall.  And with four... well by that time you are over
the wall, and down the other side.

There is hope!	No longer will you need to stick a disk into a drive just
to get it to shut up.  I hereby unveil:

noKLICKstart

A program to patch your V1.2 Kickstart disk.  After the modification the OS
will test for disk insertion silently.	If you have an Amiga with Kickstart
in ROM you have just discovered a disadvantage of Kickstart in ROM.

When Kickstart V1.3 comes out you won't need this.  It will be part of
the Operating System.  Right Dale? 1/2 :-)


Technical mumbo jumbo:	It's quite simple, really.  The /CHNG signal is set
low and latched by the drive when a disk is pulled out.  In order to see if
a disk has been inserted the latch must be unlatched.  This is done by
stepping the head.  Normally the Amiga goes from track 0 to 1 and back.
This is what makes the noise.

Now these drives all have track 0 sensors.  You can't make the drive go
past track zero.  You can, however, reset the latch by _trying_ to step out
past track zero.  Sony literature confirms that the latch will be reset,
but the head will not move.  Great!

All that is needed is to patch Kickstart.  You need to change one solitary
bit, and then fix the checksum.  Which bit??  heh... heh... there are
2,097,152 choices... what's it worth to 'ya?  Nothing???  Ok then, I'll
tell you.  Change the long word at $00FE99E8 from $086B001 to $08EB001.  I
don't know where the real checksum is kept, so I just mangle the Copyright
notice by changing $00FC007C from $6D6F646F to $6CEF646F.

This turns a "BCHG" instruction into a "BSET".

What? The Kickstart ram is not writable??  You mean you don't have a button
to do that??  Gee.  Maybe you'd like a program.  Here's one:

(To decode get "uudecode" from Fish disk #53 and type:
"uudecode <name_of_this_file>" from the CLI.)

begin 644 noKLICKstart
M```#\P`````````!``````````````$X```#Z0```3@L>``$D\E.KO[:*D!P'
M`"(M`*QF($'M`%Q.KOZ`0>T`7$ZN_HPD`$ZN_WPB0DZN_H9P_DYU+'@`!$/YI
M```#)$ZN_F@L0"I`3J[_Q"(`0?D```,P)`@F/````:U.KO_0MH!F'$ZN_\HB3
M`&<468\D#W8$3J[_UA`76(\,``!Y9P1P"DYU(CP````#(#P```(`+'@`!$ZN_
M_SI*@&?D)$!P`2!*80`!%&9@#*IM;V1O`'QF``!,)7QL[V1O`'QP`2!*80`!D
M`&9"(#P```%-($IA``#H9C0,J@AK``$!Z&8@)7P(ZP`!`>@@/````4T@2F$`K
M`-)F%$'Y```"=G888!)!^0```LIV26`(0?D```*.=CPD""Q-3J[_Q"(`3J[_H
MT")-+'@`!$ZN_F(@/````@`B2DZN_RYP`$YU+PHB/``!``%P(DZN_SHD0$J`W
M9Q1P_TZN_K9R_[*`9@XB2G`B3J[_+B1?<`!.=15```\5?`````X5?``$``A"P
M*@`)D\E.KO[:)4``$$'J`!0@B%B00J@`!"%(``@@"B1?3G4O"7#_$T``""-`;
M`!1P`!`I``].KOZP(E]P(D[N_RY(YS`2-CP``F`(2.<P$C8\``,L>``$)``F7
M2)_\````.'`W($]"&%'(__QA`/]49P``>"]```X??``%``A!^0```Q,B3W``(
M<@!.KOY$2H!F6#]#`!PO?````@``)'`)X:(O0@`L+TL`*")/3J[^.!`O`!]F)
M)#]\``0`'")/3J[^.#]\``D`'$*O`"0B3TZN_CA^`!XO`!]@$C]\``D`'$*OG
M`"0B3TZN_CA^_R)O``YA`/\RW_P````X3-](#"`'3G5N;TM,24-+<W1A<G0@*
M:6YS=&%L;&5D+@IN;TM,24-+<W1A<G0@9F%I;&5D+B`@4&5R:&%P<R!Y;W5RF
M(&1I<VL@:7,@=W)I=&4M<')O=&5C=&5D/PI9;W4@8V%N)W0@9F]O;"!M92$@_
M.BTI(%1H870G<R!N;W0@86X@=6YM;V1I9F5D(%8Q+C(@*#,S+C$X,"D@2VECR
M:W-T87)T(2$*=')A8VMD:7-K+F1E=FEC90!D;W,N;&EB<F%R>0!N;TM,24-+W
M<W1A<G0@5C$N,"X@J3$Y.#<@0G)Y8V4@3F5S8FET="X*1G)E92P@<F5V;VMA?
M8FQE(&QI8V5N8V4@9W)A;G1E9"!T;R!A;GEO;F4@;W(@86YY=&AI;F<@;W1H&
M97(@=&AA;@I2;V)E<G0@5RX@4VMY;&5S+"!3:WEL97,@16QE8W1R:6,@5V]R$
M:W,@26YC+BP@2F%M97,@1')E=RP@4F5G9VEE"E=A<G)E;B!O<B!-96=A<V]FO
M="!);F,N"E1H:7,@<')O9W)A;2!C:&%N9V5S(&$@2VEC:W-T87)T(&EN=&\@:
M82!N;TM,24-+<W1A<G0[(&5M<'1Y"F1R:79E<R!W:6QL(&YO(&QO;F=E<B`B9
M8VQI8VLB(0I5<V4@=&AI<R!O;B!A(&)A8VMU<"!O9B!Y;W5R(%8Q+C(@2VEC.
M:W-T87)T(&1I<VLN"@I);G-E<G0@2VEC:W-T87)T(&EN=&\@9')I=F4@1$8P9
M.BX@(%1Y<&4@>2!T:&5N(%)%5%523B!T;PIC;VYT:6YU92P@;W(@:G5S="!2I
M15154DX@=&\@86)O<G0N(`````````/L````!@````````'T```!"````/X`(
3``#T````3@```#H````````#\@``Q
``
end
size 1324


|\ /|  . Ack! (NAK, EOT, SOH)
{O o} . 
( " )	[email protected] -or- ucbvax!hoser!bryce
  U	If "hoser" does not work, try my old address at "cogsci"
If you have a problem with this program, please send EMail.  I want
to know.


        
    

I haven't tried it yet, but I will ASAP.
The only reason I don't *HATE* the drive clicks is because
I'm so pro-Amiga biased.  My wife, on the other hand, has no such bias;
and justifiably shows her dislike of the noisy drives.

YEAH!  No more polling!
I like the author's jab about kickstart in ROM too;
it's one feature I keep hoping will prove itself worthwhile.

    i tried it last night.  It does make the internal drive stop clicking.
    My external drive started clicking in a strange pattern...
    normal click, a louder click, a metallic click, then sequence repeats
    
    My drives are the old noisy kind, maybe they didn't read the SONY
    docs when they made them.
    
    -dave

    I think I read on Plink that the hack would act strangely or not
    at all on NEC drives.  Seems that Amigas produced for the first
    nine months or so used the NEC.  Now they're using Panasonic and
    Nutronics.
    

    It works great on my Panasonic Drives.
    
    Now my RAM: clicks....................................(just kidding)
    
    Randy
    

    Does somebody want to post an ARC'ed version.
    Pleeeaaase!
    
    Chris

    One drawback guys ... you'll need to insert your Kickstart everytime
    you perform a warm reboot by holding down the two Amiga keys and
    the CTRL key. Not only that but you'll never be able to get your
    Timesaver to work with NoKlickstart-ized Kickstart disk!!!!
    
    
    

Re: .6
>    One drawback guys ... you'll need to insert your Kickstart everytime
>    you perform a warm reboot by holding down the two Amiga keys and
>    the CTRL key.
    
Not sure I follow why the warm reboot should modify the kickstart ram?

Guess I now know how old my Amiga is. My internal drive continues to klick
but the external one is perfectly quiet. Since my internal drive always has
a disk in it for warm reboots of the recoverable ram disk, this will probably
never be noticed.

Dick

    When I modified mine, I received the message, "You can't fool me!
    :-) That's not an unmodified V1.2 (33.180) Kickstart!!"
    
    Well, its what came with my Enhancer V1.2 package and it says 33.180
    on the version message. Now I hear that a gamma version of Kickstart
    went out with some of the early Enhancer packages (nuts).
    
    Guess I'll have to get a truer 33.180.

    My timesaver still works...and so do warm reboots, with NoClickStart
    installed.
    
    Randy
    

    Well, I discovered that my V1.2 Enhancer (I paid $12.95 for) is
    not the correct released version. Apparently the earlier Enhancers
    (like the ones distributed at the Marlboro show last year) were
    actually Gamma releases. If you apply the NoKlickStart patch to
    the Gamma release of 33.180, then the problems I decribed will happen.
    
    Now, to find the real 33.180!

    I've been using it for a week or so now with no problems.  Blessed
    silence.
    
    Gary