Adventures with an Amstrad PC1512

I've just got hold of an Amstrad PC1512 (been after one for ages) and I'll be playing with it over the coming weeks so watch out for more info on this blog soon...

Problems Reading MSDOS disks on an Amiga A1200

I was having difficulty reading DOS disks on an Amiga A1200. I could get it to mount the disk but not read it. After much head scratching I discovered the following file was missing in the L directory:-

CrossDOSFileSystem

It seems that version 3.1 of AmigaOS doesn't have this file. However, all is not lost as version 3.0 does. Transferring from the Workbench disk of version 3.0 (show All files first) to my HD cured the problem. I have no idea if this is just my (genuine) copy of 3.1 has this problem. Moral of the story is hold on to your version 3.0 disks, they may come in handy...

AOL on PCLinuxOS

Still having problems with the eciadsl driver for the Voyager 105 modem I use to access AOL broadband. It generally hangs first time Linux is booted with the message:-

[EciAdsl 4/5] Connecting to provider...

If CTRL-C is pressed and the driver restarted then it starts fine. The problems seems to be that ppp (or pppd) cannot use channel zero and subsequent restarts uses another channel number usually greater than zero. There have been several fixes published on the web but none of them seem to help. I have thus come up with a fix of my own although it isn't very pretty it does seem to work. So login as root and find the following file:-

rc.local

and add the line:-

eciadsl-start

and save it. Log back in as your normal user name then open your home folder and show all hidden files. Go into the .kde/autostart folder and create a shell script as follows:-

#!/bin/sh

konsole -e /usr/bin/eciadsl-stop
konsole -e /usr/bin/eciadsl-start

and save it. Give it permission to execute. Reboot Linux.

This has the effect of attempting to start the eciadsl driver once Linux has booted which will fail. When KDE loads the script will auto start, close the driver and restart it. This should have the effect of starting the driver with a channel number greater than zero. It isn't a perfect solution but it does seem to work. Hopefully an upgrade to ppp or pppd in the not too distant future will make this unnecessary.

Website/s now gone

Just a quick note to say that links on this blog to my websites will now no longer work as the companies I use have both decided to stop providing web space services. Great! I am thinking of using other ways of getting content onto the web such as blogs (like this one), social networking sites or possibly Youtube. Oh well...such is life.

BBC Website and RealPlayer in Linux

As a keen user of the BBC's website, I have found it very frustrating that I cannot listen to the Radio iPlayer in any version of Linux that I have tried (the TV iPlayer works fine). However, I have now found a fix in the shape of RealPLayer 11 which works fine. Go to the RealPlayer website and download the following file:-

RealPlayer11GOLD.rpm

which can be loaded with the command:-

rpm --install RealPlayer11GOLD.rpm

from a konsole. You will also need to install lsb (from Synaptic in the case of PCLinuxOS) and its associated packages. When the Radio iPlayer is invoked a seperate RealPlayer window will popup and it is this that you use to control the playback rather than the main BBC page. This has been really bugging me for a while and its great to finally get it fixed.

Nvidia GeForce 6100 display (2)

Further to this problem, it seems that PCLinuxOS 2007 has some updated drivers available in the repository. Just use Synaptic and search for nvidia and select a newer GeForceFX driver. You will need to restart X after installation.

4 in 1 Card Reader and PCLInuxOS 2007

This is a bit like the zip drive - you put a card into the reader, the LED lights up and a window pops up enabling you to open it in a window.