Fēng Shuǐ distro for GEM use

Here is a modest proposal for the V4SA, based on my own setup. My purpose is to use a simple and stable, clean and tidy GEM environment for my GFA coding: have to discard my own bugs from unsafe/unverified softwares. So few applications, the only I could use everyday. My own apps seem to run without a hitch, so they are present in number here. Sorry about that, please complete and test one by one with other softwares you want to use.

Futhermore, I wanted to keep the old files and folders layout, including the antique icons from the MagiC years. Thing is still the 1.27 stable. Though FreeMiNT, XaAES, NVDI drivers (for the V4SA) are latest versions.

If you want something more modern-looking and all recent, please consider OL’s distribution.

The archive proposed here is still Amiga-core based and use OL’s highly modified version of EmuTOS. It’s suited for a GEM-environment machine, similar to Hades or FireBee.

NB: an Atari-core for the V4SA is currently developped and released (seen in ApolloTeam’s discord), very new for power-users to test. PSG, Timers, Shifter and old Atari ST legacy are implemented and coupled with the V4SA « hardware ». In the long term, this Atari-core will prevail and I will migrate to it.

Long flashes from the past

If you have not read previous article to transgender from Amiga/ApolloOS to Amigatari/EmuTOS, prepare a FAT32 formated SD-card, put a version of emutos.rom on it, launch within ApolloOS the Amiga CLI and type this line:
c:ApolloFlash sdO:emutos152.rom
Once you typed YES and waited for the process to complete, turn off your V4SA, wait for 10-15 seconds, and turn on.

The SA_9954.jic Amiga-core firmware is now old and deprecated, it’s x13 speed (92 MHz), you can have x14 speed, even x15 experimental these days.

But it you want this old-stable-reliable 9954, flash it and with the emutos just after, without rebooting between the two flashes. If not, you will run into ApolloOS boot.

Now you have OL’s EmuTOS in ROM, prepare a SD-card (or new safe CF-card). On my V4SA, a crappy Compact-Flash fried the IDE port, it was the same CF that destroyed the IDE/CF port of my FireBee (U35 chip). So I only use the SD-card as disk.

This EmuTOS boots preferentially on the SD-card. If you install the distribution on a CF, keep a non-bootable SD-card (no AUTO folder) in the micro-SD port.

macOS don’t like deprecated things

Just a tip for those owning a recent apple thingy as primary computer like me, macOS Sonoma seems to have forgotten FAT16 format in its Disk tools. Run the terminal:

To find the SD/CF-card:
diskutil list

To format FAT16, needed for EmuTOS, assuming you SD/CF-card is ‘disk2’ (careful not to use disk0 or other important datas-disk):
diskutil partitionDisk /dev/disk2 MBR "MS-DOS FAT16" "SD-ATARI" 900M free "" 0B

Means a logical disk 900 MB size, rest ‘free «  » 0B’ will be not used (but must be declared). I guess additional partitions can be declared in the same command, for CF-cards, such as a D: disk FAT32-formated for posix things.
TOS partitions FAT16 can’t be greater than 2GB. For my own use, 900 MB is enough.

Once your FAT16 SD/CF-card is formated, copy the contents of the DISK_C on it. Unmount from your PC/mac, and insert it in your turned-off V4SA.

Boot leads you very quickly to TC32 colors and 720p screensize. That should be OK for every HDMI monitors. If this is not the case, edit from your PC/mac the c:\mint\xa_video.cnf file and choose the mode code accordingly. Other codes can be shown by yoprez.prg or find in the EmuTOS sources.

Lingua Franca

I have configured this setup and softwares for english language and UK keyboards. At the right-top of the desk, set up your language for boot and keyboard with Joska‘s KeyEdit. I left my french keyboard layout for logitech K120 with special characters for convenient coding in fr_k120.tbl.

NB: no NVRAM like on the Falcon computer, so this EmuTOS saves it in a file at C: root.
Also, F12=Undo key, End=Help key.

For softwares, look into the c:\temp\ for i18n versions to suit to your native tongue. KKcmd can handle *.zip files (and also .st floppy images for CaSTaway).

Internet connection

Ethernet driver for the V4SA is installed with configured MiNTnet to run as DHCP client. GlueSTiK is also launched by default. So you’d better plug an ethernet cable to the V4SA to allow yourself to the opened world.

ntp_clnt.acc is there to retreive the internet time and discard hardware clock option.

Litchi has some distant common ftp servers configured, so download from Kurobox and lip6 are directly possible.
I populated some usenet newsgroups in Troll, but news.free.fr NNTP server may be not usable (access for Free customers only).

The background image

Though XaAES is capable to handle it (it’s still possible here), the background image is here handled via Thing configuration, with the help of ThingImg and LP’s plugin system. Some images are located in c:\mint\bckgrnd\ and most 720p screens from 16 colors to TC32 screenmodes.

General message: customize it accordingly to your desires. And add your prefered softwares and tools from this proposal. To save your time, a smart website shows an accurate compatibility list.

Developers! developers! developers!

Courtesy of Lonny Pursell, GBE is here in the archive for everyone to (try to) code and be more active for the Atari scene. GBE system folder and c:\guides\ contain enough dev-docs. I cleaned most of my dev folders, keeping only the VDI_FX on the disk as coding samples: sources in c:\programs\devel\… and target in c:\programs\toys\…

To avoid messing the screen with unwanted PRINTs, MiNT is configured to route characters to u:\ram\console.log
So look at this file if you roughly log things.

Here it is…

I guess archive maintenance and updates will be on the road. Please contact me if you want your program removed from the archive or on the contrary added (if running smoothly on a V4SA setup).

Last thing: if something is wrong at boot, verify in the AUTO folder which contains only 3 executables, you can disable each one by renaming .prg to .prx.
Also, launch order is important: first PSGXBIOS, then NVDI, then MINTLOAD. In the c:\tools\, AUTOSORT.PRG helps you to have them in correct order.

Archive Size Date
English freemint-v4sa-amiga-core 138.5 MB 02-02-2025