Workbench Screen Grab of AMIGA FOREVER Emulator running on a Pentium II PC A Wolf in Sheep's clothing! Yes I know, it's not a real Amiga, so what is the point of sending this screen grab to AMIGA FORMAT I hear you say. Well, it could be a glimpse of the future!!! Being as I have an Amiga 1200 ( 030/40 MHZ / 32 x CD / 4.3 GIG Hard Drive / 32 MEG RAM ) plus a Pentium II PC ( 300 MHZ / 36 x CD / 8 GIG Hard Drive / 64 MEG RAM ) I wondered how I could make use of the PC's hard drive which was nearly empty, and my Amiga's hard drive which was almost full. Looking through some back issue's of AMIGA FORMAT I saw an advert for AMIGA FOREVER ( copyright CLOANTO ) the Amiga Emulator. Having used loads of emulator's on the Amiga for computer's like the CBM 64 ( my second computer way back in 1984 ) and knowing how poor some emulator's are, I was in two minds about buying a PC Amiga emulator! A few day's later, having been told by my Amiga that my hard drive was full I sent off for the AMIGA FOREVER Emulator. Oh dear I thought when I opened the CD disk case and saw a CD ROM disk and an Amiga 3.5" floppy disk, NO MANUAL! Great, I said to myself, here comes a few sleepless nights getting it to work. I slid the CD disk into the PC and a couple of seconds later the Main Menu appeared on the screen. The manual was on the disk. I read the info about getting it to work etc and clicked on the section INSTALL TO HARD DRIVE. A minute or so later it had installed and a requester came up saying that the PC needed to be reset for the program to work. A quick reset and after WINDOWS had loaded I clicked on the Amiga Emulator ( with all my fingers crossed ) and it loaded with no problems. Having adjusted the prefs ( I selected 8 MEG Chip Ram / 32 MEG Fast Ram / 8 MEG Graphics Card ) I clicked O.K. and about 20 seconds later, the Amiga Emulator was up and running, looking just like a real Amiga, except that I now had 8.5 MEG of Chip Ram instead of 2 MEG. Now there was another problem, linking up the Amiga to the PC! Back to the AMIGA FORMAT magazine ( where would we be without it? ) and I found what I was looking for, a cable and software enabling the user to transfer files etc from the Amiga to the PC or PC to the Amiga ( AMI-PC LINKUP ). A couple of days later it arrived and after switching both computers off I connected the cable, switched them both on again and installed the software to the PC and the Amiga. A simple click on the PC and the Amiga got them talking to each other. Now for the test, a nice big LHA packed file ( my Amiga System backup will do ). A click on Copy in DoPus on the Amiga and the file appeared about a minute later on the PC hard drive. After a couple of hours swapping files from the Amiga to the PC and setting up the Emulator,this screen grab is the result. O.K. it may not look as good as some of the screen shots you see, but it will do for what I need to use the emulator for. Plus it's better than using Windoze. Why don't I just use my Amiga? Because it is connected to a 14" TV. ( connected via a SCART cable to a video recorder for direct to video tape recording and high res screens flicker like crazy!, and I am fed up scrolling down the screen on a 800 x 600 screen to play a certain game, yes I know, buy a monitor! ). The downside to this Emulator ( for me ) is: It's a ECS Amiga Some game/programs won't load/run ( like AGA stuff ) Some games ( not all ) are slow The plus side ( for me ) is: 8 MEG Chip/Graphics Mem ( no more NOT ENOUGH CHIP/GRAPHIC MEMORY ) A Graphics Card 8 GIG Hard Drive ( less about 2 gig for Windows/Games etc ) 36 x CD ROM 32 MEG Fast Ram Loads of Amiga program's/games play O.K. A 15" Monitor ( no more crazy flickering screens ) Utilities up and running on the Amiga Emulator ( in the first couple of hours ): MUI 3.8 ( Magic User Interface ) - Available on AMIGA FORMAT CD ROM's / AMINET SET 5a Improves the look of Menu's etc, required by a lot of the newer Amiga programs ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NEWICON'S 4.1 - Available on AMIGA FORMAT CD ROM'S 20 + 21 / CU AMIGA CD ROM's / Aminet 6a Transforms the look of your Workbench, see icons on screen grab ( right hand side ) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MAGIC WORKBENCH 2.1 - Available on AMIGA FORMAT CD ROM 16 / AMINET 6a Transforms the look of your Workbench, see screen grab System window ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SKANDALFOCLOCK - Available on AMINET SET 6a Loads of clocks available for the Workbench, see various AMIGA FORMAT CD ROM's ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MUI-ASL - Available on AMIGA FORMAT CD ROM 21 / AMINET 6a Improves the look of various utilities, see screen grab open window titled SELECT FILES TO VIEW ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SHUTALL - Available on AMINET SET 4a Shuts down all disk activity ready for a safe exit or re-boot ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SGRAB - Available on AMINET SET 7a Easy to use screen grabber ( used to grab the screens ) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PPaint 7.1 - Free with the AMIGA FOREVER EMULATOR / Demo version on AMINET SET 7d used to convert the screen grabs to 64 colours / ILBM See AMIGA FORMAT magazine for outlets selling the latest version. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TOOLMANAGER - Available on AMINET SET 1 / AMINET SET 7a ( version 3.1 ) Utility that enables you to insert icons onto the Workbench, see right hand side of screen grab ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BOOTSCREEN 2.2 - Available on AMINET SET 2a Installs a picture to the hard drive that is shown on boot up, very easy to use. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- CLASS ACTION - Available on AMINET SET 7a / Various CU AMIGA CD ROM'S / AMIGA FORMAT CD 28 Needed by NEWICON'S 4.1 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- VISAGE - Available on various AMIGA FORMAT CD ROM's / AMINET SET 2b / AMINET SET 3b A IFF / ILBM / PNG / datatypes picture viewer ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- MAGIC MENU - Available on various AMIGA FORMAT CD ROM's / AMINET SET 5a / AMINET SET 6a Improves the look of the Workbench pulldown menu. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- VINCI - Available on AMINET SET's 2a,3a,4a,5a Text / Amigaguide viewer ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- UNPACKER - Available on AMINET SET's 1a,2a,3a,5a / AMIGA FORMAT CD 16 Easy to use packed file ( lha / lzx / dms etc ) unpacker ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- TOOLS DAEMON - Available on AMINET SET 2a / various AMIGA FORMAT CD's Add tools / menu's etc to the Workbench tool bar ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- CENTER TITLES - Available on AMINET SET 3a Center window titles in title bar ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- DOPUS 4 - Available on AMIGA FORMAT floppy disk 100 / Check AMIGA FORMAT magazine for outlets selling the latest version. A very good file manager with loads of options, copy, delete, format disks, show pictures etc ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- VIRUSZ - Available on various AMIGA FORMAT CD's / AMINET SET 4a Keep's your hard drive virus free ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WB WORT - Available on AMINET SET 6c / AMIGA FORMAT CD 26 One of the better SCRABBLE clones ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WORKBENCH BACKDROP - Thousands of picture backdrops available on the AMINET SET's Two included with MAGIC WORKBENCH 2.1 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ray Richards January 1999