A: Yes, but the Amiga emulation
environment can only run on top of another operating system, such
as Windows or GNU/Linux, where it can take advantage of hundreds of
thousands of existing hardware device drivers. This underlying
operating system can be more or less "thin" and hidden.
The Amiga Forever CD-ROM
includes the KX Light boot component, which allows the PC to boot
from the CD, loading a lightweight GNU/Linux environment
before starting the GNU/Linux version of the UAE emulation software,
with the Amiga Forever preinstalled Workbench and application
environment. This is the same environment which is normally
accessible when Amiga Forever is run under Windows (from CD or
after installation). No configuration is required on the PC, other
than making sure that the option to boot from CD is enabled in the
PC bios, and that the CD is in the drive when the CD boots. All PC
disks are accessed in read-only mode by the KX Light environment,
making this a safe environment to experiment with the Amiga
emulation.
In the case of Windows, the emulation software uses the DirectDraw system to
get efficient low-level access to hundreds of different display cards,
DirectInput to support a variety of joysticks and other up-to-date input
devices and the network interface and protocol drivers to let the emulation
access the internet and your LAN. The emulation also has access to all file
systems which the host system has drivers for, including NTFS, DVD-ROM, etc. If
the emulation could not use the numerous existing graphics, sound, file system,
SCSI, IDE, TCP/IP, DSL, CD-ROM, DVD, Blu-Ray, USB, FireWire, wired and wireless networking,
3G, WiMAX,
Bluetooth, modem,
input and many other drivers and configuration options, somebody would have to write new
drivers and user interfaces for all of these PC devices. In practice, there are not
enough people and resources to do this. Even GNU/Linux, to make an
example, had great difficulties to reach a reasonable initial set
of PC hardware drivers.
Should you need to run the Amiga emulation on a PC without
installing any software, please consider that the Amiga Forever
CD-ROM also contains ready-to-run Amiga configurations which do
not require installation. Just insert the CD on a Windows system
and as soon as the MenuBox launcher appears (if AutoPlay is
enabled, otherwise right-click the CD to start) click once to
select the desired configuration, which will start immediately,
usually in full screen mode. After you are done just eject the
CD - no files on the PC will have been changed. In this way you
can use Amiga and PC applications side by side, without
rebooting the computer, and without installing any software
(which for example at work or at school may not always be
possible). Unless the software which you need to use requires
access to files on the CD, the CD itself can even be removed
right after the emulation has started and the system has completed booting.
It is possible to configure the PC so
that the underlying operating system is hidden, and the emulation
automatically starts in full screen. Under Windows this involves
three steps:
-
Removing or changing the Windows boot
graphics
-
Logging on automatically
-
Automatically starting the emulation.
To remove the boot graphics on Windows 9x,
add the line "logo=0" to the "[options]"
section of the hidden system file "MSDOS.SYS" in your
boot drive's root directory. If instead you prefer to create your
own custom graphics, you need to place a BMP file (320x400 pixels,
256 colors) named "LOGO.SYS" at the root of the system
volume (or the host partition, if the system volume is
compressed). Special programs exist to add color cycling to the
boot graphics, but in general any program capable of saving in BMP
format (e.g. Personal Paint as included in Amiga Forever) can be used. If your system
already had a LOGO.SYS file, you may want to rename it, so you
have a backup copy of the original. Under Windows NT the boot logo
is stored inside the system directory, can have any size (the
initial screen resolution is that of the Administrator account),
and has one of four possible names, depending on the system type
(workstation or server) and the color-depth (16 or 256 colors):
"winnt.bmp", "winnt256.bmp", "lanmannt.bmp"
and "lanma256.bmp".
The next step in order to make Windows boot
as discretely as possible is to have it log on automatically. You
can do this using the Microsoft Tweak UI tool that is a
component of the PowerToys utilities (free download from the Microsoft
Download Center), and setting the "Log on automatically
at system startup" option. Warning: disabling the requirement
to log on, any user will have access to your computer (like on an
Amiga).
Next, make sure that your default WinUAE
configuration ("Default.uae") is set to open in full
screen mode and has the "Show GUI on startup" option
disabled. Now, drag-and-drop a link to the WinUAE program file to
the Start Menu, "Programs/Startup" folder, and you are
done: the PC will boot without showing the Windows logo, it will
log on automatically, and it will start WinUAE with your favorite
settings.
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