AmigaOS4.1 Update 6 Install for X1000

Overnight (30/11/2012) saw the release of AmigaOS4.1 Update 6 for the AmigaOne X1000 and other AmigaOS4.1 based hardware. Today I wanted to cover the installation process and changes in Update 6 focussing on AmiUpdate!

To download the update you need to go to http://hyperion-entertainment.biz/ and login using your credentials you used to register your AmigaOS 4.1 software. You can create an account to register (on the same site) if you don't already have an account. Once logged in and in the downloads area you will be able to download the Update 6 archive (click to expand):

Next you have to agree to the software license agreement (as usual) before you can download it:

After downloading the file, I opened the archive and took a look at the contents:

Looking in the archive contents, of interest is the update files for the AmigaOne X1000 include new IDE, Xena, and Kicklayout files, as well as the AmiUpdate program, which is used to allow automatic updates to be deployed for AmigaOS4.1 Update 6 in the future, allowing for a simpler method to deploy updates for users, and also allowing more frequent minor updates to AmigaOS4.1 rather than large update packages. Good stuff!

Once extracted we have the Update6 folder with an installer and Readme:

Being the cautious type with updates, I read the Readme.guide which contained some useful information about system requirements (needing AmigaOS4.1.5 to install), Installation help, known issues (mainly affecting non-X1000 systems) and AmiUpdate program information, as shown below:

 

So first I double check my X1000 version, which (yes I know) should be AmigaOS4.1.5, and is:

Ok, so let's start the Update 6 Installation, which requires us to agree (yet again) to the Software license agreement to proceed:

Next we are prompted where we want to install the update to. SYS: is the default location and I would imagine for nearly everyone this would not be changed:

The Installation now proceeds:

Installation is now complete, and by default it ticks the box to reboot the X1000 when clicking Finish:

After the reboot, my desktop title bar is updated to reflect the version upgrade to AmigaOS4.1 Update 6 (click to expand):

As covered in the Readme.guide, there is now an option in the Title Bar Menu when right clicking that shows the new Update Software... link to run AmiUpdate. I wanted to look a bit deeper before running AmiUpdate, so I checked out the System: drive for new folders and icons. First, I found a new icon called Updates, under the Prefs folder:

When I open the Updates icon, I get the following preferences options to control how AmiUpdate behaves. The first window tab covers update check frequency, set by default to never check, and where downloaded archives and updates are stored, by default in RAM Disk:Unpacked...

The Servers tab shows which servers AmiUpdate uses to get updates from:

The Install and Rollback tabs cover options to control the use of the AutoInstall functionality of downloaded updates, and the Rollback functionality default lcoation for older files, to allow rollback of updates if needed:

The General tab allows configuration of the log file for AmiUpdate, by default in RAM Disk:au.log with the option for more verbose logging for assistance when problems are encountered, and the option to keep unpacked updates that don't install automatically in the Unpacked folder so that the user can manually install them (more on this later!!), and iconifying options:

Next I had a look in the System folder, where there is now a AmiUpdate folder:

In the folder is AmiUpdate and the System_Rollback program:

Ok, so next let's run the Update Software link in the Workbench title menu bar, as this is how I expect everyone will run it! After selecting it, AmiUpdate first checks if there are any updates for itself (click to expand):

Now we get the initial AmiUpdate window, ready for us to click Scan to check for updates:

After clicking Scan, we are prompted for the same login details we used to log on to the Hyperion Website earlier to download the Update 6 archive. Clearly Hyperion wants to make sure the only licensed users are able to access any updates:

After putting in the credentials, AmiUpdate comes back with one AmigaOS System update (Calculator) and several third party updates to install:

All updates are selected by default. I clicked on Update to start the Update process. It then starts downloading the archives and running Automatic installation of the programs where available:

When it got to the SDL update, it hit an error:

After I clicked OK, the update process continued without further errors. I did get a prompt for the installation of XAD RAR Autoinstall, which warned me that the AmigaOS4 version of the file I have has different fucntionality to this third party version:

At the end of the updates, AmiUpdate prompts me to tell me that a couple of the updates require manual installation and have been stored in RAM Disk:Unpacked for me to action later:

The update is now complete:

Ok, so next I went to review the au.log file contained in RAM Disk:au.log to review the log of the install, and to show the error encountered with the SDL install (second image):

Hmmm, ok...the error doesn't help me much. I go next to look into the Unpacked folder on the RAM Disk to see what manual installs I have to do:

I ran the Codesets Installer with no issues. The SDL folder, contained a README.install file which explained that I had to copy a file manually to SOBJS: folder, which I did also, no problems. Makes sense why it didn't install automatically:

However, the Mixer folder is a mystery:

No help to explain how to install the Mixer - the readme doesn't provide installation instructions. Sorry but this update needs some work! I copied the folder to my WORK: drive to work it out later. I would love to know how to install it! Perhaps non-auto install updates should be separately listed in AmiUpdate to make it easier to deselect them.

I went to the Calculator to check the Autoupdated program works still:

Finally, I went to check the version of AmigaOS from the Workbench Titlebar, selecting the About option under Workbench:

So there you have it, AmigaOS 4.1 Update 6 installed successfully on the AmigaOne X1000!

I hope to see more frequent updates via AmiUpdate now on the X1000 and more information distributed of what enhancements were made to the IDE and Xena drivers in due course!

Mini-Game Review - GEMZ on X1000

Today I am looking at a new game called GEMZ for the X1000 under AmigaOS4. The game is written by Fabio Falcucci and Pascal Papara. It is also available on other platforms like AROS, MorphOS, Windows and Mac. It was written using the Hollywood development package.

The game is essentially a Puzzle game where the objective is to get rid of all the tiles in the centre of the game field. This is done by clicking on the tiles around the edge of the gameplay areas which horizontally or vertically can slide into a tile in the centre of the game field.

As tiles are moved from the outside of the game field they are replaced with another tile of a random colour.

When two or more tiles of the same colour in the game field touch, they are removed from the game and your score is increased.

There is a timer for each level. When your time expires, your score is quickly reduced until it reaches zero. Once it reaches zero the game is over.

It is quite a challenging game and I got through the first few levels without difficulty but it gets quite hard very quickly!

Some mention needs to be made of the install process for the game as it is a bit confusing and not explained very well.

The game demo can be downloaded from the GEMZ website here. However please note that the game also requires a quite large game data file (489MB) to be downloaded from the same page.

The reason for the large file is mostly because it includes 43 minutes of uncompressed music that is included with the game data! Using MP3 or OGG format music files would be more space efficient I think.

I understand the music is left uncompressed for AmigaOS3 game players, but given the tight storage constraints on AmigaOS3 systems a 489MB download is not possible for many of these systems to store and extract on hard disk anyway, unless they have been significantly upgraded.

It is unfortunate that the data files are so large since a game of this type would normally be fairly small - it may put people off downloading it which would be a shame as it is a interesting game.

After downloading the two archives (Game Data and Game Demo), extract the Game Data where you want it on your hard disk as usual, but make sure first that the structure you extract into eg. Work:Games/OS4/GEMZ exists before you extract to the GEMZ folder.

After extracting the game data archive to this folder location, it will create a another subfolder called GEMZ. It is important not to change this, or the installation of the game demo archive will fail as I discovered below:

So after I corrected the error as described above, I ended up with the correct folder structure.

I then reran the game archive installation (which I extracted to RAM:) again and this time it was successful (click to expand):

The installer then prompts a User license agreement:

The installer reminds you that you need to download the game data archive and extract it before running the installer:

The installation finishes quickly, however the final message below is missing the installation path:

I have to say the installer and install process needs some work and I noticed on the Amiga forums that a few people had problems with it. So I hope my tips help some people out!

The final GEMZ subfolder then looks like this:

When I first ran the game it came up with an error trying to initialise the sound and exited. I found the issue was that if I ran TuneNet or some other audio program prior to running GEMZ it would report that error. When I boot the X1000 and ran the GEMZ game first, I had no issues...

Here are some game play screenshots, starting with the intro which after a background story explains the games rules:

There are a number of difficulty levels to choose from - I didn't go beyond Normal because I was hopeless at that level! (Screengrab utility didn't do a good job of the screen capture as the tiles are moving quickly, sorry!):

You can run the game on the workbench or full screen. Onto the game itself, below I am working through Level 2:

Onto Level 3 now:



A few levels later and things get harder - much harder:

 Game Over! To be honest I am not very good at this game!

HiScore screen - I am not even close to getting an entry on this. I am curious how you get an entry on it given that your score has to be zero before the game ends....anyway!

To register the game costs Euro4,99 using PayPal from the webshop linked from the Download page  here. Once paid, as I did, within a few days you will receive the registered game executable via email with the registration assigned to your name.

This game is interesting - it needs some tweaks, especially to the installation process, and sometimes the music seems to stutter, especially in the main menu - but it's good fun to play, although I am not good enough to do the game justice!