Atari TT/NOVA and Mint/MyAES

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For the general specifications of an Atari TT, read this page!


Boot NOVA graphics Desk and System Internet AztechMonster CF Benchmarks



Boot


Boot sequence



On the left, the boot sequence showing the memory size and the two connected SCSI units :
  • SCSI 0 : the internal hard drive, 4GB in height 480MB partitions.
  • SCSI 5 : the ZIP drive 100MB
The internal drive is an adapter SCSI to CompactFlash.

The VGA switch



As this TT comes with a NOVA Graphic Card, the boot settings can't be seen on this card. You have to go back to the original VGA output for that. That's why i use this VGA switch to toggle easely between TT and NOVA outputs.
Once the settings are correct, I do not use it a lot.

Xboot



Then, the tool XBOOT is loaded. Again on the TT VGA output, you can select your settings.

I have three of them:
  • MUSIQUE : output to TT VGA, to run CUBASE and drive the BOSS DR-5.
  • NOVA_MINT : output to NOVA with Mintnet for Internet and Mint+MyAES.
  • NOVA_TOS: output to NOVA without Internet and TOS 3.06


NOVA Graphics


The NOVA board is able to display monochrom, 16, 256 or 32768 colors resolutions. Installing NVDI for NOVA ET4000 was imperative : SPEEDO Gdos was not stable with Mint.

ISA Card



The graphic card comes in two parts:
  • An internal VME to ISA adapter.
  • An external ISA ET4000 graphic card.
I don't have any box to protect it, beware the static discharge!

The resolutions



My favorite setting, 800x600 in 32768 couleurs. This can be changed at boot time with XMENU, or from the desktop. In the last case, you have to reboot.


Desk and System


The multitasking desktop



The desktop with:
  • NOVA display in 800x600 and 32768 colors
  • Multitasking system Mint 1.19 and MyAES 0.97
  • Desk Teradesk
A stable system, a great visual aspect but that requires a lot of memory.

Note: the two screen dumps were obtained using Ctrl+Alt+d that saves the screen to the clipboard under the name SCRAP.TGA in 24 bits.

System Informations



Using SYSINFO:

  • There are 18MB of free memory after having loaded HD-Drive, NVDI for NOVA, Mint, MyAES, Teradesk and Sysinfo and the Control Panel and M_Player as accessories.
  • There are close to 80% of free disk space, the 4GB are perfect for my usage of the Atari TT.
  • The version of NVDI is 5.00, it comes with the font management.

PS/2 Mouse Adapter



With the high resolutions, higher than 640x480, the old Atari Mouse is outdated.
Installing a PS/2 adapter allows you to use a more recent mouse, perfect for larger screens.

This one is an optical mouse with a USB/PS2 converter !


Internet


NetUSBee



On the hardware side, I use a NetUSBee that plugs into the ROM port. Very easy to set with MintNet.

The downloading rate with Litchi (FTP client) from my WEB bage is about 100KB/s, what I find very good for this kind of vintage hardware!

MinNET



On the software side, you just have to:
  • copy INET4.XDD and NE2kENEC.XIF in the Mint folder. These are the hardware driver and the TCP/IP layer.
  • call IFCONFIG and ROUTEfrom MINT.CNF to set the static IP address and set the resolver address.


Note: calling FSCHECK prevents from getting an ugly warning on the desktop each time you access a new partition!.

TROLL : News and Mail client



Troll is a very powerfull tool, under development, that allows you to manage several Mail boxes and read the USENET groups.

On the image next, access to Comp.Sys.Atari.St.


AztechMonster CF


CF Adapter



Directly driven by HD-Drive, this little board replaces a SCSI Hard drive with a Compact Flash.

The settings are simple:
  • Jumper T: if closed, SCSI term is ON, I let it open.
  • Jumpers 1/2/4: to specify the SCSI identifier, if empty ID n°0.
  • LED connector to plug the front LED of the drive.


 You can insert directly this adapter into the original TT box. Then you have a new drive, with high capacity, low consumption and no noise at all.

The only problem is that it's slower thant a real drive, especially when it comes to write!


Benchmarks


My three TT comparison



  • In BLUE : the TT under TOS with Nova 16 bits, no NVDI. It has the AztechMonster card to replace the internal HD with a 4GB CompactFlash card.
  • In GREEN : the TT under Magic with 256 colors !
  • In RED : this particular TT under Mint/MyAES with Nova 16 bits and NVDI.

    • Note : the test was performed before I changed the drive with the CF adapter.