Amiga F1GP/WC Support Site
Futaura.co.uk / Oliver Roberts
Amiga Formula One Utilities
IAF1GPC
Hall of Fame
PerfBase
Troubleshooting
F1GP Links
Mailing List
Webring
Music
FAQ
Amiga Links
F1 Links
Site History
Guestbook
About
F1GP/WC Troubleshooting
The fact is that F1GP was released in early 1992 when the most common Amiga systems were bog standard 68000 A500s. So, it is not surprising that there are some problems getting F1GP to work on todays' Amiga setups - although, with a little bit of effort F1GP will work perfectly well on all current Amiga systems. Ironically, F1GP is more system friendly than most games written at that time. Nethertheless, some assumptions were made which cause problems on some of todays' Amiga setups. It should be noted that it is shouldn't be necessary to disable the AGA chipset or any cpu caches in order to get F1GP to work.

Below, you will find some of the more common problems and ways to solve them:

If you have experienced any other problems with F1GP that are not listed above, perhaps you could let me know so I can help you get F1GP working on your system and add the problem to this page (your solutions will also be welcomed, if you have any).


Problem The F1GP menu system works just fine, but when I go to enter the cockpit the screen goes blank and everything freezes. The only way to get out of it is to reboot.
Affected Systems Amigas with some fast memory plus 68040/060 processors, and in some cases 68020/030
Why SetPatch or some other program is enabling the VBR (Vector Base Register). F1GP assume the VBR doesn't not exist!
Solution Use F1GP-Ed 3.40 or higher - this comes supplied with f1gp.library v36 which provides a VBR patch for F1GP. This will make F1GP use the VBR so that it does not crash any more. There is no longer any need for you to disable the VBR to get F1GP working. You should 'save to the binary' at least once with F1GP-Ed, and this will add some code to F1GP so that it automatically loads f1gp.library and patches itself everytime you run it.

Problem The F1GP menu system works just fine, but when I go to enter the cockpit the screen goes blank or the F1GP display comes up, but then everything freezes. The only way to get out of it is to reboot.
Affected Systems Accelerated (Blizzard PPC boards, 060 boards, 040 boards and maybe fast 030s too) A1200s with a 4-device buffered IDE interface.
Why The buffered IDE interface you are using is not compatible with your system. The technical reason is that these faulty interfaces somehow affect the hardware interrupts of the A1200 - as a result, many games (including F1GP) will not function correctly or will simply crash.
Solution As this is a hardware fault, the only proper solution is to buy another buffered IDE interface that does not have this problem - either that or you will have to simply disable your accelerator board when you want to play F1GP :-( But, first of all, ensure that you are not mistaking this problem for the VBR problem above!

From personal experience I know that both the Eyetech EZCD-Mk3 and EZCD-Mk4 (the latest version) are not compatible with my system when either a 1260 or PPC board is enabled. However, the cheaper EZCD-SE does work! Note that this is the opposite to what Eyetech's adverts say: EZCD-Mk4 for 060s, and EZCD-SE for <= 030/33 accelerated A1200 systems). I know other people who have had the same problem with Eyetech's EZCD-Mk4 interface.

I can recommend the interface that Power Computing sell - I now have one of these, and it has solved the problem. Note that Power's interface is exactly the same as the EZCD-SE (the Power, EZCD-SE and EZCD-Mk4 interfaces are all made by DCE, Germany). Whatever you do, I do not recommend that you buy an interface from Eyetech, unless you find that no other interface will work. Eyetech's policies are pathetic - they will rip you off given any chance. If you ask for a refund they will ask you to return the board, so they can test it and then tell you there is nothing wrong with it (believe me, they don't know what they're talking about when it comes to IDE interfaces!) and if you're lucky they'll have the cheek to say that the £10 test fee has been waived!


Problem The F1GP menu system works just fine, but when I go to enter the cockpit the display is corrupt
Affected Systems AGA Amigas (A1200/A4000) with Mode Promotion enabled and DBLPAL / DBLNTSC monitor drivers installed, or any Amiga which is attached to a monitor that doesn't support PAL or NTSC.
Why F1GP was written is such a way that it assumes it is getting a particular screenmode (standard PAL or NTSC)
Solution Use F1GP-Ed 3.40 or higher. This automatically installs a patch to allow the game to use screenmode other than PAL or NTSC. Note that this is only possible on AGA Amigas, as it uses the hardware scan-doubling features new to that chipset. However, it's not a complete solution - you will need to do something else to make sure the F1GP menu screen is using the correct screenmode, especially if your Workbench is using a graphics card screenmode...

I suggest that you install some screen mode promotion software, such as ModePro. With ModePro you just need to configure it so that F1GP always opens using a chosen screenmode. If your monitor supports it, I recommend that you stick to standard PAL or NTSC. Of course, on a VGA monitor this is not an option, so use ModePro to make the F1GP menu screen open on a DblPAL, DblNTSC, Multiscan, or any other native screenmode that works on your monitor. The same goes for graphics card users: although the F1GP menu screen is able to run on a screenmode provided by your graphics card, the game itself can not - you must use ModePro to force the F1GP menu screen to open on a native Amiga screenmode.

Unfortunately, there is no way to get F1GP working if you do not have an Amiga with an AGA chipset (ie A1200 or A4000) and a VGA monitor which does not support standard 15kHz PAL or NTSC modes :-(


Problem Whenever I try to run F1GP I get an error requester saying "Can't allocate timer" and the game refuses to start up.
Affected Systems Mainly A600s or A1200s with a PCMCIA CD-ROM drive (the Q drive is know to be one of the drives that causes this).
Why The driver software for the CD-ROM drive is allocating the same timer as the one which F1GP requires to be able to operate.
Solution I'm afraid I don't have a foolproof solution, but I can offer a few suggestions of what you can try to resolve the problem. It's likely to be caused by the driver software for the CD-ROM drive, or maybe just the CD32 emulation software if you have it installed. Try removing bits of the driver software piece by piece to see what file is causing the problems. If all else fails, try disconnecting the drive altogether.

Please let me know if you had this problem and have managed to get rid of, and a brief explanation of how you did so.


Problem When starting a race, sometimes the computer cars on the grid are positioned at a funny angle and they can't drive. Also, when driving around the track, the track seems to break up and it is impossible to stay on the track after a particular point.
Affected Systems Certain 68030 cards (the Blizzard 1230-IV is one example)
Why The problem occurs if DATABURST is switched on (using the CPU command for example). I'm not sure exactly why it happens - but, it happened to me :-)
Solution The simple answer is to make sure the DATABURST is switched off. One way to do this is to use the CPU command - for example: CPU NODATABURST. Usually, the DATABURST is switched off anyway and doesn't offer any performance advantage (on the Blizzard 1230-IV, at least). Note that Embedder will switch the DATABURST on if data cache is enabled - so, if you are using to disable the VBR you will have to turn the DATABURST off afterwards.

Problem When starting a race, my car keeps spinning around in circles and has a mind of its own.
Affected Systems All Amigas
Why The problem is a side effect of the frame rate setting in F1GP-Ed and occurs if the frame rate has been set too high.
Solution The only way to stop this happening is to decrease the frame rate using F1GP-Ed. Generally speaking, 20fps NTSC (16fps PAL) is the maximum frame rate usable in a race. Using higher frame rates can cause strange things to happen.

Problem When playing the game using the keyboard I find it impossible to brake and steer at the same time
Affected Systems Most A1200s, and A1200T's with PC keyboard interface
Why Commodore changed the keyboard hardware in the A1200. As a result, it is not possible to press 2 keys (which are on the same row) at the same time. By default, in F1GP Z is the brake key which is positioned on the same row as the steering keys (< and >).

In the case of PC keyboard interfaces, this situation is much worse... most simultaneous keypresses are simply not recognized - the Eyetech and Micronik keyboard interfaces (possibly others too) have this problem.

Solution Use F1GP-Ed to redefine the keys, making sure that the brake, accelerate and steering keys are on different rows. This can be done using the relevant option in the Car Control window. For example, the following key combination should work: W - accelerate, S - brake, < - steer left, > - steer right.

Problem When using MicroProse's hard disk installer, I can only install F1GP to a certain partition on my hard drive, and not where I want it to go. Or, simply, MicroProse's installer won't work at all and it crashes.
Affected Systems Most Amigas - especially A1200s & A4000s
Why The installer supplied with the game is crap ;-) It isn't very system friendly and was really designed for bog standard A500s.
Solution I have written my own install script which uses the, now familiar, standard Amiga installer program. The script is supplied with F1GP-Ed and can be found in the Extras drawer - filename Install_F1GP. Simply double-click the icon and follow the instructions.

Problem On the password protection screen, when typing the word, the cursor doesn't move and the word appears backwards. For example, 'aznom' is shown on the screen when typing 'monza'.
Affected Systems All Amigas
Why F1GP's menu system reads the joystick port - the above problem happens if you're accidentally leaning on the joystick (especially an analog one), or if you have a mouse or dongle (for Tornado 3D, for example) plugged into the port
Solution At this moment in time, the only solution is to remove the offending device from the joystick port. I hope to add an option in F1GP-Ed soon, which will stop the F1GP menu system reading the joystick port.
- About this site
- Link to this site
- Site History
- Guestbook
- Web Ring
- Mailing List
- Utilities
- IAF1GPC
- Hall of Fame
- PerfBase
- FAQ
- F1 Music
- Trouble- shooting
- F1GP/WC Links
- Amiga Links
- F1 Links
[counter]
hits during 1997-2024
Maintained and created
by
Oliver Roberts

e-mail:
webmaster@amigaf1.co.uk

Page design by Oliver Roberts - Copyright © 1994-2024, All Rights Reserved - Terms & Conditions.

Valid HTML 4.01! Best Viewed With Any Browser IBrowse - Best Amiga Browser Built with Amiga software NO PIRACY Campaign