Heh, I really start liking modding the 600XL.
I replaced the OS ROM (which is normally a 128k ROM) with a 27512 EPROM and burned 4 different OS versions in it.
The idea to make two switches to be able to select between the 4 different OSes.
Why ?
Well I found an OS version which had the following improvements over the orignal:
- OPTION key inverted. This means it is no longer neccesary to hold the OPTION key down while booting to disable BASIC. You barely use BASIC anyway. This option is now inverted now which is great.
- it is now possible to do a cold-boot by holding the left shift key while pressing RESET. This saves a lot of turning off/on.
- the SIO routines have been patched which makes it possible to run the SIO port at mugh higher speeds than standard. This is great for use with the Happy Board that is in my 1050 Floppy Disk drive as it will now be in "turbo" made right away and automatically. This rocks !! This also works with SIO2PC etc.
OK so but why 4 OSes ?
Well first of all because I didn't have a 27128 EPROM anyway and also because you can
More reasons is that I also included the original OS for the (rare) situations where you need/want 100% compatiblity. The third OS is a patched version of the 400/800 OS so I can run the few games that really need this too (no need for "Translator" dics/files anymore.
The foruth OS is one I found about on the net. It includes the first three mentioned patches plus some more stuff and is especially usefull if you have 256k or more installed because it can automatically set-up RAMdisks etc. So not too usefull now, but well I had to burn the EPROM anyway.
Didn't have time to add the switches yet so I just bent up two pins and slammed the EPROM in the socket and it works great with the first OS I mentioned....
It's great to do hacking and everytime it works straight away. This is a nice change from the arcade stuff
