Somebody told me that Maxim Magazine had and article about some people that went out and dug up all the old Atari carts that had been buried when Atari went under and that they were selling them on the web. Is this true? Where can I find the web site? [William Lieder]

Don't know anything about this. Can anyone else help?

I have purchased a new 14mb memory board for the Falcon. The problem is that after about 30 minuets use when trying to load new programs under MagiC the following error message is displayed.

68000 Exception (error#69)

This problem never occurred on the old 4mb ram board. I have tried removing MagiC and reinstalling, but still the same problem arises. The only thing which has not been tested is to see if the same message returns with the original memory board. [Thomas Jordan]

Can anyone help? All I do know is that error #69 is a MagiC specific error.

At the end of May I received my Eclipse graphics board.  When the board was installed originally the Falcon would display a desktop but in non standard Atari desktop colours e.g. black background with purple or orange  borders. The desktop had mouse and window droppings when windows were opened.

I visited Cortex to see if it was just a faulty board.  But a different problem was encountered the desktop could not be displayed.  All that the Falcon would display was a scrambled picture of flickering colours.

At Cortex a new ribbon was installed, also new PCI adapters and eclipse boards were tried.  Different software settings were tested.  After along day the problem was left unsolved.

It has been suggested that during transit that one of the wires on nemesis might have worked lose? Any help will be very appreciated. [Thomas Jordan]

I can only speak of my own problems with the Eclipse board. I had the graphics board installed in my Falcon last October and had similar problems to which you describe in your letter. After a few software bugs were ironed out by the authors in Sweden, the flickering screen was finally replaced by the standard desktop. However, I found it made my system extremely unstable.

I eventually sent the Eclipse board back to Titan Designs (now Cortex Designs) in Birmingham and proceed to fight for my refund. After several weeks and a visit in person, I received a full refund. If you have not spoken to Eclipse's designers in Sweden, I suggest doing so as they are extremely helpful.

Should you find that after their suggestions, your Eclipse board still does not work, I'd recommend returning it - in person - to Cortex Designs and ask for a full refund. [Matthew Bacon]

Last year I bought a second-hand Falcon030. On the whole I have been very pleased with my purchase, however there are a few things about it that really annoy me! 1) Sometimes when I boot up, its like a key is being held down resulting in a continuous bleeping noise. 2) After an hour or so of use, my screen sometimes goes completely black without warning and I have to reboot. Can you help? [David Lambourne, United Kingdom]

Humm... I have some good and bad news I am afraid. The good news is that when your Falcon boots and you hear continuous bleeping, there is nothing wrong with your machine. It is not uncommon for Falcons to do this and must be considered a "feature" of your machine. However, your second question worries me ... your Falcon should not simply die without warning.

Without more detailed information like does it switch off? or is it just the video signal lost? I am unable to diagnose your problem with 100% confidence. As you bought your machine secondhand, do you know if any screen savers were already installed on the machine? It could be that after a certain period of inactivity, the screen saver is simply kicking in.

2nd Opinion: (Ken MacDonald)
Sounds like a heat problem to me! Take off case, which will let the Falcon run cooler, and see if it still occurs. 

I was one of the first members of the public in the UK to purchase an Atari 64-bit Jaguar games console. Although it now shows its age now when you compare it to the forthcoming PSX2, I still enjoy using it a great deal! Unfortunately, the company that I bought my Jag from no longer supports it, can you please tell me where can I still buy games for it in the UK? [Brian Hill, United Kingdom]

Certainly, try The Console Centre on +44 (0) 1484 544926.

After using my STFM for about an hour, all of sudden my mouse movement inverts! What is going on? [Alan Dent, United Kingdom]

Ah you have fallen foul of the dreaded Ghost virus! Don't worry, it is not as bad as it sounds. The virus, I believe, is completely harmless (in other words, it does not destroy any of your precious data). To remove the Ghost virus from your machine I recommend using "The Ultimate Virus Killer" by Richard Karsmakers. It is available from www.uvk2000.com.

May I first say it's great to see MyAtari supporting every Atari platform and not just the ST and Falcon. My question is... Are there any cheats for Doom or AvP on the Jag? [Joseph Welsh, United Kingdom]

I'm stumped. Are there any Jag users out there that can help?

2nd Opinion: Urban Berggren
Check the following page and under codes you will find what you seek :) http://www.wheres.com/etc/area64/frames.html

3rd Opinion: Jesus.Marugan
http://users.aol.com/themage1/jaguar/jagcodes.txt  He´ll find anything there. 

With the closure of Floppyshop, where can I get the latest Public Domain software from. I have heard rumours that someone took over from Steve and Irene but have been unable to find out who! Can you enlighten me further? [Alice Compton, United Kingdom]

I certainly can, Floppyshop PDL is now become LaST PD. Further details can be found at http://www.last-pd.co.uk. Alternatively, FaST Club still sources and catalogues a great deal of new Atari public domain software. Check them out now!

I am currently using my fathers Pentium PC for browsing the internet (which is how I came to find out about your excellent magazine!) but would like to be able to browse using my trusty STe. Where do I start? [Jennifer Brown, Scotland]

Thank you for your kind words, MyAtari will be soon publishing an article about getting an ST/Falcon on-line. Keep your eyes peeled!

Can I turn my old STFM into a STe or Falcon? [James Clark, USA]

No. The architecture found in the STFM, is far too different from the STe and Falcon to make this a possibility - sorry!

I was recently happily using my STe when all of a sudden, it stopped. This was swiftly followed by a burning smell! I am reluctant to open up the case as I am not particularly knowledgeable about things like this. Can you please tell me where I can send my poor STe to be fixed (cheaply!). [Philip Brompton, United Kingdom]

Gosh, this does sound terminal I'm afraid. Whenever the smell of burning is involved, it is not a good sign. As you are reluctant to open up your STe's case and fiddle, I recommend sending it to either the Atari Workshop (Tel: 020 8693 3355) or The Upgrade Shop (Tel: 01625 503448), however, I cannot promise that it will be cheap as it sounds like a power supply problem to me!

I would like to start composing music on my 1mb Atari STe. I have been given a copy of Cubase but it refuses to work! What do I need to get it working? [Thomas Spring, United Kingdom]

Thomas, your question is rather vague. A 1mb STe is certainly the minim I'd suggest for using Cubase (you don't state which version you are using, as in my experience, Cubase Score sensibly requires 4mb), have you tried contacting the dealer you purchased your copy of Cubase from? For a start, are you using a high res monitor or an emulator? Cubase refuses to work correctly in resolutions below 640x400.

2nd Opinion: (Ken MacDonald)
Do you have a Cubase dongle? A friend of mine once bought Notator and excitedly rushed home to try it out, and it wouldn't work as he was not sold the dongle! He didn't know you needed one.

Which is better MutilTOS, MiNT or MagiC? [Sven Tersk, Sweden]

Good question. My personal favourite is MagiC however many users swear by MultiTOS or MiNT (and occasionally at it!). Does anyone fancy writing an article pitching all three operating systems against each other in a head to head winner takes all??
 

 Team of experts

• Matthew Bacon (Music/MIDI, Programming in HiSoft/Power BASIC, Utilities)
• Shiuming Lai (Hardware solutions, digital audio, engineering and games)
• Mark Bedingfield (Hardware problems)
• Chris Crosskey (Electronics, Hardware upgrades)
• Stephen F. Winsor (Hardware upgrades for ST/TT, MIDI interfacing, VCS 2600 troubleshooting)
• Bruno Padinha (Games, Emulation)
• Olaf Piesche (Graphics, Programming in PureC, GNU C and 68k-assembler, HTML/JavaScript)
• Ken Macdonald (mint, linux, graphics, dtp, os)
• James Alexander (Electronic and wireless problems, C / Pascal and Basic programming - no GFA though, Basic Linux and HTML. Finally, OASES o/s)
• Russell Hayward (Atari Emulation)