M4 n00b Questions

[Lomax]

Hello,

I've just received an M4 board for my Amstrad CPC6128 and I have a couple of newbie questions:

1. Under what circumstances should I use a USB power supply to power the M4 board instead of the Amstrad itself?

2. There is a lot of talk about AMSDOS being in slot 7 when referring to game compatibility. As shipped to me (as of
14th March 2023), "CPM ROM" was in slot 7. Why is this and has the current "best practice" changed?

3. What is the [CD ON CPC] folder that appears by default in the WebUI and how can I leverage it?

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Thanks in advance for your help.

Lomax

[TotO]

1- If your expansion slot can't provide the required voltage for it.
Because, the converter circuit to produce 3V3 need not less than 5V.
Some converters allow to produce 3V3 from 4V5, but it is not the case here.

2- ROM7 is for AMSDOS. But, on 464 it was easy to add an alternative ROM instead, into the DDI.
Parados was released to be used like that and require to remove / socket the ROM for the 6128.
The best to extend / patch the AMSDOS feature st to add extra ROM under it (ROM6, ROM5, ...)
But, few softwares not properly programmed (and not patched) do direct access to ROM7 and fail.

3- Current Directory on CPC.

[SerErris]

CPM rom and AMSDOS rom is the exact same. But it should be named as AMSDOS rom. CPM is in this rom as well as the AMSDOS (nonCPM firmware) part of the rom.  

Also you need to be sure to use the correct ROM files for your system, as they vary from 464/664/6128.