Let's boot!

I'm going to run through how to use the Launcher as a first step into the emulator. In further posts, I will go into more depth about setting up an Amiga system, and explain some of the magic behind the various config items.

The directories created by the Launcher application give you a logical layout where to store the various files required for the emulation:

• CD-ROMs - store ISO files for any CD32 or CDTV games
• Configurations - this is where the uaerc.config file goes
• Controllers - custom settings for joysticks/joypads
• Flash Memory - another function of the CDTV/CD32 emulation, saved games
• Floppies - put your .adf files in here
• Floppy Overlays - (I haven't a clue about this... yet)
• Hard Drives - UAE can read from an HDF file, or a directory
• Kickstarts - ROM file storage, the plural shows that you can store a variety of versions of ROMs
• Launcher - Cache for the Launcher
• Save States - save the emulation to a 'state', handy for games with no save function
• Themes - (I haven't a clue about this... yet)

Now if you remember from an earlier post, I said you'd need a Kickstart file from an Amiga. Copy this into the /Documents/FS-UAE/Kickstarts/ directory. This is required in order for the Amiga to be able to boot and run software. Without it, no Amiga.

Copy any .adf files into the /Documents/FS-UAE/Floppies/ directory. The .adf stands for Amiga Disk File, and is a bit for bit copy of an Amiga-formatted floppy disk. Even if you had a USB floppy drive, you wouldn't be able to read an Amiga disk on a PC or Mac without special hardware - hence why the emulation uses .adf.

Now run the FS-UAE Launcher application. A window will open like so:

Most Amiga games were released for the A500, so I'm using that as the example for the emulation today. In this example, I've selected A500 from the "Amiga Model" drop down - leave the next drop down as "Accurate" (unless you find the emulator is running too slowly).

Under "Removable Media" you should be able to select the .adf files you copied over to the /Floppies/ directory. I've used Lemmings here - always my test subject whenever emulating or trying out a newly acquired Amiga.

Leave the drop down menu saying "Window" alone for now - we'll just try it out in a window before fiddling with full-screen. Now click "Start" - and after a few minutes, FS-UAE should boot up into your .adf files!