Can I read/Backup an AMIGA format CF card on a PC?

[Chewieshmoo]

In anticipation of getting an A1200 I ordered from Ebay on of those CF Hard drive kits, it comes with the IDE adapter and CF card pre-formatted with WB3.1 and a couple other partitions containing tons of games/demos etc.

It is my understanding and correct me if I am wrong that CF cards typically do not last as long as a standard hard drive. Either way, I would like the piece of mind of having a backup of the CF card, should anything happen and I need to replace it I would like to restore the original content. SO, is there any way I could read the content of the CF card on my PC? I could even just back up the entire content to a DVD for safe keeping. Any info or ideas are much appreciated thanks!

[Harrison]

Hi,

Because the CF card is formatted as an Amiga HDD, Windows can't read the file system. You will instead need to use the emulator WinUAE. Connect your CF card to the PC in a card reader, start WinUAE and go to the Harddrives section and add the CF card as a Harddrive to the list. You can then boot WinUAE using yout CF Amiga HDD.

To back it up I would suggest creating a folder on your PC somewhere where you would like to store the backup copy. Then in WinUAE again go to the harddrive section and this time add the CD card as a harddrive, and also add the folder you created as a directory HD. This allows the emulated Amiga to think it is an Amiga HDD, but it can also be accessed fom the PC. And also boot the emulation using a Workbench ADF and not from the CF card. This will allow you to copy all of the CF cards contents. Otherwise some files will be locked and won't copy as they will be in use.

Alternatively you can create a .hdf hardfile image of the contents of the CF card. Again you can do this in the harddrive section. once created you will be able to boot the emulator from the .hdf file and it will act just like the CF card.

I hope that is helpful.

[Chewieshmoo]

Thanks for the great reply Harrison! Much appreciated.