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Kickstart 3.0 ROM chips installed in an Amiga 1200 Kickstart 1.2 floppy disk. Kickstart is the bootstrap firmware of the Amiga computers developed by Commodore International.Its purpose is to initialize the Amiga hardware and core components of AmigaOS and then attempt to boot from a bootable volume, such as a floppy disk.
The Kickstart ROM is not a custom chip but a mask-programmed ROM chip for most versions. It contains the largest part of the operating system . Kickstart 1.x ROMs have a capacity of 256 KiB , Kickstart 2.x and 3.x contain 512 KiB. 32-bit Amigas use a pair of 16-bit chips to provide full-width access.
Initial machines had a 1.4 beta ROM that looked for a "super" Kickstart disk similar to the 1000. It could load Kickstart versions 1.3, 2.0, and 2.04 this way or from specially named partitions on the hard disk. Developers could also "kick" in higher versions of the OS, up to 3.1 Amiga 3000T: 1991–1992 68030, 68040: 1-2 MB Chip 1-4 MB Fast 2.04
Kickstart V1.4 is actually a beta version of Kickstart which is loaded from disk. 68040 microprocessors require at least 2.0 ROMs. The A3000 has a number of Amiga-specific connectors including two DE-9 ports for joysticks, mice, and light pens, a standard 25-pin RS-232 serial port and a 25-pin Centronics parallel port.
Kickstart/Workbench 1.4 was a beta version of the upcoming 2.0 update and never released, but the Kickstart part was shipped in very small quantities with early Amiga 3000 computers, where it is often referred to as the "Superkickstart ROM". In these machines it is only used to bootstrap the machine and load the Kickstart that will be used to ...
Amiga OS v3.1.4 additionally also came with newer releases of the Amiga Kickstart-ROMs (either as a digital download in Kickstart-images, or shipped with physical Kickstart-ROMs). In 2019, AmigaOS 3.1.4.1 was released as a software only update to Amiga 3.1.4 free-of-charge, mainly as a bug fix. [ 32 ]
Autoconfig is integrated within the Amiga's Kickstart firmware, usually stored in ROM. When the system is switched on, AmigaOS interrogates each expansion device in turn and assigns address space or resources as needed. For example, in the case of a memory card, the OS can dynamically add the memory to the system.
The Amiga Forever [2] emulation package offers legal copies of Kickstart, Workbench and various games. Another legal option for Amiga emulation is the AROS Research Operating System, which is available as free software. An AROS boot ROM can be used instead of Kickstart, which allows booting the m68k port of AROS from a floppy or CD image. [3]