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The Amiga CD32.
The CD-Rom was a twin speed, multi-session unit, You load a CD like you would most game consoles, a lift up top reveals the CD-Rom, You place the CD on and close the top, Gone is the need for a caddy. The CD-Rom still uses a none standard interface, Unlike the CDTV the CD32 uses a small ribon to connect to the motherboard instead of the normal cable interface just incase you were wondering.
The CD32 has a single expansion connector like the CDTV's but this one lets you add the optional FMV card to let you play Mpeg video CD's or add a new CPU.
The CD32 has a "fall back mode" to let you play most CDTV games, This is done by the CD32 looking for either the CDTV.TM file or CD32.TM file, If the CDTV.tm file is found the fall back mode is activated and an ECS screen is opened, If the CD32.TM file is found an AGA screen is opened. Smart.
The CD32 is missing a few CDTV items so full backward compatiability, Some things you wont miss (Do you use the propriaty memory card slot? Good because the CD32 doesnt have one.) but other things that where nice are also gone, No IR port so you have to use a joypad or joystick, The CD32's joypad does support a few things, For one it has four action buttons and two menu select buttons plus the standard 4 direction keys and a play/pause button, This isnt that unusuall but it does use a standard Amiga joystick port which upto then only suported three buttons and no play/pause button.
The CD32 was made after the CDTV but was developed at the same time as the CDTV-CR prototype and it shares a few things, They both have an FMV card upgrade option (Different connectors though)(The CDTV-CR's FMV card was developed first and was then adapted for the CD32), The CD32's AUX port (A cut down serial port that was used for an optional modem or mouse or keyboard) is also on the CDTV-CR and the CD-Rom interfaces look the same. (But the CDTV-CR's CD-Rom is on a slide out tray, Unlike the CD32.)
The CD32's screens are very like the CDTV's, They have just been upgraded to show off the extra colours and faster CPU.
The main screen and preference screens where re-written, The main screen shows the CD-Rom flying through space, The colours at the top of the screen cycle through the complete pallet and a background music was added, There is no version number as the Prom was surface mounted to the motherboard, Changing the chip was not an option.
When a CD is inserted the screen goes black and then there are two animation that can appear,
1: At the top the words Amiga CD32 slide in and then slide out.
2: Or (Something else, What happens?).
The preference screen has been cut down to just language selection, The CD32 makes no use of the on-board clock so there is no reason to set it up, The screen position is fixed as it is just ment to connect to either an SVHF input (SVHF is a cut down Scart and scart doesnt need to be positioned either) or the RF input (Standard ariel, Again doesnt need positioning.) so that was removed, That just leaves the screen saver (which the CD32 doesnt have, :( very very sad.), Key press sound effects (They are always on), Display frequency (Never was any good), That just leaves the language selection (And easter egg).
The language display scrolls as it does on the CDTV but when a country is selected (Or you just stop over it for a second) the correct flag will lighten and will flap in the wind.
The globe just sits there and spins, Which is nice, Ermmmm......
Each of the preference screens can be opened by pressing one of the coloured buttons.
Red for , Blue for , Green for and Yellow for .
The audio player is very much the same as the one on the CD32, A few of the buttons have moved and the background colour is now light blue to dark blue (Instead of light blue to cream).
The CD comes up as normal, The CD tracks are displayed in the boxes on the right, The track thats playing is displayed in the box above the CD laser, The time played is displayed in the box under the CD and unlike the CDTV, If a CD+G or CD+Midi is in the CD32 it is shown just under the play time box.
The play / stop / rewind and other buttons are the same as on the CDTV's CD-Player.
The CD32 CD-Player can still display CD+G and CD+Midi CD's by pressing the bottom left button, Just like the CDTV did.
When the CD-Rom cover is opened the CD slides out and the CD32 resets and waits at a black screen untill the top is put back down (With the CD in or not).
The CDTV had a small amount of memory set asside for your preferences to be stored in, This was called the Bookmark, The CD32 expands that idea by having a full 1Kb of Flash RAM, This was used by a number of games as a way of saving your position, The problem is if you have a few games you can fill up that 1Kb very quickly so you will need a way to delete the files when you get boored of a game, That is what this screen is for, You can lock a score into memory (Which will survive a reset) or unlock it (So it wont).
Once you selected the title you wanted to lock or unlock press the red button and the key onthe side of the box will turn and lock / unlock the score, The number of locked and unlocked scores are displayed on the bottom of the box.
Misc Notes:
The CD32 only had a 24Bit Address bus, This was due to cost cutting before the CD32 went into mass prduction, They used the 68EC020 14Mhz CPU, The EC unit was a cheaper CPU and it still had a 32 Bit Data bus so still remained the worlds first 32 Bit Games Console.
Due to the cheaper CPU the CD32 can not have more than 8 Meg of fast ram (The same as the CDTV) without changing the CPU.
Commodore put a large advertising budget into the launch of the CD32, Including TV adverts, posters and lots lots more. One of the best advertsing stunts was for the CD32, Commodore made a masive poster and put it up on the bill board right outside Sega`s UK office, There main competitor saying "TO BE THIS GOOD WILL TAKE SEGA AGES." with a nice big picture of the CD32.
The CD32 uses the same power suply as the A590 Harddrive upgrade for the Amiga 500.
Spec:
CPU: 68020 (EC Version).
Memory: 2 Meg Chip Ram.
Graphics chip: AGA.
CD-Rom: 2X Speed, None standard interface.
Ports: Aux port (Cut down serial port), SVHF out, RF out, Composite out, RCA Audio left & right out, two Joystick ports (Standard Amiga style), Power in, 182 Pin expansion slot (For a CPU upgrade or FMV card).
Display: From 320X200 (low res, None interlaced) to 1280X400 (Super High res, Interlaced).
OS: Kickstart 3.1 (The first Amiga to have Kickstart 3.1), Patched to add CD32 features like CD-Player.
Recomended Links:
The CD32 Allianz:
A great German site along the same lines as this site but for the CD32, Lots of info and downloads plus a busy forum.