E3B and Chris Hodges are proud to announce the availability of a new version of the Luciferin FlashRom software for the Algor and Highway / Romulus expansion cards. It is a free update provided as service to all registered Algor/Romulus users.

Although the last update is nearly a one year old, nearly all of the reports were positive and only a few requests have been made. The software was indeed ahead of its time. However, developers of other FlashRom solutions have planned some new features, which were missing in the old version of Luciferin. As usually, Algor and Romulus users are the first to get these features working in their machines, preserving that the Algor/Romulus continues to be to the best FlashRom solution on the market.

An absolutely new feature is the ability to now install a (possibly custom) Kickstart ROM image inside the FlashRom. It then can be enabled instantly at the first boot with the newly included AlgorKick module. AlgorKick uses the MapROM option of the various phase5 cpu cards, most of the users have in their machines. The 512KB Kickstart image easily fits into the FlashRom using compression, taking less than 300KB inside the FlashRom. There is still plenty room for lots of other modules! No need for BlizKick anymore!

The following boards are supported by AlgorKick:
- Blizzard 1230-I/II/III/IV, 1230-T/ERC, 1260, 2040-ERC, 2060, and PPC
- Cyberstorm MKI/MKII/MKIII and PPC
- (Commodore A3640 / Blizzard A4030 -- please ask)

Also, a new tool "HatchSentinel" has been included to generate a password protection to the machine. Once installed in the FlashRom, it will present a password screen instantly after turning the machine on. The Sentinel module comes with various options, such as starting itself in the background, so that the booting process is not delayed.

The Bootloader has been improved to correctly determine the Kickstart version number with the BoingBag2 exec.library update. This was only cosmetic, but was added on user demand. The loader now also comes in a new "permanent" version, that will add RomTags only once, making it even faster than before.

Several other new RomTags have been added to the archive, such as modules to disabled the IDE controller to avoid unnecessary waiting (if you don't have any IDE devices connected). Or removing the bootmenu for secure and even faster booting. Or SpeedRamsey, a contribution by Christian Sauer.

Luciferin, the user friendly graphical tool for handling the FlashRom contents has become even better and will now warn you, if you try to include a program that shouldn't be installed into the FlashRom.

This is the list of most improvements. The update will be emailed free of charge to registered users the next days. Users of the Highway should be reminded that they still have the offer to update their card with a Romulus module, check out the IOSpirit website for details:

E3B and Chris Hodges hope that you will enjoy this update.