A4000TX ATX Amiga motherboard

[Jope]

I'm interested in one of these boards as well. :-)

If you decide to make larger changes, one consideration might be to go full E-ATX and have the CPU slot more towards the front of the machine so that a CSMK2 + CyberSCSI would fit.

Not sure if it's possible to squeeze a fifth Zorro slot in there, probably not trivial either. :-)

[Marlon_]

Originally Posted by spudje

Oh, yeah, that makes more sense than my suggestion of putting PCIs on the PCB. Will this still have the PCI cards in place actually, I always wondered that, (have the brackets fit the backplane?). Is this 3,3V or does it require a mod?

IMO Prometheus is not a realistic option from driver/compatibility perspective. There are cool things happening PPC wise with the Elbox mediators!

If you look at the link and then go to the installation guide, you'll see that you need risers for the brackets to "fit".

[1NOM155]

well both options for having pci cards seem a good thing but unfortunately I dont think elbox will show any interest in support Hese but i hope that i'm wrong lol.

i think the prometheus, like i linked before, seems a good option. the lack of drivers its a matter of people devoting their passion to this project and help it grow. unfortunately i dont have the knowledge otherwise i would help Hese in everything i could.

to finish again mate congrats in this awesome project.

[alexh]

Originally Posted by spudje

There are cool things happening PPC wise with the Elbox mediators!

While I know it is happening on the Mediator platform, I'm not sure the development is in the form of Mediator drivers? Are they not OpenPCI drivers? It is the PCI PPC talking to PCI cards not going via the Amiga/Mediator.

Originally Posted by 1NOM155

the lack of prometheus drivers is a matter of people devoting their passion to this project and help it grow

I think prometheus supports OpenPCI and the work being done for the PPC PCI cards means openPCI is in a better shape than it was in the Prometheus days? If it is then perhaps it means more drivers for Prometheus bridges? (Admittedly the work is perhaps not being compiled or tested for 680x0)

Never having owned a PCI bridge nor a PPC this is not my area of expertise.

[Marlon_]

Originally Posted by alexh

I think the work being done for the PPC PCI cards means openPCI is in a better shape than it was in the Prometheus days and could mean more drivers?

The work being done for PPC cards in collaboration with Elbox, not OpenPCI.

[alexh]

Understood

[Marlon_]

Originally Posted by alexh

Understood

With that said, OpenPCI should get some more love. But I understand it's hard work. If there were more products using OpenPCI, maybe things would be different though!

[1NOM155]

if someone want to help develop drivers were i should start?

[spudje]

I lack any technical knowledge. But if the Elbox mediator daughter boards are really simple (not containing Mach/TTL/GAL whatever logic chips/active components), in theory you could implement this in the PCB instead of the ISA slots and still use the original A4000D(i) Mediator bridgeboard to provide you access to the PCI bus. And when layout is done smart you could even save the video slot maybe. Although indeed ATX size is a bit limiting here.

[1NOM155]

From my little knowledge they use a bunch of CPLD's in PLCC format. the magic appears to be in the programming.

I think Hese can have two options, redo a new board and incorporate Prometheus project if someone help him develop drivers and correct the DMA issues that Prometheus have, or can copy the lower board ( https://thumbs.worthpoint.com/zoom/i...5313bc1481.jpg ) to accept the elbox bridge board to activate the PCI's (top board).

Also I like to thanks Marlon_ for the PM about OpenPCI Github project ( https://github.com/jeperk/OpenPCI ) is a good start to develop drivers. but I will stop with the off topic.
once again this thread is to talk about A4000 ATX bosrd made the incredible Hese

[spudje]

Yes, but as far as I know, all CPLDs are on the logic bridgeboard, not on the daughterboard (with the slots). So if on the mainboard the ISA slots are replaced with PCI slots (and traces), would that be enough and can you simply plugin the Mediator bridgeboard to make the PCI slots work?

[grelbfarlk]

The Mediator bridgeboard I linked just plugs into a Zorro slot and the slots are perpendicular to the motherboard like the Zorro slots are, they're just something like 1/2" higher up than they normally would be. If you then want to still use Zorro slots then you have to get the Zorro risers so they will clear the PCI board.

The DMA fix for the Prometheus is available but you have to make contact with a M Boehmer on A1K.

Hedeon mentioned at one point he could see about making his driver work with the Prometheus but there are not many of them out there and the original version had a rather hacky method for mounting the PCI cards.

It would be cool to integrate the Prometheus directly on the motherboard but there should be some means of interfacing it directly to an 040 or 060 so it doesn't have to traverse the slow motherboard logic.

[hese]

Originally Posted by Yulquen74

Would be cool if you could enable the use of PC floppy drive, and footprint for pin-headers behind every DSUB for the option to relocate the DSUBs would also be nice.

Yes, I can add support for PC floppy drives. Would Escom style PC floppy support be fine or did you have some other mod in mind?

As for relocating DSUBs, that requires a major rerouting and needs more space on the board than what is available. But I'll keep that in mind for the future revision.

Originally Posted by ExiE

1. I would like to ask if the MC68030 have to be populated in case there will be cyberstorm in the cpu slot.

No, the MC68030 doesn't need to be populated if you use CPU cards (A3640, CSPPC, ...).

Originally Posted by shaf

where did you find the connectors for the Risers for Ser/Parallel and Dual 9 Pin Din (Mouse/Joystick)?

I got them from Mouser.

Originally Posted by alexh

If you are ever thinking about doing this again, I *think* Prometheus (Zorro III -> PCI bridge) is now open source (or it could be made available) so you could include PCI slots on the board.

Yes, the plan was to implement the PCI support for the next major revision (2.0) using Prometheus and naturally open source this. Some have raised the option to use a Mediator instead which also has it's pros. I'll have to ponder which would be a better option..
I'm also thinking about adding an USB support and maybe an ethernet if there is a suitable project available.

[spudje]

Originally Posted by hese

Yes, I can add support for PC floppy drives. Would Escom style PC floppy support be fine or did you have some other mod in mind?

As for relocating DSUBs, that requires a major rerouting and needs more space on the board than what is available. But I'll keep that in mind for the future revision.



No, the MC68030 doesn't need to be populated if you use CPU cards (A3640, CSPPC, ...).



I got them from Mouser.



Yes, the plan was to implement the PCI support for the next major revision (2.0) using Prometheus and naturally open source this. Some have raised the option to use a Mediator instead which also has it's pros. I'll have to ponder which would be a better option..
I'm also thinking about adding an USB support and maybe an ethernet if there is a suitable project available.

Nice, nice, so great you're considering many of the suggestions. I doubt Ethernet would make sense, at least just as a pass through socket together with the other connections, since most Ethernet cards are full length zorro cards that take up a bracket anyway. USB however (Highway etc.) could be helped with a pass through socket somewhere in the connectors area. Saves you a bracket, for example to put a CF adapter, easily accessible.

Just wondering wether it would be possible to even combine Prometheus and Mediator support. If for mediator support it only requires the PCI slots, and traces for the connecting bus, than maybe with a jumper you can connect/disconnect it to the additional Prometheus circuits?

[Marlon_]

SPI headers maybe? There are a few accelerator projects now that uses them. So it would possibly enable sharing of drivers between these projects. There are already ethernet modules for SPI with drivers for Amiga.

[shaf]

I thought of one Modification the the Motherboard an option to disable the onboard CPU since my A4000/040 has on onboard CPU, and i use a WarpEngine for CPU and SCSI support.

[Chucky]

do not solder in CPU. put a resistor on pads below cpu..

and use WE.

[grelbfarlk]

My suggestion for any future PCI plans is add enough address lines so at least 1GB of PCI space is available, so we don't run into the problems we're having on the Mediator with a max of 512MB of address space. Not sure whether 1.5GB is possible but that would be ideal.

[TjLaZer]

Excellent job! Any plans to mass produce the board with the common avail components and sockets for the Amiga chips?

[Jope]

Originally Posted by hese

As for relocating DSUBs, that requires a major rerouting and needs more space on the board than what is available. But I'll keep that in mind for the future revision.

Any consideration for adding more space between the fast slot and the rear of the machine? I can provide you with the footprint of the CSMK2 + CybSCSI2 if you like. :-)