Individual Computers - New accelerator cards for A600 & A1200

[Fabie]

I was thinking and out of topic but

why not to create new turboboards with a 040/40mhz or 060/50mhz?

are those cpu really expensive or hard to find nowdays?

I was calculating and

the 040/40mhz is 30 mips on sysinfo + overclocked to 50mhz + sdram interface + other hacks.....maybe can reach 50 mips

idem for the 060/50mhz which is 39 mips on sysinfo....overclocked and the other hacks...maybe can reach 60 mips?

I'm wrong?

[Calabazam]

Originally Posted by Fabie

I was thinking and out of topic but

why not to create new turboboards with a 040/40mhz or 060/50mhz?

are those cpu really expensive or hard to find nowdays?

I was calculating and

the 040/40mhz is 30 mips on sysinfo + overclocked to 50mhz + sdram interface + other hacks.....maybe can reach 50 mips

idem for the 060/50mhz which is 39 mips on sysinfo....overclocked and the other hacks...maybe can reach 60 mips?

I'm wrong?

60860 MIPS benchmark is wrong in Sysinfo. Actually, MIPS are double the Sysinfo results.

[DDNI]

68060 @ 60mhz gives me about 79.5MIPS

[Schoenfeld]

Originally Posted by Calabazam

Does that mean that it will be permanently fixed or soldered?

The ACA630 goes on top of the 68000 CPU - not soldered, but pushed in place and kept from falling off by two screws. These screws don't go into regular holes, but they use two of the four slot holes that were originally designed for the harrdisk cradle, which needs to be removed. The cooler of the ACA630 serves as new harddisk cradle, but it's a lot higher than the original cradle: The computer won't close with a real harddrive installed. You will have to use a CF-card adapter (for space and heat reasons!).

Since this is kind of a permanent installation, we have one more feature on the ACA630 in the works: If we're successful, then the card can be disabled, and you can also run the A600 with it's native 68000 at about 7.1MHz. One more time: This feature is not yet tested, it may or may not be in the final version.

Jens

I just order one ACA1230
Now I can't wait when a new Indivision AGA was released.

[amigakit.com]

Many thanks :-)

[Calabazam]

Now i'm really curious to see some benchmarks of the ACA630 versus Apollo 630@40 or 50 MHz and MTEC 630.

[TronPlayer]

I was also curious as to if there will be a process to update the firmware in case the new models come out buggy.

[DDNI]

Apologies for pulling this Ot again.

A quick video of Doom on Amiga.
Doomattack gives me 35fps on 060 using Voodoo3 320x240x8.
AGA 320x256 using the 040+ c2p routine also gives 35fps with same system.

[ Show youtube player ]

[Schoenfeld]

Calabazam: I'll make an AIBB module of the 600 card in the next few days.

TronPlayer: There is no firmware. That's one part of the cost optimization: None of these cards has a flash rom. It's pure hardware, no software trickery required for operation. The ACAtune tool, which lets you tweak some parameters and activate Maprom (or even re-kick 1MByte Kickstarts), will be available from our website. If there's an update, you just download and install it on your harddisk/CF card.

Jens

[Retrofan]

Originally Posted by amigakit.com

The ACA 1230/28 will arrive first so we are happy to take the orders for that.

@Amikit you could tell something in A-org... they will be grateful to know about it too...

[FOL]

Originally Posted by Retrofan

@Amikit you could tell something in A-org... they will be grateful to know about it too...

Amikit??
Wonder how a preinstalled os will post on A-org, .

[Retrofan]

Originally Posted by FOL

Amikit??
Wonder how a preinstalled os will post on A-org, .

Oh, so sorry, I've been all the afternoon making an Amikit picture for my A1200 running on a real amiga...

[Fabie]

Originally Posted by DDNI

68060 @ 60mhz gives me about 79.5MIPS

in another program must report 79 mips
but on sysinfo a 060/60mhz must report something like 47-48 mips

[Fabie]

Originally Posted by Calabazam

60860 MIPS benchmark is wrong in Sysinfo. Actually, MIPS are double the Sysinfo results.

is not wrong....sysinfo is correct
the superspeed of a 060 is an urban myth

[Photon]

Originally Posted by DDNI

impressed as I am with these new cards, I am amused how important the often dismissed "Meaningless Indicator of Processor Speed" unit of measure has become so very important!

Correct, it has become unimportant on 2010 PCs. Because of:
- PC OSes rely on heavy background access of secondary storage
- memory is much slower than the CPU
- Onto the OS is a huge number of background services, drivers, and managers to do all the extra things a PC OS must do these days.

On Amiga (at least on OS<3.9, I don't know the others):
- memory is much less of a bottleneck, at least for < 68040
- partly due to allocate/load/use/free paradigm
- OS interferes as little as possible
- "no" background harddisk accesses or heavy tasks

This means that what's making MIPS less meaningful on eg. PC is two bottlenecks, memory and harddisk, but since the OS doesn't need it, those are gone on Amiga. Let's say OS3.1 runs decently with 5 MIPS. Doubling the MIPS basically doubles the speed in everything, even maxing out some programs so that you have 'instant response'.

Also, the MIPS levels available for Amiga are all well below 1% of current CPUs, which means that for even moderately complex programs such as a word processor, every MIPS counts. A better example is an assembler or compiler, where compilation speed can be 15, 30, 120 seconds even with the fastest Motorola CPU available. Ie. it will never max out.

The same is basically true for all portable devices such as cameras, phones or gaming handhelds. More MIPS in your ARM instantly makes them more responsive, or even capable of performing heavy tasks, such as running emulators or browsers.

[Zetr0]

@Fabie

whu? myth ?

IF you can get sysinfo to run on an 060 it cannot use the chip properly thus only about half of its used (or I should say calculated).

an 060@50 is 65 MIPs using AIBB and as Alan pointed out its 79mips@60mhz

Although Motorola's spec sheet states that the 060@66Mhz is capable of 100mips.

[Schoenfeld]

Originally Posted by Calabazam

Does that mean that it will be permanently fixed or soldered?

These screws should only be installed once. If you remove/insert them too often, the slot hole of your A600 will soon wear out. That's why I'd consider the installation "permanent".



The stand-offs are only mounted on the cooler/CF-card cradle. They are NOT fixed with the mainboard, they only stand on the surface.

Originally Posted by Predseda

I hope there will be the RTFM! sign in the production version of ACA 630!

Originally Posted by Retrofan

I don't know if someone has asked before, but what about overclocking?

The ACA1230 does not have a crystal that you could tamper with. For the ACA630...


Jens

[Fabie]

Originally Posted by Zetr0

@Fabie

whu? myth ?

IF you can get sysinfo to run on an 060 it cannot use the chip properly thus only about half of its used (or I should say calculated).

an 060@50 is 65 MIPs using AIBB and as Alan pointed out its 79mips@60mhz

Although Motorola's spec sheet states that the 060@66Mhz is capable of 100mips.

a 040/40 overclocked to 50mhz report 60 mips
is that real? no
040 and 060 are idem cpus....xx mhz = is the final speed which you will obtain.....from 25mhz to 80mhz
I can calculate how many mips sysinfo will reach acording to xx mhz
and the only difference between the 040 and 060 is the fpu which the 060 one is much faster...maybe the double speed of the 040
That's why some fpu'programs works much faster on a 060 vs 040
but if a program or game does not uses the FPU......a 040/50mhz will works at the speed of the 060/50mhz
anyways

idem calculation for 020 and 030 which are identical cpus and I can calculate sysinfo speed as well
and
yes..060 super speed it is an urban myth like the ufos
but if you believe in that..that's ok

[Retrofan]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

The ACA1230 does not have a crystal that you could tamper with. For the ACA630...
Attachment 26953

Jens

I was needing that message on the board: "don't even think about overclocking"

Does any of them run hot? Is it recommended a fan over them? (Well, I'm the one with a B1260 with the newest mask and with two fans with only 66Mhz...). Although will wait for the 56Mhz for my other virgin Amiga....