Vampire 500+ Pre-orders now being accepted

[Marlon_]

Originally Posted by Hiddenevil

Just because you havent witnessed it does not mean it doesn't exist, so try to give people the benefit. Also if your going to offer a counter arguement try not to attack the person with derogetory remarks as it not only makes you appear crass, but also reaffirms what I was saying about the community and casts the forum in a bad light.

Allow me to address one or two of your points.

No I didnt feel entitled to pay 90 euro that was an unsastainable price. I had agreed to 150 EUR when without any notification I was asked to pay 250+shipping without any prior notification even though I had signed up to the mailing list. Which was meant to keep me informed or so I was led to believe.

Say five months ago I agreed to sell my Blizzard 1260 to my pal Dave while down the pub, we shake on a price and thats that. Then as time passes I realise that I cut myself a little short and should have asked Dave for more money. Do I get in touch with him or when the time comes just ask him for 50% more then we agreed on? One of those options is going to lead to Dave feeling miffed that his times been wasted, which how I felt when I was asked to pay for my Vampire card.

I dont feel entitled in the slightest as you've clearly read what I said, I was trying to support what I thought was a worth while project. But that doesnt mean I nor anyone else who has been waiting should have their emails ignored and not be kept appraised of price changes.

You signed an interest in the product, not a contract that you would get it for 150 EUR. If you read either Majsta or kipper's sites you would have gotten this information, where they explained exactly why the price increased. Sure they should have sent out an email with links to either site when it happened.

And I'm sorry if you took this as a personal attack, I'm just tired of reading people feeling entitled to this at a lower price like it would be a right rather than a privilege to get hold of one of these cards. I'm just venting rather than shutting up about it.

They're trying to correct their mistakes by getting their website up to par with an order page with the info. Sure 300€ was not really what I was hoping to pay to get a card for my A500+, but that's how it is now.

[Hiddenevil]

Good grief do you know me? Have we met before? No we havent so please refrain from making assumptions about me and we'll got on great.

I'm sorry but you can attribute the demand for these cards and how kipper manages his private life on me. If your going sell a product then you have a duty to your customers. You can blanket this under the guise of a hobby as much as you like. But the Vampire is a product and the people paying for them are customers who deserve a degree of respect.

[Hiddenevil]

Originally Posted by Marlon_

You signed an interest in the product, not a contract that you would get it for 150 EUR. If you read either Majsta or kipper's sites you would have gotten this information, where they explained exactly why the price increased. Sure they should have sent out an email with links to either site when it happened.

And I'm sorry if you took this as a personal attack, I'm just tired of reading people feeling entitled to this at a lower price like it would be a right rather than a privilege to get hold of one of these cards. I'm just venting rather than shutting up about it.

They're trying to correct their mistakes by getting their website up to par with an order page with the info. Sure 300€ was not really what I was hoping to pay to get a card for my A500+, but that's how it is now.

Thats perfectly alright and understandable. I wasn't offended just some of the attitudes on Amibay have left my feathers a little ruffled and questioning the Amiga community. I think we are both guilty of venting.

I have nothing but respect for the team making the Vampire cards, even though I do feel ignore and let down after my experience with them. I'd love nothing more then to support the project, but its frankly out of my price range now.

[kipper2k]

hi,

all people deserve respect, and sellers deserve to make a product without loss, unfortunately due to increased costs those that never paid in the prebuy were not "grandfathered"

majsta lost on this deal and he kept up the project until completion.

[clebin]

Originally Posted by Hiddenevil

Good grief do you know me? Have we met before? No we havent so please refrain from making assumptions about me and we'll got on great.

I don't think I was harsh at all, and if I made it assumptions about you it was only in response to what you posted.

If your going sell a product then you have a duty to your customers.

You were never a customer. Sending an email to express interest does not make you a customer.

You can blanket this under the guise of a hobby as much as you like. But the Vampire is a product and the people paying for them are customers who deserve a degree of respect.

You never paid anything though, did you? Kipper's say on this final as far as I'm concerned so there's no point in me added anything. I'm just thankful that this kind of attitude didn't drive him away from the Amiga scene for good.

[grelbfarlk]

Originally Posted by Omolungo

Is it possible for you to show us some pics?
Just to see how many work needs the CDTV to fit the V500.

I did get the CDTV SCSI controller working with the binddrivers version. I tried to loadmodule the CDTV expansion ROM contents, that doesn't work.
Here is a pic showing the very small modifications.


The two caps that were moved to the bottom could just be replaced with smaller ones if you want those caps on the top of the board for some reason. Since these caps are 25 years old at this point it's probably a good idea.

Here's a side view


Here's a bonus pic, those terrible ribbon cables that drive the LCD display and IR controller are bastards to get reinserted, so I "replaced" them.



Also while you have the motherboard out, why not replace the legacy SRAM slot with something useful?

[grelbfarlk]

Also since a 68000 relocator board will be needed anyway, should add clockport to it, so we can use RapidRoad/Prisma/$somethingelse.

[bubbob42]

Originally Posted by grelbfarlk

Also since a 68000 relocator board will be needed anyway, should add clockport to it, so we can use RapidRoad/Prisma/$somethingelse.

Exactly! CDTV + Vampire + Prisma = TheRealMultimediaMachine!

[grelbfarlk]

I did get the CDTV CD player to work by loadmoduling the cdtv.device plus a couple other libraries from the CDTV expansion ROM. But for data discs-no matter how I mount the disc I get NDOS volume. Running a raw sector dump just returns garbage.

[Omolungo]

@grelbfarlk

I also got the front panel cables welded directly to motherboard in my CDTV

How did you fold the ide connector on V500?

And what about the hdmi output on the Vampire? It seems too tall to permit the closure of the case with the cable inserted

[grelbfarlk]

Originally Posted by Omolungo

@grelbfarlk

I also got the front panel cables welded directly to motherboard in my CDTV

How did you fold the ide connector on V500?

And what about the hdmi output on the Vampire? It seems too tall to permit the closure of the case with the cable inserted

Oh I replaced the IDE connector with a right angle one, it may just work with the IDE cable crushed with the straight up connector, but I didn't like it. The HDMI cable is not a problem it's actually an extension cable that routes out to the expansion port on the back where the SCSI controller is. I need to 3D print an expansion cover with the two DB-9, HDMI and SCSI HD-50 connectors. Right now they all just sort of hang out that hole like an octopus. The tallest thing on the V500 is actually the JTAG connector and the plastic housing is nearly touching the top of the case.

[Omolungo]

So we hope to get the new 68000 adapter from kipper2k.

About the rear expansion slot be aware that there's enough space for db9s, scsi connector and hdmi output: in another CDTV I owned I had to cut part of metallic rear cover in order to fit them all (with exclusion of hdmi naturally).

[grelbfarlk]

Originally Posted by Omolungo

So we hope to get the new 68000 adapter from kipper2k.

About the rear expansion slot be aware that there's enough space for db9s, scsi connector and hdmi output: in another CDTV I owned I had to cut part of metallic rear cover in order to fit them all (with exclusion of hdmi naturally).

Yes it looks like it would all fit. I was holding off trying to cut the old plate until I knew what all I was going to try to fit on it.
Seems like 3D printing one would be the easiest, if a little expensive, thing to do.

If we get a clockport adapter or even a dual one like Ian Stedman's or the Kato Dev one, then we can dream about adding dual USB and maybe some kind of audio header. Nice thing about the CDTV it appears to have a nearly standard old-style audio header, so we could inject the Prisma audio right into the motherboard and connect the CD audio to the CDDA connector (if it ever works) or the line in on the Prisma.

[bubbob42]

Originally Posted by grelbfarlk

, so we could inject the Prisma audio right into the motherboard and connect the CD audio to the CDDA connector (if it ever works) or the line in on the Prisma.

Your patience will be rewarded (Oh my, I sound like a Chinese cookie here...) Current alpha tool/driver already enables CDDA.

[Hiddenevil]

Originally Posted by clebin

I don't think I was harsh at all, and if I made it assumptions about you it was only in response to what you posted.



You were never a customer. Sending an email to express interest does not make you a customer.



You never paid anything though, did you? Kipper's say on this final as far as I'm concerned so there's no point in me added anything. I'm just thankful that this kind of attitude didn't drive him away from the Amiga scene for good.

As I can see there is no besting you, I'll bow respectfully to your superior grasp of the situation.

[grelbfarlk]

Regarding the price talk, it's just a simple fact of how much the parts cost. When the project started initially Majsta was going to use something like an 18k LE FPGA, that was cheap. As they started to add features like RTG then realized how much space the CPU+FPU was going to take up they had to upgrade to a 40k LE FPGA-that costs more.

The team doesn't have the money to buy $100,000 worth of parts up front so they buy for the cheapest price they can when they do a batch. Those batches are relatively small so when they go to place an order they are at the whims of their suppliers how much it is going to cost in a given month. Then people complained about how long the waiting list was, now some components are getting pre-assembled in a factory that costs more. To me, waiting a couple months for assembly versus waiting a year or two is worth the extra expense.

I'm not part of the Apollo team-these are just my observations and my opinions are in no way are endorsed or verified by the Apollo team.

[Hiddenevil]

I know the team recieved a lot of flak for the waiting time which wasn't helped by the lack of communication. I guess the simple fact is the sheer demand caught them by surprise and totally unprepared. Who isn't going to jump at a 90 euro card? I jumped when I saw it at 150, i probably would have done so at 200.

[Omolungo]

Originally Posted by grelbfarlk

Yes it looks like it would all fit.

Try to insist with kipper2k about the new 68000 adapter

By the way, great CDTV yours

[Marchie]

Originally Posted by kipper2k

Hi,

The V500 will fit and work in an a2000, either in the cpu slot or the coprocessor slot (with an adapter)

Can we order the adapter with the Vampire card? Or do we get it from somewhere else?

Awesome work Vampire team, keep it up!

[tin]

Originally Posted by Overflow

Just leaving out the discussion of price;

Its odd you didnt get anything before since you pre-ordered..? Did you sign up on the Amibay thread? I see alot of people that has waited for a good while, myself included, and we kept requenting IRC. I poked Kipper there to verify that the order was in etc.
Not to grind salt in your wound, but again, very suprised you had to wait this long.

Yeah I went back to the Amibay thread to check I remember correctly. I expressed interest and later reminded of such in what I am pretty sure is the very original Vampire 600 thread.

I guess in a way I never *actually* ordered as it was asked for us to express interest and that was never followed up for me and it seems a lot of other people. Majsta was way behind in the list and Kipper came in at some point - I didn't follow what happened very well (life gets in the way). Then it appears there was another thread that you were expected to PM & pay straight away but I missed that also (that life again) until it was too late.

(BTW no email to my expression of interest via the instructed method this time around either! But kipper's site does say don't panic!)

But you know, as I say it is what it is. I don't want anyone to give me a card at a loss, I want Kipper, Majsta or whoever to make some decent money and be happy doing it and maybe carry on and do other great things. It benefits nobody if people with these skills leave the scene.

The reason for posting wasn't really to bring this up, just to add weight to my view that wanting 250+ euro for such a thing is OK. Even for someone who hoped for it at 90 euro. You buy it at the price it's offered or you don't. For people that can't afford that's a shame but I drive a 13 year old car for the same reasons.

Now if money actually changed hands, that's different - witness the collapse of pebble over the past week - but even in a scene as small as this I think I could forgive.