New products for C64 and Amiga from Individual Computers

[Crumb]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

The initial concept with stacked PCBs already had a compromise with it's 40-pin IDE: I don't want to offer 44-pin, as that one carries power that would overload the PSU of 90% of the A500s out there.

40-pin IDE would be perfect for me too. I prefer 40-pin IDE instead of CF.

Crumb:
I do need the very early execution of $f0 ROMs in order to boot from CF even under Kick1.2.

IIRC Kickstart 1.2 didn't autoboot from HD so I guess you patch it, couldn't that patch be removed or the rom moved to other location using a jumper?

Autoconfig ROM is not an option (and it would break compatibility with even more A1200 accelerators, because there is no config in/out lines on the 150-pin slot). The 2M Fastmem is available to the A1200 accelerator through Z2 mem space, just not using the autoconfig mechanism in order not to collide with possible autoconfig use on the A1200 accel. Your assumption that "only adapter+IDE" makes it easier is not in line with reality; that would have no means of dealing with the Kick1.2 issue.

Nice to know it's in z2 area. Decent accelerators didn't map their memory there anyway and those that did usually had an option to restrict them to 4MB in order to avoid colliding with PCMCIA.

Couldn't be possible to disable ACA500 rom so Blizzard boots? Even if I lost IDE I have a bunch of SCSI devices and a nice ATX PSU so I wouldn't mind much about losing IDE/RAM but the possibility of using cpu accelerators is more important to me.

[Mohican]

+1 vote to 40 pin IDE. Do not tie the hands of a fixed solution.

[moijk]

for those who would like a cdrom an ide would be neat, towerize the miggy or something like that. But it is what it is. I see where Jens is going, and I'm buying a couple anyways. not that I ever would put anything but a CF card on it. _but_ if i wanted to route the cf card somewhere, like outside the machine i can't with a permanently mounted one without a cf card extender which isn't exactly that commonplace compared to a pata solution.

[Orcish75]

+1 vote to 40 pin IDE.

Yup, if a 44 pin connector is a no-go, then a 40 pin connector is the next best thing. At least this way you can still have a slave device, CD-ROM, extra CF adapter etc. I'd like to set up my A500 in much the same way as my A1200 with a dual CF adapter.

This way you can have one CF card permanently in the machine as the main HDD and then have the second slot accessible from the outside to transfer data from your PC or other Amigas.

[moijk]

Originally Posted by Calabazam

About that IDE/CF port:
* actually, CF are not as reliable as they say. I have here a drawer full of dead CF

Wow, what do you do with CFs? I am a hobby photographer but never even had a cf or any other flash media fail on me - they are usually retired way before their mbtf. but I'm only loading a 1-8 gb each time i'm out shooting so it is nothing compared what the regular amiga user needs apparently.

I have probably several dozens of them in use in different cameras and apparatus. And you've worn out several dozens?!? I'm impressed!

[Retrofan]

Originally Posted by moijk

I have probably several dozens of them in use in different cameras and apparatus. And you've worn out several dozens?!? I'm impressed!

I agree. I "only" fried 2 of them when I had a short. And it was very very sad, they aren't cheap, you know? On the other hand, I've got a working 32GB Trascend CF which I've formatted some hundred times.

[demolition]

I have never destroyed a memory card. The oldest I have is a ~10 year old 256MB Sandisk CF card. It is really slow, like 15kB/s when moving small files, but I think it was always very slow and besides that it still works fine. I have used it to transfer adf files a few times to the Amiga, although it has now been replaced by a 2GB card, mainly due to the slow speed.

[lukassid]

Geez, there is no way of pleasing everyone.

[demolition]

There never is.

But I think most people can learn to live with a solution that they maybe did not prefer. I think his reason for not wanting to use a 44 pin connector is very reasonable though and I can only hope for a 40 pin connector as the next best thing (although this might encourage users to put 3½" HDDs in their A500?). Always assume that customers do stupid things and violate the instructions. That's how Toyota got their reputation for quality.

Originally Posted by moijk

Wow, what do you do with CFs? I am a hobby photographer but never even had a cf or any other flash media fail on me - they are usually retired way before their mbtf. but I'm only loading a 1-8 gb each time i'm out shooting so it is nothing compared what the regular amiga user needs apparently.

I have probably several dozens of them in use in different cameras and apparatus. And you've worn out several dozens?!? I'm impressed!

Why the sarcasm? Personally, I like old things... Amiga's being one of them. CF drives weren't around in the Amiga days, so personally I'd like to keep it as "late 80's early 90's" as possible, which means a real H.D.D..
Besides, if I'm honest I like my Amiga's to be as heavy as possible. I don't like anything that's light, as light stuff to me tends to feel cheap. It's just a matter of personal taste.

[utri007]

ACA500 could easily be most important product.

A500 is best sold amiga model, there are millions of A500 laying around. As a bad thing about A500 it is the least interesting amiga model.

IF price of ACA500 is adorable, someting like 50-80€ it could gain some interest outside of amiga community. CF without IDE is OK, it is easy to use and install.

Would it be that it could came with CF card wich has a pre installed enviroment? Something like easy hd preparation tools? games? whdload? Wb pimping tools?

It all about software, not a hardware

[lukassid]

Jens said that you can't plug anything power hungry to this card. People would start plug in Cd roms and hard drives with 2.5a brick you know what would happen. Cf becomes sort of standard in A600/1200 world anyway as its small SSD IDE hard drive really.

[moijk]

Originally Posted by paul1981

Why the sarcasm? Personally, I like old things... Amiga's being one of them. CF drives weren't around in the Amiga days, so personally I'd like to keep it as "late 80's early 90's" as possible, which means a real H.D.D..
Besides, if I'm honest I like my Amiga's to be as heavy as possible. I don't like anything that's light, as light stuff to me tends to feel cheap. It's just a matter of personal taste.

The sarcasm was about having a drawer full of dead cf cards. I find that not very plausible unless your doing something to the cards they weren't designed for (and would likewise kill a harddrive). I understand people wanting ide. I just don't buy into the "cf cards isn't realible" stuff.

Like the fact that people wanting cdrom on their a500 to make it a cdtv can't do that with the cf card slot.

[moijk]

Originally Posted by Retrofan

And it was very very sad, they aren't cheap, you know?

Well, in my eyes they are very cheap. however, in the store i buy most of mine the sandisk ultra (cf) is as fast as the sandisk extreme (sd) but twice as expensive. (30MB/s)

So I'd take SD cards over CF cards because of that. it exists sd to cf adapters but the ones i've seen reviewed has been a huge bottleneck speedwise. not that i think it'll matter when the controller can only read at a fraction of the bottleneck-speed. So just have to remember to take the sd card out of the adapter if one want full speed when connecting to the pc to transfer whatever.

[Schoenfeld]

Originally Posted by Crumb

Couldn't be possible to disable ACA500 rom so Blizzard boots?

One more time: The ACA500 $f0 ROM is switched off by the Blizzard card anyway. What's happening is that the Blizzard ROM crashes, because it does not like something in the A500. There is nothing that an adapter can do about the underlying computer, and there is nothing that an adapter can do about the software in a ROM that it doesn't have control over.

The Blizzard 1230-IV ROM is written for the A1200. I currently have no idea where exactly it fails, but it does, and debugging that would mean a lot of time that I'm not willing to invest. You're free to do so, as removing the SIMM from the Blizzard lets you boot the system, creating a basis for debugging.

Jens

[Calabazam]

Originally Posted by Retrofan

I agree. I "only" fried 2 of them when I had a short. And it was very very sad, they aren't cheap, you know? On the other hand, I've got a working 32GB Trascend CF which I've formatted some hundred times.

Most of them died while modifying partitions with HDToolbox, some because of a crash during a drive access, and some just died all alone.
When something goes wrong with a CF it seem to be worthless to try to reparition/reformat the card either on amiga, PC or any card reader. I even tried to reformat them in a camera with no success.

Besides, with Cf, there is always a doubt about its genuinity, with all the fakes made in China.

Trashing several 16 and 32 GB CF gets really expansive in the long term.

Meanwhile, i had only one hard drive definitly dead in more than 20 years, and it was because of a loose screw which shorted the drive's PCB.

A real computer deserves a real hard drive.

[Calabazam]

Originally Posted by lukassid

Jens said that you can't plug anything power hungry to this card. People would start plug in Cd roms and hard drives with 2.5a brick you know what would happen. Cf becomes sort of standard in A600/1200 world anyway as its small SSD IDE hard drive really.

Yet a mere less powerful A600/A1200 brick can power a 2,5' hard drive on an A600/1200 with no problem.

[Calabazam]

Originally Posted by moijk

The sarcasm was about having a drawer full of dead cf cards. I find that not very plausible unless your doing something to the cards they weren't designed for (and would likewise kill a harddrive). I understand people wanting ide. I just don't buy into the "cf cards isn't realible" stuff.

Like the fact that people wanting cdrom on their a500 to make it a cdtv can't do that with the cf card slot.

Yeah i did something that the cards were not designed for: i used them on an Amiga and i partitionned and formatted them with tools from 1985-1993.

[Calabazam]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

One more time: The ACA500 $f0 ROM is switched off by the Blizzard card anyway. What's happening is that the Blizzard ROM crashes, because it does not like something in the A500. There is nothing that an adapter can do about the underlying computer, and there is nothing that an adapter can do about the software in a ROM that it doesn't have control over.

The Blizzard 1230-IV ROM is written for the A1200. I currently have no idea where exactly it fails, but it does, and debugging that would mean a lot of time that I'm not willing to invest. You're free to do so, as removing the SIMM from the Blizzard lets you boot the system, creating a basis for debugging.

Jens

If you think about redesigning the whole ACA500, what do you think of an external device for the side expansion slot?
This could save all power problems with an external PSU. No need to open the computer for those who are afraid of that. Room for hard drive or any type of connector (USB, Indivision ECS, etc).

[Mr B]

Originally Posted by Calabazam

Yeah i did something that the cards were not designed for: i used them on an Amiga and i partitionned and formatted them with tools from 1985-1993.

So what your saying is that there is actually nothing wrong with the CF's but that they "stopped working" possibly as a result of erroneous config, or more likely, as a result of FFS crapping out? How to fix this more then likely needs it own thread, but there is nothing the Amiga does that kills the CF hardware, except the very small possibility of a hardware defect in the Amiga that would also kill a physical drive. I'm just guessing here, but it's more likely that you did something wrong, then that your CF / Amiga did it.

I'm not sure what makes you think CF's weren't designed for use as storage in embedded devices. This is one of the main reasons for including ATA specs in the design, just like the new CF standard includes sATA. CFA's stand on this is that CF's are aimed at the embedded market, they name networking routers and switches, factory automation control systems and medical devices as candidates, and i'm fairly certain they wouldn't object to our uses. Which as a nice bonus means nobody can deny you warranty based on that you used it in a Amiga.