FastATA along with Indivision MK2cr and Mediator

jurassicman · 15 January 2019, 17:48

Hello guys,
I've been told by the always kind and fast Elbox Support that, in order to use a FastATA on my BlackBox1200 with an Indivision MK2cr (with ratte switch monitor) and a Mediator PCI TX Black I have to use this ROM risers and this Mediator riser kit.
While I perfectly understand the use of the ROM risers, needed to avoid contact between the FastATA and the Indivision AGA MK2cr, I don't understand how it is possible to lift the Mediator without having problems with the PCI cards.
If the Mediator is lifted about 1.1 cm I think that the PCI cards won't be at the same height of the slots in the rear panel, will they?
If someone already tried this configuration, could they, please, confirm that it works well?

indigolemon · 15 January 2019, 19:39

I believe the idea is that you screw spacers in where the card retaining screws would normally go to raise that fixing the correct amount also.

It's an awful solution, imo, I've been playing with a board to relocate the KS sockets out from under the Mediator, but having little success with it.

jurassicman · 15 January 2019, 20:27

Yes it doesn't sound like a neat solution... I think that a board to relocate the KS socket would be much better but is it so difficult to do? And nobody else has my issue?
I've tried to fit everything under the Mediator lifting a bit the FastATA with some risers but all cards were very close and I couldn't leave them that way...

Daedalus · 15 January 2019, 22:02

The FastATA is *extremely* sensitive as it is, with signals so marginal that sometimes even in the normal Kickstart sockets they don't behave well, needing a socket replacement to get good enough contact to be reliable. A Kickstart relocator board just adds an extra contact into all of those signal paths, as well as extra traces for picking up noise and reducing the supply voltage. It's something I'd love to have more free time to work on, but as it stands, it's just not reliable.

indigolemon · 15 January 2019, 23:33

Yes to clarify, by "I've been playing with a board" I mean Daedalus has pretty much designed and built a board, and I've tried it in my 1200

No joy so far, so I've gone back to the on-board IDE with IDEFix, maxing out at 2.5Mb/s sadly.

Ideally, I would love to find an IDEFix Express - sidestep this altogether!

wiz12 · 15 January 2019, 23:38

It is possible to combine everything together but not easy. Coincidentally, today I just finished the hardware side of it but now need to find time to test everything.

It involves hardware modifications though and is not for the faint of heart. The kickstart socket needs to be replaced with a wire wrap (long pin) socket cut at an angle so the FastATA can sit above the Indivision AGA. Details are on this thread.

The FastATA will then sit on these new sockets but itself needs to be hacked. The IDE headers need to be removed as they are too high and touch the bottom of the Mediator. IDE ribbon cables for the Hard Drive and CD Drive then need to be soldered directly into the FastATA header ports.

The Mediator should then sit nicely above everything giving enough clearance for PCI cards to fit in the case. I'll try post some pictures when I get a chance.

jurassicman · 16 January 2019, 20:13

Thanks guys for your replies... it is quite sad that it is so difficult to setup together those components.
What about this riser?
I really don't understand how it is supposed to work. Would it be useful with Fastata, Indivision and Mediator?

16 January 2019, 20:29

There is a video of a person on youtube that puts a FastATA 1200 inside an amiga 1200. His drive without fast ATA has a throughput of 1.5Mb/s. With the fastATA is about 6.5 Mb/s. The place where he expected an performance increase (WB), however didn't get significantly faster. I read the Elbox specifications and it more or less suggests that you get a great speed improvement when copying data from IDE to IDE. I am not really sure if the amiga motherboard can handle throughputs of 6.5 MB/s from disk to ram.

The conclusion of the men in the youtube video: not worth the money. Given the problems you get with fitting in the board on rom risers, using clockport risers for the clockport you can reconsider the fast ATA board.

fgh · 17 January 2019, 23:13

User Yulquen74 made a new FastATA PCB with better tracks that fit with the indivision.
You need to move everything over from your FastATA though, so not a job for everyone

He has plenty of PCB’s left..

indigolemon · 17 January 2019, 23:39

Interesting! Is there a thread where he shows this?

fgh · 17 January 2019, 23:42

No, I don’t think so.
I can make a photo of mine on saturday.
Didn’t populate the PCB yet, though..

jurassicman · 17 January 2019, 23:52

@fgh
That's very interesting, mate!
Please, post a picture of that pcb as soon as you have some spare time. I still have a FastATA that doesn't work anymore due to some issue on the pcb and I could ask a technician to move the chips on the other pcb...

fgh · 20 January 2019, 23:14

Here is the PCB.
It’s a four layer board and should be a bit more stable than the original. (plus fit with indivision)

jurassicman · 20 January 2019, 23:31

Thanks fgh! This looks very interesting!

indigolemon · 20 January 2019, 23:33

That looks ace, did you say he had more PCBs ?

lord of time · 21 January 2019, 12:40

how about some nice fpga replacements for those original chips? maybe a new fpga based fast ATA board?

fgh · 21 January 2019, 12:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by lord of time

how about some nice fpga replacements for those original chips? maybe a new fpga based fast ATA board?

Go for it, you can do it!

Marlon_ · 21 January 2019, 12:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by fgh

User Yulquen74 made a new FastATA PCB with better tracks that fit with the indivision.
You need to move everything over from your FastATA though, so not a job for everyone

He has plenty of PCB’s left..

Is there a thread where he sells them? Could you provide a link?

fgh · 21 January 2019, 13:46

I don’t think he made a thread about it, but I think he has a more pcbs.
I sent him a link to this thread, so he can take it from here if he want to sell them.

Marlon_ · 21 January 2019, 13:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by fgh

I don’t think he made a thread about it, but I think he has a more pcbs.
I sent him a link to this thread, so he can take it from here if he want to sell them.

Thanks! I have a busted FastATA MK-V PCB and I need to relocate due to Indivision anyway. So this would be a great replacement.

15 January 2019, 17:48	#1
jurassicman Registered User Join Date: Dec 2017 Location: Sassari/Italy Posts: 873	FastATA along with Indivision MK2cr and Mediator Hello guys, I've been told by the always kind and fast Elbox Support that, in order to use a FastATA on my BlackBox1200 with an Indivision MK2cr (with ratte switch monitor) and a Mediator PCI TX Black I have to use this ROM risers and this Mediator riser kit. While I perfectly understand the use of the ROM risers, needed to avoid contact between the FastATA and the Indivision AGA MK2cr, I don't understand how it is possible to lift the Mediator without having problems with the PCI cards. If the Mediator is lifted about 1.1 cm I think that the PCI cards won't be at the same height of the slots in the rear panel, will they? If someone already tried this configuration, could they, please, confirm that it works well?

20 January 2019, 23:14	#13
fgh Registered User Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Norway Posts: 820	Here is the PCB. It’s a four layer board and should be a bit more stable than the original. (plus fit with indivision) Attached Thumbnails Last edited by fgh; 20 January 2019 at 23:21.

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15 January 2019, 19:39	#2
indigolemon Bit Copying Bard Join Date: Jan 2017 Location: Kelty, Fife, Scotland Age: 41 Posts: 1,293	I believe the idea is that you screw spacers in where the card retaining screws would normally go to raise that fixing the correct amount also. It's an awful solution, imo, I've been playing with a board to relocate the KS sockets out from under the Mediator, but having little success with it.

15 January 2019, 20:27	#3
jurassicman Registered User Join Date: Dec 2017 Location: Sassari/Italy Posts: 873	Yes it doesn't sound like a neat solution... I think that a board to relocate the KS socket would be much better but is it so difficult to do? And nobody else has my issue? I've tried to fit everything under the Mediator lifting a bit the FastATA with some risers but all cards were very close and I couldn't leave them that way...

15 January 2019, 22:02	#4
Daedalus Registered User Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Dublin, then Glasgow Posts: 6,351	The FastATA is extremely sensitive as it is, with signals so marginal that sometimes even in the normal Kickstart sockets they don't behave well, needing a socket replacement to get good enough contact to be reliable. A Kickstart relocator board just adds an extra contact into all of those signal paths, as well as extra traces for picking up noise and reducing the supply voltage. It's something I'd love to have more free time to work on, but as it stands, it's just not reliable.

15 January 2019, 23:33	#5
indigolemon Bit Copying Bard Join Date: Jan 2017 Location: Kelty, Fife, Scotland Age: 41 Posts: 1,293	Yes to clarify, by "I've been playing with a board" I mean Daedalus has pretty much designed and built a board, and I've tried it in my 1200 No joy so far, so I've gone back to the on-board IDE with IDEFix, maxing out at 2.5Mb/s sadly. Ideally, I would love to find an IDEFix Express - sidestep this altogether!

15 January 2019, 23:38	#6
wiz12 Registered User Join Date: Feb 2017 Location: Ireland Posts: 753	It is possible to combine everything together but not easy. Coincidentally, today I just finished the hardware side of it but now need to find time to test everything. It involves hardware modifications though and is not for the faint of heart. The kickstart socket needs to be replaced with a wire wrap (long pin) socket cut at an angle so the FastATA can sit above the Indivision AGA. Details are on this thread. The FastATA will then sit on these new sockets but itself needs to be hacked. The IDE headers need to be removed as they are too high and touch the bottom of the Mediator. IDE ribbon cables for the Hard Drive and CD Drive then need to be soldered directly into the FastATA header ports. The Mediator should then sit nicely above everything giving enough clearance for PCI cards to fit in the case. I'll try post some pictures when I get a chance.

16 January 2019, 20:13	#7
jurassicman Registered User Join Date: Dec 2017 Location: Sassari/Italy Posts: 873	Thanks guys for your replies... it is quite sad that it is so difficult to setup together those components. What about this riser? I really don't understand how it is supposed to work. Would it be useful with Fastata, Indivision and Mediator?

16 January 2019, 20:29	#8
Syntrax Posts: n/a	There is a video of a person on youtube that puts a FastATA 1200 inside an amiga 1200. His drive without fast ATA has a throughput of 1.5Mb/s. With the fastATA is about 6.5 Mb/s. The place where he expected an performance increase (WB), however didn't get significantly faster. I read the Elbox specifications and it more or less suggests that you get a great speed improvement when copying data from IDE to IDE. I am not really sure if the amiga motherboard can handle throughputs of 6.5 MB/s from disk to ram. The conclusion of the men in the youtube video: not worth the money. Given the problems you get with fitting in the board on rom risers, using clockport risers for the clockport you can reconsider the fast ATA board.

17 January 2019, 23:13	#9
fgh Registered User Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Norway Posts: 820	User Yulquen74 made a new FastATA PCB with better tracks that fit with the indivision. You need to move everything over from your FastATA though, so not a job for everyone He has plenty of PCB’s left..

17 January 2019, 23:39	#10
indigolemon Bit Copying Bard Join Date: Jan 2017 Location: Kelty, Fife, Scotland Age: 41 Posts: 1,293	Interesting! Is there a thread where he shows this?

17 January 2019, 23:42	#11
fgh Registered User Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Norway Posts: 820	No, I don’t think so. I can make a photo of mine on saturday. Didn’t populate the PCB yet, though..

17 January 2019, 23:52	#12
jurassicman Registered User Join Date: Dec 2017 Location: Sassari/Italy Posts: 873	@fgh That's very interesting, mate! Please, post a picture of that pcb as soon as you have some spare time. I still have a FastATA that doesn't work anymore due to some issue on the pcb and I could ask a technician to move the chips on the other pcb...

20 January 2019, 23:31	#14
jurassicman Registered User Join Date: Dec 2017 Location: Sassari/Italy Posts: 873	Thanks fgh! This looks very interesting!

20 January 2019, 23:33	#15
indigolemon Bit Copying Bard Join Date: Jan 2017 Location: Kelty, Fife, Scotland Age: 41 Posts: 1,293	That looks ace, did you say he had more PCBs ?

21 January 2019, 12:40	#16
lord of time Banned Join Date: Mar 2016 Location: wolverhampton Posts: 153	how about some nice fpga replacements for those original chips? maybe a new fpga based fast ATA board?

21 January 2019, 13:46	#19
fgh Registered User Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Norway Posts: 820	I don’t think he made a thread about it, but I think he has a more pcbs. I sent him a link to this thread, so he can take it from here if he want to sell them.

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