Simplest/cheapest hardware add ons allowing WHDLoad on A500?

[Photon]

Basically what everyone's said.

For A500 games:

• The best platform for WHDLoad compatibility (make most slaves work) is actually A1200-030.
• You need a faster CPU to handle the overhead in a few tightly coded top hits
• You need 1MB chipmem even if you run a game written for 512k chipmem. This means A500+ or modded A500 late revision (soldering required).
• You need fastmem to fit WHDLoad and WB and leave 512k fast free for quite a few games.

ACA500Plus does all it can to maximize WHDLoad compatibility however it's still not 100% which is why I don't recommend an A500/+ as a WHDLoad machine.

[Daedalus]

Originally Posted by Retro1234

and if you want to run those 3D Space games faster than they were originally, but thats it.

Sometimes faster than they were is a good thing. Many of the 3D games on the Amiga were actually done properly in that more CPU speed means a higher framerate, but gameplay speed remains the same. So, a faster CPU means nicer gameplay. Of course, it doesn't *need* it, but it makes a game much, much better. Frontier is more or less a slideshow on a stock A500, but becomes playable on a stock A1200, and nice and smooth on a 68030 Amiga.

It's not limited to 3D games either - many games where a lot happens or there's heavy AI also benefit from more CPU speed. Games like Settlers, Syndicate, Theme Park (though I much prefer the AGA version) and Dune 2 are all 2D OCS/ECS games that are made more playable with an accelerator.

Just pointing out as a fairly common misconception is WHDload needs an accelerator which obviously you dont.

That's fair enough, but it wasn't really how it came across.

[Retro1234]

Sorry that's not alot of games and the majority of games show no speed increase on higher CPUs I've asked about this before and been told it's because of the Blitter wait but I don't know.

But its of no interest to me but suggesting a faster CPU is required at extra cost is misleading.

[Daedalus]

They were a few games picked off the top of my head, there are many more, but they're also some of the most popular games on the Amiga, so they are worth more consideration than any of the bland arcade-style shooters or platformers. For example, if a Megadrive emulator worked great for most games but Sonic didn't run well, most people wouldn't consider it much good.

Of course, games that are coded to an exact framerate won't show any difference, and in many cases will slow down, as you correctly point out, due to additional blitter waits introduced by WHDLoad. So, you might be better off with a Gotek instead of a hard drive & WHDLoad for some games if all you have is a standard A500 with some added RAM.

[Retro1234]

Cool .

But while on the subject I will just ask again if anyone wants to answer, why don't ST ports fly on higher CPUs as there pretty much CPU based rather than Blitter (Not just WHDload also Floppy etc)

[Daedalus]

Probably for the same reason lots of Amiga games don't - locked framerates. They're the type of games that get faster when you put a machine in NTSC mode (or slow down in PAL mode if they're NTSC games).

[dreadnought]

Originally Posted by psoma

Your cheapest bet is probably the IDE68K + RAM68K combo which gives you IDE + 8MB Fast RAM on a CPU riser.

Thanks, I heard about this one before. Seems a good solution but a bit too DIY for my non-existent skills, plus I guess Ican stomach that +50E for ACA and its various perks.

Originally Posted by Photon

• You need 1MB chipmem even if you run a game written for 512k chipmem. This means A500+ or modded A500 late revision (soldering required).
• You need fastmem to fit WHDLoad and WB and leave 512k fast free for quite a few games.

ACA500Plus does all it can to maximize WHDLoad compatibility however it's still not 100% which is why I don't recommend an A500/+ as a WHDLoad machine.

Wait, soldering? I thought I have the right model: A500 v6 with that particular ECS Angus. Sysinfo says it's "1 Meg". Something still needs to be done?

I'm not aiming at 100%, 95% perhaps. Also, other folks said I could just use HDD installs, so it does not need exactly to be WHDLoad.

I thought about A1200 but the costs start to spiral this way and there's a risk of getting a dodgy one...

[Photon]

Originally Posted by Retro1234

Sorry that's not alot of games and the majority of games show no speed increase on higher CPUs I've asked about this before and been told it's because of the Blitter wait but I don't know.

But its of no interest to me but suggesting a faster CPU is required at extra cost is misleading.

It's not misleading at all. It's not about a speed increase, you need it to avoid stuttering in some top games that used close to 100% CPU. See my previous post and the details are explained

[Retro1234]

What games? Stuttering???

[psoma]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Wait, soldering? I thought I have the right model: A500 v6 with that particular ECS Angus. Sysinfo says it's "1 Meg". Something still needs to be done?

I'm not aiming at 100%, 95% perhaps. Also, other folks said I could just use HDD installs, so it does not need exactly to be WHDLoad.

Sysinfo will say you have the 1MB Agnus, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you have 1MB of Chip RAM, or are configured to use it. There’s a jumper on the board that needs to be bridged so additional RAM is added as Chip rather than slow fast. You don’t need soldering “skills” to do that, but you will need a soldering iron and some solder.

HDD installs will get you around 50% of the games you’re looking to play (at best). The aim should definitely be WHDLoad if you’re hoping for 95%.

[Toni Wilen]

ACA500plus can optionally convert 0.5M + 0.5M config to 1M chip as long as Agnus is 1M chip RAM capable. Without any hardware modifications.

Includes a 10Mhz 68000 giving you a *slight* processing bump

No, CPU still gets its clock from mainboard. 10MHz only means Motorola rated the CPU as max 10MHz capable.

[psoma]

Originally Posted by Toni Wilen

No, CPU still gets its clock from mainboard. 10MHz only means Motorola rated the CPU as max 10MHz capable.

Ahah, thanks for clarifying Toni - I’ve been living in the age of auto-configuring CPUs for so long, I forgot how it used to be done!!

Tom

[dreadnought]

Originally Posted by psoma

Sysinfo will say you have the 1MB Agnus, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you have 1MB of Chip RAM, or are configured to use it. There’s a jumper on the board that needs to be bridged so additional RAM is added as Chip rather than slow fast. You don’t need soldering “skills” to do that, but you will need a soldering iron and some solder.

Oh for crying out loud. Are you 100% sure? I was really hoping for a plug'n play solution, they say as much on their site:

"ACA500plus is an external expansion which is plugged to the left expansion port of your A500 or A500+. There is no need to open the computer at any time. This includes a new revolutionary method that can turn your 512k trapdoor memory expansion into chipram! If your Amiga is equipped with an ECS Agnus chip and said internal 512k memory expansion, you can turn your computer into a 1MByte-Chipram computer, just by selecting a menu item in the configuration menu of the ACA500plus! A lot of stock A500 computers with board revision 6 or higher have this exact configuration"

I believe you saying the solder bit is not a big deal but for me it may just be the thing that tips me over the "not buying" side (seeing as this is a big expense which I don't actually really need).

Originally Posted by psoma

HDD installs will get you around 50% of the games you’re looking to play (at best). The aim should definitely be WHDLoad if you’re hoping for 95%.

Can I not combine these two methods, ie use HDD for the WHDLoad games which may not work?

[Retro1234]

WHDload is the most popular with good reason but there are other methods and you can use any method you want i.e combined.

My A600 is probably still 80% JST and then WHDload and other for the rest.

[LezRed]

Just an out there thought... and maybe not a popular one for some but...

My MIST is a great little gaming device and works well with both WHDLoad and ADF files. I've managed to get nearly all OCS, ECS, & AGA games working and it can be set to run at more or less stock A500 speeds or something similar to an 020 @ 33MHz A1200.

It was more expensive than my ACA500plus but much cheaper than an expanded A1200. I use it more often than my expanded A500+ :-)

[AmigaHope]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Oh for crying out loud. Are you 100% sure? I was really hoping for a plug'n play solution, they say as much on their site:


I believe you saying the solder bit is not a big deal but for me it may just be the thing that tips me over the "not buying" side (seeing as this is a big expense which I don't actually really need).



Can I not combine these two methods, ie use HDD for the WHDLoad games which may not work?

I believe ACA 500+ has a hack to get around having to change the solder jumper on Rev 6 A500 for 1M Chip RAM. That said, the jumper change is super super trivial and any 10 year old who's even held a soldering iron can do it. But if you don't want to do it, the ACA claims to fix it for you somehow in software. More importantly it's not like any other product will even attempt this.

(Rev 5 is a different story, involving cutting traces, etc.)

Honestly if you're willing to spend the extra money (which amounts to the money you'd spend going out to eat at a decent metropolitan restaurant) you will be glad you got the ACA because it leaves room for further expansion and includes a *TON* of quality-of-life features that no other device has.

[Jope]

Originally Posted by AmigaHope

(Rev 5 is a different story, involving cutting traces, etc.)

If your trapdoor card has an on/off switch, then it is just as easy or difficult as for the rev6 and onwards. Swapping the Agnus is of course always a bit exciting if it's been in place for 30 years.