New products for C64 and Amiga from Individual Computers

[Lord Aga]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

This is the part where "advertising" comes in: Make it cheap, make it seen on other channels as well, and we gain a few new faces in our groups. That's the whole target of making the ACA500. If it was just for the existing customers, I could care less about the A500, as you guys all have a maxed-out A1200 at home already.

Jens

Well, I have a piss-poor A1200, but I do agree with you Jens
Just keep going, we appreciate it

[utri007]

Nice card, but there is plenty of space inside of A500 and this design is UGLY and will be UGLY no matter what you do.

This might close out those who could buy this just for nostalgic reasons and dig out their rusty old A500 from cabinet. There are thousands of retired hobbyists out there, many times more than current user base.

[dJOS]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

If it was just for the existing customers, I could care less about the A500, as you guys all have a maxed-out A1200 at home already.

Jens

Sorry but I call BS on that Jens! Many of us (myself included) have 500's and fondest memories of this unit as it was our first Amiga!

Eg I'm just finishing building my 2nd a500 project and have spent many hundreds on parts from Mika, Tom and Brian! Just wonder over to amibay or Amiga.org if you want to see plenty of great a500 projects!

Only now have I ordered an a1200 from Petro!

If I was new to the Amiga retro scene (which i was less than 12 months ago) and your aca500 was available + other bits and peices from those mentioned I'd struggle to justify spending $100aud on your aca500. Reason being its tiny ram, external and its gonna be ugly as hell sticking up like that!

[TCD]

Why on earth do you have to crawl out of your cave again dJOS? Thought you had already given up on the ACA500? Please do and leave this thread to the people who are actually interested in the product.

[Calabazam]

The natural way to expand the A500 is to use the trapdoor for RAM and the side expansion slot for everything else.
This new ACA is 100% real A500 spirit.
It is non sense to remove the internal shielding, cut the case, remove original chips if the expansion side slot is left empty.

[prowler]

Originally Posted by dJOS

...its gonna be ugly as hell sticking up like that!

Didn't the AR cartridge stick up too? I don't remember anyone calling that ugly.

[TotO]

Originally Posted by TheCyberDruid

Why on earth do you have to crawl out of your cave again dJOS? Thought you had already given up on the ACA500? Please do and leave this thread to the people who are actually interested in the product.

THe problem is.. The product as changed since the begin and push the first days interested peoples out.

[dJOS]

Originally Posted by TheCyberDruid

Why on earth do you have to crawl out of your cave again dJOS? Thought you had already given up on the ACA500? Please do and leave this thread to the people who are actually interested in the product.

Jens is demonstrating flawed reasoning, Im just pointing it out along with others - he did ask for feedback after all. Jens has a lot of talent, it's just a shame this product seems to be getting the short thrift from multiple angles!

[dJOS]

Originally Posted by prowler

Didn't the AR cartridge stick up too? I don't remember anyone calling that ugly.

I never had one so wouldnt know - but if it has to be external, just from an aesthetics + historical perspective, imo it really needs to be horizontal like the classic a500 expansions from GVP etc. that way you could have the aca12xx cards mount directly above the aca500 board as was suggested by others.

[prowler]

Originally Posted by dJOS

I never had one so wouldnt know - but just from an aesthetics + historical perspective, imo it really needs to be horizontal like the classic a500 expansions from GVP etc. that way you could have the aca12xx cards mount directly above the aca500 board as was suggested by others.

Maybe the release version will look more like that.

It's probably cheaper to have a vertical configuration for prototyping.


@Thread: There has been a lot of criticism here concerning the ACA500 in particular.

In the interests of healthy debate, it is worth airing your views on the bad features of these new products as well as the good. But please bear in mind that an avalanche of sniping criticism may deter Jens in future from sharing his plans with us during the development phase.

A little more tact wouldn't go amiss sometimes. Thankyou.

[dJOS]

Personally Im trying to be constructive so that we get a great product for the Amiga community that's worth owning - unfortunately from Jens posts he really doesnt seem to "get" a500 owners.

[prowler]

Originally Posted by dJOS

Personally Im trying to be constructive so that we get a great product for the Amiga community that's worth owning - unfortunately from Jens posts he really doesnt seem to "get" a500 owners.

If I were Jens, then I too would find that difficult.

For example, in your above post, first you say:

Originally Posted by dJOS

I'm just finishing building my 2nd a500 project and have spent many hundreds on parts from Mika, Tom and Brian!

However, then you follow that up with:

Originally Posted by dJOS

If I was new to the Amiga retro scene (which i was less than 12 months ago) and your aca500 was available + other bits and peices from those mentioned I'd struggle to justify spending $100aud on your aca500. Reason being its tiny ram, external and its gonna be ugly as hell sticking up like that!

I really can't see that great a contrast between "many hundreds" for those pieces you mention and "$100aud" for the ACA500 with its shortcomings (and bear in mind that the design is not yet frozen).

[Crumb]

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

Unfortunately, there can only be one version: Either this tall version ("prototype 2"), or a flat, wide version. I can't even say which one would be cheaper (I'd guess it's a draw), but that sandwich-solution suggested by Crumb is not an option - it would not help anything (width-problem remains), and on top of that, it would make production a lot more complicated.

If having a sandwitch is not a choice perhaps it could be possible to fit it in just one flat board... it would be slightly wider than the width of an A1200 accelerator but probably simpler and easier to build.

PS: original picture was done by Checker from a1k.org, my ugly red lines show an idea of how big would be the flat ACA500 :-) it probably could be made slightly shorter

[dJOS]

Originally Posted by prowler

If I were Jens, then I too would find that difficult.

Originally Posted by prowler

However, then you follow that up with:

I really can't see that great a contrast between "many hundreds" for those pieces and "$100aud" for the ACA500 with its shortcomings (and bear in mind that the design is not yet frozen).

That's money spent across both of them - prolly an average of $150 each or there abouts. but my point is that from a specs POV aca500 is weak - slightly faster 68k and 2MB of ram + CF-IDE - it's not good value for $100aud when you can get CF-IDE68k + 8MB fast ram + 68010 (for WHDLoad quit key) for the same money.

Having a slightly faster 68k isnt going to fix the problem that a sizable percentage of WHDLoad games were ported for a1200's and require a 68020 to work (they crash out) - there's been about 3 I've come across in the last week (thought my 500+ was faulty at 1st but it was not).

When the pokey little a600 get's a 68020 board with 8mb ram and the capacious and much more awesome a500 doesnt it makes you wonder why Jens is bothering at all. Especially when he makes comments like this:

Originally Posted by Schoenfeld

I could care less about the A500
Jens

PS, I actually like the idea of the a1200 expansion connector but think the basic aca500 unit should be a decent upgrade on it's own.

[dJOS]

Originally Posted by Crumb

If having a sandwitch is not a choice perhaps it could be possible to fit it in just one flat board... it would be slightly wider than the width of an A1200 accelerator but probably simpler and easier to build.

PS: original picture was done by Checker from a1k.org, my ugly red lines show an idea of how big would be the flat ACA500 :-) it probably could be made slightly shorter

Here is what I think some of the others where trying to communicate - please excuse my quick and dirty Paint drawings:



PS, the other option is just build a proper a500 expansion with 020 or better and plenty of ram.

[Mohican]

Originally Posted by Mohican

I think a Pass-Through Adapter would be increase the costs, but a sandwitch solution seems to be safer, and give a simple way to case design.
(Of course the Pass-Through Adapter is an optional add-on, those who have ACA12xx turbocard.)
In this case the ACA500 stay lower price ...

@dJOS

That was my first thought when I saw the prototype. This project is very far away from the original plans and concept. ACA530 -> ACA520 -> ACA500 (internal) -> and now ...
I think the most Amiga 500 owner would like near the same parameters for the A500 as A600/A1200 ... (and if possible than inside the machine)

[dJOS]

Originally Posted by Mohican

@dJOS

That was my first thought when I saw the prototype. This project is very far away from the original plans and concept. ACA530 -> ACA520 -> ACA500 (internal) -> and now ...
Although most of them started the Amiga with an Amiga 500.

My feelings exactly.

[luy32]

just a quick check... A500 + ACA 500 + ACA12xx ....
there will be 3 CPUs...
is there any chance to use all that CPU power at once ???

just wandering ...

[dJOS]

Originally Posted by luy32

just a quick check... A500 + ACA 500 + ACA12xx ....
there will be 3 CPUs...
is there any chance to use all that CPU power at once ???

just wandering ...

LOL, and I got jumped on a few pages back for complaining that an a500 + aca500 + aca12xx would result in 2 redundant CPU's!

[Schoenfeld]

Originally Posted by luy32

just a quick check... A500 + ACA 500 + ACA12xx ....
there will be 3 CPUs...
is there any chance to use all that CPU power at once ???

No chance, sorry. The trick with modern multi-core CPU systems is that each core has it's own address- and data bus (at least on the cache side), so CPUs can run indipendent of each other.

This Amiga setup is using a common address- and data bus for all CPUs. There is no bus arbiter, but only static signals that "shut up" the other CPUs, which is also the reason why any DMA device will not work (such as A570 or A590). A pass-through for the 86-pin slot will not work for the majority of devices, so there will be none.

Jens