030 for A500 with no FastRAM or IDE

Sim085 · 01 August 2020, 18:23

I have an A500 with an external Hard Disk (connected to the side) which gives me 8MB FastRAM and SCSI. At the moment I have a 68010 which obviously runs as 7Mhz. Now I know there are are cards that give you 030+IDE+FastRAM as I am planning to get one of these for another A500 I have. However for this A500 I wanted to keep my current setup with the external Hard Disk. I was therefore wondering, is there a card which comes without FastRAM and IDE, just has a slot for an 030 (or even an 020) but possibly running at more than 7MHz? Would such a setup even work given this would be using the FastRAM and IDE from the external Hard Disk?

pipper · 01 August 2020, 18:51

Who is to say you can’t use both, the external hard disk controller and an internal accelerator with fast ram? Even if it comes with IDE, you don’t _have_ to use that. But I would strongly suggest having additional fast ram on the accelerator board as it is usually the fastest ram accessible to the CPU.

Jope · 02 August 2020, 07:54

Also be careful when adding a turbo card with an AmigaBUS SCSI controller. If your SCSI controller is DMA, it will usually fail once the turbo card is installed. Sometimes even PIO controllers will stop working. The A500 is not very nice to expand in this sense, usually it's either or. :-)

Sometimes it is possible to get it running if you have some 16 bit FAST on the SCSI controller and limit it with the mask setting in your partitions.

hooverphonique · 02 August 2020, 15:08

There wouldn't be much point in an 030 without local fast ram - your external 8MB would slow it down..

Sim085 · 02 August 2020, 16:47

Well to be honest I am more in to this for the "oh look it works" while preserving the current setup rather than some big speed increase. Therefore was just wondering if there was some "prototype" 030 out there with no-FastRAM and IDE which I could just pop in.

Quote:

Originally Posted by hooverphonique

There wouldn't be much point in an 030 without local fast ram - your external 8MB would slow it down..

AmigaHope · 04 August 2020, 16:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jope

Sometimes it is possible to get it running if you have some 16 bit FAST on the SCSI controller and limit it with the mask setting in your partitions.

This. ^^^^^ If the driver is even remotely properly coded, setting a 24-bit DMA mask in the RDB will make it work.

Sim085 · 05 August 2020, 12:24

I have been going through the Amiga Hardware Database to see if I can find any examples of what I might be looking for. I know these are impossible to get, but since they existed maybe someone would know if they would work or not in the hypothetical setup I am imagining. The examples I found are not 030 so for the moment ignore the thread title about the 030 part. As I said I am not really after speed.

So I have an A500 with an external HDD with 8MB FastRAM.

If it was 1992 and I went to buy ICD AdSpeed (link) would the setup work? This accelerates the A500 to 14Mhz and page says that it has "32 kB SRAM (16 kB cache and 16 kB of cache tags) which reduces the time required to read and write to Fast RAM". So would a setup with an external HDD and AdSpeed have worked?

I also found Creative Microsystems PAMC-500 (link) and Evolution Computer Systems Avanti (link). Both of these are similar to AdSpeed, that is - they do not come with any FastRAM on-board and increase the speed of the machine to 14Mhz. These however also provide the option to add an FPU to the system as well.

Edit:

Well with regards to AdSpeed I did found the following on another thread "So far, that's the most incompatible piece of hardware I've used on an Amiga yet".

cypher007 · 05 August 2020, 12:49

i have an A500 rev 5 with an addspeed/ide. i started off with just an addspeed then sent it away to the states with some money to get it replaced with an addspeed/ide.

they do work and make some games like Elite much more playable. but i did need to fit a switch to toggle the speed as some games and loaders dont like the timing going out. even my WB 3.1 setup with a command to load the ram in a contiguous block so i have 1mb chip and 3.5mb fast, i have a baseboard 4mb ram card in the trapdoor, hangs if its on at startup. i can run a command to toggle it i think so need to put that before and after the ram command.

i do wonder if it would be possible to make a modern version using a HC 68000 which i think can be clocked at 28mhz, as its a cmos version of the 68000.

indigolemon · 05 August 2020, 13:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by cypher007

i do wonder if it would be possible to make a modern version using a HC 68000 which i think can be clocked at 28mhz, as its a cmos version of the 68000.

Essentially this without the RAM? https://sordan.ie/product/583/turbo-...ide-amiga-500/

01 August 2020, 18:23	#1
Sim085 Registered User Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: N/A Posts: 962	030 for A500 with no FastRAM or IDE I have an A500 with an external Hard Disk (connected to the side) which gives me 8MB FastRAM and SCSI. At the moment I have a 68010 which obviously runs as 7Mhz. Now I know there are are cards that give you 030+IDE+FastRAM as I am planning to get one of these for another A500 I have. However for this A500 I wanted to keep my current setup with the external Hard Disk. I was therefore wondering, is there a card which comes without FastRAM and IDE, just has a slot for an 030 (or even an 020) but possibly running at more than 7MHz? Would such a setup even work given this would be using the FastRAM and IDE from the external Hard Disk?

05 August 2020, 12:24	#7
Sim085 Registered User Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: N/A Posts: 962	I have been going through the Amiga Hardware Database to see if I can find any examples of what I might be looking for. I know these are impossible to get, but since they existed maybe someone would know if they would work or not in the hypothetical setup I am imagining. The examples I found are not 030 so for the moment ignore the thread title about the 030 part. As I said I am not really after speed. So I have an A500 with an external HDD with 8MB FastRAM. If it was 1992 and I went to buy ICD AdSpeed (link) would the setup work? This accelerates the A500 to 14Mhz and page says that it has "32 kB SRAM (16 kB cache and 16 kB of cache tags) which reduces the time required to read and write to Fast RAM". So would a setup with an external HDD and AdSpeed have worked? I also found Creative Microsystems PAMC-500 (link) and Evolution Computer Systems Avanti (link). Both of these are similar to AdSpeed, that is - they do not come with any FastRAM on-board and increase the speed of the machine to 14Mhz. These however also provide the option to add an FPU to the system as well. Edit: Well with regards to AdSpeed I did found the following on another thread "So far, that's the most incompatible piece of hardware I've used on an Amiga yet". Last edited by Sim085; 05 August 2020 at 12:47.

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01 August 2020, 18:51	#2
pipper Registered User Join Date: Jul 2017 Location: San Jose Posts: 657	Who is to say you can’t use both, the external hard disk controller and an internal accelerator with fast ram? Even if it comes with IDE, you don’t _have_ to use that. But I would strongly suggest having additional fast ram on the accelerator board as it is usually the fastest ram accessible to the CPU.

02 August 2020, 07:54	#3
Jope - Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Helsinki / Finland Age: 43 Posts: 9,867	Also be careful when adding a turbo card with an AmigaBUS SCSI controller. If your SCSI controller is DMA, it will usually fail once the turbo card is installed. Sometimes even PIO controllers will stop working. The A500 is not very nice to expand in this sense, usually it's either or. :-) Sometimes it is possible to get it running if you have some 16 bit FAST on the SCSI controller and limit it with the mask setting in your partitions.

02 August 2020, 15:08	#4
hooverphonique ex. demoscener "Bigmama" Join Date: Jun 2012 Location: Fyn / Denmark Posts: 1,624	There wouldn't be much point in an 030 without local fast ram - your external 8MB would slow it down..

05 August 2020, 12:49	#8
cypher007 Registered User Join Date: Jan 2017 Location: uk Posts: 150	i have an A500 rev 5 with an addspeed/ide. i started off with just an addspeed then sent it away to the states with some money to get it replaced with an addspeed/ide. they do work and make some games like Elite much more playable. but i did need to fit a switch to toggle the speed as some games and loaders dont like the timing going out. even my WB 3.1 setup with a command to load the ram in a contiguous block so i have 1mb chip and 3.5mb fast, i have a baseboard 4mb ram card in the trapdoor, hangs if its on at startup. i can run a command to toggle it i think so need to put that before and after the ram command. i do wonder if it would be possible to make a modern version using a HC 68000 which i think can be clocked at 28mhz, as its a cmos version of the 68000.

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