Apollo Team announces the Vampire V4

[IanP]

I guess as it became clear that the V1200 would need a newer FPGA (the Cyclone 3 is getting long in the tooth) it is easier to evolve the design of the V500V2+ to the V500V4/Standalone than to go straight to the V1200. Also avoiding the issue of 1200 trapdoor connector supplies a little longer.

500's are (relatively) cheap and plentiful in Europe with beefy PSUs which makes them an ideal target machine. Their lack of AGA or easy hardrive upgrade has made them less attractive than the A1200 until now (A1200 still has the edge on size though but with a Vampire in a 500 it's about the only edge left).

[E-Penguin]

It's the size that makes the A600 the perfect Vampire machine, for me. One can fit more of them on one's desk...

[Amigajay]

How much are we talking £200?

[talybont]

Originally Posted by Amigajay

How much are we talking £200?

From the announcement PDF:

"Price is actually not set. Expect an increase in price due to higher specification of Vampire V4 than current Vampire 600 V2 and Vampire 500 V2+."

Amiga Kit sells the Vampire V500 V2+ for £299.99.

[Amigajay]

Originally Posted by talybont

From the announcement PDF:

"Price is actually not set. Expect an increase in price due to higher specification of Vampire V4 than current Vampire 600 V2 and Vampire 500 V2+."

Amiga Kit sells the Vampire V500 V2+ for £299.99.

Ok thanks.

Say i would go for the stand alone model, how would it compare to something like the FPGA Arcade Replay in terms of features?

[Samurai_Crow]

The FPGA Arcade replay board has a smaller FPGA than the Vampire 4. It's comparable to the Vampire 2 but doesn't have Gunnar's core design. The advantage of the replay board is that it has many cores of different types. Play the Atari ST games on their native OS rather than the Amiga port. :-P

[idrougge]

Originally Posted by Retrofan

@demolition I thought we all old members could understand what I say without explaining it much. Yes, it's not the same of course, and it will be nice to have it, but I talk just about my feeling using as much of the original hardware as possible. When I don't have nothing visible but a new small plastic box with the Amiga name printed on it, I don't feel anything different from running WinUAE.

Once you make full use of your Vampire, your A1200 is basically degraded to a more power-hungry version of the Keyrah.

[ElectroBlaster]

For a second I was jumping around thinking "Yes at least the a1200 version" but now I am not so excited reading that 1200 owners have been waiting already for the v2. There is another reason, how will this board connect to the a1200? They were having serious issues finding edge connectors afaik?

The only company/person I know of that can acquire these connectors new is Indie/Jens. Correct me if I am wrong though!

[Signman]

Originally Posted by Samurai_Crow

The FPGA Arcade replay board has a smaller FPGA than the Vampire 4. It's comparable to the Vampire 2 but doesn't have Gunnar's core design. The advantage of the replay board is that it has many cores of different types. Play the Atari ST games on their native OS rather than the Amiga port. :-P

The replay board has more ports, vga also I believe.

[DDNI]

£299 for the A500 V2. This V4 will be more expensive.
Why not just buy a Rasp Pi v3 and emulate now for under a £100?

[Overflow]

Originally Posted by DDNI

£299 for the A500 V2. This V4 will be more expensive.
Why not just buy a Rasp Pi v3 and emulate now for under a £100?

That option has always been available. Just like WinUAE for many years.
AmigaForever got it all preconfigured, or if you want to go on the cheap, download WinUAE directly and set it up yourself.

Different options for different people and purposes with different hardware.

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by talybont

This is a new board designed by Christoph 'Chris' Höhne.

Why is it called Vampire then? I thought Vampire were majsta's accelerators. Vampire V1 for A600 didn't even have Gunnar involved from the get go.

Originally Posted by SvladJelly

We don't hang onto the dream of finally a great accelerator for our classic machines, to go standalone, forgoing our beloved case, beloved keyboard, ports, aga chipset and love we've poured into the machines over the years.

Do you understand how the Vampire works? The A1200's AGA will probably not even be used, especially if you want to use the HDMI out.

Basically your A1200 becomes an I/O unit, none of it is used except the ports. The CPU, the custom chips, all that is gone.

Vampire is NOT an Amiga accelerator. It's a LOT more. It\'s unfair to call it an accelerator, and in my opinion, it's silly to stick it to an old wedge to run.

If you really want the feeling of Amiga, you should stomach the slow speeds and do things available in 1990, not 2017

Originally Posted by DDNI

Why not just buy a Rasp Pi v3 and emulate now for under a £100?

Because Raspberry Pi Amiga emulation is just not there yet. Sure, I hope it keeps being worked on and improves, but, not now.

At more than £300 there's no way I'd justify this though. I like the idea of standalone, but I rather get an Arcade FPGA.

[Signman]

Right, if it is a stand alone it is no longer a "vampire".

Using a PI emulator is pretty good, I use Amibian. Just a lot of issues come up eventually, though some show up under my Vampire to.

[demolition]

Originally Posted by DDNI

£299 for the A500 V2. This V4 will be more expensive.
Why not just buy a Rasp Pi v3 and emulate now for under a £100?

So if someone says they'd like to buy the new Tesla 3 car but there's a waiting list and it's a lot of money, you suggest they should just go buy a scooter instead? It's cheaper, you can get it immediately and gets you from A to B..

[PortuguesePilot]

Will the stand-alone Vampire V4 work with a Gotek drive? And will it be ATXable?

[Samurai_Crow]

Originally Posted by PortuguesePilot

Will the stand-alone Vampire V4 work with a Gotek drive? And will it be ATXable?

Motherboard dimensions are given in a PDF file linked in the Apollo accelerator forum post. I don't think floppy drive connections are available for the Gotek drive but ADF mount might help avoid the need for one anyway.

[demolition]

Originally Posted by PortuguesePilot

Will the stand-alone Vampire V4 work with a Gotek drive? And will it be ATXable?

I also don't see that it contains a standard floppy header.

Someone might make a special floppy emulator, could be based on the Gotek, which can interface to one of the other IO connectors on the Vampire. It doesn't need to use a 34-pin connector though as the interface can be redesigned to use much fewer pins if you have full control over both ends. It would even be possible to make it work with as little as 2-4 pins using some serial interface.

Another solution could also be to make some external PCB which would interface to a couple of Vampire IO pins and convert it to a regular 34 pin floppy connector.

[wawa]

Originally Posted by DDNI

£299 for the A500 V2. This V4 will be more expensive.
Why not just buy a Rasp Pi v3 and emulate now for under a £100?

why does that bother you?

[Allen1]

I think that for myself, I will just sit back and see what happens. I had really looked forward to getting a V2 for one of my 600's but after a year and a half waiting in line, that's never going to happen but hell, I don't really have the time to play with the goodies I already have!

I've enjoyed getting memory expansions and an accelerator for my 1200's also playing with my Minimig and emulating on my old Xbox via Coin Ops so basically anything I could ever want to do is already do-able without spending more on extra hardware. A lot of fun has been had playing with the different computers, the only thing I would probably buy now is a licence to flash one of my goteks to HxC.

I wish this project all the very best and hope it becomes even more popular than the V2 500/600 versions but for now, I have more than enough to keep me entertained already.

[Retrofan]

The FPGA allows them to emulate whatever new/old hardware. The thing is that it allows them to substitute or add new features. I don't know if getting Saga could be possible with real hardware.

I just think that it is like if you lose your legs in an accident, and then your insurance allows you to get some bionic ones instead and the company has two different models. Then let's say that you could get some new legs that could behave just exactly the same... but once you are on it... Why not running twice faster with the second model?. That's the point I believe.

It would be extremely easy for them to run a Vampire just like a cheaper and faster accelerator not adding anything new, but I believe that we all just prefer to run twice faster.