Apollo Upgrade Question

[alexh]

If it was a "BYO CPU" product then I'm sure the costs wouldn't be much more than that of the current ACA parts. It would make sense as 68060 CPUs are regularly available cheaply on an individual basis (sub €60) but not in bulk. Plus lots of Amiga owners already have a Rev6 060 or two to hand.

The only cost increase I can see (without looking hard) is the layout would be much more complicated (and thus more expensive) due to the through hole nature of the PGA 68060 vs the surface mount QFP 030. The 060 socket eats up a large amount of routing on all layers.

Possible that the FPGA required to create the 100MHz SDRAM interface and 68060 to Amiga BUS would have to be a higher spec too.

Still I can't see it happening in the short term.

[roy bates]

Originally Posted by alexh

If it was a "BYO CPU" product then I'm sure the costs wouldn't be much more than that of the current ACA parts. It would make sense as 68060 CPUs are regularly available cheaply on an individual basis (sub €60) but not in bulk. Plus lots of Amiga owners already have a Rev6 060 or two to hand.

The only cost increase I can see (without looking hard) is the layout would be much more complicated (and thus more expensive) due to the through hole nature of the PGA 68060 vs the surface mount QFP 030. The 060 socket eats up a large amount of routing on all layers.

Possible that the FPGA required to create the 100MHz SDRAM interface and 68060 to Amiga BUS would have to be a higher spec too.

Still I can't see it happening in the short term.

true,thats why im guessing production would put costs(for parts and labour) after design around 3-400 gb pounds a pop.(for around 150-200 units)at a guess of course(and even more for the 3-4000 amiga with a fast cpu slot)

[moxavius]

An new A4000/060 project would be SWEET. I used to have an A4000T with Cstorm MKIII/CvPPC and I loved it. My wife convinced me to sell it and I've regretted it ever since.

[cpiac64]

interest article in french
http://www.thierry-lequeu.fr/data/DOC-Stack-SYS-Em1.pdf

[roy bates]

Originally Posted by cpiac64

interest article in french
http://www.thierry-lequeu.fr/data/DOC-Stack-SYS-Em1.pdf

the mach130,131 chips on the apollo's cant be read to get the info for programming them.

[cpiac64]

ok

in pdf says that the only difference between mach130 and mach131 is the speed of work, someone with an Apollo 1260 can try to mount the mach130 and turn on the 68060 at 25MHz?

I just adjusted my 1260 try

[jimmer78]

Originally Posted by daxb

Has anyone asked Jens about that? I may wrong but as fas I can remember he bought the design and after that he noticed that he would get in service trouble if he build the cards because of bad design. So, speculate doesn`t help.

About dying Amiga hardware. Sooner or later it happen. Some more or less good alternatives exists.

I asked too, and he seems very logical, and a nice guy:

>
>"Ever since I started my business, I fully supported my customers and always wanted to help to a degree where the customer can use my product(s) to the full extent. And ever since I brought out the first card (Graffiti), I had to face accusations like "your unit is making my computer unstable!".
>
> It took me a few years to realize that all of those people had two things in common:
> - they had an Apollo accelerator
> - they knew that I would help them, no matter what
>
> In the end, I always ended up with dissatisfied customers, because in endless back-and-forth sessions, back when eMail wasn't popular, it turned out that it wasn't my product, but the Apollo card that made the system unstable. Granted, not in all cases, but for the majority of cases.
>
> Now that I have insight into the inner workings, I know that the logic components (MACH chips) are operated way out of their specifications. There may be a few cards that work fine (especially if you find the right memory module), but it takes ages and a load of cards to piece together one working unit.
>
> While building my business in the late 90s, I was watching customers disappear, and I talked to many people who were active programmers. Many of them told me that they lost interest in the Amiga, because it wasn't fun to use any more.
>
> I am now observing the same thing again: People buy a flickerfixer for their A600, which of course requires an A604, and now I get support requests with claims that the memory expansion or the Flickerfixer is not working properly. Guess what type of accelerator these people are using? Now that they have fun using the A600 again (flatscreen makes a huge difference!) they realize that the machine doesn't survive the timespan until the eyes of the user get tired. And of course, it MUST be the new unit that they installed, because everything was working fine before. See the pattern?
>
> Selling parts would mean giving support for a broken-by-design-product. People would expect me to answer questions, program logic chips, claim that the chips don't work - and they would be right, because they are operated out of spec. I'd even violate German laws selling products that are known to not work.
>
> I may or may not make a faster accelerator. It all depends on the spare time I have left after doing work on the Nequester VoIP router - that's where my money comes from. Amiga is a hobby, and it's been a really nice one ever since everybody knows that it's better not to ask me for anything Apollo.
>

>
> ciao,
> --
> Jens Schönfeld"

[roy bates]

Originally Posted by cpiac64

ok

in pdf says that the only difference between mach130 and mach131 is the speed of work, someone with an Apollo 1260 can try to mount the mach130 and turn on the 68060 at 25MHz?

I just adjusted my 1260 try

i dont think its really the speed of the component,but rather whats programmed onto it.

[roy bates]

Originally Posted by jimmer78

I asked too, and he seems very logical, and a nice guy:

>
>"Ever since I started my business, I fully supported my customers and always wanted to help to a degree where the customer can use my product(s) to the full extent. And ever since I brought out the first card (Graffiti), I had to face accusations like "your unit is making my computer unstable!".
>
> It took me a few years to realize that all of those people had two things in common:
> - they had an Apollo accelerator
> - they knew that I would help them, no matter what
>
> In the end, I always ended up with dissatisfied customers, because in endless back-and-forth sessions, back when eMail wasn't popular, it turned out that it wasn't my product, but the Apollo card that made the system unstable. Granted, not in all cases, but for the majority of cases.
>
> Now that I have insight into the inner workings, I know that the logic components (MACH chips) are operated way out of their specifications. There may be a few cards that work fine (especially if you find the right memory module), but it takes ages and a load of cards to piece together one working unit.
>
> While building my business in the late 90s, I was watching customers disappear, and I talked to many people who were active programmers. Many of them told me that they lost interest in the Amiga, because it wasn't fun to use any more.
>
> I am now observing the same thing again: People buy a flickerfixer for their A600, which of course requires an A604, and now I get support requests with claims that the memory expansion or the Flickerfixer is not working properly. Guess what type of accelerator these people are using? Now that they have fun using the A600 again (flatscreen makes a huge difference!) they realize that the machine doesn't survive the timespan until the eyes of the user get tired. And of course, it MUST be the new unit that they installed, because everything was working fine before. See the pattern?
>
> Selling parts would mean giving support for a broken-by-design-product. People would expect me to answer questions, program logic chips, claim that the chips don't work - and they would be right, because they are operated out of spec. I'd even violate German laws selling products that are known to not work.
>
> I may or may not make a faster accelerator. It all depends on the spare time I have left after doing work on the Nequester VoIP router - that's where my money comes from. Amiga is a hobby, and it's been a really nice one ever since everybody knows that it's better not to ask me for anything Apollo.
>

>
> ciao,
> --
> Jens Schönfeld"

thats fair enough,its a shame though as it would be nice to have a high end card for the amiga.