MiniMig V2?

[AmigaDave]

Originally Posted by NovaCoder

Yum yum yum

Damn Sexy!

[Lord Aga]

What is the targeted clock speed for the 020 softcore on the Arcade ?

[yaqube]

The goal is to have the CPU soft core running synchronously with 28.36 MHz system clock. Although its instruction set is compatible with 020 CPU it's much faster. It can execute one instruction every clock cycle (doesn't apply to all instructions). Currently it outperforms 030@50MHz and after some improvements I expect it to be faster than 040@25MHz.

[Lord Aga]

Woo thanks
So it's shaping up to be one super-duper Amiga
I would be quite satisfied with a regular 28MHz 020, as I think that should have been a vanilla A1200 from the beginning.
Anything faster, and it's a pure bonus

[AmigaDave]

Has a working prototype of the pictured expansion board been completed and tested yet? If yes, what clock speed was used for the 68060?

When the expansion board is attached, is a different FPGA core loaded without the 020 softcore, or do you use the same code loaded into the FPGA with the 020 softcore being disabled if the expansion board is detected?

What amount of RAM is planned on the expansion 060 card? How is the Ethernet stack & driver loaded, with the FPGA core code, or after the Amiga Workbench is up and running?

Is the Micro-SD card for storage, like a hard drive?

Are the USB ports supported through Poseiden, or the new USB stack available from Aminet (forgot the name of it)?

Finally, will the expansion board be available within the next few months, or is the projected completion date further off and what is the estimated price for the expansion board?

Great project/product MikeJ!

[AmigaDave]

Bump! MikeJ, Yaqube, Anybody that has any answers to the below questions?

Originally Posted by AmigaDave

Has a working prototype of the pictured expansion board been completed and tested yet? If yes, what clock speed was used for the 68060?

When the expansion board is attached, is a different FPGA core loaded without the 020 softcore, or do you use the same code loaded into the FPGA with the 020 softcore being disabled if the expansion board is detected?

What amount of RAM is planned on the expansion 060 card? How is the Ethernet stack & driver loaded, with the FPGA core code, or after the Amiga Workbench is up and running?

Is the Micro-SD card for storage, like a hard drive?

Are the USB ports supported through Poseiden, or the new USB stack available from Aminet (forgot the name of it)?

Finally, will the expansion board be available within the next few months, or is the projected completion date further off and what is the estimated price for the expansion board?

Great project/product MikeJ!

[fpgaarcade]

It is being tested now. I am not sure what clock speed Jakub is using.
A different soft core is loaded into the main board.

Little early to give pricing for the expansion board. It will be available without the processor and shouldn't me too expensive.
/Mike

[yaqube]

Originally Posted by AmigaDave

Has a working prototype of the pictured expansion board been completed and tested yet?

It's not possible to do that in a few days. I expect it to be done in a few months.

If yes, what clock speed was used for the 68060?

I have a rev 6 CPU and expect it to be running at 100 MHz or even over.

When the expansion board is attached, is a different FPGA core loaded without the 020 softcore, or do you use the same code loaded into the FPGA with the 020 softcore being disabled if the expansion board is detected?

Initially it will be done with a different core. But later it may also include the soft CPU core.

What amount of RAM is planned on the expansion 060 card?

I have 128 MB of SDRAM. It will run with the same clock speed as the CPU does.

How is the Ethernet stack & driver loaded, with the FPGA core code, or after the Amiga Workbench is up and running?

It's expected to be loaded at the time of booting. We can have 2 MB of ROM space (and some more auto-config space) but not all drivers are romable.

the Micro-SD card for storage, like a hard drive?

Exactly. It's intended to be directly accessed as a Amiga hard drive. With the help of DMA the transfer rates will be much higher than with a hard file.

Are the USB ports supported through Poseiden, or the new USB stack available from Aminet (forgot the name of it)?

We are going to use Poseidon.

Finally, will the expansion board be available within the next few months, or is the projected completion date further off and what is the estimated price for the expansion board?

I hope to finish the design in a few months, meanwhile Mike will redesign the daughter board for the production version of the Replay board. That's the plan.

[AmigaDave]

Originally Posted by fpgaarcade

It is being tested now. I am not sure what clock speed Jakub is using.
A different soft core is loaded into the main board.

Little early to give pricing for the expansion board. It will be available without the processor and shouldn't me too expensive.
/Mike

Thanks Mike & Yaqube for all or your answers. I was not sure if I had missed the initial announcement and discussion of this daughter card and perhaps an earlier version or prototype had already been completed and tested, and this photo of the bare board was just a later version, or second prototype, so forgive me for some of the questions that probably seemed impatient or strange.

Thanks also for taking an already great project and turning it into an even greater project that will rival some of the best Amiga computers out in the wild.

So, if I understand a comment made by Mike to another forum member earlier, the redesign of the daughter card will probably fit around the taller stacked joystick & mouse/keyboard ports, instead of sitting higher and on top of those items?

I can see now that a completed Replay board might be ready for sale within the next few weeks, but it will take another few months before we can expect the daughter cards to be available.

I wonder if there will be any chance in the future to merge some of the Natami Super-AGA code into the FPGAArcade Replay board, or will the Natami team feel threatened by the Replay board and withhold that code for use on their product only?

Mike & Yaqube, your constant willingness to answer questions and clearly let everyone know exactly where the progress of these projects are at any given moment has been a breath of fresh air in the Amiga community where there is so much secrecy and general lack of information about what is going on with so many projects in the past. It has prevented 99.9% of your critics from having anything to complain about. Well done gentlemen! Please continue to excel at what you are doing. You have earned the respect and thanks of many admiring Amiga users that are anxious to get their hands on their very own Replay boards and daughter cards when they are available.

Again, WELL DONE!

[Methanoid]

Originally Posted by AmigaDave

I can see now that a completed Replay board might be ready for sale within the next few weeks, but it will take another few months before we can expect the daughter cards to be available.

Not sure where you get that idea from. I'd be more than happy if it is only weeks away but I suspect not.

I havent been excited by something Amiga related since owning a 1260 when they came out and TBH that was a little disappointing. This will be like the feeling of your first Amiga all over again!!

[vidarh]

My urge to get one of these is just increasing with every bit of new information...

[AmigaDave]

Originally Posted by Methanoid

Not sure where you get that idea from. I'd be more than happy if it is only weeks away but I suspect not.

I havent been excited by something Amiga related since owning a 1260 when they came out and TBH that was a little disappointing. This will be like the feeling of your first Amiga all over again!!

My guess for when they would be ready for sale is just for the first production run of Replay boards, which to my understanding are in the process of being assembled now. I don't think it will take more than a few weeks to get them assembled and during that time the testing of the first few boards that have already been distributed to the developers working on testing just the Replay board could be done by then. Maybe it will take more time than that, but not too much I think. I guess it depends on how polished MikeJ requires the code to be before he starts selling that first batch of 50 boards.

After that, I was under the assumption that the second batch of boards were to be factory assembled at a reduced cost than having MikeJ assemble the boards himself. I don't know how many Replay boards MikeJ will have manufactured in the second production run, but if he has the money and sees that there is enough demand, he could do a run of 100 or more boards in the second production run.

Maybe I am wrong in some of my assumptions, as I could have easily misinterpreted a message, or missed something. MikeJ will let us know, he is very good at providing answers at a frequent interval.

[fpgaarcade]

The first batch of 10 RevB boards were all machine assembled.
I needed to do a slight tweak to the board which is delaying the rest of them being produced. I've just placed an order for the Xilinx and PCBs for another 50 which will be built asap, I'm pretty happy with the hardware.

As far as shipping goes if people are happy with the state of the current core (beta testing will show this) then they can have them. I'm going to focus on the firmware now the hardware is complete.
/MikeJ

[AmigaDave]

Originally Posted by fpgaarcade

The first batch of 10 RevB boards were all machine assembled.
I needed to do a slight tweak to the board which is delaying the rest of them being produced. I've just placed an order for the Xilinx and PCBs for another 50 which will be built asap, I'm pretty happy with the hardware.

As far as shipping goes if people are happy with the state of the current core (beta testing will show this) then they can have them. I'm going to focus on the firmware now the hardware is complete.
/MikeJ

I didn't realize that the first run was only for 10 boards, but that is understandable with any project to make the first run small until you are sure about it being the final design.

I want one of the 50 from the second batch if they are not all spoken for already. Or I would even take one of the first 10, but I am pretty sure that they are already promised to other people. Let me know.

I think you should be proud of the hardware design Mike, it is beautiful and very well designed. I am sure you will sell lots of these boards, or complete systems, is that is what you eventually decide to do.

The firmware can always be updated later as you finalize it, right? If these first 10 boards run as well as the demo video you have shown, I would think that they are ready to be shipped to whomever is waiting for them.

[Pyromania]

I want one of the 50 in the second batch too please. As long as all the Gurus have been worked out.

[Methanoid]

Originally Posted by AmigaDave

I didn't realize that the first run was only for 10 boards, but that is understandable with any project to make the first run small until you are sure about it being the final design.

I want one of the 50 from the second batch if they are not all spoken for already. Or I would even take one of the first 10, but I am pretty sure that they are already promised to other people. Let me know.

This highlights a small issue. I see many people who say they want one and understandably this is going to get repeated on many forums. People express interest, some more definitely than others. MikeJ is collecting interest so he can know who might but we don't know how that is working.

Is there a master list that shows where people are in a queue to buy these? It might help if we knew or saw this. Then again it might not!

[fpgaarcade]

How would it help?
The intention is not to "limit" supply of these in any way. As soon as the beta program is finished then they will be built to order in batches as long as people want them.
MikeJ

[RoC]

First of all, this is my first post on EAB, so hello to everyone

I was an avid Amiga user in 80s and early 90s and lately I joined again the Italian forums. I own several classics (A1000,2000,500,600,1200+exp) plus a minimig 4MB (soon I hope with an Arm controller) completed by one AmigaNG.

Having introduced myself (apologies for being too long) I come back to the topic..

Thanks to Mike and Yaqube for keeping us posted about Replay developments. For what I have seen so far out there, this is not so common, and needs to be acknowledged.

I am a quite happy minimig user (BTW thanks Yaqube for all your efforts, very much appreciated) and I look forward to using the FPGAreply board too.

I wish to book one board of the next available batch, whenever it would be ready, and could send some money in advance if needs be (like I did for the ARM controller).

I believe it is too early for this, however I would also be interested in the daughter-board once this is available.

Keep up the good work, and thanks

Greetings from Italy

[AmigaDave]

Originally Posted by fpgaarcade

How would it help?
The intention is not to "limit" supply of these in any way. As soon as the beta program is finished then they will be built to order in batches as long as people want them.
MikeJ

Have you given any more thought to the idea of trying to go mainstream retail with a product based on this design? If packaged and marketed right, I think it might be a good seller to thousands of potential users. Not just for Amiga emulation, but for the emulation of dozens of Arcade Consoles and a few other "Vintage" computer systems in addition to the Amiga. Perhaps more time is needed to write, or perfect the code for the Arcade Consoles and there might be licensing issues with emulating other old computer systems, but partnering with Colanto to provide Amiga and C64 compatibility with a valid license, should be easy (if you can get them to return your emails, or phone calls). They should be interested in providing an OEM version of AmigaForever & C64Forever at a small discount, due to volume sales.

[Methanoid]

Some Guy at Amiga.org posted he has bought one of these boards. How the heck? There's been no announcement of going on sale has there?