On topic of being pointless, let me drag this further...

* CD32 with dumb expansion that allows A1200 expansion board
* ACA1221, RTC and RapidRoad, USB storage + ethernet
* Custom kickstart with Poseidon drivers for rapidroad and usb storage
* or just a boot CD that contains ACAtune, poseidon drivers etc to bootstrap to USB.

Given that "dumb expansion" works, that should be a nice little setup.

Bling....
* Indivision AGA
* Small adapter board that plugs into joystick/mouse ports and the combo keyboard/rs232 port, offering USB ports for mouse, keyboard and joysticks, as well as containing a rs232-bluetooth controller for wireless nullmodem connection. All in a neat little black box matching the CD32 casing.

Agree with you here. Memory and IDE is all I want for my CD32 =) Still waiting patently.

Hi All,

Lets give a bit of good news to the thread. The PS/2 keyboard is extremely close to becoming a reality so you will be able to plug in a regular PS/2 keyboard into the adapter. For those people who already have the adapter you will need to buy the chip for a few $$ as the code is not open source. More info very soon :)

P.S. buy a keyboard now :)

Hi,

I'll do a full update soon, I promise. ;)

Has anyone got FFC cable that connects the CD32 mainboard to the CD drive?
Mine broke and I need one to get my CD32 going again.

Ease of implementation. I don't want to develop a SD-card/SPI to parallel interface unless I have to and with 'off the shelf' designs that fit a CPLD, why should I?
@thread
Have been extremely conscious not to change the specifications I set myself, so that I can finish this project. After a few hiccups, it is now moving well (hope I've not jinxed myself).

Am in the final stages of getting 200 ATX adaptors ordered/assembled, amazing how much time that simple task has taken. Still it will leave me with more free time when done for new projects.

Ian

Yeah! Stedy is BACK!

Any picoPSU adapters in that batch? I've been waiting for those a long time! I need two more :D

If it helps to speed up development, Steady, I can give you a whole CD32... PM me address if you want it.

Stedyily waiting for this...

I see what you did there :D

I got my kipper2k extension board, I am very ready for Stedy's invention!!

Add me to the list of people who are interested in buying one of the expansion units - if not to late!?

I am fairly sure you can find the exact model at DigiKey, they have everything: http://www.digikey.com/product-searc...cables/1573391

That is fine with me, I can stock a dozen (or more) CF cards so I am sure I will never over-live them, however please allow for more than one CF card to be plugged at the same time. ;)

Keep up the good work!

I'm curious about what'd be the advantage of this. Care to explain?

What are the advantages of having two HDDs instead of one?
Moreover, two easily swappable HDDs. ;)

You can use one for manual transfers while the other is still available for booting, you can make backups much more easily, etc. It is simply more convenient.

And convenience is priceless, especially with old machines which already have lots of constraints.

Exactly, I don't see the reason.
Also because:
They wouldn't be that easily swappable, you have to remove the kipper adapter from the slot, and it would put extra wear on the expansion port that I wouldn't want! And once you went in there and accessed one CF card, you also have right there the other one, rendering one pretty useless.
Would definitely be convenient if one was accessible without removing anything, but that is clearly not possible ;(

Now backups, yeah, if you wanted to have redundant backups done on the machine, I'd say it works out, but in any other case, it just seems it doesn't add any convenience, since you would have to access both cards in an equally "inaccessible" way.

I think simplicity is key for this to actually even exist, so whatever is simpler for Stedy to implement, is what I'd like. Otherwise it will turn into vaporware.

Ok, my bad, I had read the thread long ago but I had forgotten the expansion board ended up inside the machine and that the Kipper "edge" connector is now fairly static and cannot host more connectors.
Although I understand and appreciate the technical considerations which lead to this design, it does preclude additional external ports which is regrettable.
But indeed, this is much better than the alternative (which was ... nothing :)) and if I want something else I guess I should shut up and brush up my electronics courses. :)
Still, there is something which annoys me with CF cards ports being inside instead of outside but clearly this is an Amiga tradition. ;)

Not necessarily on the machine itself. I know myself: when I unplug the CF card from the CD32 that does not mean I am going to back it up the same day, which means that when I'll want to play it I'll have to find the CF card and plug it back.
If I have a backup at all times, I'll keep that one in the machine and only move the other one. Does not happen often, but I know that these inconveniences would prevent me from using the machine so removing them is worth it for me.

I agree, let us have version 1.0 first then we can discuss modifying the physical design. This said, handling two CF cards is not much more complex. The IDE bus supports it, you just need the room for it on the board but it does not require additional logic.

But indeed, if they are internal, then one is fine for me. It is just going to be a pain to backup regularly.

The fact that this goes INSIDE the machine, I think, is one of its biggest assets for me. I hate how the SX-1 and similar peripherals stuck on the back doubling the size of the machine. If I had one it would make the console not fit where it does right now, which is right here the other consoles are, on a TV table. Thankfully, those devices, besides being clumsy, are prohibitively expensive ;)

I just never saw the advantage of turning a CD32 into a computer when you already have an A1200, so a simple interface that goes inside the machine and lets you still maintain the unit as a games console I think is the best idea ever and, as you said, there isn't much of an option,so I am glad Stedy has decided to work on this!

PS: who backs up regularly? ;) But seriously, if all you have there is games, there's nothing really to back up, one backs up the data one creates all the time, but this would be a pretty static list of read only data.

I would also buy the expansion, up kipper2k!

If there was an ethernet port, USB or even high speed serial port, doing backups and transferring files would be a breeze.

Depending on what FPGA/CPLD he's using high-speed serial would be practical. The others.... not at all.

How about clock port?

I suppose you have a CD32 otherwise you wouldn't be posting here. Is it your main and only Amiga? What would be the point of having a clockport?
You mention backups, of CDs you mean? if you want to backup original games, they are all already backed up and online, no need to do any more of those. Perhaps you have a super rare game or something? I'm sure a PC or an A1200 with a CD ROM drive can back it up. What any other things do you want to backup? The 1KB of NVRAM? Point taken, but you don't need any of what you mentioned to achieve such a backup. The expansion WILL HAVE a hard drive option. Why serial/ethernet/USB connectivity??

The CD32 is a games console. Expanding it with desktop computer peripherals makes absolutely no sense. From all current CD32 owners, I wonder how many, if any at all, have the machine as their main and only Amiga and for some reason can't or refuse to buy an A1200 to use expansions like the ones you suggested.

As the games console it is, the CD32 doesn't need more than a PS/2 port for the keyboard, an RGB video port and/or SCART connector, a little Fast RAM and a CF IDE hard drive.

If you want to crunch numbers, watch 060 demos, add some USB device, run OS3.9 or whatever else, just get an A1200 and expand that with what already is available.

There's so far only a couple of guys interested in giving the CD32 any extended life from what it can do in a stock config, and these guys are super busy. CD32 owners like myself hope very much that these expansions are completed and sold. I already got my kipper2k extension board and am waiting for Stedy to come up with his expansion. If you didn't read what he wrote, he explained in detail what his expansion will and will not have. I'll quote him for you:
Any discussion past this point about what the expansion could or could not have in some particular person's hardware wet dream is moot.