Amiga 600 schematics nearly put into Kicad

[Mick]

Originally Posted by Shiozaki1

so is there a down load for the files?

I uploaded them to the zone earlier in the year and nobody did anything with them, the files were also uploaded donkeys ago to A1K forum and are still there but again nobody has done anything with them (that I know of anyway). CD32Freak has since been made to take his files down by the Amiga community police so like I said it's probably best for me to wash my hands of them. I've learned a lot from them though so I'm grateful to CD32Freak for the work he did.

The files I uploaded to A1K mainly just need routing if you want to give it a go, one of my reasons for making this thread was to try to encourage people to get into Kicad like I had done. I will re-do A600 using what I've since learned if I can get help building/testing it.

[AJCopland]

Mick, what tutorials did you use for learning Kicad?

[Mick]

I just started off trying to replicate a memory project I saw on here, whenever I got stuck I just did a web search to try to find the solution. I think the hardest part at first are setting up project libraries and familiarising yourself with everything. I've never used any other of this kind of software so I never had anything else to compare it to, a lot of people who've used other software seem to just give up on it early on from what I've heard. It seems really intuitive to me though. I'm a lot better with the designer side of things and although I criticised Kicad routing earlier it's actually really good I'm finding now, one tip I have though is when you have a lot of footprints using mils as a metric it's best to lay everything out and route using mils, like I am now.

[Lemaru]

As there is no replacement A600 PCBs as the A600 gets neglected I was thinking about doing a board and was discussing it with a friend recently. I was going to try and obtain a board to scan and trace, but this maybe the perfect starting point.

I know the zone had a clear out a while ago and many files were removed. Do you still have them available?

My original plan was to do a recreation and then once that's working, work in to adding some modifications. It will be a slow process with my spare time but will be a great ongoing project.

If you still have them available it would be great to have a copy.

*Update* I think I have found them. Though there's two versions. "Amiga600 [Open A600 KiCad].zip" and "Amiga600 [Amiga 600 KiCad].zip] so not sure what the difference is if any as yet as on my phone

[Jope]

It might be an easier start if you took an old board and traced that instead, like Chucky did with the ReAmiga PCBs. :-)

[Lemaru]

Originally Posted by Jope

It might be an easier start if you took an old board and traced that instead, like Chucky did with the ReAmiga PCBs. :-)

Yeah, tracing an existing board would be better. But doing the routing blind, without have a referenced schematic wouldn't be great. Especially for modifying it going forward.

I may not even be able to manage it or have the time to invest, but fancied a new project in my spare time

[CD32Freak]

Originally Posted by Lemaru

Yeah, tracing an existing board would be better. But doing the routing blind, without have a referenced schematic wouldn't be great. Especially for modifying it going forward.

I may not even be able to manage it or have the time to invest, but fancied a new project in my spare time

The A600 Rev 1.5 and Rev 2 schematics are available at Amigawiki:
https://www.amigawiki.org/doku.php?i...ice:schematics

By the way, I would recommend Sprint Layout 6.0 (https://www.electronic-software-shop...ml?language=en) for tracing like Chucky did. It is a very intuitive and fast tool for cloning a PCB, but it lacks a link with a schematics editor like Eagle CAD. You can create parts (called macros) with the Gerber files I have created and build a whole new board with it like Mick did!

[Mick]

I've been re-doing the A600 this past week.

I went back to the original files that I uploaded to A1K and re-placed everything using a mils grid instead of mm. The difficulty I had routing with Kicad before was that things just never lined up right and ultimately it didn't look very neat and as I'm a bit of a perfectionist it drove me mad. Somewhere along the lines (probably thanks to CD32Freak) I figured out that Commodore must have used a 10 mil grid and things are going much better now.




One thing I'm not sure about is the original boards had absolutely huge via's for some signal lines (seemingly at random), for example near U42 D0-D6 have huge via's but D7 is small and it's the same under Denise where DRD9 is normal size and the rest are big.. is there a reason for that or was it just a case of them using whatever space was available? can i just use normal sized via's on the signal lines or do I need to try to fit bigger ones in?

[Lemaru]

Originally Posted by CD32Freak

The A600 Rev 1.5 and Rev 2 schematics are available at Amigawiki:
https://www.amigawiki.org/doku.php?i...ice:schematics

By the way, I would recommend Sprint Layout 6.0 (https://www.electronic-software-shop...ml?language=en) for tracing like Chucky did. It is a very intuitive and fast tool for cloning a PCB, but it lacks a link with a schematics editor like Eagle CAD. You can create parts (called macros) with the Gerber files I have created and build a whole new board with it like Mick did!

Yeah I have had all the schematics for years. I was meaning having them drawn up in KiCad so they link up with the PCB design.

I see Mick is back on the case so will wait and see how the progress goes to save reinventing the wheel.

[Lemaru]

Sprint layout does look the the way to go, for a simple replacement. Not ideal for adding modifications though.

Need to find someone with a faulty A600 motherboard to strip and scan

[rvctech]

Originally Posted by Mick

[ .. ] Somewhere along the lines (probably thanks to CD32Freak) I figured out that Commodore must have used a 10 mil grid and things are going much better now.

PCBs are traditionally designed using imperial units, not metric. Especially for anything that comes out of the US. All track widths, spacings etc on US designed Amiga motherboards are a proportion of an inch.

[CD32Freak]

Hi Mick,

Every heard of the KiCad Interactive HTML BOM Plugin? It might be interesting for your A600 project to view your PCB more interactively: https://openscopeproject.org/InteractiveHtmlBomDemo/
When you export your PCB, only one HTML file will be created and you can view the board offline, zoom in/out with your scroll wheel, rotate, search parts, view tracks, etc. This plugin lured me back into the KiCad world

[Stedy]

Hi,

Nice work on the board Mick, I must finish testing the first design!
Can you move the RAM chips 5-6mm apart?
Soldering J-lead devices is tricky and with the lack of room, it was tricky even with hot air, it certainly made me swear a bit. We still use some J-lead parts at work, I can see why the rework techs get upset with them

I've stopped all Amiga work at the moment, as I have been trying to make the best of the nice (up until this week) weather to get out (where safe). Probably late October, early November I'll restart my Amiga projects.

Originally Posted by CD32Freak

Well then my Gerber conversions of the Amiga PCB Explorer boards were as close you could get to a 1:1 copy, but some crybabies in our community said it was wrong to copy a copy of what was illegally obtained in the first place.

Do Amiga Inc still exist in some form?
Would be interesting to know if they class the PCB designs as copyrighted still.

I did get written permission to distribute the Amiga schematics on my website, back in 2003, from Amiga Inc.

With modern CAD tools, like KiCAD it is easier to create a PCB. The old Mentor tools were not straightforward, I should know, I've used a few of them.

Originally Posted by CD32Freak

Hi Mick,

Every heard of the KiCad Interactive HTML BOM Plugin? It might be interesting for your A600 project to view your PCB more interactively: https://openscopeproject.org/InteractiveHtmlBomDemo/
When you export your PCB, only one HTML file will be created and you can view the board offline, zoom in/out with your scroll wheel, rotate, search parts, view tracks, etc. This plugin lured me back into the KiCad world

Neat. I prefer to use the CAD tools for PCB inspections as I invariably want more information than a viewer can show (PCB trace impedances, widths and stackup normally) but for a quick look, see it is good.

[CD32Freak]

Originally Posted by Stedy

Do Amiga Inc still exist in some form?
Would be interesting to know if they class the PCB designs as copyrighted still.

Mike from Cloanto wants to release the original Gerber files (and everything else from Commodore) through amiga.com and GitHub. He needs help finding those files and people like Scrat and viertelvor can help him, because they have the original files in their possession. The question is, do they want to help him?

[rvctech]

Originally Posted by CD32Freak

Mike from Cloanto wants to release the original Gerber files (and everything else from Commodore) through amiga.com and GitHub. He needs help finding those files and people like Scrat and viertelvor can help him, because they have the original files in their possession. The question is, do they want to help him?

Do you have a link to an announcement (or similar) from him? Would be nice to have as a reference.

[Mick]

This is where I am right now, went back to basics in terms of the dac not really sure what to do though... I figure it might be best to just get something basic working and let the diy community and electrical experts make any changes.




I made big via's for power as they have more current?

[Mick]

The video area on the original boards seems to have an area where the ground copper pours have been removed, is it important do you think?

Should I change the footprints to look less like Commodore?

I just noticed the big hole at the modulator is off, will fix that.

[Mick]

Originally Posted by Stedy

Can you move the RAM chips 5-6mm apart?
Soldering J-lead devices is tricky and with the lack of room, it was tricky even with hot air, it certainly made me swear a bit. We still use some J-lead parts at work, I can see why the rework techs get upset with them

It's really difficult it seems like the A600 board size was based around the most compact routing that's possible, unlike the A1200 there's literally no room to run even one extra trace from one side of the board to the other. If I'd routed with 8mil traces it might be possible but I thought that might be one of the reasons for the first board apparently not working.

I might be able to get about 1.5mm by moving the 12V trace onto the bottom layer but it's still only about 3.8mm of clearance.

[Mick]

Originally Posted by CD32Freak

Hi Mick,

Every heard of the KiCad Interactive HTML BOM Plugin? It might be interesting for your A600 project to view your PCB more interactively: https://openscopeproject.org/InteractiveHtmlBomDemo/
When you export your PCB, only one HTML file will be created and you can view the board offline, zoom in/out with your scroll wheel, rotate, search parts, view tracks, etc. This plugin lured me back into the KiCad world

I've already made a spreadsheet of parts using the Amiga 600 service manual that is floating about.

Now thinking about what to do with the DAC, I could remove Z221/Z222 and add a combined CXA1645/CXA2075 footprint I think but it will take away the originality and mods already exist for most of the changes I was planning. The CXA1645 just needs an extra capacitor/resistor and the VVref stuff leaving in I think, you would need to install different parts/values so it might complicate things.

[Lemaru]

Originally Posted by Mick

This is where I am right now, went back to basics in terms of the dac not really sure what to do though... I figure it might be best to just get something basic working and let the diy community and electrical experts make any changes.

If it were me, I would just try to reproduce the board as close the original as possible and get that working before adding/changing stuff. Once the basic board is done and working, then think about the mods and changes (or let the community do it).