Amiga questions you've always been too embarrassed to ask

[ancalimon]

Was the 020ec expensive when A1200 was first released?

[vitux]

Originally Posted by ancalimon

Was the 020ec expensive when A1200 was first released?

No, it was very cheap. That is why Commodore not chose one 030, to cut costs.

Originally Posted by ancalimon

I really don't think classic Amiga's even with 256mb ram, ppc cpu and radeon gpu would be able to handle such large worlds.

From my ignorance. Being in AGA, memory resources on board, would be lower. No?
256 enough, it is the maximum. A dual layer DVD or two for data.

[Supamax]

What is RDB?
(hard disk / mass storage related)

Could this be explained in simple words?

[Hewitson]

It stores information about partitions and filesystems amongst other things. Similar to the MBR on a PC (but considerably more advanced).

[ancalimon]

Originally Posted by Supamax

What is RDB?
(hard disk / mass storage related)

Could this be explained in simple words?

And its short for Rigid Disk Block

[Supamax]

Thanks

[NMI]

Originally Posted by rare_j

The 68020 is a multiprocessor capable cpu. So why is it that when you add a cpu card to a 1200 the cpu on the motherboard cannot also be used?

The 68020 (and 68030) was designed for loosely coupled multiprocessor systems, where (a bit simplified) each CPU has it's own memory and only shares I/O-subsystems (harddisks, display etc).
To make this work in an Amiga would have required a lot of extra circuitry, and a lot of software. And AmigaOS was definitely not designed with loosely coupled multiprocessing in mind.
Much easier, and cheaper, to just disable the slower on board CPU.

[Hewitson]

If you've got a decent accelerator fitted the performance gained from using the 68020 as well would be negligible anyway.

[rare_j]

Loosely coupled multiprocessing does sound a bit rubbish. Still its a shame the 68ec020 just sits there getting warm. Some Sega arcade boards used multiple 68000s.

[Hewitson]

Originally Posted by rare_j

Loosely coupled multiprocessing does sound a bit rubbish. Still its a shame the 68ec020 just sits there getting warm. Some Sega arcade boards used multiple 68000s.

Using multiple CPU's in arcade hardware and consoles is VERY common. But these CPU's are performing different tasks (eg one for sound and one for everything else). There's no SMP or threading.

[Mrs Beanbag]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

Using multiple CPU's in arcade hardware and consoles is VERY common. But these CPU's are performing different tasks (eg one for sound and one for everything else). There's no SMP or threading.

I could still totally use something like that though, imagine using the 68020 to do sound channel mixing on its own

[dJOS]

I can't imagine it being a very useable system with one 020 having 128mb fast and the other stuck with slow chip ram - it'd be a bit of dogs breakfast IMO!

[jolly11]

what is the best flight game for amiga?

[Arnie]

Originally Posted by jolly11

what is the best flight game for amiga?

The one you enjoy the most

[Gzegzolka]

Originally Posted by jolly11

what is the best flight game for amiga?

You should try Elfmania, Fight'n'Spirit, Double Dragon 3, Motorhead, Ninja Mission (Arcadia port), Shadow Fighter, it is most matter of what You like

[s2325]

flight, not fight

[mc6809e]

Originally Posted by vitux

No, it was very cheap. That is why Commodore not chose one 030, to cut costs.

Very unfortunate.

And with the '30, Alice could have been designed to handle synchronous and burst mode to get at the extra chip ram bandwidth available since the A1000 (and even more using page mode).

The A1200 with the '20 was notorious for having mediocre chip ram bandwidth numbers.

[jolly11]

what's the best solution to replace a failing a500's keyboard?

[Bead]

Why is that on my stock A1200, I can run the games on the CD32 compilation discs (which use WHDLoad) using the CD32 emu bootable floppy, but can't run the same games (also WHDLoad) by booting into the shell and running them from the HD? No matter what the game, I seem to always get a lack of memory error. I think I'm going to answer my own question by saying that the CD32 discs load them into RAD, and boot from there. Which leads to my main question, how can games be stored in RAD (which I believe is on the RAM) and still have enough memory left on RAM that the game requires to operate?

[ajack]

Originally Posted by jolly11

what's the best solution to replace a failing a500's keyboard?

A replacement A500 keyboard?

Originally Posted by Bead

Why is that on my stock A1200, I can run the games on the CD32 compilation discs (which use WHDLoad) using the CD32 emu bootable floppy, but can't run the same games (also WHDLoad) by booting into the shell and running them from the HD? No matter what the game, I seem to always get a lack of memory error. I think I'm going to answer my own question by saying that the CD32 discs load them into RAD, and boot from there. Which leads to my main question, how can games be stored in RAD (which I believe is on the RAM) and still have enough memory left on RAM that the game requires to operate?

The CD32 emu bootable disk must be doing something important enough to get the emulation working which is not loaded otherwise? Perhaps a look into the Startup-Sequence file in the S folder may give you a clue of what is happening or needs to happen to get CD32 emu running.