Where to get Vampire support

[Hedeon]

So I finally dusted off my V2 I had for some years now. Sadly, I had a lot of issues of getting it running as:

1) Apollo wiki is not working
2) No mention of the V2 on the Apollo site at all it seems.
3) Cannot find where to download drivers/cores.

Is there somewhere where the drivers/cores are available? Also older versions as I read that 2.12 should be the one for the 500V2 and that sagasd.device 0.12 is needed for OS3.2 compatibility.

EDIT: Got it almost 5 years ago, I see now. Call me slow...

[Pyromania]

Dracula did not help you? Just kidding, he’s a fictional character. You should visit the Vampire Discord channel for Vampire support and help.

[kriz]

https://discord.com/invite/5wSA4Bn and the forum: http://www.apollo-core.com/knowledge.php?b=10

Discord link did not work Telegram link is here but i do not know how official it is.. https://t.me/vamped_amiga

[Hedeon]

Why this extra barrier for drivers? Thanks, I'll look over there.

EDIT: invite no longer works

[kriz]

I guess this is the latest version for A500: VAMPIRE 2 V500_R214_7987.jic 2MB

http://www.apollo-core.com/index.htm?page=downloads But I agree this is a mess, i am unable to find the discord link myself

[Hedeon]

Thanks for the Telegram link. I got at least the 2.7 drivers. However, while the micro SD card works in WinUAE, it does not under vampire. SDiag sees it correctly, Hd toolbox within UAE sees it correctly, HD toolbox within vampire not. Reads in configuration all wrong and I can not save anything to it. I think this was the reason why 0.12 of sagasd.device was needed with OS 3.2. This with the core flashed to 2.12 gold.

[Hedeon]

Originally Posted by kriz

I guess this is the latest version for A500: VAMPIRE 2 V500_R214_7987.jic 2MB

http://www.apollo-core.com/index.htm?page=downloads But I agree this is a mess, i am unable to find the discord link myself

I don't have a byte blaster, an exe would be nice. But thanks for those links!

[Pollock]

Your best place for support is other Vampire users, and the usual Amiga channels, that is, forums like this etc.

The Apollo support, is, well, non existent. At no point are you ever made aware of how long, if any, any warranty is with the product. Mine needed fixed, and i was told, "buy another one". It's the one major flaw with the Vampire guys, they make interesting stuff, but have no business savvy, and no support.

There are a whole host of Vampires owner on here, someone will try to help you.

[manossg]

To be fair, I had a problem once (with some CF errors) and I reported it in the apollo forum. I am happy to say the response was lightning-fast from the Vampire guys and they invested quite some time to help a newbie such as me to troubleshoot.

[kriz]

Originally Posted by Hedeon

I don't have a byte blaster, an exe would be nice. But thanks for those links!

I see, Gunnar posted that an exe would come this December, but time flies..

"Lucio Morassutti wrote:
When will you have core 2.14 in .exe format?

Gunnar von Boehn
The plan is to make new Release in December for all cards including EXEs" From topic: http://www.apollo-core.com/knowledge.php?b=5&note=36857

[Hedeon]

I saw that posting. Also read that it really just contains V1200 upgrades. So maybe not really needed for v500.

[Hedeon]

Got some help on the Discord server. Everything is up and running now. Thanks all!

[Pyromania]

Originally Posted by Hedeon

Got some help on the Discord server. Everything is up and running now. Thanks all!

That’s awesome news!

[grond]

Originally Posted by Pollock

Mine needed fixed, and i was told, "buy another one".

This sounds like your Vampire was one of kipper's. He sold cards where he left away parts because putting them on the cards was too much work and used parts different from those on the bill of materials because they were easier to get resulting in poorly working cards. Majsta actually replaced some of those cards with new cards of his own production because kipper never reacted to complaints but eventually everyone was fed up with cleaning up kipper's mess.

[kriz]

Originally Posted by Hedeon

Got some help on the Discord server. Everything is up and running now. Thanks all!

Could you help me with the Discord ? I am unable to find any working link..

[Hedeon]

https://discord.gg/dsGWPbRE

[johnnybarker]

Originally Posted by grond

This sounds like your Vampire was one of kipper's. He sold cards where he left away parts because putting them on the cards was too much work and used parts different from those on the bill of materials because they were easier to get resulting in poorly working cards. Majsta actually replaced some of those cards with new cards of his own production because kipper never reacted to complaints but eventually everyone was fed up with cleaning up kipper's mess.

Is that true? I have a card from Kipper2K which had issues and I don't recall him failing to react to complaints. I do recall though Majsta posting on his own website how to fix the problems which related to the the power and HDMI (sorry, "digital video") issues. It appears this issue also applied to boards he built as well.

https://www.majsta.com/modules.php?n...rticle&sid=147

[Chucky]

Originally Posted by Pollock

The Apollo support, is, well, non existent. At no point are you ever made aware of how long, if any, any warranty is with the product. Mine needed fixed, and i was told, "buy another one". It's the one major flaw with the Vampire guys, they make interesting stuff, but have no business savvy, and no support.

this is as they give an impression of being a company etc.. but they sell all as private persons. meaning you have no rights.. so warranty is what we call in sweden "Around the corner" or some weeks at-best..

[nonarkitten]

Originally Posted by grond

This sounds like your Vampire was one of kipper's. He sold cards where he left away parts because putting them on the cards was too much work and used parts different from those on the bill of materials because they were easier to get resulting in poorly working cards. Majsta actually replaced some of those cards with new cards of his own production because kipper never reacted to complaints but eventually everyone was fed up with cleaning up kipper's mess.

I've owned two kipper Vampire boards and both have worked exceptionally well. I've ran them with the older x17 core and while I was on the team, could run the newer x14 cores as well even when not everyone on the team could. I've had my V2's running stable at 1600x900 though I usually run them at 960x540 because the 1600x900 slows it down too much.

The first board was stable but I noticed some caps were loose and fixed them. Also found one that was cracked and replaced that as well. These were just decoupling capacitors and aren't super critical. Kipper offered to fix the board for me at the time, but I had a friend who is an artist with the soldering iron and fixed it all up for me.

The Team knew I had a Kipper Vampire and never offered to replace it, but they did register the serial number back when the firmware would grey-scale on "fake" boards, so there's that.

[johnnybarker]

Yip, I think your experience echoes mine. I have to confess that I think Grond is being somewhat untruthful here. I wouldn't like to speculate whether it is by accident or design though.