OK... why no new 68K boards?

[alexh]

Price and availability of MC68060RC50 chips and edge connectors.

Freescale do not make the MC68060RC50 chips anymore and try to encourage people to use a Coldfire in a new design. One of the ways they have encouraged people is to raise the RRP to $373.29 well beyond the price of anything other than Military apps.

The tooling costs alone for the edge connectors in RoHS plastic would be several thousand dollars before you have even made one and then you'd probably have an MOQ (Minimum order Quantity) of about 1000 units.

You'd have to make at least 500 units to break even. When was the last time you saw 500 MC68060RC50 chips for sale?

Add to that the demand. With lots of people already owning an 060 board the total number of people wanting one is much smaller than say for 24-bit Scan doublers or USB controllers.

[alexh]

If UAE wasnt so flakey then I'd do that but IMO it is still a bit poop, especially in JIT modes.

Designing the 680x0 to SDRAM logic would not be that hard, especially as Rodolphe has done it recently for the CT060 for Atari Falcon. There are some timing diagrams and some bus wave form captures to look at. Probably get it done in a few days.

Considering how much hard work that Oliver Hannaford-Day put in a few years ago, coupled with the investigation work being done over at EAB I would imagine you could get a lot of information about the technical pitfalls to making an accelerator before you start.

[alexh]

Belial6 wrote:
As far as I can tell, new 68k boards are being produced, and they can run faster than the A500. You have MiniMig and C-One.

Neither are that fast compared to a bog standard 1230.

Neither support the 020+ instruction set and so are of limited use with "modern" Amiga software designed for accelerators.

Neither have an FPU (not that there is much Amiga software that uses one).

A C-One plus MiniMig FPGA expansion cost a lot more than most second hand Amiga 060 accelerators.

Jose wrote:
060's can be got second hand for a relatively cheap price. At least for now. I even remember some old Mac 68k cards had a recicled 68k on them.

In ones and twos? Yes.

In 100's? No!

[alexh]

cv643d wrote:
If a single developer can create Minimig I am sure someone could make a new 68k board.

MiniMig was created for fun. Not for profit and originally not for others. Dennis spent a lot of his own money which he never got back.

When MiniMig went on sale it was unique, new. It had a much wider appeal than a new 68k board, potentially the entire Amiga retro community. It was a better investment.

Belial6 wrote:
You can argue that they are not 'good enough' accelerators

Don't need to argue. Its fact. A v1.1 MiniMig, even with it's 28MHz(?) 68000 cannot compare on price, performance or compatibility with an even a 14MHz A1200. Form factor and novelty are MiniMig's two saving graces.

Belial6 wrote:
doesn't change the fact that they are A500s that can be boosted above the standard speed.

They are not quite A500's (yet).

Belial6 wrote:
You have to start somewhere.  No doubt that as improvements happen

Yup. Yacqube has already shown it and as long as people keep an interest I imagine developments will progress.

Belial6 wrote:
and new FPGAs come out, speed will increase, and someone will add 020 instructions, and the fact that they cost more doesn't change the fact that they are being produced.

You're not going to make anything close to a 100MHz MC68060 with an FPGA for a LONG time. But yes I think that adding the 020+ instructions and stack format will be possible now. The cache... that is another issue as AFAIK no-one really knows how it was implemented. Trial and error no doubt. UAE does without it so I guess it's not THAT important. I bet Tobias Guebner is already working on it.

[alexh]

AeroMan wrote:
I´ve heard some good news from some friends about Freescale.

??

Next gen Coldfire will be more compatible with 68k apps?

[alexh]

jpera wrote:
Why not selling 68k boards without CPUs?

Kinda defeats the point.

jpera wrote:
I think that most Classic Amiga users already have a 68k board but they want a new one because the board is broken

I think the market for Classic Amiga users who already own an MC68060 chip is ridiculously small don't you?

jpera wrote:
or the new board is somehow better (possibility to use modern memory modules, flash memory for storing KS ROM and programs, etc.) than the old one.

No-one who has a working 68060 board is going to seriously consider buying a new one are they? Most (all?) boards support BlizKick for storing KS ROM and most owners of 68060 boards have already maxed them out with RAM.

The only reason to upgrade that I can think of would be something like a true 2x performance upgrade. And even then I think people would think twice considering the sums of money involved.

jpera wrote:
Removing a CPU from the old board and installing it to the new one isn't hard - I think.

Agreed. But it is not a real market.

[alexh]

bloodline wrote:
The "feeling" problem is 99% psychological, based on a perceived difference between doing something "in Software" and doing it "in Hardware"

Nah, it's more the fact most people do not run UAE with a 50Hz screen (or 100Hz?) and vsync on.

[alexh]

It was me who suggested the news might be about Coldfire. It could be something else altogether!

If it is just about Freescale confirming that they have no patents still enforceable on the 020+ instruction set (making it legally reproducible in FPGA designs) I'll be a bit disappointed. :-)

[alexh]

It is illegal in the EU to sell NEW electronic products using certain plastic connectors that were used in the past. That instantly rules out using most NOS (New old stock) connectors, if you could find them.

One part of the RoHS (Restriction of Hazardous Substances) requirements is that you must use a substitute for certain chemicals (mainly fire depressants) in your plastics. This has required development of new plastics and new tooling.

[alexh]

You can still buy and use leaded solder everywhere.

You just cannot use it in parts which are then sold as retail.

The edge connectors are still available to order in RoHS for about $1 each but they have minimum order quantities (MOQ) of 1000 units.