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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: X-ray on August 21, 2008, 11:28:57 PM
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Okay, I am on a bit of a RAM mission, just for kicks.
I have two DKB boards, each with 128mb, I have 16mb on the mobo and I have another 128mb on the Cyberstorm.
I should have 400mb RAM in total.
But...I can't get more than 372mb. As soon as I put the last 32mb SIMM on the DKB board, the total goes back down to 272mb.
I can put any of the two DKBs in any Zorro slot alone, and I can see the 128mb on that board. It's not the SIMMS and its not the boards. They have the same jumper settings.
So, what gives here?
I'm running OS3.9 and I took out the Kickflash and Picasso IV for testing.
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@X-Ray
"To Boldly go where no one has gone before" :-D
Seriously, Good Luck!
-Jeff
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You know it, buddy. If all goes well my Miggy is going to have three DKB boards soon!
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Yes, mine is the third one! It'll be on it's way to you soon now I'm sure.
-Jeff
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Surely someone else has run two DKBs in one Miggy?
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X-ray wrote:
You know it, buddy. If all goes well my Miggy is going to have three DKB boards soon!
...surely this isn't a case of "Plug and Pray"! :hammer:
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Update:
Tried 3 DKB3128 boards, and the same thing happens (I can't have more than one of them fully loaded).
The curious thing is: I can have all three of them loaded with 96mb of RAM, and that RAM is recognised just fine.
So it looks like it is not an upper RAM limit on the Zorro bus, it is a problem with how 128mb RAM is recognised per 'slot'
Will do more testing, it is very strange.
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X-ray wrote:
...
The curious thing is: I can have all three of them loaded with 96mb of RAM, and that RAM is recognised just fine.
So it looks like it is not an upper RAM limit on the Zorro bus, it is a problem with how 128mb RAM is recognised per 'slot'
Will do more testing, it is very strange.
Hi X-ray,
Can you show us the output of the "ShowConfig" program?
Would be useful to see how the memory ranges are being placed.
Red
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Have you tried (3) 32 megs and (1) 8 or 16 meg SIMM per board? That might narrow it down a little bit more.
-Jeff
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I am wondering what the heck you are going to do with all that RAM on an Amiga???
Have you found any Amiga programs that can use more than 200mb?
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amigadave wrote:
I am wondering what the heck you are going to do with all that RAM on an Amiga???
Have you found any Amiga programs that can use more than 200mb?
Sometimes the answer would simply be in the lines of 'Because I can'.... :-)
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The answer is (at present) because I can.
However back in the days when I was raytracing with Cinema 4D I frequently ran out of memory (and I had 128 +16 +2).
So yep, the answer is raytracing with complex objects.
I have another update here:
I found that these DKBs behave a lot better if the PIV is in slot two and a fully populated DKB is in slot 1. I can then have a fully populated DKB in slot 3, and a 96mb DKB in slot 5.
That seems to be the combination to use for now.
Total fast ram is therefore 496mb on my Amiga.
I have to test this, though.
Still not allowed to have all boards fully populated but I guess I can live with that (although it would have been cool to have a classic Amiga with 530mb RAM.
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X-ray wrote:
The answer is (at present) because I can.
Still not allowed to have all boards fully populated but I guess I can live with that (although it would have been cool to have a classic Amiga with 530mb RAM.
Nerd! ;-) :lol: :-P
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Not just a nerd, a super nerd!
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X-ray wrote:
Not just a nerd, a super nerd!
*laughs*
I have *NO* comment!
*cough*
...nerd...
*cough*
:roflmao:
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Someone asked earlier about the output from ShowConfig. I'm curious about the mapping as well. Could you post the output?
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Sure, I'll get on it.
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Here is the PIV in slot one, and three DKBs all with 96mb RAM:
(http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/Odd_Job/1.jpg)
Here is the PIV in slot one, 1st DKB has 128mb and the other two have 96mb:
(http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/Odd_Job/2.jpg)
Here is the PIV in slot one, next two DKBs have 128mb and last one has 96mb. All of a sudden, you lose one DKB!
(http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/Odd_Job/3.jpg)
When I put the PIV in slot two, I can have two DKBs with 128mb:
(http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/Odd_Job/4.jpg)
But I can't have the last board fully loaded, because it disappears entirely, or in one case it turned into 48mb
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Have you tried all 3 DKB's with 384Mb, but leave the Picasso out? ;-)
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Hah! Interesting... It looks like you found a bug with Z3 addressing.
I'm not much of a deep-level hardware guy, but it looks like any time you have a border condition, (like having the end of the RAM board at 48000000-4FFFFFFF run right up to the one starting at 50000000) it is causing problems. When there is extra space there, (like the board at 48000000-4FFFFFFF and then empty space until 58000000-5FFFFFFF) everything is ok.
Moving around the PIV seems to move around where the physical addresses of the memory ends up, allowing you to get those breaks between banks. (Or, of course, removing some RAM from the board, also gives you that break between banks, allowing the system to work.)
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Ja, its weird, but that makes sense.
Kin-hell, removing the PIV makes no difference.
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That is odd indeed. Not what I would expect, but then I have not made in-depth analysis of the ZIII specs, either.
What is the closest you can get to a fully populated board? Can you put a 16MB SIMM in the fourth socket for 112MB?
I wonder if this isn't a problem with DKB's AutoConfig logic? I would assume they thought that people would want multiple 128MB boards in their system, but perhaps didn't test it out?
(Just deleted a whole section of conjecture because the last configuration wasn't what I thought, and it blew my whole theory out of the water hehehehe)
You know, X-Ray, it just seems like you're not going to be able to use more than two. Darnit. Why not just send the extra my way and I'll give it a few years' testing in my 4000D :crazy:
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@ X-ray
Was just a wild guess, tho' methinks DMA & the memory addressing is a bit fubar'd here! :-?
*edit*
I wonder if running Pre-Boing Bag updates with different Kick files of OS3.9 would make a difference/ Even plain old vanilla WB3.1?
Worth checking out, surely! :-)
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That's definitely worth checking out, and I'll try it when the Miggy is all back together with the other drives in place.
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Here's the answer from Dean Brown, creator of the DKB RAM board: There's a bug in Commodore's expansion.library. When he made the boards he tested them by sticking a bunch of 'em in a 3000, and found this problem. He notified Commodore, but it was too low on their to-do list. Remember, this was when 128MB RAM was SPENDY. C= didn't see this situation happening enough to warrant fixing it, and of course they later went under before it could be fixed.
That's how Dean explained it to me, anyway :-)
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Well, shyt. If it's a bug in the expansion.library, we should sick Piru on it! :lol:
This might be mentioned in another thread. I wonder if anyone's considered a new ZIII RAM board which could hold more memory (like 1GB or so.) Would be fun for kicks and giggles.
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This might be mentioned in another thread. I wonder if anyone's considered a new ZIII RAM board which could hold more memory (like 1GB or so.) Would be fun for kicks and giggles.
Just because we can :-D
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*bump*
....but are we?
Wozzon Xray, - any developments! ??
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I've been busy putting the Miggy back together (it was completely stripped for testing. I'm almost done, have to solder some fan wires.)
Then this weekend I can make a few more checks, but at present the last SIMM slot of the last DKB must remain empty or I lose the whole board from the RAM pool.
I also got an ATX PSU for the Miggy and found an unwanted 36gb wide SCSI drive I want to try (if it works I'll ditch one of the standard SCSI ones, probably the 1gb)
Oh, and I also built proper retaining standoffs for the Cyberstorm, and replaced some mobo screws and LED panel screws. It is somewhat of a major MOT for the old girl.
:-)
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Photos damn it. We want photos. :-D
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I don't have photos of the standoffs, but there are photos of the 3 DKB boards and also the ATX to AT converter in the photo album.
http://www.amiga.org/gallery/index.php?u=2374
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Okay, I have trouble running my 3.1 partition (getting recoverable alerts), but I have put a 16mb SIMM on the last DKB card, running 3.9.
(http://i55.photobucket.com/albums/g154/Odd_Job/WB3.jpg)
So I guess for now, that's the max I can have. It's also the most I've ever seen on a classic Amiga. If someone has more than 512mb, I want to know how he did it!