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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: DoomMaster on September 09, 2003, 04:59:27 AM
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I am putting together a 3rd Amiga 2000HD. This one will have Kickstart 3.1 and Workbench 3.9. I am using an A2091 SCSI Controller card with the 7.0 Boot ROMs and the revision 08 Western Digital Controller IC. I would like to include a CD-RW drive. What do you recommend? :-o
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I've used a Yamaha CRW4416S (SCSI-2 50-pin) with my Amiga 4000 while it had Cyberstorm 68060 Mk.2 in it. It worked like a charm, with no problems. I still have the CD-RW, if you would like to buy it. It is in working condition, and the date stamped on it is January 1999. Not sure how many hours of use is still left in it, but at the moment it works fine.
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To x56h34:
I already have a Yamaha CRW4416S CD-RW drive. It is installed in my 2nd Amiga 2000HD, which has Kickstart / Workbench 2.04. My goal is to have 3 Amiga 2000HDs in MINT condition. One has Kickstart / Workbench 1.3 and is dedicated to my over 600 vintage commercial games. My 2.04 system will be used for music and MIDI, and my 3.9 system will be used for graphics and animation. So, I need a CD-RW drive that can keep up with the animations. I already have a Seagate 10,000 RPM fan-cooled hard drive just for my OS 3.9 Amiga 2000HD system. I also have Commodore's high quality 68030 board. It blows the doors off the 040 to 060 boards in quality and reliability! The custom Chips in my new Amiga 2000HD are military grade ICs, even the two 8520s are military grade. I am looking for military grade quality 256k X 4 DRAM memory ICs and I am willing to pay the price to get them. :-P
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What do you recommend?
C'mon, dude. I recommend you get a life & stop this foolishness. I can't believe people are still willing to even try responding to your posts with genuine help. :-?
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Sounds good. :-) It will be kind of hard to track down SCSI-2 mint or new CD-RWs nowadays. You'd probably need a SCSI-3 CD-RW and then use 80-50 or 68-50 pin cable conversions. Make sure you get round cables, too. They are the best.
I've been thinking of getting myself an A2000 just for kicks. I only have A4000 of the big box Amigas at the moment. I have all the necessery extras to upgrade it too. Picasso IV (not sure whether to sell or keep it...and how would I fit it in? I think it doesn't fit in A2000 without some major hacking), 4.3GB SCSI 2 IBM Hard Drive, 10 new OEM packaged 12X Sony SCSI-2 CD-R drives :-), the Yamaha CD-RW I mentioned, even an extra KS3.1 A500/600/2000 ROM...All I'd need would be a nice accelerator with a SCSI controller and RAM (e.g. Blizzard 2040/2060 or A GVP G-Force 030/040) for the entire setup and that's it. I would need a 6.0+ rev A2000 though...wouldn't settle for less than that. Maybe even a 2MB CHIP RAM hack.
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To Oldsmobile_Mike:
It sounds like to me that it is YOU that should "get a life & stop the foolishness".
How come you do not have your picture posted for your avatar? Are you afraid to show the rest of us what you look like? I do like classic Oldsmobiles though. They are very nice cars. I myself have owned a few. Have fun here on Amiga.Org and stop picking on me. :-D
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I already have a Seagate 10,000 RPM fan-cooled hard drive just for my OS 3.9 Amiga 2000HD system.
10krpm hard disk for A2000/030 system is total overkill, you're not getting full speed out of it anyway. Zorro II bus is capping the transfer speed. 10krpm helps with the seek time however.
BTW. Are you sure it's 10krpm on your A2000HD? According to your previous posts the speed is changing... So is it 8-15krpm or what?
I also have Commodore's high quality 68030 board. It blows the doors off the 040 to 060 boards in quality and reliability!
Have you ever owned 040 ot 060 board? Or where do you get this quality idea from? Lots of CBM hw was totally crap.
For example Blizzard 2060 (http://www.amiga-hardware.com/blizzard2060.html) would be something to consider. It has built-in SCSI controller aswell, that'll eat any Zorro II controller alive.
About the CD-RW, don't bother getting high end drive as your A2000/030 is not fast enough to transfer the data thru Zorro II bus anyway, and even if it was, the CPU is too slow to process the data.
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DoomMaster wrote:
I am putting together a 3rd Amiga 2000HD. This one will have Kickstart 3.1 and Workbench 3.9. I am using an A2091 SCSI Controller card with the 7.0 Boot ROMs and the revision 08 Western Digital Controller IC. I would like to include a CD-RW drive. What do you recommend? :-o
Firstly I would recommend you upgrade to a faster SCSI controler, one that is cabable of the high speeds of modern CD-RW drives, the A2091 is probably the slowest and is certainly not recomended for CD writing.
http://www.amiga-hardware.com/a2091.html (http://www.amiga-hardware.com/a2091.html)
Stop barracking for old Commodore products from the 80's, when there are obviously better, faster, more upgradable products from other developers made in more modern times.
I would also reccomend that you upgrade the CPU to somthing that can handle the speed, unless you want to write at slow speeds(1x or perhaps 2x) you will need an 040, or 060, CD writing requires alot of CPU cycles.
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I think a good solution would be the AdSCSI controller from ICD, www.icd.com
It is relatively cheap, probably good speeds, and can be ordered new from them
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Cyberus wrote:
I think a good solution would be the AdSCSI controller from ICD, www.icd.com
It is relatively cheap, probably good speeds, and can be ordered new from them
The AdSCSI is a TOY!! It's JUNK!!! You need to get a real controller like the A2091!!!! :-D
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x56h34
quote:
I've been thinking of getting myself an A2000 just for kicks. I only have A4000 of the big box Amigas at the moment. I have all the necessery extras to upgrade it too. Picasso IV (not sure whether to sell or keep it...and how would I fit it in? I think it doesn't fit in A2000 without some major hacking), 4.3GB SCSI 2 IBM Hard Drive, 10 new OEM packaged 12X Sony SCSI-2 CD-R
end
Major hacking? How does breaking the card in half sound? The Video
slot on the 2000 is not lined up with the zorro, the flickerfixer bit
is on the back end of the card, you snap it and run a wee cable
between that and the PIV bit!
Data from orgininal review in old AMiGA mag (AF??), other feel free to
correct if wrong :-)
My Opinion:
It is a spooky thought to snap a Picasso card in half! A Blizzard 060
PIV and lots a ram makes the 2000 a grunty workhorse. Go for it!
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DoomMaster,
Quote:
I already have a Yamaha CRW4416S CD-RW drive. It is installed in my 2nd Amiga 2000HD,
end
Well dude, you have a Yamaha drive that you know how well it works,
put it in the other A2000 and see if it gets the results you want,
unless you have done that already. If you have tried it was it not
fast enough? Was it the problem or was the data throughport of your
controller not fast enough? Could the 030 be the problem? Might you
need a bit more power to do what you want?
My opinion:
It might be that all these factors combined are the reason you cannot
get the preformance you require or is the drive just too slow? If the
drive is the "weak" link see if you can get a store with a good return
policy, as SCSI is expensive, but as long as you set SCSI up correctly
any SCSI drive should work. It might be a different story if the
software you intend to use does not work correctly. If the drive is
NOT the bottleneck in what you are trying to do then you would do well
to look at a card like the Blizzard 060 with SCSI.
I do hope that I have given you some ideas and maybe some points to
think about. Do let us know more details of just what you are
attempting and the software being used, someone might be able to offer
more help.
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DoomMaster wrote:
I am putting together a 3rd Amiga 2000HD. This one will have Kickstart 3.1 and Workbench 3.9. I am using an A2091 SCSI Controller card with the 7.0 Boot ROMs and the revision 08 Western Digital Controller IC. I would like to include a CD-RW drive. What do you recommend? :-o
Anything made by Plextor! I have a Plextor CD-ROM drive and a Plextor CD-RW drive. Both work flawlessly with MakeCD DAO version.
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Thanks guys, you have all been helpful. I am now looking for a Plextor CD-RW drive on eBay. I found on eBay some more military grade, high quality custom ICs for the Amiga 2000HD. They are Paula, Denise, and a 8520 IC. They have the purple-pink ceramic body and gold-plated legs. I plan on bidding on these chips. :-D
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Military grade paula and denise...
...riiiiiiight.
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Could you provide a link to ebay where I could see these chips. They sound veerrryyy interesting. I tried searching there but came up with nothing.
Thanks.
P.S. I promise not to try and outbid you.
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DoomMaster wrote:
Thanks guys, you have all been helpful. I am now looking for a Plextor CD-RW drive on eBay. I found on eBay some more military grade, high quality custom ICs for the Amiga 2000HD. They are Paula, Denise, and a 8520 IC. They have the purple-pink ceramic body and gold-plated legs. I plan on bidding on these chips. :-D
When would Commodore or MOS ever have been contracted to produce military grade hardware? I find that statement highly doubtful.
If this is what you're looking at, check the link here. (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2556758147&category=4663)
From this information, how do you determine "military grade"?
Mike
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@Oldsmobile_MikeOldsmobile_Mike
Those look a lot (exactly) like the ones in my A1000. Hmmm.. maybe I have a complete military grade Amiga computer and I didn't even know it :)
Now I just need to find some high levels of radiation and see if Dpaint II will still work!
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If he wants to buy some nice ICs for his 'puter than let him go ahead...I can certainly see the attraction myself, although I'm not sure what a 'Military Grade IC' quite is
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Aww, come on, surely we all know there were military grade chipsets made for the US military?
The military grade OCS chipset, as saught after by our erstwhile friend, comprised the ultra hardened versions of out fave chips, namely "General, Commander and Seargent", fabricated to withstand a 1 megaton EMP...
Note also, that his CIA chips are in fact the real thing, complemented by an 8522 NSA chip, only available for military grade 2000HD systems.
I can't believe you had to ask. Jeez ;-)
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Be sure to get yourself a military grade avatar in future, too. Like mine... :roflmao:
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@DoomMaster
(Some more questions)
I already have a Seagate 10,000 RPM fan-cooled hard drive just for my OS 3.9 Amiga 2000HD system. I also have Commodore's high quality 68030 board. It blows the doors off the 040 to 060 boards in quality and reliability! The custom Chips in my new Amiga 2000HD are military grade ICs, even the two 8520s are military grade. I am looking for military grade quality 256k X 4 DRAM memory ICs and I am willing to pay the price to get them.
That hard disk drive sounds awful nice! Did you notice that the connectors on it don't fit the ones on your A2091 board? Do you really believe that you are getting the full potential out of the HDD here?
Could you just tell us in specific technical terms why you believe the Commodore '030 card is better than '040 and '060? Is there anything in particular that users of these other cards should be aware of?
Can you tell us the specific problems(if any)?
Also, these mill. spec. chips you have:
Did you say that the millitary grade custom chips came with your Amiga? If you installed them yourself, from where did you get them? How would we be able to find mill. spec. chips for our Amiga's?
Why do you suppose Commodore would make such chips?
What do you have to gain from mill. spec. hardware in your A2000?
Are there any specific markings on the chips that identify them as being mill. spec. ?
If you are able DoomMaster, I(and I'm sure many others) would really appreciate it if you could take some pictures of the inside of your A2000 to show us in clear detail the chips on the motherboard of your A2000. If you could show us, that would be really nice, thanks.
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a 1 megaton EMP
:lol:
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@Karlos
Be sure to get yourself a military grade avatar in future, too. Like mine...
Ah man, that one got me rollin' for some reason. Thanks! :roflmao:
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First of all, I want you guys to know that I actually work in the electronics industry as a Class 4 Assembler and as a technician / engineer's helper. There are 3 grades of electronics assembly and components. The 3 grades are: Consumer Spec, Military Spec, and Weapons Spec. Consumer Spec is made to last an average of 4 to 7 years. Military Spec is made to last 7 to 15 years. Weapons Spec is made to last for at least 20 years. Most things produced today are Consumer Spec. Military Spec is a classification of Assembly type and Quality type. It does NOT mean that these parts are made for the military. Actually, Weapons Spec is done for the military. The Amiga Custom Chips that have the black plastic bodies are Consumer Spec ICs. This is what's in most Amiga computers. The Amiga Custom Chips with the purple-pink ceramic bodies with gold-platted legs are Military Spec. These ICs are very high quality and are designed to last at least 15 years. The ceramic bodies dissipate heat better then the black plastic bodies, so the ICs last a lot longer. Also, the gold-platted legs allow the signals to flow more efficiently. The gold-plated legs are also less susceptible to corrosion. The first run of Amiga 1000 and 2000 computers all had Military Spec Custom Chips. Some even had Military Spec DRAM! My first Amiga 1000 sure did. Just last month, a guy on eBay was selling Military Spec 68-pin 68010 processors for $14.99 plus shipping. I bought one for each of my 3 Amiga 2000HDs. These 68010 processors are pin for pin compatible with the normal black-bodied 68000 processor. They just plug in. If you replace the crystal as well, you can actually gain up to 20% increase in speed. :-P
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I knew all about this Mil Spec stuff all along. I was just playing around to see how far I could lead the rest of these toy A1200 users on. A1200 users are infidels!!
The streets will flow with the blood of the infidels! Throw your Consumer Spec toy A1200s away if you want to live!
:roflmao: :roflmao: :roflmao: Ohh my sides hurt! :cry:
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@"DoomMaster"
Got a URL to back up what you are saying?
Because from what I've read in the past, it sounds like BS.
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(http://www.lorddef.net/ebay/doomaster.jpg)
A military spec DoomMaster for you all, hmm maybe I should have made his head a ceramic package.
Okay enough of these annoying threads and I'll stop the annoying posts in them.
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@lorddef
:lol:
Okay enough of these annoying threads and I'll stop the annoying posts in them.
NOOOOOOO! Don't stop!!! My life is lousy with out this kind of ####
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NOOOOOOO! Don't stop!!! My life is lousy with out this kind of ####
I have to stop because the next pic will be the same avatar with a big nob drawn on it. :-D
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:lol:
:lol:
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Hmmm....I dunno, from what I've seen there 'ARE"
actually chips with purplish bodies and gold
pins, so what's the difference then?!? Maybe
DoomMaster is on to something here guys...I for
one would like an explanation. And DoomMaster
is right - gold 'does conduct better..
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-D- wrote:
Hmmm....I dunno, from what I've seen there 'ARE"
actually chips with purplish bodies and gold
pins, so what's the difference then?!? Maybe
DoomMaster is on to something here guys...I for
one would like an explanation. And DoomMaster
is right - gold 'does conduct better..
Yeh, they're ceramic packaged chips that have advantages of dissipating heat better. Although a component is not military grade just because it's in a ceramic package, thats BS. As DoomMaster says the grade relates to the components ruggedness and expected lifespan.
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Hmmm....I dunno, from what I've seen there 'ARE"
actually chips with purplish bodies and gold
pins, so what's the difference then?!?
They're just ceramic versions, they don't actually last longer.
Many Amiga's are much older than 7 years, heck, some older than 15, they still work. I have a computer from 1979 that still works - no ceramic chips in it.
Maybe
DoomMaster is on to something here guys...I for
one would like an explanation. And DoomMaster
is right - gold 'does conduct better..
Better than what? The main advantage of gold is that it is resistant to corrosion.
Copper conducts better than gold.
Silver conducts better than gold.
People who buy cables with gold connectors thinking conduct better are fooling themselves.
Utimatly cables would be made of silver(or perhaps selenium, which is light dependant), or even better a really cold super-conducter.
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Yes but gold conducts HEAT better...which would
make sense for military grade chips :P
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iamaboringperson wrote:
Maybe
DoomMaster is on to something here guys...I for
one would like an explanation. And DoomMaster
is right - gold 'does conduct better..
Better than what? The main advantage of gold is that it is resistant to corrosion.
Copper conducts better than gold.
Silver conducts better than gold.
People who buy cables with gold connectors thinking conduct better are fooling themselves.
Utimatly cables would be made of silver(or perhaps selenium, which is light dependant), or even better a really cold super-conducter.
I may be wrong, but I seem to recall from physics lessons of old that higher freqency electronic signals (from kHz upwards) tend to flow more at the surface of the material rather than through the body of it. The presence of surface oxides and the like reduce the conductivity there so that too would put gold out in front.
My various audio cables are all oxygen free copper with gold plated jacks supposedly for this reason.
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I think DoomMaster might make some sweeping comments at times, but I think you ought to stop attacking him whenever he says anything. Life's too short to enjoy being nasty to other people, and I think that just says more about YOUR personality than his.
I am quite prepared to believe that ICs can be known as 'Military Spec' - life and languages in general are full of misnomers, perhaps he should have explained himself better.
BTW
Oh, I have two of those purple and gold 68010s myself, but they're just sitting in my room in antistatic packaging not doing anything.
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Actually, although I had a bit of a tease, the chip issue is actually quite interesting. You may have noticed there have been several serious comments since :-)
-edit-
If the components are indeed 'militarty spec', then he's got the right idea using them, given the age of the A2000 and the part's anticipated lifespan.
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Nothing wrong with taking the piss every so often, no nastiness intended.
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To Cyberus:
I would like to buy those 68010 processors from you. Email me. :-o
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To Lorddef:
That picture is funny dude. I actually laughed. :-D
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So whats the biggy with military IC's anyhows? Probs dosent make a great deal of "wows" on a 10mHz chip anyway.
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I think he is trying to get a system that will last as long as possible with out screwing up rather than a performance increace.
@ DoomMaster, use it as your new avatar :-D
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But do the CPU's normally cause the issues? I aint never had one. Had problems with custom chips and batteries, thats about all tho. Anyway, im guessin any improvement is worth it.
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@DoomMaster
There was a guy in the US selling the same thing on eBay, it'd be easier and cheaper to buy from him if he's still selling them....
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Ah the avatar... :roflmao:
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To lorddef:
I am using your picture of me as my new avatar. :-P
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To DoomMaster,
So is it the component longevity that youre after?
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to start with, i dont know anything about electronics, now that cleared up, are these chips really military grade or are they just early versions of the custom chips? to me it seems they are more than likey early version and the black plastic "if it is plastic" body chips are new cheaper made versions.
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@NitrousB
You are mostlikely right, and maybe the ruggedness of the early chips qualifies them as a military grade.
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To lorddef:
I am using your picture of me as my new avatar.
I preferred the old one!
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DoomMaster wrote:
To lorddef:
I am using your picture of me as my new avatar. :-P
A stokey poking out of the corner of your mouth and the effect would be complete! :-)
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@Karlos
You're right about the higher frequency transmitting along the outer edges of the cable, however with your OFC cables there is no gold on the cable itself. The gold is only on the connector.
I buy OFC cables with gold plated connectors(the connectors are usually made of steel or aluminium), but there is alot of hype in the cable industry - I don't believe half the crap interconnect manufacturers tell us. Mostly hype.
On the other hand, I have been able to tell the difference in audio quality between different cables.
:-)
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iamaboringperson wrote:
You're right about the higher frequency transmitting along the outer edges of the cable, however with your OFC cables there is no gold on the cable itself. The gold is only on the connector.
Er yeah, I know that :-) The contacts are only plated gold because they cant operate in an oxygen free environment, unlike the copper conductor inside the cable.
Being corrosion resistant, the jacks dont degrade the signal's high frequencies. There'd be bugger all point in excluding the oxygen from the copper conductor only to have poorly conducting oxides all over the surface of the jacks...
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@all
(I do have a better reference in a book somewhere)
These IC gradings are for temperature tolorance.
They have nothing to do with how long they will last, except under extreem circumstances.
IC's with plastic housing will last just as long as those with ceramic housing.
I'm still trying to find more decent info. on the web, however the following link might be of assistance for now:
http://www.acq.osd.mil/es/dut/ic/sect2.htm (http://www.acq.osd.mil/es/dut/ic/sect2.htm)
(notice the top level domain)
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@Ima
Bah! So no EMP resistant Denise then? Bummer.
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Here's another link. (http://www.maxim-ic.com/qa/info/naming_conventions/) I think you're ment to guess what the letters on the left side of the table stand for (under "Temperature Ranges").
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Cyberus wrote:
I think a good solution would be the AdSCSI controller from ICD, www.icd.com
It is relatively cheap, probably good speeds, and can be ordered new from them
ICD scares me. Have you seen the price of their stuff? Someone needs to email them and let 'em know that:
1: Commodore is dead.
2: It's not 1990.
3: Amiga models beyond the 2000 and 500 have been released.
Phew!
(Still, if for some reason someone simply must tart up that old A500, at least there's a company still making (?) stuff to do it with :lol: