FPGA Replay Board

[amigadave]

I'm just got back home.
I have the new boards and almost all the components to get them built
/MikeJ

That is good news!  Is this the second batch of boards that have the fix for the spacing of the audio connectors?  How many boards are in this second batch, another 50, or was it 100?  I hope I am on the list to get one of them?

I hope your efforts to turn this into a commercial product are going well and you will soon have the opportunity to sell thousands of them, but finding retailers that will commit to purchasing large numbers of them is probably a hard thing to do for any small startup company.  Plus the cost of packaging, marketing and peripherals, like the case, PSU, etc. all add up and may make the product too expensive for large retail distribution.

Still, I wish you luck MikeJ and I still think that the Replay board is a large step beyond the original MiniMig, so you might find that someone like ACube or AmigaKit is interested in selling them.

Edit:  What is the amount of time it takes to complete the production of this second batch of boards?  Is it a certain number per day, or does the production facility assembly all 50 or 100 boards in a few hours, since they are mechanically assembled, not hand assembled?

[amigadave]

There is 64MB as Wizard said, and it can be configured in several ways:

CHIP:  0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0
SLOW:  None, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5
FAST:  None, 2.0, 4.0, 8.0
XRAM:  None, 48MB FAST, 48MB CHIP

Is this a new math where 48 + 48 = 64?

[amigadave]

Good news, mike, can't wait to order one!

Me too!  

Money is here waiting to be spent on a Replay board.  Just tell me when and where to send the money Mike.  Paypal is fine with me too, if you are set up to receive payments that way.

[amigadave]

we will have some boards 1st week October.

Great news Mike!

[amigadave]

MikeJ has just given me permission to mention that I will be displaying the FPGA Arcade Replay Board at my table during the AmiWest 2011 Show, Oct. 21st to 23rd in Sacramento, CA.

This makes me very happy to know that I will have my board soon (or if worst case happens, MikeJ will lend me his personal board for the show).  I will have hand-outs to distribute to interested show attendees and have the board connected to a monitor to show it running several Amiga programs and/or games.  This will be in addition to my display of my MorphOS2.x computers running the latest version and Acill displaying his iPhone running AmigaOS3.x.  Going to be another great AmiWest Show!

[amigadave]

Anyone who is not sure about purchasing an FPGA Arcade Replay Board yet and wants to see one running first should attend the AmiWest 2011 Show in a bit over 2 weeks, as I will have one running at my display table at the show.

[amigadave]

Cool. You got hold of one from Mike already ? That's pretty quick

No, but he has confirmed that he will be shipping it any time now and I have no doubt that it will arrive in time to take to the AmiWest 2011 Show with me.

Since I have a flip-down video screen in the back seat of my car that also has composite and audio inputs in the rear of the center console next to an electrical outlet fed by an inverter to provide a small amount of 120 volt A/C power, I will be able to use the FPGA Arcade Replay board inside the car while someone else is driving to and from the AmiWest 2011 Show.

Amiga gaming fun from the back seat at 70mph should be a fun change from looking at the boring freeway traffic!

Thanks Mike for making this all possible.  The Replay board is a great step forward for Amiga FPGA computing.  I can't hardly wait for the daughter board to be ready for production and sale.

[amigadave]

You know, this project has not received much front page news love here at the .org . I'm cool with that, as I already praised the less hype characteristic of this project.

But there should be some thunder when the time is right...

Just sayin....

I don't know about "Thunder", but I will be giving it some praise and play time at my display table at the AmiWest 2011 Show, so hopefully it will get some of the attention it deserves.

The product I think has gotten very little attention is the Chameleon from Individual Computers.  I almost never see any discussions about it on the forums.  I don't know if that is because very few of them were sold, or for some other reason.  Jens keeps development pretty close to his vest and I don't know who else is working on the Chameleon firmware updates with or for Jens (or who did the hardware design for Jens, was it Jerry "what's-her-name"?), but I think it is strange that we don't hear more about it.  I guess we also don't hear much about the original v1.1 MiniMig these days, so maybe it is just because the product is complete and there are not many problems or improvements to talk about, that there is no discussion about them anymore.

[amigadave]

The Yahoo group is very active and I get a bunch of emails every day as people discuss and test each new core and various software.

The current core is still beta and is 6g.

It is certainly a great product for people who don't mind reflashing it when updates arrive, but I think Jens is just keeping everything quiet until he has a core that he believes will satisfy the everyday customer.  Rather like MikeJ with the FPGA Arcade.

I have a friend that has a Chameleon and another that has an MCC-216, but have never seen anyone put together a review comparing all FPGA based systems with each other.  It would be interesting to see in which ways they are the same, or similar and which features are different on each of these systems.

I have not kept up with the features of the Chameleon, MCC-216, Natami, or expanded v1.1 MiniMig.  I think MikeJ has done a better job of keeping most of us Amiga users up to date with the progress of his work and the work of Yaqube, than some of the other system designers have done with their offerings.  Although the Natami Team seems to be very active on their forum, not as much of that info spills over to sites like this one.  The same is probably true for the Chameleon and MCC-216 on their own sites.

[amigadave]

The Minimig v1.1 is built into the black keyboard on the far left.  You should just to able to make out the yellow Chameleon cartridge sticking out of the cartridge port expander on the back of the C64C and the FPGA Arcade is that tiny board to the left of the keyboard on the right.

Another problem with testing is that the Chameleon Minimig core doesn't recognise the joystick ports on the C64 (yet).  The IR controller is supposed to work if I use a CDTV remote as a joystick, but I don't have one.  My only option was to use the keypad on a PS2 keyboard as a joystick.

I think AmigaKit still has a ton of brand new CDTV remote controllers for sale.

I for one am interested in testing comparisons of your three FPGA based Amiga computers, so I hope you will find time to renew your interest in testing and reviewing them for the rest of us.  You can always update the results for the FPGA Arcade Replay board after you get the next firmware update.  That will also show how much improvement has been made between the firmware you have now, and the next version.

I should have my own Replay board within the next few days.  I can hardly wait to get it and test it out.

[amigadave]

I have received a lot of emails!
I will respond to you all, thanks for being patient.

Hardware assembly and testing is going well.
I really want to roll out the new core with these boards, but there are a few issues remaining.
I'll keep you posted.
/MikeJ

I don't want to distract you from doing your work, but what are the main features you are trying to improve, or issues you are trying to fix in your new core?

[amigadave]

Enhancing the original Amiga features with more modern additions to the feature set in these FPGA based Amiga systems is a good thing that will allow new apps and games to look and/or behave differently than was previously possible on an Amiga, while still maintaining good backward compatibility.

Having open communication of ideas between all of the people working on such systems will help  encourage more programmers to use these new features and without new apps and games that use the new features, there is no point in having them.

Not all new features that are created for one of the new FPGA systems will work on all of the other FPGA based systems, but most of them should be possible.  It appears that there is a spirit of cooperation between all people working on FPGA based systems, not competition, which is refreshing to see in the Amiga community.

[amigadave]

Will it include cut-outs for the daughter board?

I'd be up for one at 10-15 euro's.

Partially cut openings that could be easily removed later for the ports on the daughter card, for the USB and Ethernet ports would be a good idea, so we all don't have to replace the back plane when the daughter card is perfected and ready for sale.  The price is fine with me at 10 to 15 euro's.

How is the testing and assembly of the remaining 48 boards going?

How many of those are spoken for, or more importantly, how many FPGA Arcade Replay boards are available for people to buy.  If the answer is they are all reserved for people waiting for them already, when will the next batch of FPGA Arcade Replay boards be produced and how many are you planning for the next batch?  50, 100, 200?  Have you received lots of interest and requests to purchase the FPGA Arcade Replay boards from outside the Amiga community, like from the Retro-Arcade communities, or the Atari community?

[amigadave]

Sorry to change the topic. I am just curious on where in the run the daughterboard is :-)

What is the current focus as of today, and when do you think the daughterboard might see the light of day for beta-testers ? Ballpark estimates are more than adequate :-)

I don't think MikeJ has had much time to work on finalizing the daughterboard yet.  He has been busy with final assembly and testing of the 48 FPGA Arcade Replay boards he produced and has a full time job AFAIK.

I too am anxious for the daughterboard to be finished, but don't expect it for another 6 to 12 months.

Hope all is going well with your assembly and testing Mike.

[amigadave]

Can we get a spec sheet posted on your website MikeJ for the components that are to be installed on the daughter board.  I don't think there is a list anywhere that describes it in detail, or I just have not found it.

IIRC, from the picture of it, it has 3 USB ports, additional RAM, but I don't know how much is planned, and the Ethernet Port.

A custom graphics card that could use already existing CyberGraphX4 or Picasso96 drivers, would be a very nice addition for the Replay board and daughter card.  Is that something that is even possible?

[amigadave]

MikeJ will be able to answer in more depth, I'm sure, but my understanding is that the output modes selectable, is something which is entirely determined by the core itself, and then any drivers written in AmigaOS to support what the core supports.

The Replay Board itself is capable of outputting just about anything: it is equipped with a DVI socket on the back capable of outputting both digital and analog signal outputs.  The rest is entirely up to the core.  As for precisely what Minimig AGA supports screenmodes-wise, that's something that only MikeJ or Jakub can answer right now.  As for custom graphics card support, well a lot would depend on what exactly you have in mind.  But my understanding is that if what you want is Picasso-style graphics card support, then I'm pretty sure that support can and will in due time be implemented in FPGA as well.  There's no need for a physical card via the expansion slot, just as there's no need for physical AGA chips to gain AGA compatibility, it can all be done in FPGA.

On the question of Chip RAM, I know it is possible to expand Chip RAM from the standard AGA 2MB up to a massive 50MB(!). There is a Youtube video from last year which which shows this in action; the additional Chip RAM can be activated by executing an 'xchip' command in the AmigaShell.  Chip RAM availability then shoots up from 2MB to 50MB: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vn4ZzLH6MpE (it's at around the 1:10 mark.)

I know that the display modes are controllable by the core, but my question, or hope was that more advanced display modes could be supported with an actual graphics RTG card connected to the Replay board, or to it's daughter card.  Display modes from the core will be limited to the softcore AGA code and it would be nice if there was a way to also have some more powerful, better looking display modes from a video card.

Thanks for the answer about the Chip RAM, as I had forgotten what was done with that.  So many Amiga choices these days, it is hard to keep up with all of them.