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Author Topic: Minimig PCB run - interest thread  (Read 98861 times)

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Offline Crumb

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Re: Minimig PCB run - interest thread
« on: July 25, 2007, 10:18:08 PM »
/me bows to Dennis, the custom chip master :-)
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Re: Minimig PCB run - interest thread
« Reply #1 on: August 02, 2007, 11:33:40 AM »
I like Dennis idea of keeping FPGA firmwares compatible and well structured.

BTW, about form factor I think MiniMig is nearer to nano-itx (12x12cm) than others like mini-itx.

For minimig v2 there are cheap 68LC060/75Mhz that could be a very interesting cpu as it has good compatibility, great speed, MMU (it lacks FPU but if the 060 was socketed people could put a full 060 if they prefer it).

I think Minimig v2 could be a substitute of an A1200 Blizzard 060. It should be able to interface with the 040/060 directly. There's no need ATM to add A1200 cpu connectors because if you change FPGA code to work with 040/060 correctly you would save a lot of logic and get a much faster system. An option could be added to "slow down" memory accesses to a similar speed of a Blizz060/50, but I guess that since the 040/060 would be supported by the fpga a lot of goodies would work like burst modes and access to ram would be much faster than on real Amiga 060 boards.

If it has RTG and other features it would be great, but 64MB would be mandatory (latest amiga scene demos are starting to require more than 32MB)

About the RTG software AROS CGX system could be modified to run on AmigaOS 68k and patch standard libraries like CGX/P96 do.

An AHI driver could be developed and sound output could be mixed with paula output without the need of cables :-)

Apart from network and USB I don't see much need of PCI stuff. I think that the basic computer functionality should be provided as standard.

My wishlist:
1.- Minimig v1 should be released more or less as is ASAP. Otherwise nothing will be done.
2.- Minimig v1.1 may have different form factor and slight changes but the core should be compatible as Dennis has said. Includes a dumb IDE port (similar to the A500IDE from aminet) and more ram that can be configured as chip/fast ram. Up to 2MB of of Chip ram (I guess that a plain 68000 wouldn't accept 8MB of chip). The rest could be configured as fast ram or slow/ranger ram.

3.- Minimig v2 with AGA and 060 socket. 64MB chip soldered on board. LC/EC 060s are not much more expensive than other motorola cpus. ¿ISA slot for old NE2000 cards? ¿faster PIO modes or even DMA? ¿keep an extra 68000 for 100% comaptibility with A500 games?

4.- Minimig v3, retargetable edition. Like v2 but with RTG, RTA, Network.

5.- Minimig v3.1 USB support.


Of course it's just a dream as I guess Minimig will reach my dream Minimig v1.1 as maximum, but it will be ok anyway. Dreaming is cheap :-)
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Re: Minimig PCB run - interest thread
« Reply #2 on: August 23, 2007, 03:43:13 PM »
It would be nice if someone with fpga and pic coding skills added a "gayle" + hardfile support. It could work with the current design (even if hardfile would be a little slow) but could be useful with OS3.x :-)
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Re: Minimig PCB run - interest thread
« Reply #3 on: October 31, 2007, 12:20:19 PM »
@alexh

maybe you want to plug in a real hard disk from your old miggy, CDROM, DVD...
The only spanish amiga news web page/club: Club de Usuarios de Amiga de Zaragoza (CUAZ)