Help optimizing an A500.

[Ral-Clan]

Hi,

So as I've mentioned I've been setting up an A500 with WB3.1, ECS chipset, hard drive.

Just wondering if there are any tweaks I can do to the basic WB3.1 to get the most out of the 68000 processor.  I.e. are there any faster datatypes or libraries that are recommended? I'm also going to install Fblit.

I don't want to go crazy customizing the Workbench - I like just the basic 4-colour stock icon workbench for speed.  But if there are any easy patches or tweaks to make the machine the best it can be I'd be interested in hearing from them.

I've seen this improved Mathtrans.library (http://aminet.net/package/util/libs/tmathtrans) but I'm not sure if it will make a difference with a 680000 - the description doesn't say.

PS: Is this 68010 okay for an Amiga?  It has the P10 at the end which I am wondering about --- there's another on eBay that has a P12 on the end.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/1pcs-MC68010P10-MC68010-16-32-Bit-Virtual-Memory-Microprocessor-/170845532651?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27c72ff1eb

[Ral-Clan]

I did some research online (Google'd 68010P10 and AMIGA) and looks like some others use this designation of the 68010 in their Amigas.  So it sounds like it's totally compatible.

I ordered one at the above link just because, for $8.50US it's worth the 5% to 10% speed bonus.

I guess I'll let you know in three weeks (delivery time from China to N. America) how it goes.

I'd still like advice on faster math libs and other patches that are good for 68000 Amigas running WB3.1.  Thanks.

[Ral-Clan]

If you want to see noticeable speed differences, make sure you have 8mb of fast ram.  Fast ram is easily expandable on the A500 with sidecars, or with Kipper's board, and you will see a difference.  You didn't say how much fast ram you have, so I am unsure, you may already have it maxed out.  Good luck, and enjoy the mods, as that is what it is all about.

I have an ECS Amiga 500 with the following:

- MegaChip (1MB in A500 and 1MB on MegaChip gives 2MB Chip RAM)
- PowerXL internally mounted High-Density Floppy Drive
- Kickstart Switcher 1.3/3.1
- Supra 500XP Sidecar with 2GB Hard drive and 2MB Fast RAM installed (expandable to 8MB but I can't find 1M x 4 chips for sale).
- DCTV for full colour graphics work with supported software

So in total I have 2MB CHIP and 2MB FAST.

I used to have several much faster big box Amigas (RTG, AHI, 68040 and over 36MB RAM) but once I started using WinUAE for Amiga productivity software and experienced the speed (rendering, graphics) then it was hard to go back to even a 68040.

So now I just have this expanded Amiga 500 for my nostalgia fix, and use my "virtual" Amiga on WinUAE for the computationally intensive work.

I agree that it is silly to install Fblit on an A500 with 16-bit chipmem and a super slow motion 7.15909 Mhz 68010. There is no real point.

Thanks for the information on Fblit. As for the 68000/68010, yes, it's slow in comparison, but it's still quite capable.
After years of using super expanded and FAST big box Amigas, I started to think of the old 68000 Amigas (A500/A600) as toy or garbage machines, barely worth saving from the junkyard.

Now that I've gone back to using one - I'm actually impressed by what it CAN do!  It's a nice little 2D graphics, animation and Paula music machine that's capable of some creditable work!  Not useless at all (as long as one doesn't expect to run Lightwave on it or something)!  I am finding it a lot more fun and useful that I thought it would be.

I thought there were some optimized mathlibs out there for Amigas....but maybe these were for FPU equipped Amigas...