Enter the Dragon or enter the vapor?

[Donar]

In my understanding the V4(e) core needs a Program (the CF68klib which is provided by Freescale (Programed by MicroAPL) to run 68k code properly.

There are two ways this CF68kLib works
a) Run code, trap out when needed -> The opcodes that are "double" in 68k and CF and behave differently can not trap out and do whatever they should do in Coldfire world. Maybe that is a bit different to what they would do on 68k.
There are only a few (4?) opcodes that are double between 68060 and coldfire V4e instruction set an behave differently, but it is a valid point when speaking about binary compatability.

b) Set up an virtual 68k on Coldfire but without MMU and FPU, run 68k code. One problem could be if you want to emulate an 68060 (because there are only a few (4?) opcodes that are double between 68060 and coldfire V4e instruction set) that you probably need an MMU for your AMIGA to work...
You could emulate an 68030 but i think it has more unupported instructions, which should slow down the Emulation...

Someone (i think his name was Darek Smirtana?) from Elbox wrote in a forum post that they had to write their own software because the one that was provided by Freescale did not work, without getting more specific.

I also think (like eslapion) that if the Coldfire V4e at 266MHz gives a raw Power on 68k code that is at least at an level of an 68060 @ 100MHz i will be fine with it. One could argue that a 68k emulator on an embedded PPC is faster then "Emulation" on the Coldfire and probably cheaper but that is another thing.

The price difference between the Chips (68060 vs Colfire) and goodies (USB/Ethernet/PCI) that come with the Coldfire speak for the Coldfire. Performance wise there are only guesses, and a little Screenshot from ATARI Coldfire Project where "Raw Power" of an Coldfire developer board (V4 @ 200MHz, TOS under 68k Emulation) is equal to TOS running on a real ATARI that is equipped with a CT63 Accelerator (68060 @ 100 MHz)

As for the x86, i somehow have a bad feeling about having one in my AMIGA. It's fine for my PC running UAE but not for the Miggy. If it were for the money i would have sold my Blizzard 1260 on eBay for 200€-300€ already...

[Donar]

Tripitaka wrote:
 :-o Deja Vu :-o

This thread has happened before....

As there is not much to talk about in Amiga land... better to talk about the Coldfire then about the (bad) weather... :lol:

[Donar]

Lemmink wrote:
... but the Elbox coldfire will never go faster then any 68060 accelerator for the Amiga. The outcome of the presentation was that the card ran unmodified / optimised software at the speed of an 68040 at about 33 MHz. ..

The thing that i do not understand is: The Coldfire is (Mips wise) roughly 4 times faster than a 68060 @ 70 MHz it shares a good lot of instructions/adressing modes with the 68k (75%?). Why shouldn't it reach the performance of an  68060 or more?  :-?

[Donar]

I must admit it's only a screenshot, actually it is about porting PCI drivers to Atari but as the guy had no ATARI PCI device he used his Coldfire Evaluation Board (from the ATARI Coldfire Project) for development, and i stumbled over the Screenshot...

Link, look in lower half -> the two pictures before the GFX Card...

I do not know which instructions are used in the Tests/Benchmark and how accurate it is.

[Donar]

Oli_hd wrote:

AJCopland wrote:
I've always hoped he'd open source everything if he didn't plan to take it any further *hint-hint*

Wouldnt help Im afraid, my problem was with the coldfire/68K bus interface with the V4 CF.

Maybe someone could give you a hand if he sees more of your card/glue logic...

AJCopland wrote:
That seems to be a problem even with the 68060 etc accelerators too (though different I admit) would it require something like the GAL arrays or FPGA based bridges that they use to translate bus addressing and data signals?
...
Andy

Not that i know what i'm talking about, but maybe the information i heard helps...

For a Coldfire card to work it had to imitate dynamic bus sizing of the 030 (like it's done on the 040/060 cards) so i think your GAL/FPGA guess is right.

The information needed for this interface should be available from Motorola/Freescale but their implementation is not the fastest one. But hey it's a start.

[Donar]

Piru wrote:

I explained this 4 years ago in June 2003 already. See ColdFire V4 Amiga accelerator project from the m68k emulation perspective.

Thanks for the link, i think i already had read it at some time but hope(d):
a) You are over pessimistic about performance problems.
b) Your conclusion that Coldfusion would be slower than a 68060@50 would be based on the CFV4@162Mhz (as we now have a 266MHz part).

Hey Elbox release the Dragon, then we can see if it's crap or not.

[Donar]

Akiko wrote:
Is the coldfire range still being developed for?

Motorola/Freescale "presented" a Coldfire V5 in 2002 it should have been two times faster than the V4... whatever happened to it...