UltimatePPC and everything else

[Heiroglyph]

I know almost nothing about HW. But when I saw the design I thought it was a replacement for the old PPC-Blizzard-PPC-like accelerators. 100% compatible (including Binary compatibility for sure)  with new features added.

The problems with making a CSPPC clone are many.  It was a super complex card with no documentation and the people who know exactly how it worked aren't telling.  Also CPU's have changed dramatically since then, the buses aren't even remotely as compatible with 68k as they were then those cards were produced.  External local bus masters as we know them are ancient history so it would be a major redesign with lessened compatibility.

Compound that with the fact that getting AOS or MorphOS ported to even a platform closely related to existing ones is pretty much out of the question actually makes alternative CPU's like this an option.

My suggestion would be to run it like a hyper fast 680x0 and forget native code.

The OS is already available.
The apps are available.
Apps designed for it would still run on other Amigas and emulators.
If faster, cheaper SOCs become available you can jump ship without breaking the OS and apps.
A vast number of Amiga users never had a PPC anyway, thus have no investment in compatibility.  They all have an investment in 68k.

A 500Mhz+ 68040 would be nothing to scoff at.  I'd certainly use one.

[Heiroglyph]

More importantly, how many ££££ for the ppc versus ££ for the PI ? even people wanting to have a laugh could afford it.

TomUK

I get your point, although I've been given several PC's faster than a PI for free.

If it was about $ per GHz or just plain GHz, I don't think anyone would be on this site, even for the absurdly expensive X1000.

I do find a certain appeal in making my good old Miggy run at hundreds of MHz even if my PC could still outpace it.  Love trumps sanity at times.

Edit: also note that the PI would have to emulate the chipset which would have a serious impact on performance.  A PPC card just needs to handle CPU duty.

[Heiroglyph]

Gah, I guess everyone is missing that you're saying "port AOS4".  I did it too, sorry.

I think there's about 0% chance of that.  Other than AROS, they just don't seem interested in logical directions.

[Heiroglyph]

MPC8610. An e600 (aka G4) based SoC, a bit old but pretty suited for Amiga/MorphOS things. e600 comes with Altivec. The 8610 has a fast bus, resonable heat dissipation, most things on chip, is not too expensive (the lower clocked versions at least).

Those are about twice the cost, don't have SATA and can't use DDR3 but I'm sure there are upsides to the 8610 as well.

That's what I notice at a glance and price varies from place to place, I'm not sure what their choice was actually based on.

To me, the upside of potentially running existing PPC software isn't really a factor when you consider the improbability of OS support.

[Heiroglyph]

Then a x86 cpu running a 680x0 JIT (and perhaps PPC JIT to emulate CSPPC) may be perfect.

I don't disagree, but this card might actually be available at some point.

For price to performance this CPU is probably a pretty good balance.

[Heiroglyph]

And what does Z3-DMA ?

- Deneb.... well there is USB on the board
- A4091/A4000T-SCSI .... no big loss, SATA onboard
- Fastlane ... ditto

Right, and only one at a time because Buster is Bust-ed.

Assuming the final product can't DMA into other memory, it's not a huge loss.

[Heiroglyph]

That 68040 says 66/33Mhz.  Is there any way to make it run at 66Mhz as opposed to 33?

That isn't two options, it's the clock needed and the CPU speed.

A normal 25MHz 040 like on an A3640 is 50/25.

There is a bit more to supporting an 060 than just the voltages, you've also got timing and protocol differences.  You can make an 060 fall back to speaking 040 fairly easily but they seem to really want a surface mount chip.

I can't blame them, they have to be way cheaper and easier to source, plus if you can use the PPC as an 040 at some point, who cares?

I'm still very excited about this project, can't wait to get my grubby little hands on at least one.