opinions on ppc options ..please

[Karlos]

I have the BlizzardPPC+BVision combination. They were expensive enough when they were new and they've only gotten moreso since.

My first caution then is the price. I really don't believe the classic PPC cards are worth the crazy prices they fetch. However, if you insist...

As for an objective opinion on performance. Well, I have the 040 version. Under OS3.1-3.9, I use the PPC principally for datatypes and media playback. There's no denying that even with the dreaded context switch overhead that it kicks the 040's ass for that. However, I reckon a fast 68060 would do just as well in many cases and potentially better in some. Beyond that, I for the various WarpOS / PowerUP applications and games that were originally written for it. Are there enough of them to be worth it? I'm not sure. Probably not, in reality. Summary: an expensive co-processor for the OS without a large enough library of software to really justify the price IMO.

Then there's OS4. At least your PPC is getting some use, but while using AGA only is possible, but you'll have to make all the same basic cutbacks you'd have to do under 3.x to get usable performance. Chip RAM access is as slow as it ever was and as the PPC can do much more work per unit time than the 040, those wasted cycles spent reading/writing ChipRAM equate to a bigger percentage reduction in real performance. It doesn't help that out of the box, it tries to use display settings that are just too slow (256 colours, gradients, solid window moving/sizing etc).

In short, unless you intend to use a graphics card with it, forget it. With a graphics card, even the BVision, there are some surprises. I found that a few 68K applications I regularly use on 3.9 under RTG ran considerably faster on 4.1 with RTG. I'd say that basically, 4.1 classic is for users that already have PPC and associated expansions rather than someone looking to upgrade.

If you must go PPC, then I'd suggest you focus on getting either a new Sam on which to run OS4.1 or a PPC Mac to run MorphOS (note to self, one has to be careful mentioning these in the same paragraph as it can be rather like using a lighter to illuminate a warehouse full of explosives during a blackout). For some, the choice between the two has become akin to a religious divide but objectively, the latter is cheaper and has been in development for longer. Be prepared to be flamed either way, if you go for 4.1 you'll be regarded as insane by some, if you go for MorphOS you'll be branded a heretic by others

Personally, I'd suggest that if you want to stay "classic", look for the fastest 68060 card you can get and give PPC a miss. Otherwise you'll need to buy more than just an already priced-as-if-made-of-gold PPC board for your A1200.

[Karlos]

well, ofcourse I disagree with most of you..

get that ppc. get the fastest one, like those 060/330mhz versions that you can find on amibay at times. get the bvision. get the pcmcia right-angle adapter and a pcmcia ethernet card. get os4.1. insanely expensive? yes. a very frustrating software installation? yes. prone to breaking down? well, yes.. but definitely worth it one you got it running! imho the most you can get out of the real classic amiga -thats what counts for me. all the other stuff I can do on my pc.

Don't get me wrong, I love my PPC A1200 and like yourself, enjoy seeing what can be achieved with it. I wouldn't consider myself an enthusiast otherwise. However, I'm also a realist - to build it from scratch now would cost a not inconsiderable amount of money and isn't something I could recommend to someone on a "try it and see" basis.

[Karlos]

...but I would not recommend an Efika for the thread author, even if Efika does circles around any BPPC/CSPPC board.

Sure about that?

[youtube]3GNtOM3ZLQM[/youtube]

That's was recorded running on an OS4.1 A4000 (CSPPC @233MHz), on a beta version of the Permedia2. Which is by far the weakest 3D hardware you can use on any PPC equipped Amiga.

[Karlos]

About some invisible to me Flash crap? I don't know what to say ;-).

Well, since you can't see it, it's Quake 3, running on the least powerful 3D hardware there is for an OS4 equipped classic machine and still managing to turn in a frame rate over a single digit.

[Karlos]

@Karlos

It still doesnt change the fact that BPPC/CSPPC is useless on Amiga. There is no support, it is slow and impossible to find. Even if you fnid one it costs a fortune. Better invest on a fast 060 and if you want PPC get something clocked at 1 GHz or better with AltiVec.

If you read my earlier posts, you'll see that I recommend a fast 060 unless he's determined to use PPC.

I don't agree that it's a useless expansion however, it's just stupidly expensive to obtain for a degree of acceleration far less than your G4 class system will offer. If, like me, you already happen to have, say, the 040 based BPPC and accompanying RTG card, the speed increase you get for most OS friendly 68K applications under JIT in OS4.1 is pretty conspicuous. Faster than your typical 060 for a lot of things (pathological cases do exist, of course) and even WUP applications aren't hit by the cache purging context switch overhead that they have to endure under OS3.x, meaning they are often quite a bit quicker too.

Ironically it's OS4 native software it is less well equipped for, simply because of the performance gap between the old L2 cacheless 60x boards and the newer PPC systems that superseded them.

[Karlos]

I think if Efika could have more RAM than those 128 MB, it would be able to run Quake 3 faster. And BTW 3D speed is only loosely related to CPU performance.

That's only true if you are dealing with a graphics system that does all the calculations for you, preferably offloading them to hardware T&L and clipping.

Warp3D is not that system and even if it were, the Permedia2 has absolutely no T&L acceleration of any kind whatsoever (you count yourself lucky that it at least has a delta unit to subdivide triangles into screen-aligned trapezoids and even then there can be times it's quicker to do it on the CPU).

The CSPPC in that video is delivering a considerably better framerate, for the same 3D card, than my humble BPPC. Which can play it, just. Not that you'd want to

-edit-

Incidentally, the CSPPC had 128MB of RAM too.

[Karlos]

damn that's smooth and quick for that ol classic beast running OS4.1:eek:

Yeah I was pretty surprised myself when I saw it and I wrote the damn driver for 4.1 :lol:

[Karlos]

however, this thread is about PPC options for classics versus going to a NG Amiga system (whether the NG system is OS4.x, MOS, or AROS is the OP's decision)

Quite, and I'm sure we'd all prefer it not to turn into a blue v red piddling contest. Besides, I drank a lot of coffee today and I have no doubt that I can pee longer and further than the rest of you put together.

[Karlos]

Indeed, and MorphOS does not use Warp3D as we know

Of course not, but it doesn't change the fact that if you *were* lumbered with having to support that particular 3D rasterizer (notice I don't use the word accelerator here ), you'd also be doing all the work in software too.

In case it was missed, my point is that despite all the handicaps the system featured in the video has, it is still churning out a half-playable framerate, which I'd say demonstrates there is some life in the old dog and claims that the old boards are entirely useless is not really founded.

In my personal experience is any measure, for OS/RTG friendly classic software on such a machine, unless you have a 100MHz 060, you probably aren't going to get a faster 68K experience out of your existing classic hardware. And as I said, the real irony is that it's more recent PPC software for 4.x that struggles, simply because it's generally written on and for faster machines.

The real issue is that such hardware is just too stupidly expensive to be viable compared to the alternatives, whether real 060+3.x, OS4, MOS, AROS or UAE.

[Karlos]

I agree but alas guess which friend of ours immediately posted this comment on this very thread:rolleyes:

"If you insist on OS4 your options are either insanely expensive or underpowered"

You may not like his choice of words, but he does make a valid point. Nobody can deny that there is quite a cost involved if you want a high-end OS4 experience on newer hardware or conversely if you want to run it on classic hardware, you equally have to accept that you are running it on the PPC equivalent of your basic 020 class system of yesteryear.

Your best bet for a reasonable cost/performance OS4 experience as I see it is to source a second hand Sam or A1.

[Karlos]

I almost completed my modification to my Blizzard PPC 300Mhz (no overclocking) its performance is very high and should show better performance than the video in this thread.

It will out perform some other Blizzard PPC cards that claim to be faster or operate faster than 300Mhz

What is the screenmode Quake III in this thread?

I am not sure as I didn't make the video. It looks like the default 640x480 but it could be higher.

[Karlos]

If the video is 640x480 then for sure my Blizzard/Bvision combo is faster. I have always enjoyed 800x600 with very good performance on permedia 2.

Permedia 2 is now showing some very good performance (1024x768) on a small number of PPC 3D games with more tweaks to come.

If you keep boasting about your uber blizzardppc, I'm going to add a feature to the next driver that detects your specific card and reduces the framerate to 2fps whilst playing oompah style tuba music and scrolling a message to taunt you...

[Karlos]

wow  ...never expected  to get so many  different  views ...it is a hobby  after all

Well, it's normal for people to be passionate about their hobbies. There are basically two PPC offshoots and some folk have strong opinions about which you should be using. MorphOS has been around a long time and was at the outset the de facto next gen AmigaOS as far as most users were concerned. Prior to that, all we had was OS3 with WarpOS and PowerUp, which was never a truly satisfactory combination. When I first saw MOS boot up on my blizzppc it seemed we were finally getting the chance to use this freakish accelerator board I'd spent a kidney on as it was truly intended.

And then excrement and fans combined, as they so often do in Amigaland and before you know it, everything is up in the air again. MorphOS continued to be developed but dropped support for the classic machines back in the 1.x days, which is a great shame in my opinion, but I suspect I am in a minority there and seeing it on G4 class hardware, it's probably not surprising.

 ..why are we hating  0s4? ..i havent  used it  seen it etc ..i run  3.5  on all my machines  cause it  seems to work  best

OS4 became the official successor to OS3.x at a time when a lot of users were still understandably aggrieved over this turn of events. Personally I was happy that there would be an official successor, particularly one that I can still run on my ageing A1200

...os4  has some options  that workbench 3 cant offer i guess
decent  browser  comes to mind i think ..i just wanted to throw  my thoughts out to people  who have  used ppc  for a while ..is it overpriced  yes ..could i do everything i wanted to on my pc ..yes ..but thats not the point  ..its a hobby  u get to enjoy yourself  doing  fun  stuff  with ur amiga  again ....i value  peoples opinions on ppc options  thats why i asked ..but i didnt expect it to turn into  mines  bigger than yours ..good  grief .

As I said, my opinion is that OS4.1 on classic is great for accelerating your existing software, or at least the software that can run under JIT. However, it's not so great for running more recent OS4 native software, simply because it tends to be written on and for faster machines. A bit like having a vanilla 020 in the days when everybody else has 060.

[Karlos]

Furthermore, compatible 68K applications that expect the real native hardware to be present run a lot better under 4.1 on a genuine classic machine than they do when emulating everything in UAE on faster OS4 machines if comparisons between my 4.1 A1200 (603e 240MHz) and 4.1 A1 XE (G4 800MHz) are anything to go by. That will probably change as UAE on OS4 matures though.