MiniMig with AGA

[billt]

There is a solution for that... Use a big honkin' FPGA. Future proof now! LOL!

Yea. And I'd put a number of conncetors on there, even if current Minimig doesn't support them yet: IDE, maybe SCSI, ethernet, USB, etc. including analog chips related to them. Not sure what sound looks like in there as I don't have a Minimig board. Sure, that may mean a larger BGA FPGA package, I'd be fine with that. And do a 24bit/color video DAC, hoping for more than just ECS (which now came true with AGA added).

If I ever have time, I do want to play with porting Minimig AGA to a board I have. It even has a PCMCIA slot. I'll have to make a small PCB for an SD at some point, will try to use PCMCIA-CompactFlash initially. For a new small PCB, I'd also want to put on an HD-Audio codec and a couple other things, just in case. But I'll probably work in verilog, learning that is more relevant to my day job and much easier for me to deal with. I really hated VHDL in college, just a personal taste thing.

[billt]

More curriosity than anything, I wonder if productivity apps benefit.
One could build a 68k computer with chunky graphics instead.

Does the AGA minimig include the CD32 chunky->planar chip Akiko? If so, then problem solved. If not, add it. Heck, create new chunky modes that are not in legacy AGA from Commodore and add them. Isn't Natami planning to do such things, why not Minimig too?

[billt]

It has to work in legacy mode of course as well, these new modes are no use unless we write a driver to support them.
/Mike

Wasn't there an old AGA driver for P96 or CGX? Even if it seemed silly back then, it may start making more sense now with this new AGA and potential addons in Minimig. OK, so maybe new modes aren't useful without drivers. So write a driver... I don't see that as a reason not to create new modes.

[billt]

But the catch is BGA..

I'll never understand why BGA is such a stigma on the bigger chips. OK, you can't really do them yourself at home in your kitchen, so why not have a pro assemble them like Mike does?

[billt]

I have a couple techy questions about the FPGA Arcade board.

What FPGA doe sit use?(Sorry if I missed that)

Do you have any external signal connections in place for self-reconfiguration? I know some FPGAs have an internal system for this, but for example Spartan3 was not internal, the SelectMAP group of pins must be connected to other programmable I/Os by PCB design. I think Virtexes and Spartan6 do this internal to chip, not sure what Altera and other brands have as equivalent. Just curious.

[billt]

What would I lose if I bought one today vs. waiting for (going by this thread what appears to be) a new version? Also, what upgrade options are availalbe, both now, and planned in the future ?
Thanks.

The FPGA Arcade board has a lot of benefits compared to the traditional Minimig PCB. Larger capacity FPGA, so it can hold more stuff. I think it has a larger video DAC for true AGA to the monitor, I think Minimig only has outputs for ECS color to the monitor. (more digital RGB to the DAC than Minimig) For that matter, Minimig looks to have a VGA port, FPGA Arcade looks like DVI. Hopefully the digital DVI stuff is connected to something too. Sounds like FPGA Arcade will have cores for other platforms as well, I'm nto sure if Minimig has anything other than Amiga core. It sounds like Yacube is waiting for FPGA Arcade release before he releases his AGA extension to Minimig.

If it was me, I'd wait for an FPGA Arcade board.

[billt]

The A500 core on a Minimig is simply a complete A500 recreated in software and loaded onto the FPGA chip.

FPGAs don't run software. They are not processors themselves.

[billt]

I did look at HDMI connectors originally but you need to license them and it's quite expensive. I am working on another project which uses display port, but it's not so handy for TVs.

For the first boards I may offer a soldered on in-line socket on a short lead as a solution.
Cheers,
Mike

What exactly needs licensing? The connector itself on your board, or the protocol it uses? Couldn't you use a connector, and only allow its use with DVI connector (DVI protocol) and leave out anything HDMI specific? Or is anything using the HDMI connector using enough of the HDMI protocol etc. to get hit by licensing? And if you leave out HDCP?