How to get the most memory out of an A500

[Antiriad]

Guys

What is the best combination of memory I get get for my A500 in order to get most out of it. The memory expansion slot underneath can take a max of 1MB of Chip ram extra. I have seen a expansion for an Amiga 500+ that can add an extra 1MB to a total of 2MB chip ram. If I use the side expansion I can add another 8MB externally?

Any thoughts?

Thanks

Mike

[Effy]

Aren´t there 2,5 Mb expansion cards for the memory expansion slot underneath of the A500

[Michael_D]

Hi,

you can use a 2MB-"trapdoor"-memory (incl. 0,5MB Chipram-expansion)
expansion and an axpansion with 8MB at the side expansion slot
at the same time.
The "trapdoor"-ram (also called: ranger-ram) will be adressed
at $c00000 and up and the side expansion will be located
at $200000. So no adress conflict will accur and it will work fine. :-D

[leirbag28]

There are certain expansion that let you upgrade it to 32 MB (I think) and totally internally with an HD and all.

thats the best way to go to leave your external expansion free for other essential upgrades..such as that A570 CDROM drive or a LIVE board....or a Zorro slot expander. But of course these are super rare to find so good luck.

eBay is the place to look.

[doctorq]

I have my Amiga 500 more or less maxed out memory wise...

I have a Eureka ram expansion in the trap door slot which gives me 0.5 MB chip ram and 3.5 MB fast ram, as well as a GVP HD8+ with 8 MB of ram. That gives me a total of 1 MB chip ram and 11.5 MB fast ram.

[rayt]

You could add a zorro2 board(if you find one) with an a2000 expansion slot and add a blizzard2060 with 256MB ram :-D

[Amigaz]

Let's not forget this expansion:

http://eu-shop.elbox.com/cgibin/shop?info=660E500&sid=1732463d

[bloodline]

leirbag28 wrote:
There are certain expansion that let you upgrade it to 32 MB (I think) and totally internally with an HD and all.

thats the best way to go to leave your external expansion free for other essential upgrades..such as that A570 CDROM drive or a LIVE board....or a Zorro slot expander. But of course these are super rare to find so good luck.

eBay is the place to look.

Not with a 68000, anthing more than around 8meg will require a 32bit CPU.

[mr_a500]

I got the awesome Viper 520CD which gives 8Mb Fast RAM, 68020/68882FPU, 3.0 ROMs and IDE interface for adding a 2.5" IDE harddrive internally. Unfortunately they seem to be very hard to find. (got mine brand new in Australia!...the last one!)

I wish I could add even more memory though. Has anybody out there successfully modified a Viper 520CD to add more memory? (or does anyone have the elusive 530CD with 128Mb RAM??)

[SilvrDrgn]

Antiriad wrote:
What is the best combination of memory I get get for my A500 in order to get most out of it.

Check out the memory setup of my A500 -> About My Computers

[patrik]

@doctorq:

Does the eureka put its fast memory parts of the memory map mapped as reserved then? This as the Zorro2 memory space is already taken by GVP memory and the Zorro2 IO space aint big enough to hold 3.5MB. A showconfig output from that computer would very interesting . Btw, does it require any software to map some parts of its memory into the system free memory list?


/Patrik

[patrik]

@SilvrDrgn:

Your CTX-monitor will probably get a seriously reduced life-length with all the heat building up inside it when its top ventilation is covered by that printer.

(edit):

Looked at the pictures and read about your A500 with an A2091 inside a Dataflyer 500 case using its Zorro2-to-86-pin-A500-expansion adapter. You also mentioned there that the A2091 card disappears when you reset the A500 so it sounds like the A2091 doesn't reset if the A500 resets. A Zorro2 card needs to be reset to respond to "autoconfiguration-requests", which would explain the behaviour you are experiencing.

When looking at this picture - the internals of a Dataflyer 1000 (identical to DataFlyer 500 internals according to The Big Book of Amiga Hardware), the Zorro2-to-86-pin-A500-expansion adapter looks like it is a straight-forward connection between pin 1-86 of the two connectors and pin 87-100 on the Zorro2 connector are just left unconnected.

One of the signals that the A2091 wont be getting then is the /BUSRST signal (Zorro2 pin 94). The /BUSRST signal is a output only (to the Zorro2 card) buffered version of the /RST signal (Zorro2 pin 53 and 86-pin A500 expansion pin 53) and is the signal a Zorro2 card that is not able to reset the machine should use for knowing when to be reset.

As the A2091 is a Zorro2 card not able to reset the machine it should use the /BUSRST signal if it follows the Zorro2 specification and would then not be able to reset on your setup.

This picture of the A2091 from the front shows that /BUSRST is connected and this picture of the A2091 from the back shows that /RST is not connected (pictures courtesy of The Amiga Hardware Database) - thus can the A2091 only be reset with the /BUSRST signal which confirms that it will not be able to reset on your system.

As this is a one-slot Zorro2 solution, you should be able solve this issue by a quick hack and just connect /RST to /BUSRST - in other words connect pin 53 of the 86-pin connector to pin 94 of the 100-pin Zorro2 connector on the Dataflyer Zorro2-to-86-pin-A500-expansion adapter you are using.

If you want to do it according to the book - which in this case has to be the A2000 schematics, you need one 74LS08 quad AND gate and one 1kOhm resistor. Actually you only need to use two of the four AND gates in the 74LS08.

To the first gate you should connect /RST as one input and +5V as the other input. To the second gate you should connect the output of the first gate plus one end of the 1kOhm resistor and +5V as the other input. The end of the resistor not connected to the second gates input should be connected to +5V which will make the resistor act as a pullup-resistor. The output of the second gate is then your /BUSRST, made according to the book .

A simple schematics of it should look something like this:

Code: [Select]

                         ____
        ____       +5V --|    \
 +5V --|    \            |AND  |---- /BUSRST
       |AND  |---+-------|____/
/RST --|____/    |
                 R
                 |
                +5V
You ofcourse also need to connect Vcc (pin 14) and GND (pin 7) of the 74LS08 to +5V and GND from the 86-pin connector and the spare AND input pins of the 74LS08 should be connected to GND.

An example arrangement seen from the 74LS08 would be this:

Code: [Select]

74LS08 pin:    Connected to:                             Comment:
1              86-pin Connector pin 5                    +5V
2              86-pin Connector pin 53                   /RST
3              74LS08 pin 5 + pullup side of resistor    To second gate
4              86-pin Connector pin 5                    +5V
5              74LS08 pin 3 + pullup side of resistor    From first gate
6              Zorro2 Connector pin 94                   /BUSRST
7              86-pin Connector pin 1                    GND
8              Nothing                                   None
9              86-pin Connector pin 1                    GND
10             86-pin Connector pin 1                    GND
11             Nothing                                   None
12             86-pin Connector pin 1                    GND
13             86-pin Connector pin 1                    GND
14             86-pin Connector pin 5                    +5VI have double-checked this, but do check it by yourself to make sure it is ok. I would anyhow suggest that you try the /RST to /BUSRST quick hack solution mentioned above first.

References:
Part 1 of 6 of the A500/2000 Technical Reference Manual - page 80, 84-86, 92 and 98-100 is of special interest.
Part 6 of 6 of the A500/2000 Technical Reference Manual - page B2000-10a is of special interest.
74LS08 Datasheet


/Patrik

[SilvrDrgn]

patrik wrote:
@SilvrDrgn:

Your CTX-monitor will probably get a seriously reduced life-length with all the heat building up inside it when its top ventilation is covered by that printer.

I rarely have that monitor turned on.  So, it's not building up heat anyway.  Thanks for all of your information!  Cool stuff!

[doctorq]

patrik wrote:

Does the eureka put its fast memory parts of the memory map mapped as reserved then? This as the Zorro2 memory space is already taken by GVP memory and the Zorro2 IO space aint big enough to hold 3.5MB. A showconfig output from that computer would very interesting . Btw, does it require any software to map some parts of its memory into the system free memory list?

Well, I can't fully remember about the mapping, and have no chance to check since the computer is at my parents house :-( However, I seem to remember that the Amiga has 9.8 MB fast and 1 mb chip when powered on. The rest of the memory is only activated if I run a program written for it.

I hope this answers your questions; I will try to get a showconfig output for you next time I get home.

[Kronos]

rayt wrote:
You could add a zorro2 board(if you find one) with an a2000 expansion slot and add a blizzard2060 with 256MB ram :-D

And how do you do that ?? (hint the 2060 has 4 slots with each 32MB max).

On topic:
Without 030/40/60-card:
2MB chip
1.3MB "ranger"
8MB fast