potential PPC Amiga REAL CHEAP

[uncharted]

Horse. Dead. Flogging.

[koaftder]

lou_dias wrote:

koaftder wrote:

lou_dias wrote:
http://devkitpro.sourceforge.net/devkitProWiki/libogc/a00144.html

That's a link that describes the aram.h header file for accessing the 'Cube's 16MB of audio RAM.  Yes, that is the hoop you jump through to access it.  As anyone with basic understanding of programming can see, a simple function call can copy data from memory there or copy data there to memory just by specifying the 2 address ranges and a direction.

very unusable indeed

feel free to browse the rest of the supposed non-existant documentation...

It's just a stack. A 16MB stack. The way the library is written makes it unsuitable for multiple processes to use this space.

Even if you did adapt a malloc lib to use that space, and made a super easy wrapper to fetch/store data there, you wouldnt end up with 16mb of space there, as you would still want some memory avaiable for the sound support.

Suppose you leave 4mb for the sound and use the 12MB as heap space for processes though a seperate malloc implimentation. What is going to motivate a programmer to jump through hoops to fetch some memory out of a measly 12mb block, and jump through more hoops passing data back and forth from it? The code wouldnt be portable, and most applications would never be adapted to use it as it would be too much work and almost no benefit anyway.

Scarfing memory from other subsystems was clever 15 years ago, these days it's kind of a waste of time. I can find a system better suited for aros or linux from a near by trashcan ( with 4 times the memory of a game cube! )

The hoops you mention are a function call.
Let's look at video editing.  How does that happen.
Well, usually a frame at a time.
Do you think that the entire video is loaded into memory or are a certain amount buffered.  That's exactly what you would use that memory for.  You define a simple allocation table, then request x amount of memory allocate for your "worksspace".  This is what happens with "main" memory now.  The OS is a memory mamanger.  Only difference is now is has a separate/extra bank of memory to reserve and allocate.  It could happen at the kernel level and unless you are "banging the hardware" an application programmer doesn't need to worry about it unless their app occuppies 24 MB of physical memory.  99.9% of Amiga apps will run in well under 2mb of memory.

All a cpu knows about is what's in it's cache.  The OS is responsible for the rest.  Don't get it mixed up.

Of course you would want to ask the kernel to allocate/deallocate blocks from that region. Thats how you would make access to it from multiple processes sane. You are still going to end up with 2 mallocs though, one for main memory and one for that measley 16mb area. The library you mentioned earlier is no good for this.

Immagine a 1000 node linked list setup in your elite 16mb audio ram space. Traversing the linked list will be a pain because i have to setup a buffer in the main memory space, then call a function to move a node from the audio memory into the buffer i created in main memory.

It's just retarded. Id pay a nice performance penalty to use the audio memory. I have to copy blocks from one area to the next just to use it. And it's not portable, or trasnparent.

You cant make it transparent to the c/c++ programmer writing application layer stuff. It doesnt matter what kind of libs and kernel services are avaiable. You still have to go out of your way to use it, and it would be slow, and still require you to allocate in main memory to make use of it.

it sucks

[Louis Dias]

@koaftder

About 8 years ago I did set up gcc on my CD32 + SX-1 Amiga OS 3.1 system because I was taking a C++ class in school.  I also bought the GameSmith C/C++ development system.  In that, I remember a function that allocated memory and I also remember being able to specify chip ram always or fastram if available...or something to that effect.  So I don't see this situation as anything different.

As a programmer, you want to bang the hardware, you use the function I showed you.  As an application developer, you use the API you are provided to make OS compliant software.

The concerns you have about performance are only relevant when you are either using a 20 year old machine with low processing power or are creating an A+ video game.

When "running" application, 99% of cpu time is wasted waiting for user input.

On a side note, the GC has the most cache of that generation of game machines and that is what helps it perform better than it's clock speed shows it can.  The same will be true of Revolution (rumors are 2MB).  Can you imagine that?

[Louis Dias]

adolescent wrote:

lou_dias wrote:

I find it interesting that none of you are OS4 developers but Hyperion says they can run it on a cell phone but you people say it can't run on the Gamecube.

Next some troll will tell me that cellphones have had 256MB of memory for years...

Actually, some do.  But, that's beside the point.

You've made a claim.  Prove it.

[Hattig]

What it shows is that a PowerPC system that will sell in the millions (around 20 million for the Gamecube) can be sold for $99 retail and probably still makes a profit.

The Gamecube is too limited for a general purpose computer however (although I had considered it before as a nice AmigaOS platform). Now the XBox360 ... three 3.2GHz PowerPC cores, 512MB memory, Hard drive (SATA), DVD drive (SATA), high end graphics - that'd be a nice hardware platform. Still, it is being sold at a significant loss right now - given the retailer markup it must be at least $200 to Microsoft per console.

I'd rather that the company making this neat A1200 accellerator just made a standard MiniITX sized motherboard, with a full PCI slot and maybe some useful PCI devices like a SATA controller, good audio chip, and so on.

As for PDA/Mobile Phone applications, I think AmigaOS would be a great match.

[MskoDestny]

lou_dias wrote:
but that's what I've always said

once however amount of information you want is swapped in, it's useable

it's easy to swap

It's easy to swap to and from a hard disk too, but that doesn't mean that having a 120GB hard disk gives you 120GB of general purpose RAM.

The closest you could get is to use it as really fast (compared to a hard drive anyway) swap space. Unfortunately, page swapping is a rather expensive operation even with a RAM based swap. A program tries to access memory that's not paged in which causes an exception. The OS then has to decide what chunk of memory hasn't been used recently and then triggers a DMA operation to copy the area that is being paged out to ARAM. Once this is done it triggers another DMA operation to copy the data from ARAM to main memory. Then it has to rewrite the MMU table so that the area that was paged out is now invalid and that the are that was paged in is now valid.

Normal memory access is nothing like that. The program just looks for the data at the appropriate address and it gets it. No exceptions, no DMA, no rewriting of the MMU table.

Since a single application like a webbrowser could easily use more than 24MB of RAM (particularly once you take out a chunk for the OS) it's conceivable that you would end up swapping almost constantly which would really kill performance.

RAM is for storage with fast access.

In a general sense that is true. Hard drives have RAM for cache, video cards have RAM, etc.

Cache is what is getting executed.

Cache is storage that tries to mask the slowness of some other storage whether it be a disk or even main RAM (in the case of the CPU cache).

If you have an extra 16MB that's quick to access, why wouldn't you use it?

Because apart from using it as cache or swap as I described above you can't use it without specifically writing software to use it.

[koaftder]

lou_dias wrote:
@koaftder

About 8 years ago I did set up gcc on my CD32 + SX-1 Amiga OS 3.1 system because I was taking a C++ class in school.  I also bought the GameSmith C/C++ development system.  In that, I remember a function that allocated memory and I also remember being able to specify chip ram always or fastram if available...or something to that effect.  So I don't see this situation as anything different.

It's very different, because you are talking about two hardware architectures here. Amiga and game cube. On the amiga you can access chip and fast through a generic pointer, on the game cube you cannot access aram through a generic pointer. This is why you have to use a special interface to make use aram. It's not the same situation. The aram area is not suitable for general purpose use.

The concerns you have about performance are only relevant when you are either using a 20 year old machine with low processing power or are creating an A+ video game.

Immagine a tight loop crawling a chain, having to do a dma transfer for each inspection of a 13byte node. It would be god awful slow. And if you were using this area as a general purpose store, you would be doing this *all the time*.

When "running" application, 99% of cpu time is wasted waiting for user input.

So what if most of a computers time is unproductive. When people want a machine to do a particular function, they want it done fast.

On a side note, the GC has the most cache of that generation of game machines and that is what helps it perform better than it's clock speed shows it can.  The same will be true of Revolution (rumors are 2MB).  Can you imagine that?

I can immagine that when it comes out we will have some asinine discussion about porting amiga os to the new nintendo platform. Of course you will focus much on some obscure capability of the microprocessor and make lots of comments about programming concepts you dont understand.

[Louis Dias]

koaftder wrote:

I can immagine that when it comes out we will have some asinine discussion about porting amiga os to the new nintendo platform. Of course you will focus much on some obscure capability of the microprocessor and make lots of comments about programming concepts you dont understand.

Probably.   :-D

[Louis Dias]

Hattig wrote:
What it shows is that a PowerPC system that will sell in the millions (around 20 million for the Gamecube) can be sold for $99 retail and probably still makes a profit.

The Gamecube is too limited for a general purpose computer however (although I had considered it before as a nice AmigaOS platform). Now the XBox360 ... three 3.2GHz PowerPC cores, 512MB memory, Hard drive (SATA), DVD drive (SATA), high end graphics - that'd be a nice hardware platform. Still, it is being sold at a significant loss right now - given the retailer markup it must be at least $200 to Microsoft per console.

I'd rather that the company making this neat A1200 accellerator just made a standard MiniITX sized motherboard, with a full PCI slot and maybe some useful PCI devices like a SATA controller, good audio chip, and so on.

As for PDA/Mobile Phone applications, I think AmigaOS would be a great match.

Yeah, the x360 has everything you would want.  when it's not overheating.  Estimates are that they are losing about $125.  We stand to benefit so that's no sweat off my back.  But from what I hear, an in order executing processor is not ideal for the desktop.  I think the Cell in the PS3 uses an O-o-O core.  I expect Nintendo's Revolution to use an Out-of-Order exectuing cpu as well with lots of cache and excellent branch prediction.  They are touting their games system as a platform to better gaming through a better interface and A.I.  The 360 is just an XBOX with even better graphics, same gameplay experience.

Recently, the PS3 has been losing some steam.  Rumors are that it will be delayed further.  Don't expect a March '06 release.  Revolution development news has been good and it's picking up ALOT of developer support now.  I expect it will hit US shelves well before the PS3 and not too long after E3 2006.  The cpu was just finished a week or 2 ago and is being shown to developers now.  I have a thread in the OT Entertainment section of this site about that.

Sony seems to throw alot of marketing B.S. around when it comes to the Playstation line of products.  Forinstance, the PSP downclocks to 200MHz for alot of applications.  A far cry from the 300MHz it advertises.  Also, the slimline PS2 is not 100% backwards compatible with the PS1.  I don't expect the PS3 to be 100% backwards compatible with the PS2 and PS1 either.  They also said the PS2 would be alot more powerful than the DC...  Yeah that was almost true.  Also if you believe that the PS3 can do a dual screen 1080p 120fps display.  While I don't doubt the capability, I doubt the application.  I don't think it will have the power to play games like that but maybe a static screen...but if it's static, why would you need 120fps.  More marketing b.s...

Only thing I can really knock Nintendo for is not supporting high definition resolutions.  Ever since Iwata took over, they have been solid with there promises.  No B.S.

[Waccoon]

[Louis Dias]

Waccoon wrote:

Lou:  You've made a claim. Prove it.

You're an expert in this area, eh?

You could always follow your own advice, and "look it up yourself."

I think the Cell in the PS3 uses an O-o-O core. I expect Nintendo's Revolution to use an Out-of-Order exectuing cpu as well with lots of cache and excellent branch prediction

Think?  Don't you look these things up?  Is the info even out there right now?

That's why you are what I've always said you are.  You made the claim, YOU need to back it up.  Otherwise stop trolling this thread.  As far as Cell's ppc core being an O-o-O processing cpu, it's what I recall from memory comparing the 360 to the PS3 sometime between the Game developer's summit in March and E3 in May.  Since a Cell-based product doesn't exist yet, it's really quite irrelevant.

Funny how you think lots of cache on the Revolution CPU is a big plus, but the lack of RAM in Gamecube is no big deal, especially with the 68K emulation going on.  I seem to recall that few Amiga apps are PowerPC native.

It's a well known fact that more cache improves performance.  Also the GC has more cache than the PS2 or Xbox.  68k emulation is no big deal.  There are open source 68k emulators and there is currently a homebrew GC developer writing one.  Also there is already a port of a Sega Genesis emulator (which incase you forgot, is a 68000 based machine) on the GC homebrew scene.  So I don't see 68k emualtion as an issue and besides, I don't care about backwards compatibility anyway when it comes to Amiga, I already have that in WINUAE.

Forinstance, the PSP downclocks to 200MHz for alot of applications. A far cry from the 300MHz it advertises.

...and it scales up to 333Mhz for some applications.  It also downclocks to 1Mhz.  It scales to save power, not to screw-over consumers.  Your point?

My point is there marketing.  What's your point?  They make it sound like a PSP is as powerful as a PS2 and it can be...for about 1 1/2 hours, then you need fresh batteries again.

Also, the slimline PS2 is not 100% backwards compatible with the PS1.

Most of the time that's because developers don't follow programming guidelines.  Early titles tend to have the most problems.

What is the compatibility, BTW?  15%?  25%?  I own 22 PSX games and they all work with my PS2.  Currently, 0% of native N64 games work with Gamecube.

22 games out of about 1200 isn't enough to make a basis on.  There are some articles on the 'net' about which ones don't work and we'll really never know ALL the ones that don't work because nobody is gonna has the entire catalog in there possesion to try.  The exact number is irrelevant.  The fact that it's not 100% is the point.

Actually the 2 Zelda N64 games released on the GC as a ore-order bonus for pre-ordering Zelda:The Wind Waker were emualtor based.  Infact hackers have ripped it and injected there own N64 roms to play other N64 games on the GC.

Funny you should criticize Sony on this issue, seeing how they basicly started the trend of backwards compatibility in the console industry.  Before Revolution, Nintendo's compatibility abilites were limited to their portable systems, and to run anything on Revolution, you will have to re-license any games released prior to Gamecube.  Paying for software you already own is not backwards compatibility.

No they didn't.  The Gameboy Color was b/c with Gameboy as has been every Gameboy product since.

And it you really wanna go way back, Atari's 7800 was backwards compatible with the 2600.  And the Atari 5200 had a plug-in module for 2600 backwards compatibility.

Plus, we don't know how Gamecube games work on Revolution.  I'm most concerned about how GC mini-discs will work with a full-sized, slot-loaded DVD drive.  There are slot-load drives that will take 80mm discs, but they are quite rare.

I'll refrain from commenting on the cartridge issue for N64.  Everyone knows what happened, there.

3" discs rare?  Yeah, Ok.  3" CDs and DVDs have been around a long time.  Look at the center 3" of you PC's DVD player,  they all support them.  Ritek it the preferred brand for GC pirates.

As far as Revolution's front loading drive supporting drive supporting them, it's no major technological feat.  My car's in dash player pulls the disc in after only inserting it in about an inch.  All you need is some moveable guides to move in or out for a 3" or 5" disc.

As for the catride issue...so what, it happened, it's been over with for 7 years.  It's the same issue MS is going through now with not going to HD-DVD.  Elder Scrolls is supposedly on 4 DVDs right now ( http://www.joystiq.com/entry/1234000903070963/ ).  Because Nintendo is sticking with 480p max, there games will fit on 1 DVD like current gen Xbox games.  I I've already expressed discontent with Nintendo on this for Revolution.

Also if you believe that the PS3 can do a dual screen 1080p 120fps display. While I don't doubt the capability, I doubt the application.

Monitors, HDTV, VGA capabilities... moving forwards, basicly.  While I commit to buying game systems based on game quality, I'm really looking forward to plugging a PS3 into my PC monitor and running my PS2 games on that display, like I can with my Dreamcast.  I don't need dual displays, but it beats having to buy two consoles or playing multiplayer games in teeny windows.

Of course, you're so happy with your Gamecube and S-Video, you'd have no issue using it for a computer desktop, too.  I use S-Video for my PS2, and while it looks bright and pixelicious, I'd hate to use a desktop that way.  My current A1200 setup looks better than my brand new Panasonic TV with S-Video.  Now that I've used WinUAE on my PC monitor, I definately don't want to go back to using an Amiga on a TV.  The Amiga was designed to work on crappy TVs, but video technology has improved a lot since the 80's, even in the low-end.

I guess you forgot that I play my GC on my 50" DLP HDTV using component cables from my GC's digital video output.  It can be modified to display VGA or a separate cable can be purchased.  This can be done on the GC because the DAC in built into the cable, not the system.

It's the extra one I bought to put the modchip in that doesn't support the DV out.  If I wanted to, now that I know how simple it is to mod, I can always simply remove my mod chip from that GC and sell it and put the mod chip into my Rev A GC.

I don't think it will have the power to play games like that but maybe a static screen...but if it's static, why would you need 120fps. More marketing b.s...

Ah, so you do doubt the capability.

No, it's not.  It's scalable in refresh rate so it can work with a huge array of display devices, including LCDs that default to 75Hz.  Displays aren't going to run at 60Hz forever.

Besides, PC displays have no problem running dual screens.  The PS3 is based on a modified nVidia PC GPU.  Tool compatibility is questionable, but performance isn't going to be that far off.

How choppy the video will be with dual screen support and a wide variety of resolutions depends largely on the complexity of the games.  Some games on my PS2 chop like crazy, and some work at 60FPS no matter how much action gets on screen.  That's the difference between good developers and engines, and bad ones.  Blaming the hardware for framerate problems, as you do with XBox 360, is plain stupid.

I'm not arguing the technology.  Re-read the post. :rtfm:
I'm arguing the application of it.  I'm saying it's marketing spin by Sony.  You want a PS3, buy it.  You don't want a Revolution, don't buy it.  I don't care.  The day I see a dual screen, 1080p, 120 fps game on the PS3, I will declare Sony the be-all, end-all of the video games industry and pray for an earthquake to swallow Nintendo whole.

Nintendo has conceeded that Revolution will be less powerful than XBox 360.  Does that mean Revolution games will run at 5FPS?  Please...

5FPS...Oh that's a good one.  I really think you have nothing better to do than write rubbish in this thread.

[_ThEcRoW]

@lou_dias

Ack boards will not need an a1200 to work, the will work withouth any classic hardware fitted into it. And the size of the board will fit perfectly in an a1200 case, so i don't see the point of a need for a tower case for it.

[Louis Dias]

_ThEcRoW wrote:
@lou_dias

Ack boards will not need an a1200 to work, the will work withouth any classic hardware fitted into it. And the size of the board will fit perfectly in an a1200 case, so i don't see the point of a need for a tower case for it.

That's a bit of a contradiction.
How can you have a A1200 case and not have had a A1200.

From what I read, to not rely on a A1200 at all, you need a psu and a mystery device to give you a keyboard and mouse interface.
EDIT: Not to mention an RJ-45 ethernet jack
 And since that means you don't have an A1200, you need a tower...and a keyboard...and a mouse...and a monitor...and a miniPCI graphics card...and hopefully OS4 comes bundled with these drivers.

Oh and somehow this mini-PCI graphics card is supposed to have a VGA port the you can mount to the tower.

I think you'd be better off with an A1 and making a clean break from reliance on legacy hardware.  By the time you find all you need to run an ACK standalone it will be near the cost of an A1 and an A1 comes with a faster processor.

The ACK reminds me of Eyetech's original A1200-addon A1 design only this one is even less expandable and even more propriety (miniPCI).

[adolescent]

lou_dias wrote:

No they didn't.  The Gameboy Color was b/c with Gameboy as has been every Gameboy product since.

Not true anymore.  The micro only supports GBA games.  :-(  (And, if you re-read what Wacoon said, you'll see he said the portables were backward compatible)

[Louis Dias]

adolescent wrote:

lou_dias wrote:

No they didn't.  The Gameboy Color was b/c with Gameboy as has been every Gameboy product since.

Not true anymore.  The micro only supports GBA games.  :-(  (And, if you re-read what Wacoon said, you'll see he said the portables were backward compatible)

Must you add this dribble.
The DS also doesn't play plain GB games but it's not a GB series product on the "Micro" is a limited release product, not the next "Gameboy".

He was still wrong on Sony with backwards compatibility pioneering and I'm still waiting for him to show me a cell phone with 256MB of ram.

[Tripitaka]

lou_dias wrote:

That's a bit of a contradiction.
How can you have a A1200 case and not have had a A1200.

Many of us have spare cases after putting the A1200 motherboard into a tower.

From what I read, to not rely on a A1200 at all, you need a psu and a mystery device to give you a keyboard and mouse interface.

Keyboard and mouse? ACK have allready stated that they will be making an add on to do this.

and a miniPCI graphics card...and hopefully OS4 comes bundled with these drivers.

As I posted before ,the mini pci gfx cards are oem only, ACK would have to supply them. Then again, why wouldn't they? That's upselling.
As for OS4, why bundle OS4 with the drivers? ACK have stated that OS4 will be bundled with hardware so they can supply drivers with this as an oem.

I like the idea of a ppc wedge with my wireless pcmcia card but a ppc CD32 expansion (or coldfire), now THAT would get me happy.
 :-)