Don't email Jens - Clone-A limited beta production run.

[Darrin]

Hi Jens,

Personally, I think that 333 EUR + S&H isn't a bad price for an modernised C64 and a Minimig combo.  As I haven't kept up with the C-One development (and I'm sure I'm not alone), can you give us a quick summary of what the existing C-One cores offer today and what the existing expanded C-One hardware provides for C64 and Minimig users.

Thanks.

PS.  Any more news on that SVGA expander for a real C64?

[Lorraine]

/

[Darrin]

Lorraine wrote:
I am glad this thing still exists. I thought that the MiniMig and NatAmi hype may kill it off.

Personally, as a Minimig user I see the Minimig and Clone-A as 2 entirely different products aimed at 2 totally different markets.  The Minimig is an attempt to recreate the A500 in a small formfactor that provides an ideal classic gaming machine and it does this perfectly.  The Clone-A is a new Amiga for serious users that could replace the big-box classic machines that some of us have leaking battery acid onto our desks.  :-)

[Crom00]

If the Natami is real then that will be stellar too.
Good problem to have...what shall I get... Clone A, MiniMig or Natami?

[bloodline]

Crom00 wrote:
If the Natami is real then that will be stellar too.
Good problem to have...what shall I get... Clone A, MiniMig or Natami?

While the MiniMig is interesting, if the Clone-A does AGA, then I'll get it. I don't see any point in the NatAmi, to be really honest.

[Johan Samuelsson]

i thought AGA support was more or less planned?...
i am SO looking forward to this little beast!

[darksun9210]

ok wait... what is this?
i thought the clone-a was going to be a set of replacement chips for existing machines? whats this now? an ATX A4000 compatable mainboard with FPGA based AGA chipset?  :-?

[bloodline]

darksun9210 wrote:
ok wait... what is this?
i thought the clone-a was going to be a set of replacement chips for existing machines? whats this now? an ATX A4000 compatable mainboard with FPGA based AGA chipset?  :-?

The Clone-A was always going to be a standalone chip... but it was developed as three descrete chips, in circuit to increase compatibility with real Hadware.

Jens did a lovely talk on the subject... the video is somewhere...

[Belial6]

I have to second that.  Two years ago at AmiWest, he was very clear that the discrete chips were for development purposes only.  He felt that producing them for sale would be a losing proposition, as there just were not enough people with working mainboards but bad chips to make it worthwhile.

At that time he was hoping, not promising, but hoping to get the Clone-A into a joystick.  And if the economics of it worked out, perhaps even having an SD slot in it.

[Jope]

weirdami wrote:
I hope Jeri didn't have to go back to eating ramen and sleeping in the back of a store because of it. :-(

Probably not.

She was originally going to do a super C-64 core for the C-One, but ended up doing the C-64 DTV instead. The DTV was a stong enough resume for her that she got picked up by someone to do fpga stuff for a living.

This is one of those messy stories we have had plenty of in the Amiga/Commodore scene. I don't know all the details nor do I wish to.

[Schoenfeld]

No need to talk about Jeri in this thread, it seems like she has left the C-One project for good. All the fame for turning the C-One into the historic piece of hardware that it is right now (world's first fully re-configurable computer) goes to Tobias Gubener, Peter Wendrich and me.

I have put more pictures of the FPGA extender card online, this time from the final production run (previous pictures were of the hand-built unit that I made last weekend). Check www.c64upgra.de/c-one and click on "pictures"!

The production of the FPGA extender is finished, the units are shipping now. If you already have a C-One (Redrumloa did sell a few through eBay, right?), you can buy the extender board alone for 99,- EUR, or you can get the bundle of C-One board, extender card, SIMM and CPU/Ram card for 333,- EUR (about 420 USD at the moment - the dollar has done well in the past few weeks!).

The boards come with all the latest modifications done (for example the BA mod that makes lots of cartridges work!), and with Newboot installed - that's the nice graphical user interface that replaces the Amstrad-look-alike startup screen that we previously had.

Jens

[TheDaddy]

I wonder if this needs a case :-)

[tonyyeb]

@Jens

So how close are we to a fully working (purchasable!) Clone-A?

[TheDaddy]

Can you quickly summarise please?

A-Clone: what is it and its specs?

C-Clone: is this an improved C64 clone? Specs?

Many thanks :-)

[Schoenfeld]

tonyyeb wrote:

So how close are we to a fully working (purchasable!) Clone-A?

Far, far away. The project is growing and growing, the user interface is taking up lots of resources, and I have just put two more people on the project. It's HUGE and it's worth waiting for.

Jens

[Schoenfeld]

TheDaddy wrote:
Can you quickly summarise please?

It's not that easy to do "quick" if you're talking about a totally different principle of computers.

A-Clone: what is it and its specs?

A-Clone: There is no such thing. However, I have a project called Clone-A. This is the internal summary name for the project "reverse-engineering the Amiga set of chips for inclusion in various products". I do have boards that plug into the real sockets and they work in any combination with the original chips (just as a proof that I do the exact same inter-chip-communication as the original set), but I have no plans of selling chip replacements.

Plans are to make a new machine that is living-room-compatible. Something silent (all-flash based) in a nice case that lets you play games. You can choose between various processor speeds and chipsets - not on a by-unit-basis, but on a by-game-basis, as the same machine will have it all built-in. One game works better with 68000@7MHz and OCS, another game takes advantage of the 030 command set, fastmem and AGA. Clone-A technology will provide all this.

Knowledge gained from reverse-engineering the chips and inter-chip communication has already been used on the Indivision AGA flickerfixer.

C-Clone: is this an improved C64 clone? Specs?

You probably mean "C-One". It was meant to be a "C64 on steroids", but never reached that point. Back when the board was designed, it was meant to be an 8-bit only system for running C64, Amstrad/Schneider and VIC-20 software. With the new expander board, the 8-bit limit is broken, as the Minimig port shows. The C-One with the extender card will be used for public beta testing the Clone-A technology sometime next year. The Minimig core will be released next week, maybe already this weekend.

The C64 core for C-One has reached a compatibility level that is better than many emulators already. You can plug real SID chips (up to two of them!) to the board and use both from the C64 side. Both NTSC and PAL are supported, you can switch between the video modes while the machine is running (yes, the whole timing model is being changed while the machine runs!). If you always wanted to see all the nice PAL demos, this is your chance.

C-One is an ATX board with small changes. You need to provide a case, power supply, a CF card, PS/2 mouse and keyboard, monitor and some skill, as the case needs minor modifications.
The monitor must be VGA, and if you want to watch PAL demos, it should support a vertical frequency of 50Hz (for example compatible with old Amiga-scandoublers in PAL modes - Indivision AGA is not a good test here, as it can output PAL in 62.5Hz).

Jens