MiniMig with AGA

[Louis Dias]

Can we please keep to something that is going to happen during this decade (or at all)?

Yeah cuz FPGA tech will never be able to run a Amiga software...

Oh wait?!  O_o

[Piru]

Yeah cuz FPGA tech will never be able to run a Amiga software...

Excuse me? Who claimed anything like that?

[Dr_Righteous]

It sounds like we should have some kind of cross-project repository for all of this VHDL. A blending of technologies, sharing research and code. Pick your favorite FPGA kit, select the code pieces you want to use, put them together and run with it.

Exciting times!

[Iggy]

The MiniMig has a 68000, AGA needs 68020 minimum... Can you even buy 020s cheap anymore?

50 MHz 68060's are available for about $40.00. I you need a reference I can point you to them.

The Natami project is progressing slowly, but surely. Developer boards may be available this year (this is purely my speculation - no firm notice yet).
I trust Gunnar (who supervises the Natami's forum) and his technical team. Eventually their work should yield something with more capability than is present in the AGA chipset.

[Louis Dias]

Excuse me? Who claimed anything like that?

Everytime *Natami* comes up, you have something negative to say.
The people on the team have CURRENT (not ancient) industry experience.

Now that we have Minimig and FPGArcade, is it such a stretch to see a similar device with even more oomph?

Here you'll see Gunnar has already developed an Amiga 3D card years ago:
http://www.natami.net/knowledge.php?b=2¬e=16454&x=1

As you can see, yacube has an AGA core...is it so hard to expand upon or add to that?

There goal is an Amiga 5000 if Commodore had still been around in 1997ish or better if possible.  Seems attainable since *the community* has already replicated (with minor enhancements) what Commodore release to the public up to its demise in 1994.

The Minimig core is cycle-accurate with the 68000 and because it has a faster memory interface on the FPGArcade board, it performs 1.85x better (atleast that is my understanding).  The latter Amigas did not use the 68000 and still maintained high compatibility.

Here: http://www.natami.net/knowledge.php?b=2¬e=17027
You can see how much improved the N050 will be in processing instructions over legacy hardware because cycle accuracy is not necessary when moving forward in progress.  Alot of stuff will still run, some stuff will break just like when the 3000 was released and then the 1200/4000 from there...  Big deal.  The goal in an A5000, not A500/3000/1200/4000 emulation.

Recall the flak Dennis took on this very forum when he first announced his project.

As you are (iirc) a MorphOS developer, my feelings are that such a project succeeding may cause a conflict of interest for you here.  However, you could put your talent to use and join the team and write new libraries to take advantage of the platform.

[downix]

You could have several models

MiniMig AGA 030
MiniMig AGA 060
MiniMig AGA 060 Notebook with Amiga 600 keyboard layout wow... that would be something!!!! Dreamings too much, but if someone did that.. huhu... no more social life just kidding.. hehehe... but yea.. would be great ... I think

Can't guarantee the 060, but am adapting my minimig netbook now to hopefully get aga onboard now... gee thanks guys for moving the goal posts just when I had the pcb masks prepped...

[Dr_Righteous]

Can't guarantee the 060, but am adapting my minimig netbook now to hopefully get aga onboard now... gee thanks guys for moving the goal posts just when I had the pcb masks prepped...

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

[Belial6]

I don't know if you really are making a netbook, but I bet a lot of people would be really interested in a MiniMig motherboard that was sized and had the right connectors to just replace the motherboard on a cheap netbook.

People already pay ~$100 for a case, and ~$100 for a monitor + the cost of a keyboard and mouse.  If a MiniMig motherboard coud be made that could use the screen, keyboard and touchpad of a pre-existing netbook, I would buy a $250 netbook and throw the motherboard away.  The only missing piece would be getting it to take a joystick.

[FrenchShark]

I doubt softcores are going to implement any cache anyway. They just rely on the brute execution power, faster memory etc.

I have a TG68 softcore with a 4-way 8KB unified cache running on an FPGA.
What's wrong with that ?
To use the massive throughput of an SDRAM, you have to put a cache.
Pure random access on an SDRAM is not better than an old DRAM : 60ns at best.

Regards,

Frederic

[Piru]

Everytime *Natami* comes up, you have something negative to say.

I've questioned the feasibility of the Natami project. I don't believe they will ever finish it (with the plans they have). It's just way way too much work. Just the software side of the project is enormous (10 years or so with moderate sized team).

It does not equal to "FPGA tech will never be able to run a Amiga software" however, as MiniMig has clearly shown. MiniMig project uses the correct approach of dividing the problem to smaller sections which can be solved individually.

Now that we have Minimig and FPGArcade, is it such a stretch to see a similar device with even more oomph?

Yes. I've skimmed the reasons above, but I can dig up the more detailed posts about it if it is required.

Recall the flak Dennis took on this very forum when he first announced his project.

I had my doubts, but didn't voice them. That was because it was clearly within reason to create such a feat. With Natami it is just totally unrealistic. Unless if they cut out most of the unrealistic stuff it will never finish.

As you are (iirc) a MorphOS developer, my feelings are that such a project succeeding may cause a conflict of interest for you here.

You're correct that I'm a MorphOS developer.

You are incorrect in that my dislike of Natami would have something to do with MorphOS. Natami wouldn't compete with MorphOS in any way as they're targeting different audiences. Getting either one doesn't exclude getting the other.

Not every move I make or thing I say have some hidden MorphOS agenda behind them.

However, you could put your talent to use and join the team and write new libraries to take advantage of the platform.

I was already asked years ago. I declined as soon as I realized what kind of unrealistic mess the project was.

When I was contacted regarding MorphOS project ~10 years ago I instantly knew the people behind it were serious and had it all well thought out. I knew it would work and that's why I joined up.

[Piru]

To use the massive throughput of an SDRAM, you have to put a cache.
Pure random access on an SDRAM is not better than an old DRAM : 60ns at best.

Forgot about that. For some reason I built an analogy in my mind that this would be similar to running software emulation on top of a host system, but indeed that is not the case. Here we have to deal with the memory interface directly, which indeed is quite slow. Just shows how much of a software guy I really am.

I have a TG68 softcore with a 4-way 8KB unified cache running on an FPGA.
What's wrong with that ?

Nothing.

So I assume the 68000 softcore has some kind of built-in cache to compensate for the slow memory interface, too?

[wizard66]

@ MikeJ or Yaqube,

Can you please tell us the sysinfo speeds from the FPGAARCADE board ?
I realy want to now how fast the softcore speeds are and HDF speeds.

[FrenchShark]

So I assume the 68000 softcore has some kind of built-in cache to compensate for the slow memory interface, too?

The softcore from Tobias does not have a built-in cache but I added one. This is the beauty of VHDL.
The cache is more like a L2 than a L1 one (no instruction prefetch, no Harvard architecture). It works in write back mode too.

Regards,

Frederic

[FrenchShark]

@ MikeJ or Yaqube,

Can you please tell us the sysinfo speeds from the FPGAARCADE board ?
I realy want to now how fast the softcore speeds are and HDF speeds.

On http://www.a1k.org, Tobias has his new core having 6 MIPS with a 8-byte I-Cache and 7.6 MIPS with 16-byte I-Cache. This is with his new core.
You can expect maximum 6-7 MIPS with the first TG68 version running at 28MHz and a good cache.
The new core would certainly reach 15 MIPS.

Regards,

Frederic

[yaqube]

Can you please tell us the sysinfo speeds from the FPGAARCADE board ?
I realy want to now how fast the softcore speeds are and HDF speeds.

TG68K @ 7.09 MHz : 4.27 x A500 / 1.85 x A1200
TG68K.C @ 7.09 MHz : 5.81 x A500 / 2.52 x A1200

Hardfile read speed: 1900-2000 KB/s

[Crumb]

@yaqube

you rock, man!

If it was possible to add a socket for a real 68060 I would probably buy one.