OK... why no new 68K boards?

[AeroMan]

Quote:
Belial6 wrote:
and new FPGAs come out, speed will increase, and someone will add 020 instructions, and the fact that they cost more doesn't change the fact that they are being produced.

You're not going to make anything close to a 100MHz MC68060 with an FPGA for a LONG time.

I hate to be pessimistic, but bigger FPGAs will probably be all in BGA package, and soldering these beauties is not something easy to do in our backyard
Besides this, they also recquire a multi layer PCB (8 to 10 layers, maybe more) which are expensive and hard to do

In the good hand, I´ve heard some good news from some friends about Freescale.(hehehe) Let´s wait for the future :-D

[alexh]

AeroMan wrote:
I´ve heard some good news from some friends about Freescale.

??

Next gen Coldfire will be more compatible with 68k apps?

[little]

I´ve heard some good news from some friends about Freescale

If you have not signed a NDA then spill the beans already, it is not like we haven't been waiting for years to learn what exactly the new v5 coldfire will offer.

[Ratte]

GBA1000 ?

[orb85750]

Aren't the 68040 chips still quite plentiful?

[mrmkl]

orb85750 wrote:
Aren't the 68040 chips still quite plentiful?

There was some 3.3V 68040V chips in boxes of 80 pcs for auction at eBay. They went at around $200, more or less.

[Spektro]

alexh wrote:
When was the last time you saw 500 MC68060RC50 chips for sale?

Why not selling 68k boards without CPUs?

I think that most Classic Amiga users already have a 68k board but they want a new one because the board is broken or the new board is somehow better (possibility to use modern memory modules, flash memory for storing KS ROM and programs, etc.) than the old one. Removing a CPU from the old board and installing it to the new one isn't hard - I think.

[Daedalus]

A lot of accelerators (most?) have their CPUs soldered down, and PGA chips like that are very difficult to desolder without causing damage unless you have really specialised equipment...

[bloodline]

I'll let you all into a little secret...

Run UAE on one of these:



Check out what you get... it will squeeze happily into an old Miggy case and give you EVERYTHING you could possibly want...


Nano-ITX

[Darrin]

bloodline wrote:
I'll let you all into a little secret...

Run UAE on one of these:

Check out what you get... it will squeeze happily into an old Miggy case and give you EVERYTHING you could possibly want...

... except real joystick ports and the "feel" of a genuine Miggy running old games.

[bloodline]

Darrin wrote:

bloodline wrote:
I'll let you all into a little secret...

Run UAE on one of these:

Check out what you get... it will squeeze happily into an old Miggy case and give you EVERYTHING you could possibly want...

... except real joystick ports and the "feel" of a genuine Miggy running old games.

The Board comes with a Mini-PCI slot... Who doesn't one of the FPGA hackers here, build a breakout board with the Joystick ports... perhaps an RGB port... maybe even an Amiga floppy connector! the point is why not use a nice piece of high powered commodity hardware to do the boring stuff, and then use simpler hardware to do the exotic stuff...

Just looking around... the Pico-ITX boards are an even better fit!!!

As for feel... If you hid the host OS (Linux or Windows), you would never know you were running an Emulation! Until of course you brought up the config menu to run software than needs a specific hardware config... something real hardware simply can't do!

[alexh]

jpera wrote:
Why not selling 68k boards without CPUs?

Kinda defeats the point.

jpera wrote:
I think that most Classic Amiga users already have a 68k board but they want a new one because the board is broken

I think the market for Classic Amiga users who already own an MC68060 chip is ridiculously small don't you?

jpera wrote:
or the new board is somehow better (possibility to use modern memory modules, flash memory for storing KS ROM and programs, etc.) than the old one.

No-one who has a working 68060 board is going to seriously consider buying a new one are they? Most (all?) boards support BlizKick for storing KS ROM and most owners of 68060 boards have already maxed them out with RAM.

The only reason to upgrade that I can think of would be something like a true 2x performance upgrade. And even then I think people would think twice considering the sums of money involved.

jpera wrote:
Removing a CPU from the old board and installing it to the new one isn't hard - I think.

Agreed. But it is not a real market.

[Darrin]

bloodline wrote:
The Board comes with a Mini-PCI slot... Who doesn't one of the FPGA hackers here, build a breakout board with the Joystick ports... perhaps an RGB port... maybe even an Amiga floppy connector! the point is why not use a nice piece of high powered commodity hardware to do the boring stuff, and then use simpler hardware to do the exotic stuff...

Just looking around... the Pico-ITX boards are an even better fit!!!

As for feel... If you hid the host OS (Linux or Windows), you would never know you were running an Emulation! Until of course you brought up the config menu to run software than needs a specific hardware config... something real hardware simply can't do!

So, like I said, it doesn't do everything I want.  ;-)

Yes, a breakout board like you describe would be nice, so why hasn't anyone done it?

I use WinUAE and while it is very good, it still doesn't feel right.  Fiddling with the setting tabs, waiting for the S to boot and then running UAE... it's just not the same.  Close, but not the same.  I'd rather use my A4000 and Minimig.

[Ral-Clan]

Something I've been thinking about for a while....

1. Real Amiga hardware is breaking down.
2. Many don't want to use Amiga emulation because emulation does not "feel right" due to the fact that custom chip funtctions aren't documented, only reverse engineered.
3. Then perhaps someone can produce an unpopulated PCI card where the user could insert a real PAUL, AGNES, DENISE, KICKSTART, etc. (from a dead Amiga).
4. The emulator (UAE) could recognise and use these real Amiga custom chips on the PCI card.  It would only have to emulate the CPU and other address things (or heck - one could even put a real 68000 CPU on the card as an option).

This has been done to an extent with the C64 SID chip PCI cards.

[darksun9210]

didn't the PCI catweasel card support amiga mice/joysticks, and keyboards?

[bloodline]

ral-clan wrote:
Something I've been thinking about for a while....

1. Real Amiga hardware is breaking down.
2. Many don't want to use Amiga emulation because emulation does not "feel right" due to the fact that custom chip funtctions aren't documented, only reverse engineered.

No, the Hardware was well documented, though obviously many of the bugs in the Amiga chipset were not well documented... The "feeling" problem is 99% psychological, based on a perceived difference between doing something "in Software" and doing it "in Hardware", the fact that Emulations use modern display and audio devices and thus lack the inherent flaws in the older devices... and the lack of "ritual" required to get the Emulation running.

3. Then perhaps someone can produce an unpopulated PCI card where the user could insert a real PAUL, AGNES, DENISE, KICKSTART, etc. (from a dead Amiga).

Why bother... the amount of work required to get it to sync up, you may as well just use UAE... plus, do you really want to plug a TV, Amiga Mouse, Amiga Keyboard into your PC?... You would prefer to just use the I/O of the PC... bang... let's just use UAE...

4. The emulator (UAE) could recognise and use these real Amiga custom chips on the PCI card.  It would only have to emulate the CPU and other address things (or heck - one could even put a real 68000 CPU on the card as an option).

To Sync with real hardware is a pain..

This has been done to an extent with the C64 SID chip PCI cards.

The SID chip is basically a simple but quirky Synth on a chip, that is quite desirable... the Amiga is a more integrated system, with the individual parts not doing much on their own...