AMIGA Coldfire FAQ Version 1 - Non Technical

[Chathurawind]

>doesn't have a Coldfire VP translator

Hi
From AMIGA SDK for Linux v.1.0 manual, page 148:
"Supported processor type: CPU #26 CF52XX"
Therefore it is possible to run AMIGA DE / AA on top of ColdFire CPU!

[Chathurawind]

Every year or so somone pops up with a Coldfire Accelerator that uses 4 Coldfires, and is super great etc.

Everytime nothing happens.

Everytime, it is ridiculed by people who know its virtually impossible.

Why would I want a coldfire accelerator option when I could just use an Amiga One?

Go back to your stupid vapour world you stupid people.

[Chathurawind]

Sir, thankyou for your kind words - not

[jahc]

Oh and while your here - WHERES OUR SCREEN SHOTS

Yes, I'm also eagerly awaiting these screenshots.

[Coder]

Hi PJ,

What I ment was how the payment would go to you. If I decide to do it how would that go. Just curious.

Coder

[jdiffend]

Therefore it is possible to run AMIGA DE / AA on top of ColdFire CPU!

Based on the CF52XX I'd say yes but on top of uclinux only.

[System]

Q – The AGA chipset is dated.
A – Yep, its there for compatibility, stick with your regular graphics card or an alternative GPU for everything else. One possibility is to raise the AGA chipsets CHIP RAM limitations above 2mb. Most signs say we can’t do this, however a jumper on the AMIGA 4000s motherboard suggests this may well be possible, but no promises.

Interesting story, I once had an A4000, and I also noted the whole 8mb jumper thing. I slotted 8mb simm in the graphics memory slot jumpered it to 8M and what happened... I blew up my Alice.

Shortly after I saw a sig in someones email which was a quote from Some Amiga engineer, which was about not playing with jumpers.

The truth is to take 8MB you need to redesign a whole bunch of the custom chips, this was a possible future possibility so was marked out on the A4000 Motherboard and no doubt you could have just swapped in the new chips a la angus.

To be honest getting your promises from jumpers on the A4000 motherboard sounds a little bit silly.

[Rodney]

walibe wrote:
I think your in for a suprise when it lands on your desk - OS 5.0 is the biggy. Development will go ahead due to the sheer number of e-mails I've had (and Oliver has had) asking for us to continue with this project. The AMIGA community has spoken, paticuarly on ANN. Now AMIGA One is great and I'll order one, along with OS 4.0 but it ain't be great to begin with, I'm beginning to wonder just how far OS 4.0 is, but it will be great when we see it huh. I think AROS is great though, why AMIGA Inc just didn't have those guys move it I will never know.

Who do you think your replying too? Take a closer look at that nick name. "HyperionMP"!! Correct me if im wrong, but thats just one of Hyperions (OS4 Builders) public access names.

So, as they say, those comments are unfounded and are of your opinion only!

My opinion is that these guys have been doing a lot of work and personaly, if it wasnt any different to OS3.9 would that be a bad thing? Its going to run a lot faster then it will on your machine. No that i have anything against your machine, i just feel sorry for you if you expect to be able to market this outside the Amiga Community. Your acting as if its a compeditor to the A1? Its not, and i say this because people realise where OS4 is headed. Thats PPC and ultimatly but not confirmed, "platform independence", to some degree! Its also expected to be merged with the DE, and so, a merger of two communities will be formed!

Also some AMIGA users have raised some very valid points - Do you think the AMIGA One is AMIGA Incs priority? Nope - they arn't developing the board and they certainly arn't nmoving the OS. Quite rightfully they are dealing with the AMIGA De which is great and has caused some stir amongst the general world but our AMIGA One hasn't really. Now I understand all you AMIGA One supporters, myself and Oliver like it too but don't want to see the classic AMIGA die, we want to see it grow and thrive and so do most of you guys.

Amiga Inc have a HUGE interest in the AmigaOne and other competing products that shall run AmigaOS4 and future products. This has been shown by Amiga Incs latest announcement in which they described their copyprotection that shall be writen into these boards and OS4. This is a commitment to the future platforms of AmigaOS4.

Lastly, this sounds like a great idea. I have nothing against it, for i believe those people wishing for a faster and more update and complete calssic system will finaly be able to get one. I for one have been considering getting a classic Machine to play with OS3.1 and some open source technolgoies and also to play some old games.

As i see it, and this is only my opinion, but i dont see any other market for your hardware then the one ive listed above, i hope your not too upset when you dont sell a heap of boards outside of the classic amiga. Just incase you wonder why im talking as if you think your aiming these boards outside the amiga market, ill tell you thats becase you seem to be implying that this machine is an alternative.

Well, it may be an laternative ONLY if these boards are compatible with the PCI accelerators comming out, even then, i wouldnt expect too many people to buy your bourd for that reason (although i might).

I say that because most people who are buying accelerators already have the A1200 so why by another prolly fairly expansive machine to run AOS4 when the A1 will be totaly cabable of that?

I may buy your board becase i want a classic machine, i hope you go through with your project, but surly, this is mainly marketed at JUST the Current Community right, and those that have been here before!?!?!?

[jdiffend]

Every year or so somone pops up with a Coldfire Accelerator that uses 4 Coldfires, and is super great etc.

The V4 core is the first one really capable of working and it hasn't been out that long.  Keep in mind hardware development requires a lot of know how and any decent design sofware is rediculously expensive.  

Everytime, it is ridiculed by people who know its virtually impossible.

Most of the people I've heard talk about it have done little if any research, don't have the proper training or background and are generally without a clue.  It is very possible... any chip prior to V4 would have been a nightmare to do it with.  The current project these guys are undertaking sounds feasable but they need to do some more homework before they get too far.

As for nothing ever happens... nobody is thrilled with working two jobs... one of which you make no money.

A project like this would take a couple months.  I've personally worked on an embedded system that was designed, built, and all software was written for it in just over 6 months.  But it took one EE and three Software Engineers to do it.  Hardware, case, powersupply, OS and GUI all from scratch.  The funny thing is that now that could be done with less people and in less time.  A Coldfire and DIMMS would replace over 75% of the chips in that system including a 68020 a DSP, ZIPs and I/O chips... and it would be faster.

My project requires protected memory, USB, and 10/100 ethernet... the first 4e coldfire part supposedly has this... but it's over a year late!  Without that part I really can't do what I want with the Coldfire so to me it's not worth building.  Now I'm looking for alternatives.

[System]

The V4 core is the first one really capable of working and it hasn't been out that long.

The V4e is the new core that might implement dual stack pointers, which will be necessary to run Amiga OS on this accelerator.
The V4e core has been announced, no part actually exists which implements the technology. The V4e core is vapour itself you see.

Most of the people I've heard talk about it have done little if any research, don't have the proper training or background and are generally without a clue. It is very possible... any chip prior to V4 would have been a nightmare to do it with. The current project these guys are undertaking sounds feasable but they need to do some more homework before they get too far.

Dave Haynie has posted on it I consider him to have a little bit of knowledge on the subject.

These people seem to have very little knowledge, some of their claims are wildly innacurate.
Their whole plan is ill concieved. Its like they were taking this degree in computer studys and discovered that Motorola still sells a chip similar to the 68k, and thought it would be a great idea to create an Amiga accelerator on these lines.
I dunno maybe I'm wrong and they've done plenty of computer hardware design and manufacture.
And I suppose Amiga fanatics are entirely within their rights to get all excited about nothing, and then to be disapointed when it doesn't pan out.  
I'd be more inclined to believe in them if they didn't start saying slanderous things about Amiga and its OS4.0 plans, etc. when they obviously know nothing about it.
Its a nice idea for a project but its a stupid idea for anything else. And if it is just a project why would it be posted all over the Amiga news sites, like its some legitimate thing?
It says to me, "hey were a bunch of guys that want to take you for a ride"
Its the new Iwin, listen to our new super wonder machine, it'll revolutionise the Amiga... etc.

At least thats my point of view.

[Jose]

I f you want 8mb chip ram, go for AAA:)

[Chathurawind]

Dave Hayne seems to support your view on incopability.
He states some (unfortunate) problems with this enthusiastic
project..
He posted a whole series of posts on ANN:

http://www.ann.lu/comments2.cgi?view=1019068405&category=unmoderated&71
.
SlimJim

[Chathurawind]

Which one of these new Amigas will run my Video Toaster/Flyer. I have about $20,000 bucks invested in the Flyer including third party software.  The editing and effects have always been in real- time, Speed is needed for rendering out fancier clips.
I will buy the Amiga that runs the Flyer.

Manbot
manbot@indy.net  

[Dr_Righteous]

None of them... VTFlyer is Zorro based, and none of the new Amiga designs incorperate Zorro bus. Aside from the current line of accelerator boards, your only hope is that we get a working AmiCF accelerator card.

[Chathurawind]

Dave Hayne seems to support your view on incopability.

Dang... I totally forgot that the supervisor stack pointer doesn't show up until  the 4e core (if in fact it will). I think Dave pointed out the lack of a supervisor stack pointer to me when I looked at it.

 See what happens when you don't look at this stuff for months.  Give it up and wait for 4e guys!  (I really wish I had saved the stuff I posted last year...)  That was the reason I decided to wait for 4e originally... I just wanted USB, 10/100 etc for what I wanted to do.  I actually thought of building a proto board that used a CPU card slot so I could start with a 5407 and replace it with the 4e on a card later.  

BTW, somebody commented something like *now Motorola has a ROM that offers 100% compatibility".  Uh... no.  Same emulation stuff I saw when I looked at doing this.  This would be programmed into ROM (probably FLASH) but at the very least you would have to force the startup vector to point to the new ROM instead of the standard one because the addon ROM idea they talk about won't work for the reason I posted.  
The emulation startup code must be run before any unimplimented instructions get used.

The Motorola literature talks about using a combination of emulation, the conversion utility and some hand intervention to run everything.  That doesn't sound like 100% compatibility to me.

As for AA or AAA... I suggested going with PCI graphics and sound cards and emulate older chips with code from UAE.

These guys could work on logic to hook to the accel ports of existing migies and hope the 4e hits this quarter.  Most of the Coldfire pin names they will need should stay the same.  Look at Motorola doc titled Family Overview & Technology Overview. (cfprodfact.pdf) The first 4e part on the timeline will include multiprocessing and it is way faster than the 5407 anyway.  The most interesting thing to me is that it closely follows the 5249 which has already been released.

[Chathurawind]

The stack issue has a work around, one is to wait the for the 4e, one is my own soloution - more soon

Oh and I'm quiet cause I'm working on it - not because I've dropped the idea.

If needed parts of AROS can be used with the emulation layer running in software solving alot of problems but my work around could solve this.

I doubt anyone from our project said a ROM existed which offered 100% compatability, nothings 100% compatible in this world - knock us all you like, we will succeed in one way or another. You can't just dump something because someoen says you can't do it straight up - everything has a work around. Just more people trying to kill our project - if anyones serious in helping in this project who hasn't already e-mailed me then do so. Haynies point (which was damned obvious but overlooked) is valid - its great stuff and its all true.

Everything has a work around - yeah we could wait for the 4e - but how longs that going to take - Motorolas hardly reliable at all!

PJ Matthews