ACube Systems

[ajlwalker]

Well just to show how easily pleased I am, it's got a girl's name, so I am happy.

 :-)

[redrumloa]

Well just to show how easily pleased I am, it's got a girl's name, so I am happy.

 :-D

[Louis Dias]

I'm sorry, I saw embedded PPC and automatically associated Freescale.

Anyway, as a further contrast, the GC/Wii have the SPI interface and everything else integrated into the gpu where this SoC is on the cpu.

As for the performance of the ATI mobility gpu, mobile chips always lagged behind in laptops.  40 million polygons, is there a real game where this was achieved or is it a test like MS's claim that the original XBOX could do 130 million but in-game was only 18 million at best.

Well, it's nice to see another PPC maker enter the market.  But they are clearly not targeting the desktop market.  This board is something you have running a robot in a hot factory that can provide you with a descent user-interface.

At work we used "manufacturing PCs" but they cost ~$2000 because of the rack form factor and the extra fans, etc...  So if this board is targeted at that market, then I see where they are going...

But when you or I want to play the latest games, or even games on par with PC games of 2001, this system will not provide the muscle (neither will a GC).  Memory requirements alone for textures on anything over 800x600 will eat up that shared ram.

Let me say this about the GC's architecture.  The GPU has it's own bank of 16MB of memory and a 3MB internal texture cache and direct access to the disc drive, so it could be streaming audio and graphics data from disc INDEPENDENTLY of the cpu.  The GC's cpu had more cache (and programmable at that) than either the Xbox or PS2 which is why when games were made specifically (as opposed to quick cross-platform ports) for the GC it was easily on par with the best the Xbox could do.

I know people just want to run OS4 even if it's on a 200MHz PPC on a BVision...  Hyperion says maybe this quarter for the classic port.  I just think we need to aim higher.

Between this, ACK, Efika, the A1 and the CyberStorm/BVision stuff, the Amiga hardware market is going to be extremely segmented.

The A1 market is dead already, what's out there is what's out there and it was outdate even when it was designed.  The rest aren't even as powerful.  So we are going backwards now.

I want to go forward.

[Rob]

Well Genesi are working on the Pegasos 8641D maybe one that will run OS4.  It has the the chance as Efika does.

[Hammer]

As for the performance of the ATI mobility gpu, mobile chips always lagged behind in laptops

So? Given similar GPU generation they don't lag to far behind in performance i.e. they can still post unplayable fast frame rates scores in game benchmarking.

is there a real game where this was achieved or is it a test like MS's claim that the original XBOX could do 130 million but in-game was only 18 million at best.

NV2A based architecture was use in higher performing Geforce 4 TI.  

The GPU has it's own bank of 16MB of memory and a 3MB internal texture cache and direct access to the disc drive, so it could be streaming audio and graphics data from disc INDEPENDENTLY of the cpu.

Recall the purpose of "AGP Fast writes" and DMA protocol.

Intel P6 FSB 64bit FSB in XBOX1 doesn't consume nForce’s 128bit wide bandwidth.

The GC's cpu had more cache (and programmable at that) than either the Xbox

Recall NVIDIA's DASP function in nForce chipsets
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NForce

DASP amounts to 3rd level cache functions.

[kolla]

Let me just start off by saying that I own a gamecube chipped with Viper, running Cobra-1.2 and GCoS-Ripper as bootstrapper (mostly to boot Gentoo/PPC ), and also a viper casemod.

So I know what I'm talking about. :-D

Things that pull it down compared to a general purpose computer like the Sam440:

* The so called "broadband" adapter, which is a 10Mbit dongle stuck into a serial port, and it's nowhere near 10Mbit, it's barely around for half the speed of that.

* Too little system RAM (22MB) for "real life" use, and no way to upgrade the ammount of system RAM. You can then add 16MB of ARAM by swapping.

* It doesnt read CDs, only DVDs, so your AROS LiveCD would have to be a DVD.

* In principle it only reads 8cm DVDs, allthough with a casemod (like mine) you can use regular size DVDs, however you an only use the mid 8cm of them, and it can be pretty picky about them.

* Lack of local disk-controller. Yes, you can use SD cards via adapter, but it isnt exactly fast or anything.