A600 questions.

[Cammy]

That's going to be a really interesting project, make sure to take photos once you've done the work! I found the best place to add a USB slot to the A600 was just above the PCMCIA slot, or possibly just above the joystick if you're using a smaller USB plug. You can see how the USB slot might look if you cut it above the PCMCIA slot if you have a look at these old photos of my A600 http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=49670

[XDelusion]

Nice!!!

Is that a Numeric Keypad and USB Joypad hooked up to your 600?!

[Cammy]

Yep, sure is! The numeric keypad is a USB hub also, which has the USB mouse and USB joypad plugged in, and they all work of course!

[zombie10k]

I'm considering "carefully" cutting a spot in my case to fit a female USB plug, then desoldering the USB connector from the HCX board, and in it's place run wires to the plug that will attach to the Amiga casing.

This way, I should, in theory be able to relocate the HCX Board to an out of the way location inside the 600. My hard drive will be a CF card, so it does not take up much room itself, and I should be good.

In the end I should have an A600 with a place to plug in a USB cable that will network to the PC, which I will use to load ADF files, not unlike APE and the SIO2PC for the Atari 8-bit line of computers.

Did you consider getting this one instead? I just pre-ordered one and like the idea of the SD card slot being available right at the floppy entrance. This way I won't feel too bad about getting rid of the floppy to install the 603 + ECS Indivision.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180482035120&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT

[XDelusion]

I saw that, but am in a hurry to get my A600 up and running. I will probably order one of those as well in a couple weeks after I finish ordering more upgrades for my Atari 8-bits.

[tokyoracer]

Hmm,I see alot of people are saying 2Mb isn't enough, looking back I only ran single disk games so maybe that explains why I said it was fine for me.

There was a RAM upgrade that plugged onto the 68k CPU that gave you either 4Mb (PCMCIA active) or 8Mb (PCMCIA disabled). Though if you want one of these things I doubt they are still being made. I really would like one myself if im honest.

Best of luck with the project.

[Gulliver]

Hmm,I see alot of people are saying 2Mb isn't enough, looking back I only ran single disk games so maybe that explains why I said it was fine for me.

There was a RAM upgrade that plugged onto the 68k CPU that gave you either 4Mb (PCMCIA active) or 8Mb (PCMCIA disabled). Though if you want one of these things I doubt they are still being made. I really would like one myself if im honest.

Best of luck with the project.

It shouldnt be too difficult to create a ram expansion, a bit pricey, but certainly doable as a home hobby project. I am thinking on sram attached to a cpu socket converter and using the addmem command to add this memory to the system.
Yes, it doesnt sound difficult at all.

[XDelusion]

There have to be some RAM hacks on Aminet somewhere. I'm pretty sure I'd seen some before.

Personally I'd like to see more hacks that involve a good old fashioned soldering job, instead of relying upon the expansion ports for everything. It's been great fun with my Atari 8-bits!

[rkauer]

Just to comment: My A600 currently have a 1Mb SRAM card hooked in the PCMCIA slot and I use it with WHDLoad games!

 All I did was disabling the "preload" option in games that requires more than 256kb of FAST RAM. My A600 have the original A601 from C= era (I bought it NOS from a brazilian seller 2 years ago).

 Most games that "requires" 512kb of FAST in truth will work with only a bit more than 256kb available. A500 OCS/ECS games, of course. They ask for the 1.3 ROM (or even pre-1.3 ones), which are 256kb only.

 BTW: my A600 have a 4Gb CF instead the HD and I'm using a LCD TV which can handle 15kHz native modes.

 Also for HD-installable games intended for the humble 68000 CPU will work (like Syndicate) with no effort.

 But one thing I concur with our Amiga princess: PCMCIA will boost the A600 speed by something around 33%! Not much, but still an improvement.

[rkauer]

There have to be some RAM hacks on Aminet somewhere. I'm pretty sure I'd seen some before.

Personally I'd like to see more hacks that involve a good old fashioned soldering job, instead of relying upon the expansion ports for everything. It's been great fun with my Atari 8-bits!

  Not for A***i machines :madashell:, but a russian guy made a reconfigurable RAM expansion for the A600! You can choose from 1.5/4/5.5Mb (all PCMCIA-friendly!) and 8Mb (ruling out the PCMCIA port).

 Same speed gain as the PCMCIA SRAM cards, but in a more comfortable way (internal), and keeping the PCMCIA slot free for an Ethernet card or other hardware. Mine is paid and awaiting assembly.

[XDelusion]

Amiga princess, funny.

I did forget to mention (and we can thank the Amiga Princess that I even know about this), is that I recently contacted Zetr0, and he is currently asking that people show interest in a second run of 100 A608 boards. These boards will have the 8Mb of RAM that we are hungry for.

You can sign up on the A608 forums, and show your interest here:

http://www.guildserver.co.uk/forums/AmiDev/index.php


Now just imagine that coupled with an 8Mb PCMCIA card and 2Mb of GFX RAM!

I'd be in OctaMED heaven!

[utri007]

If you replace 68000 cpu with 68010 quit problem should disapper

[lauri.lotvonen]

I did get some 5 floppy games to work with only 2MB Chip also(without preload), but the constant flickering between the game and WB was too much for me ... And I like my WhdLoad experience as a smooth ride

[XDelusion]

rkauer: Is this guy taking more orders? Does he have a project page?

[rkauer]

Now just imagine that coupled with an 8Mb PCMCIA card and 2Mb of GFX RAM!

 PCMCIA port only accept 4Mb SRAM cards as memory RAM. Any card with more than this will only act as media storage.

 So only 512kb (never see one of those, but I think they exists), 1Mb, 2Mb & 4Mb SRAM cards will run.

 @XDelusion: search for LVD A608 in Russian pages. I think the guy(s) can sell you one.

 But money transfers to Russia costs a lot, no Paypal support and then the options are Moneygram and Western Union. Both companies charges absurd taxes to send money to Russia. Be warned.
 
 That's why my very good friend Zetr0 bought the rights to make some boards for the community. But he is banging his head to solve design problems, like the very tight space between traces the card demands. Just a few companies in the world do this job and they want mass production scale, which is not the Amiga situation nowadays.

 The few companies that can make a board in low scale charges too much.

[Cammy]

Zetr0 has sorted out those issues now and already found a PCB manufacturer for the first batch of A608s, so once those are finished the second batch should be 100, we just need to put our names down on the list at the A608 forum. Unless I dreamed that...