Possibly dumb question. 030 vs 040

[Karlos]

Duplicate thread merged. Didn't notice it before

[tone007]

but you don't see it with the vast majority of amiga software.

You'll see the speed everywhere, even in Workbench popping windows and icons up.  Obviously most games are supposed to run at a certain speed, so of course further acceleration isn't going to do much for them.

btw I have had amigas with 68000, 68020, 68030 25mhz and 50mhz, and 68040

Not too bad, I've had 68000, 68010, 68020, 68030@25mhz, 33mhz, 40mhz and 50mhz, 68040@25mhz, 33mhz and 40mhz, and 68060@50mhz.

[zipper]

My A500T is 68060@ 50/57/60/62/64 MHz depending on what I throw in -or 68000@7.14... That makes 6-speed computer.

[pyrre]

Looking at the mess of various accelerator cards that were made for amigas. I see some 040's clocked at lower speeds than some 030 cards. Would there be any gain to an 040 in that case, or is it better to just go for the higher mhz ?

I will try to answer as best as i can.
However, i would like to know what you are going to use the computer for...

I have a blizz 040 and a close friend of mine has a blizz 030.
(we have same amount of fastram)
In pure figures the 030 gives close to 7 or 8000 points in sysinfo.
while the 040 gives just over 14000 points.
(if i remember correctly. it has been a while since last time i powered up my A1200)

The 040 is faster, and generally the experience feels a lot crispier.
But like stated of others, the 040 gets HOT...

If speed is what you need. go for a 060. give a damn about 040.
In most cases a 030 (@50) will suit most applications.
And a 030 will almost always be cheaper.
I have a 030 50 in my a 500. and it is a blast to play around with.

Just make sure you get as much fastram as possible...

[KThunder]

You'll see the speed everywhere, even in Workbench popping windows and icons up.  Obviously most games are supposed to run at a certain speed, so of course further acceleration isn't going to do much for them.

Not too bad, I've had 68000, 68010, 68020, 68030@25mhz, 33mhz, 40mhz and 50mhz, 68040@25mhz, 33mhz and 40mhz, and 68060@50mhz.

There are many things which will improve workbench speed much more than an accelerator. 640x400 4 color is way faster than the same res in 16color. Running any video card is also much faster. Using a good harddrive and interface is also much faster. My point is in most amiga systems the bottleneck isn't cpu speed.

I used to try to get the best and fastest, then I experimented with settings and subjective sense of speed with each and found that you really can't tell if an amiga is running at 25mhz or 50.  
I would tell anyone looking for an accelerator that doesn't have a real lot of experience to look more for features: hard drive interface, fast ram amount and type, ease of installation, compatibility, 68000 fallback mode...

[scuzzb494]

Looking at the mess of various accelerator cards that were made for amigas. I see some 040's clocked at lower speeds than some 030 cards. Would there be any gain to an 040 in that case, or is it better to just go for the higher mhz ?

For the core development era of the Amiga the creators of games and software appealed to the more common user base. While the latter years post say 1995 developers were trying to move the Miggy into a more competitive role, previous to this the commercial world limited the machines capability to say modest acceleration and more RAM. Games like SimCity 2000 for me drove me to getting a better accelerator but to be honest an 030 with say 4MB RAM worked fine with almost everything. My bigger problem was the compatibility of cards with some games.... Ishar IV hated my GVP as did Sensible Soccer. In Sensi the players would accelerate at times doing catchy up with the game. The Blizzard IV was the most consistent card ever in terms of driving anything on the 1200.

I have to say that it was graphics that floored it for me with the A1200 and the drain that that had on the machine. The A1200 needed to come out of the case and I just never could do that.

The 040 really needs cooling and a fan I would guess. Never bothered I just jumped to an 060 Apollo without cooling but more power.

My main A1200 still runs with the 030 Blizzard with SCSI Kit. The machine is on broadband and allows me to use every game and piece of software I have. To use 3.9 I run the 4000 at 040 with PicassoIV or A4000T with Cyberstorm and Picaso IV. But thats a completely different story, and I do not use these machines anything like the A1200.

scuzz

[Ilwrath]

Well, I'm with KThunder on this argument.

All things equal, the 68040 is by far the superior processor.

All things are rarely equal.  Fast RAM, HD controller I/O, etc, play a huge role in system responsiveness.

From simply a look-and-feel comparison, my A1200 with a GVP '030 Turbo+ (030/40mhz) stomped my bone-stock A4000D with 25mhz 040 (3640 board).  

But take that same 68040/25mhz and put it in a decent board, (ie, Warp Engine, CyberStorm) and that A4000D will turn right around and squash the A1200 '030 like you'd expect.  

So, I guess, what to take out of this, there's more to an accelerator than the processor.  Buy the one that best fits your overall needs, rather than worrying about benchmarks.

I would tell anyone looking for an accelerator that doesn't have a real lot of experience to look more for features: hard drive interface, fast ram amount and type, ease of installation, compatibility, 68000 fallback mode...

this + reliability

[Louis Dias]

Well, I'm with KThunder on this argument.

All things equal, the 68040 is by far the superior processor.

All things are rarely equal.  Fast RAM, HD controller I/O, etc, play a huge role in system responsiveness.

From simply a look-and-feel comparison, my A1200 with a GVP '030 Turbo+ (030/40mhz) stomped my bone-stock A4000D with 25mhz 040 (3640 board).  

But take that same 68040/25mhz and put it in a decent board, (ie, Warp Engine, CyberStorm) and that A4000D will turn right around and squash the A1200 '030 like you'd expect.  

So, I guess, what to take out of this, there's more to an accelerator than the processor.  Buy the one that best fits your overall needs, rather than worrying about benchmarks.



this + reliability

OT:
Shows how important the memory interface is to PC performance.  This is why the fpga-based Amigas in development (Minimig, Replay, NATAMI) will perform alot faster than the classics as they now use SDRAM/DDR/DDR2.

[Crumb]

Of course it is way faster, the '040 kicks close to 1 instruction per clock cycle average, but you don't see it with the vast majority of amiga software. An '030 needs no libs for compatibility, produces much less heat, and uses less power especially if you don't need the fpu. Which again most amiga software doesn't.

A 040 runs rings around a 030. Just try to load some images and 030 will choke compared to 040. This is very easy to notice. Emulators also run faster on 040 thanks to bigger caches and demos run faster too. Video playing is also a good test.

I never had problems with power or heat with a 040, these "heat" problems sound like urban legends to me. They work fine with a heatsink and if you use it inside a desktop A1200 you may need a very small fan but that's all. 040s do not emit so much heat. Phase5 sold Blizzard040/40 and Cyberstorm040/40 without any fan.

Power requirements are not much higher than 030+fpu.

I jumped from a 68000/7Mhz to an A1200 with Falcon040/25 and I used a BlizzardIV 030/50 the weekends at our local club and I always noticed it way slower. Of course you may find a few applications that perform in a similar way on a 030 but 040 usually crushes 030s. 040 has 4KB+4KB of cache and 030 just 256bytes... even if BlizzardIV memory interface is well designed it can't fight against cache L1. I have/had Amigas with 68000/7, 68020/14, 68030/16, 68030/25, 68030/50, 68040/25, 68040/28, 68040/30, 68040/40, 68060/50, 68060/60, 040/25+PPC, 060/50+PPC... I never had heat problems on my A1200 despiting it carried a 040 and I never had to add stuff to raise it or improve airflow.

Even the slowest 040 I ever touched, a cbm 3640 felt faster in normal use than a BlizzardIV 030/50.

68040.library is included as standard with AmigaOS so he doesn't have to install extra libraries. If he wants to play games WHDLoad is the best piece of software he could use.

This guy is asking for basic advice which I gave. We could get into Mips and stuff or we could give him some simple suggestions on picking an accelerator. With most amiga software imho an '030 is actually better for many people especially beginners.

btw I have had amigas with 68000, 68020, 68030 25mhz and 50mhz, and 68040

If he just wants to play games then he doesn't need much cpu anyway. Just some fastram and whdload. If he's interested on 3D games a 040/28 or faster would be needed.

For demoscene a 060 is almost mandatory for watching last 12 years productions, for apps I would get at least 040/40 and a graphic card.

[runequester]

Interesting stuff. Thanks all!

I'll keep poking around. Honestly, my main concern is just to be able to play some of the "heavier" games like AB3D and Gloom. Not interested in DOom or Quake

A guy on amibay is selling a cheap 030/25 with 8 megs fast ram. Not a monster accelerator by any means, but should give a reasonable speed boost I guess

[Crumb]

I'm with KThunder here - 040 may be significantly faster, but without fast ram on the turbo board it never reaches its potential. Subjectively with A1200 Blizzard 1230 MKIV felt faster than A4000 with A3640. Especially in demos.

This is ridiculous. Who installs a cpu card without fast ram??? I don't know anyone who uses a 040 without fastram. Do you use your 030s without fastram?

I never felt BlizzardIV 030/50 faster than A3640 in demos... in fact many won't work on a 030.


@runequester

If you don't even have fastram then a 030 is better than nothing. For Gloom/AB3D you can always reduce screen size and use 2x2 pixels if you want. If you want to use your miggy for something else than games get a 040.

[runequester]

This is ridiculous. Who installs a cpu card without fast ram??? I don't know anyone who uses a 040 without fastram. Do you use your 030s without fastram?

I never felt BlizzardIV 030/50 faster than A3640 in demos... in fact many won't work on a 030.


@runequester

If you don't even have fastram then a 030 is better than nothing. For Gloom/AB3D you can always reduce screen size and use 2x2 pixels if you want. If you want to use your miggy for something else than games get a 040.

The card Im looking at is 8 meg fastram, with a jumper to reduce to 4, to avoid messing with the PCMCIA slot.

[TjLaZer]

Compatibility is a big deal, as I want things to work as simply as possible. So I gather the 030 is going to be the more compatible here? (as its seemingly just an overgrown 020, which the 1200 has a version of anyways)

If I were you I would look for an 030 at 40 or 50Mhz.  But in your search, if you find a 1240 040 card just get that, it will work fine.  If you use WHDload games, there should be no problem anyways.  Some cards even have a disable feature so you can revert back to 020 for compatibility.

[rvo_nl]

I never felt BlizzardIV 030/50 faster than A3640 in demos... in fact many won't work on a 030.

I've had quite the opposite experience. Many demos were made to work on a blizzard 1230IV, simply because it was one of the most popular accelerators around. 040's were a bit more rare in the demoscene, while 060 were a bit more common.
 
@runequester: honestly, you'll soon regret you didnt get the 060 straight away. quake wont be running well on a 060, but gloom, ab3d and doom are a lot more playable on 060 compared to 030.

[koshman]

This is ridiculous. Who installs a cpu card without fast ram??? I don't know anyone who uses a 040 without fastram. Do you use your 030s without fastram?

I never felt BlizzardIV 030/50 faster than A3640 in demos... in fact many won't work on a 030.

I'm not sure what you're talking about, but I'm talking about the RAM that's on the turboboard itself. Of course, I have the usual 16MB A4000 mobo RAM, but with A3640 it still feels subjectively slower than 1230 MKIV. I don't have any benchies, I simply remember quite a few demos that were slow, but still enjoyable on 030/50 that are nothing more than a slideshow on A3640. I'm not saying the A3640 is slower across the board - it might well be faster in WB and serious apps, but that's more difficult to judge.

[Karlos]

The stock A4000/040 using the 3640 card was badly crippled (due to the slow access to motherboard memory). Any 3rd party 040 accelerator card for the A4000 utterly trashes it.

I can vaguely remember the WarpEngine 040 running at 28MHz (just 3MHz faster than the 3640) with it's local RAM and support for 040 cache line transfers outperforming the stock A4000 by a factor of 3 in some tests.