Cloning the CyberstormPPC

[Jose]

Probably illegal but would it be possible to clone the thing and have it produced in one of those cheap chinese factories ?
I've read some post in a thread here that P5 protected the PLC's or something, but there must be a way around it:)

Note, I personally don't belive cheap chinese salaries is the way to go but unfortunately it's the way the world is going right now..
Just though I'd post something controversial, been long since I used to post more around here...

Cheers :pint:

[ddniUK]

happy to be wrong, but...

Not feasibly possible and not economically viable.

[Jose]

Ok, but let's get more deep into it. What type of PLC does it use ? What type of encoding was used when programming it ?
Regarding economics, I bet they could produce it for peanuts if they wanted...

[ferrellsl]

I'd be happy just to see a CyberStorm running inside of PearPC.

[Jose]

Oh no, are the X86 vs PPC wars still going on ? Well for real speed one can use WinUAE, but I don't think an emulator is the same thing, it's just cool to run Classic hardware and it sells for fortunes on eBay.
This could also be a good way to screw DCE a bit, after all the cards they kept without rapairing them or sending them back (if anyone still remembers that...).

[billt]

Probably illegal but would it be possible to clone the thing and have it produced in one of those cheap chinese factories ?
I've read some post in a thread here that P5 protected the PLC's or something, but there must be a way around it:)

Note, I personally don't belive cheap chinese salaries is the way to go but unfortunately it's the way the world is going right now..
Just though I'd post something controversial, been long since I used to post more around here...

Cheers :pint:

Are all the components still available? Or will you be digging around in clearance bins of used or shady Chinese counterfeit part sellers to get them?

It might be cheaper to design a new board than to reverse-engineer this old one.

Here's my idea: accelerator board that really only has connectors and an FPGA. Then plug in an existing (ie known good) PowerPC module in some industry standard format (ie. Com-Express) on top of that. Thus the FPGA accelerator board can be a relatively minimal design to connect PCI to the 68K CPU slot, provide a couple other connectors available on your module standard, and the hard stuff like memory bus is already done by someone else. And there's some modules with the newest buyable QorIQ chips on them.

[560SL]

Surely, with the outrageus prices the CSPPC cards go for these days, one ought to think there would be some business in the PPC for classic market. I like the idea with an FPGA based board. How about N050/N070 on that?

[bbond007]

Probably illegal but would it be possible to clone the thing and have it produced in one of those cheap chinese factories ?
I've read some post in a thread here that P5 protected the PLC's or something, but there must be a way around it:)

Note, I personally don't belive cheap chinese salaries is the way to go but unfortunately it's the way the world is going right now..
Just though I'd post something controversial, been long since I used to post more around here...

Cheers :pint:

Even if you get around cloning the boards you may not be able to produce them because of RoHS.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restriction_of_Hazardous_Substances_Directive

[mechy]

Probably illegal but would it be possible to clone the thing and have it produced in one of those cheap chinese factories ?
I've read some post in a thread here that P5 protected the PLC's or something, but there must be a way around it:)

Note, I personally don't believe cheap chinese salaries is the way to go but unfortunately it's the way the world is going right now..
Just though I'd post something controversial, been long since I used to post more around here...

Cheers :pint:

Some problems i can see just off the top of my head:

The mach chips used have mostly been obsoleted,so its a chip broker for new old stock here which probably wont be cheap.

You need the code that is in those chips, this is not easy to do since they blow fuses in them to protect it being read....it can be done,but its not a trivial thing and literally involves chopping/drilling/cutting the chips up to restore the blown fuse or other methods..

The 604e's used are obsolete now also, same deal.The 060 is no problem,but theres no cheap replacement for either.

Its a 8+ layer pcb and you have no schematic,the time it would take to get a schematic from a real board with all its components off is not trivial but can be done.

The fast slot connectors are still available,even in Rohs-not a problem there.

So,there is basically nothing on the PPC the chinese can easily/cheaply  knock off, the ppc and 060 are the costly parts.other than the Mach chips the other components are still more than likely available.

So in my opinion No,not cost effective.
If you have a few Million to blow,the sky's the limit.

Mech

[Jose]

The only reason I posted this is that, while not news, CyberstormPPC's are selling over €1000 these days, when they once sold for less than €300 in 2004/5, it's amazing. I never thought prices would keep up this high for such a long time, and the tendency is to go even higher.
Designing a new board  is also a fortune, from what I've gathered from the experts.
And even if it did happen it wouldn't be cheap, just look at the new 030 for the 1200.
Natami is looking better and better I guess, I hope they join both worlds and make a PPC / 68k card for it, or maybe just program a PPC core too.

[DonutKing]

If those MACH chips are just programmable logic devices then it might be possible to dump the logic without destroying them but its very involved.

http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/entry.php?314-Cloning-a-PAL-HAL-(Part-1)

From a quick look at the datasheet the MACH chips are a LOT more complex then a basic PAL though.

[ferrellsl]

Oh no, are the X86 vs PPC wars still going on ? Well for real speed one can use WinUAE, but I don't think an emulator is the same thing, it's just cool to run Classic hardware and it sells for fortunes on eBay.
This could also be a good way to screw DCE a bit, after all the cards they kept without rapairing them or sending them back (if anyone still remembers that...).

Who said anything about a war?  I'd rather run it thru emulation than thru nothing at all, which is the current situation.

[Ancalimon]

Why aren't the good people who made these cards for us make the design, software and the documentation available so that someone can rebuild BlizzardPPC and CyberstormPPC cards?

Or did they stop supporting amiga and amigaos altogether?

[freqmax]

Make a PPC addon for the FPGA Arcade, that way you can use the FPGA to glue original drivers to new hardware?

[ddniUK]

They are still about... http://www.dcecom.de/

Good luck getting anything from them.