Minimig/FPGA question

[freqmax]

you can get 32GB SDHC cards nowadays I'm sure you can set up a bunch of 4GB hardfiles on that.

Do the cores for Minimig and FPGA Arcade support  SDHC timings ..?

They are notable tighter than for standard-SD.

[amigadave]

@Tension,

The FPGA Arcade Replay is a very good system to consider as a potential replacement for aging original Amiga hardware.  Except for not having Zorro slots, the Replay should do everything you want an Amiga to do, including games and other software that bangs the Amiga chipset.  The chipset is recreated in the FPGA chip, including timings of the recreated chips for the most part.  Improvements continue to be made with the FPGA cores to increase compatibility and speed.

I will always own several original Amiga computers made by Commodore, but with the Replay board, I am seriously thinking about selling my A1200 w/060, SCSI2, & IndivisionAGA.

It is a great alternative system to run all of your old Amiga software on.

[bloodline]

@Tension

I moved to using OctaMED in UAE, that gave me many more options than sticking with hardware. I could capture audio and mix downs directly without going to analogue... Plus I could use my 24bit balanced audio interface etc... The serial pass through let me plug my midi devices in too... Why make life difficult for yourself

[wizard66]

Do the cores for Minimig and FPGA Arcade support  SDHC timings ..?

They are notable tighter than for standard-SD.

I have a SDHC card running in my FPGA Replay without any isu !!

[mikej]

Great care was taken with the routing and termination of the signals to the SD card, so it should work well.

It is actually wired up in 4 bit mode if we wish to make it go faster in the future, but as this is not supported by the ARM in hardware, it may end up being slower.

The prototype daughterboard has a second SD card directly connected to the FPGA. If this works out, it willl allow much faster transfers. It means you need two sd cards, a small one for booting the FPGA on the base board, and the large one with hard-disk images on.

The daughterboard also has digital audio connectivity running in parallel with the feed to the DAC on the main board.

/MikeJ

[Dwyloc]

@Tension
OctaMED already runs well on the Minimig v1.1 with around 030 speed with the 68000 chip clocked at about 50Mhz in turbo more :-)  

As I only use it to play back modules rather than create them as I have no musical abilities I can't say I have tested every feature and the v1.1's 2MB chip ram 1.5MB fast ram maximum memory configuration maybe a bit limited for more advanced use.

That said other than having no way of connecting a CD drive to burn CD's of your creations the Minimig on sale now would just about do the job you are looking for and I think the FPGA Arcade should be perfect for your needs and as soon as the expansion boards USB ports are supported you will either be able to directly attach a USB cd-writer or use an IDE to USB adapter to connect an existing IDE CD-writer or Amiga IDE harddisks.

[lempkee]

i've been out of the loop for a while..

there is a AGA FPGA out???  i thought there was only OCS/ECS ones..
i'd buy one today if i knew where they sell them.

links, show us links!

PS:i am confused about all the fpga stuff, natami,minimig,replay? etc, is it the same thing?

[Everblue]

Well to put it in a simple way:

Minimig = A500 equivalent (has been for sale for a long time)
*Arcade FPGA = A1200/4000 equivalent (available soon) http://www.fpgaarcade.com
Natami =

*More or less, the Arcade FPGA is the equivalent of an A1200 with:

CPU 68020 @ 100 (and this will get even better with the next core)
64 MB of RAM
2 x HDD (through .hdf file on SD Card)
4 x Floppy drives (through .adf files on SD Card)
Indivision (though onboard DVI)

[lempkee]

Well to put it in a simple way:

Minimig = A500 equivalent (has been for sale for a long time)
*Arcade FPGA = A1200/4000 equivalent (available soon) http://www.fpgaarcade.com
Natami =

*More or less, the Arcade FPGA is the equivalent of an A1200 with:

CPU 68020 @ 100 (and this will get even better with the next core)
64 MB of RAM
2 x HDD (through .hdf file on SD Card)
4 x Floppy drives (through .adf files on SD Card)
Indivision (though onboard DVI)

What price range do we talk about, will it(ArcadeFPGA) come boxed in a type of case/tower?

i have seen the minimig at amigakit.co.uk now, i was somewhat put off by the price for a complete setup and not just the card/mobo, i never expected it to be really cheap but i also didnt expect the cost to be spread over so many items either.
That said, the minimig ecs/ocs thing is really interesting although not where i want to land my cash, AGA is what i need for my games so i will buy one as soon as its out.

Really intrigued by the daughter board etc and i got several 060's laying about as i've burnt a few bPPC's over time sadly :-(.
Will boot times and load times etc be the same as orginal Amigahw or will it be accelerated (like UAE does).
Will CD only games work, like OnEscapee,Napalm,T-Zer0 etc?  (i did see that hdfiles are supported so i guess they will.

Which filesystems do they use?, which GB limit on bootable device partition etc?

ETA?, before summer or after?
Resellers ?
video manual?
Kickstarts? (will the os4.1upd4 kickstart's set which is included there work?)

thanks for your time.

[Everblue]

Thats a load of questions, I can't answer them all, because I don't have one yet. Hopefully someone else can fill the rest:

"What price range do we talk about, will it(ArcadeFPGA) come boxed in a type of case/tower?"

200 Euro + Tax I believe. Does not come in a box buy you can buy a mini ITX case from Ebay and put it in it as it has a standard size (unlike minimig).

"Will boot times and load times etc be the same as orginal Amigahw or will it be accelerated (like UAE does)."

I *DON'T THINK* it is accelerated, but if you use WHDLoad games (which you probably will), then games load fast anyway.

"Will CD only games work, like OnEscapee,Napalm,T-Zer0 etc? (i did see that hdfiles are supported so i guess they will."

Well T-Zer0 uses CD audio tracks, so ideally there will be an option to mount .ISO as CD0. I don't see why this cannot be done to be honest.

"Which filesystems do they use?, which GB limit on bootable device partition etc?"

You can use any file system you want. If you use SFS you wont get a GB limit.

"ETA?, before summer or after?"

I know that the first batch is being shipped right now. The 2nd batch, should follow very soon. If I were you I'd contact MikeJ immediately and tell him you want one. The earlier you do that, the earlier you will get yours.

"Resellers ? video manual?"

No idea.

"Kickstarts? (will the os4.1upd4 kickstart's set which is included there work?)"

You have to supply whatever kickstart you want. I guess you'd put kickstart 3.1. As for that stuff you put in the bracket, that's something completely different which has nothing to do with classic Amiga/arcade fpga.

[Darrin]

Will boot times and load times etc be the same as orginal Amigahw or will it be accelerated (like UAE does).

Booting from the SD card's HD image is as fast (or even faster) than most Amiga setups.

Will CD only games work, like OnEscapee,Napalm,T-Zer0 etc?  (i did see that hdfiles are supported so i guess they will.

YOu can use WHDLoad, or connect a CD ROM via the expension board's USB port.

Which filesystems do they use?, which GB limit on bootable device partition etc?

I've used FFS, SFS and PFS3 on hard files.  I haven't personally created a hard file >3GB though because I'm using 4GB cards (I'm a cheapskate).  Others have larger hard files on up to 32GB cards IIRC.

ETA?, before summer or after?
Resellers ?
video manual?
Kickstarts? (will the os4.1upd4 kickstart's set which is included there work?)

Any time now.
Not yet, just directly from Mike.
?
No idea.  I use an A1200 KS3.1 and the option to switch to an A500 1.3.

[lempkee]

@Nostromo, @Darrin

thanks for the answers, helped quite a lot!, i will contact mike as soon as possible and order one!.

As for whdload etc, yes i will ofcourse use those but i want to slow them down a bit as games like Uridium2 etc loads too fast so you won't be able to enjoy the wonderfull loading music lol
i know how to edit that in whdload so no worries with that :-)


thanks again guys!

[Darrin]

@Nostromo, @Darrin

thanks for the answers, helped quite a lot!, i will contact mike as soon as possible and order one!.

As for whdload etc, yes i will ofcourse use those but i want to slow them down a bit as games like Uridium2 etc loads too fast so you won't be able to enjoy the wonderfull loading music lol
i know how to edit that in whdload so no worries with that :-)


thanks again guys!

I know what you mean.  I still use ADFs for a lot of games.  You have the choice on whether you want the "floppies" to run in "normal" or "fast" mode.

[Everblue]

Oh you can still run floppies in fast mode? Good to know =)