ACA500 prototype

[psxphill]

and it will be external (which is simply not acceptable for me).

After many years of having internal cards in an A500, I much prefer everything to be external.
 
The prototype that lies flat on the desk looks much better.
 
I'm not sure I'd have added any ram or CPU & made it require either an A1200 ram or accelerator.
 
But I guess Jens thinks there are some people who just want a standalone cheap expansion they can plug into an A500 for WHDLOAD.

[AmmoJammo]

After many years of having internal cards in an A500, I much prefer everything to be external.
 

Why though?

I haven't used my A500 in weeks, because with the A590 connected, I simply have nowhere to set it up!

I've bought an A600 to use instead because everything can easily, and cheaply be internal.

[Lurch]

Thought the comment would be after years of having everything external it will be nice to have it internally? :-)

Back to sitting on the fence :-)

[Jiffy]

I'm not sure how many people will end up using the 14mhz 68000, or whether all customers will just add an accelerator to the back. Which of course will have it's own ram as well.

Adding an ACA12xx completely defeats the purpose of it being a lowcost solution.

If the purpose of the card is adding an ACA12xx to an A500, then completely remove all ram and the 68000, making it a simpler and cheaper design.

Sorry, but the more I think about it, the more flawed the current design becomes in my eyes.

[Kronos]

Bummer! :mad: This is very bad news. It had to be internally! :furious: All hope is floating away for CDTV & A2000 users. :pissed:

It was never supposed to work in the CDTV, as the CDTV uses DMA for its CD-ROM (and on top of that there is very little space above the 68k-socket).

A2000 could get away with a simple adapter to the MMU (turbo-slot) only question is wether you'd still be able to use Z2 cards (as the ACA won't provide a config-out signal).

But Jens also hinted at an "ACA2000", which might just be the same card minus A500-side-slot plus some logik for Z2 use (just my guess).

[psxphill]

If the purpose of the card is adding an ACA12xx to an A500, then completely remove all ram and the 68000, making it a simpler and cheaper design.

Yeah, I would probably have done that personally. However the cost of the board isn't just based on the cost of the components, so some decisions might not make as much sense to us as they do to Jens. He might also be wrong, but I think he's got so far through now that even if he is wrong then he's not going to change it anyway.
 

Why though?
 
I haven't used my A500 in weeks, because with the A590 connected, I simply have nowhere to set it up!

Because I'm fed up with having to keep opening it up to unplug one thing and plug another thing in & the sockets give up eventually.
 
I'd have probably bought an A1200 over an A600.

[NovaCoder]

I'm afraid I have to agree, it's not pretty, in fact it's actually probably a bit dangerous to have all those chips exposed.

Not really sure where Jen's is going with this product, he's normally pretty much spot on with his hardware.

I'm not a 500 owner but if I was I'd be after an internal design, either an FPGA based solution or an 030 and something with at least 8 MB RAM.

[psxphill]

I'm afraid I have to agree, it's not pretty, in fact it's actually probably a bit dangerous to have all those chips exposed.

That is a different argument, a case will solve that.
 

Not really sure where Jen's is going with this product, he's normally pretty much spot on with his hardware.

What you mean is that you normally agree with him, he might still be spot on with it (or at least as close as you can get with making hardware for such an obsolete computer).
 

I'm not a 500 owner but if I was I'd be after an internal design, either an FPGA based solution or an 030 and something with at least 8 MB RAM.

Maybe come back when you have an A500 & have tried cramming in multiple upgrades inside the case. A megachip and 1.8mb trapdoor expansion with a gary tower of death takes up a lot of the room.

[AmiDude]

It was never supposed to work in the CDTV, as the CDTV uses DMA for its CD-ROM (and on top of that there is very little space above the 68k-socket).

I'm not an hardware-guru, but fact is that they made A500/A2000 acccelerators in the past which worked also with the CDTV. Can you explain why Jens can't make such an accelerator?

[Ral-Clan]

Maybe come back when you have an A500 & have tried cramming in multiple upgrades inside the case. A megachip and 1.8mb trapdoor expansion with a gary tower of death takes up a lot of the room.

I agree with this statement.  Once you have a kickstart switcher, indvision and MegaChip installed in your A500, you will start getting a little sick of internal mods to the A500 (no room).

I don't mind internal mods, but the side expansion port on the A500 was a great design feature and should be used.  It makes installation/removal of components easy, safe and plug-n-play.

Besides - A500's with sidecars are COOL!

As for this not working in an A2000, well, since the side expansion port of an A500 is almost a Zorro slot, I'm sure with a simple adapter it could be made to work on an A2000, or the design could be used to make an A2000 version (perhaps with some lines leading to the A2000's CPU slot).

[Iggy]

I don't know why you guys assume Jens isn't going to encase this.

[_ThEcRoW]

Why are people whining about a non-a2000 accelerator?. After all, you have plenty of options for the 2000, as it is a big box amiga, and the 500 is more limited in expansion. Also, there are more a500 than cdtvs in circulation, so it makes more sense to aim at a500 only at first than trying to reach all the ocs/ecs machines.

[Jiffy]

I don't know why you guys assume Jens isn't going to encase this.

Because he said so himself in that particular thread.

[delshay]

Another third party could be making a case for it if he does not supply one but things can change in development and a case may or may not come with this device. The A500 is probably the most compatibility with old floppy disc games,but how compatible with a accelerator I don't know.

Imagine a A500 all cleaned-up to look brand new with a nice side case will it look out of place against a A1200? My answer would be no.

User(s) should always welcome new hardware be it right or wrong as who else would do it.

A500 all cleaned-up with accelerator could bring back entry level new users to amiga.

[wawrzon]

User(s) should always welcome new hardware be it right or wrong as who else would do it.

what??

A500 all cleaned-up with accelerator could bring back entry level new users to amiga.

hardly. an entry level user with no experience would be much better served with a clean a1200. it would be cheaper, simpler, easier to get and would not fall apart when moving it around the table.

[bbond007]

That thing would ONLY be impressive if I designed and built it, or some kid did, or the cat, but it does not really seem up Jens usual production quality.

Maybe it can work as an upgrade for A1000 users who are desperate an upgrade.

Honestly, if you want to upgrade a A500 to 14mhz with 2MB of ram with expansion slot, you buy an A1200, not this thing...

This upgrade alone is not really even enough to properly take advantage whdload...

Maybe I'm just negative because I'd like the AGA MKII to take priority over this thing...