"New" amiga hardware

[Honkybear]

I know we have seen a small run of the FPGA Arcade. I contacted OneCircuit

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFi_Sh9cQdk

Who had been one of the guys who did an unboxing. I asked him about the Amiga side and last time. He says he wasn't able to get the Amiga part working. This maybe user error I don't know.
But like most of you I sit in anticipation waiting. Like some of you maybe I'll be dead by then also. The video of the FPGA Arcade with Daughter board looks amazing.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug4_yh3Q288

I WANT ONE !!!! NOW !!!!

We'll that's my two cents. I'll just keep dreaming for the moment :-)

[Lord Aga]

Update : Added Chip memory bus test benchmark results:

http://www.apollo-core.com/bringup/

We have some good and true progress here

[mikej]

I know we have seen a small run of the FPGA Arcade. I contacted OneCircuit

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFi_Sh9cQdk

Who had been one of the guys who did an unboxing. I asked him about the Amiga side and last time. He says he wasn't able to get the Amiga part working. This maybe user error I don't know.
But like most of you I sit in anticipation waiting. Like some of you maybe I'll be dead by then also. The video of the FPGA Arcade with Daughter board looks amazing.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug4_yh3Q288

I WANT ONE !!!! NOW !!!!

We'll that's my two cents. I'll just keep dreaming for the moment :-)

It's very real. It has taken a long time to get the Amiga code into shape and integrated with the Replay framework. As much code as possible is generic and shared between all the cores (DRAM, OSD, IO etc).

Few glitches to sort out still, but focus will move back to the daughterboard and upgrading the soft 68K core as well. I've started to run regression tests of my soft CPU against the real one. This will be open sourced as well - although to be fair the T68 is pretty compatible and runs fast with prefetch/caching.
/MikeJ

[biggun]

Update:
Uploaded several Videos showing games running on CPU.

http://www.apollo-core.com/bringup/

[wawrzon]

chip ram access seems normal as expected, the frame rate on indy though looks pretty low?

[biggun]

chip ram access seems normal as expected

The result of 3.5 MB/sec is actually the best possible result on a 16bit AMIGA.
I'm not sure if this is normal to reach.
What do other cards reach on 16bit AMIGAs?

[guest11527]

Hi Gunnar,  

* All 68000 instructions are included
* Many good 68020 instructions are also included
* Some 68020 EA modes are included.
* Some usefull new instructions are included.

yes, thanks for the update. I guess we talked about this already a bit. The problem with that is that there is no API to signal an "almost but not quite" 68020, i.e. I - as a software author - cannot compile against a 68020 API with instructions missing since I can never be sure whether the result will work correctly. I - as a user - cannot install a 68020-only version of a software because I cannot be sure if the result works. I can only take 68K versions then, which is a shame - or software that explicitly mentiones that it has compiled for this specific CPU, even though exec has no means of signalling it.

My idea would be that you provide some "unimplemented integer instruction" exception and an "unimplemented addressing mode" exception (whoops, there are already!) and trigger that instead in case you hit an instruction you do not support, but that is part of the program interface of the 68020+ CPUs. This way, one could install a "appollo.library" via SetPatch (or otherwise) that includes the missing instructions as software emulation, and an updated "MuRedox" that includes an "on-demand" patching of software to lower the emulation overhead.

[GMeanie]

I was thinking the same thing.
With the AmigaOne they could just make a simple MacMINI clone. There is no reason for 10 USB ports like they have on their MB now. We would all use a built on board Video card and get a cheap machine out there running OS4. Also open up the OS4 project to OPENSOURCE and take Donations. I bet they would make a hell of a lot more money then they are now with their expensive machines that most people can't and don't want to afford.
I really think that is the only way to break back into the market but for some reason they want to shut a lot of people out of the fun.
But for now they need to get a cheap hobby machine out there and forget their get rich schemes and control over everything.

I picked up a used G4 powerbook for $80 and it runs MorphOS just fine!

My main issue with these *Amigans* is that they seem to want to just suck a lot of money out of the last remaining Amiga fans instead of wanting to build up a new niche market for the Amiga computer platform. There's 7 billion people on this planet, so a happy niche/hobby/etc Amiga platform with 10 million or so people would be totally possible and viable..

They're making computers for the classes, not the masses! Which is completely opposite from the original Commodore & Amiga philosophy.

[biggun]

Hi Gunnar,  

yes, thanks for the update. I guess we talked about this already a bit. The problem with that is that there is no API to signal an "almost but not quite" 68020,

We use the GNU tools ourselves to write software.
We have added a new target "APOLLO" to them to be able to code for our Core.
This target matches our CPU and allows not onle to use the new instructions
but also to enables to new address mode options we have.

Phoenix support PC-relative also for updates.
Coding like this now works fine.
ADDQ.L #2,label(pc)

I - as a user - cannot install a 68020-only version of a software because I cannot be sure if the result works.

This is true.
For the first release of Phoenix we only promise 100% 68000 compatility.
But as most 68020 instructions work fine - many 68020 programs might run fine too.

At a later point we will add more here to reach full compatibility.

My idea would be that you provide some "unimplemented integer instruction" exception and an "unimplemented addressing mode" exception (whoops, there are already!)

This is of course another option and would work even today.
Good idea.

[wawrzon]

The result of 3.5 MB/sec is actually the best possible result on a 16bit AMIGA.
I'm not sure if this is normal to reach.
What do other cards reach on 16bit AMIGAs?

ive never measured that myself, but yes, i think its as much as you can expect to get.

[wawrzon]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Thomas Richter  View Post
My idea would be that you provide some "unimplemented integer instruction" exception and an "unimplemented addressing mode" exception (whoops, there are already!)
This is of course another option and would work even today.
Good idea.

i think its self explanatory that it should be done as thomas proposes, the system should be usable at all times, even if non existent instructions lead to exceptions that are handled by a cpu lib instead crash. it will also be convenient for user bug reports.
what concerns apollo target it remains to be seen how popular it will get, but it will either fragment the scene or the new instructions will have to bi added to the appropriate existent cpu libs to achieve forward compatibility of all systems. either way most existent software is compiled against existent targets, and this will overweight any alternative very likely forever.

[biggun]

i think its self explanatory that it should be done as thomas proposes, the system should be usable at all times, even if non existent instructions lead to exceptions that are handled by a cpu lib instead crash.

That a CPU trows an excpetion for unimplemented instructions is normal.
Phoenix does this already.
And old 68000 cores did this also.


Nevertheless on AMIGA really no one cared about this.
In theory you could catch all FPU instructions  anfd run programs using the FPU this way on any AMIGA.
Did anyone do this?

[zipper]

The result of 3.5 MB/sec ...What do other cards reach on 16bit AMIGAs?

ive never measured that myself, but yes, i think its as much as you can expect to get.

On my A500T + RTG + 060 I barely could get 2.1 MB/s on Chip at best.

[wawrzon]

That a CPU trows an excpetion for unimplemented instructions is normal.
Phoenix does this already.
And old 68000 cores did this also.


Nevertheless on AMIGA really no one cared about this.
In theory you could catch all FPU instructions  anfd run programs using the FPU this way on any AMIGA.
Did anyone do this?

im not sure anymore but i always sort of expected math libs to provide soft fpu emulation, at least that is how this should have been done i guess. of course this doesnt actually offer anything, the fpu version of software remain to be recommended for systems with fpu but the system remains stable and running, and this is important. okay maybe its enough to throw exception and exit the task, except it is an important one and takes down the system.

[wawrzon]

On my A500T + RTG + 060 I barely could get 2.1 MB/s on Chip at best.

060 cards are one known inconvenient example.

[zipper]

Yes, a 030 would probably have done better.