FPGA Amiga

[kolla]

groans from European users

I believe you here mean British users. Just consider where most CPU boards and other high end hardware for Amiga were made, where Amiga clones were made, where most productivity software was made etc.

[psxphill]

I believe you here mean British users.

Well we did buy more amiga's than any other country

http://www.amigahistory.plus.com/sales.html

and the big box amiga sales worldwide were woeful.

[moogaloonie]

I believe you here mean British users. Just consider where most CPU boards and other high end hardware for Amiga were made, where Amiga clones were made, where most productivity software was made etc.

I tend to think of the CPU boards (Phase5) that originated in Germany  before those that came from the UK (though I had a VXL-30 in my 2k, not  sure where that was from). I recall the BoXer was from the UK, but Escom  was German and wasn't Quikpak based in the US?
I tend to associate  the UK with the bulk of the games and for having great printed  magazines, but I don't associate the UK with any one major application...  Germany, especially Haage and Partner and proDad seemed the most eager  to see the Amiga become a serious business machine.
Honestly, Commodore were  blind to just how big of an issue the NTSC/PAL differences would be. US  users would love to have enjoyed the games played in the UK, but many of  them either didn't run at all or put important stuff at the bottom of the  screen where it could not be seen. That doomed the Amiga as games  machine in the US, where it would be competing with Sega who had the  advantage of their Japanese catalog being developed for the NTSC  standard (of course that also gave C= an advantage over Sega in the UK).
It  seemed to me that it was mostly the people working on 3D and video  software that wanted the Amiga to incorporate MMUs and FPUs, presumably  so they could justify their developing for those co-processors. The US and  European branches should have worked on tech jointly and marketing  separately.  To an extent, they did just this.  But IMHO, the CD32 was  simply not an appropriate design for NTSC markets.

[spaceman88]

I tend to think of the CPU boards (Phase5) that originated in Germany  before those that came from the UK (though I had a VXL-30 in my 2k, not  sure where that was from). I recall the BoXer was from the UK, but Escom  was German and wasn't Quikpak based in the US?
I tend to associate  the UK with the bulk of the games and for having great printed  magazines, but I don't associate the UK with any one major application...  Germany, especially Haage and Partner and proDad seemed the most eager  to see the Amiga become a serious business machine.
Honestly, Commodore were  blind to just how big of an issue the NTSC/PAL differences would be. US  users would love to have enjoyed the games played in the UK, but many of  them either didn't run at all or put important stuff at the bottom of the  screen where it could not be seen. That doomed the Amiga as games  machine in the US, where it would be competing with Sega who had the  advantage of their Japanese catalog being developed for the NTSC  standard (of course that also gave C= an advantage over Sega in the UK).
It  seemed to me that it was mostly the people working on 3D and video  software that wanted the Amiga to incorporate MMUs and FPUs, presumably  so they could justify their developing for those co-processors. The US and  European branches should have worked on tech jointly and marketing  separately.  To an extent, they did just this.  But IMHO, the CD32 was  simply not an appropriate design for NTSC markets.

The NTSC/PAL thing was a pain in the butt, however, the later A500's and all A1200's could be booted into PAL mode and on the 1084 nothing was cut off the bottom. In my "group of gamers" 5 of us had PAL capable A500's and one didn't until I upgraded it. Also there were quite a few European games that were available in NTSC format in the late 80's, although if you  try to download a copy now it will probably be the PAL version. Seems most of the cracked versions were from Europe.

[Britelite]

Demosceners was the future, now they are the cryin past! If they dont want to move along its up to them.

The demoscene did move along, to the PC

[Britelite]

Britelite has repeatedly given his reservations with the direction of the Apollo Core, but he isnt rejecting it in a pissed manner. His main concern is the possibility that a coder (demoscene or otherwise) develop keeping the legacy timings as the foundation, but the new features MIGHT have unforseen consequences.

Indeed, if stuff works on the Apollo then everything is fine. But if it doesn't, then it's the Apollo Core that needs to be fixed, not the software.

And regarding the additional features, like AMMX/SuperAGA/whatever, I understand that from the Apollo-people's perspective they might be fun to implement. But trying to hype up the Vampire with these features might be a bit misleading to the consumers, as those are features that most likely will not see much support on the software side (other than in the form of datatypes, libraries and possible cgx/p96/ahi drivers).

But then again, it's the Apollo-teams choice and they're free to do what they please with their own product, I can always vote with my wallet and just not buy said product.

[Niding]

@Britelite

Skip has been posting alot of demos on his Vimeo channel. Not sure if you can be bothered to watch any of them, but linking his page all the same if you are intrested in seeing how the Vampire executes the demos;

https://vimeo.com/user1803902

With regards to the AMMX and other stuff; even if thats included, does that matter to YOU as long as it doesnt affect your own productions?

[Britelite]

With regards to the AMMX and other stuff; even if thats included, does that matter to YOU as long as it doesnt affect your own productions?

Nope, I couldn't care less for these features. I'm maybe more annoyed by people complaining about (demo)coders not wanting to make use of them

EDIT: Pretty much the same reason why I'm not really into the PPC-side of things either

[Niding]

Nope, I couldn't care less for these features. I'm maybe more annoyed by people complaining about (demo)coders not wanting to make use of them

Hehe, that reminds me about your comments on ADA Unterground towards people posting the Revision 201x threads, pushing your coders to make entertaining productions, while doing nothing themselves.

That aside; you shouldnt really attribute to the Apollo/Vampire project what some daydreamers say or think. Its not Gunnars fault that some expect you or others to press ESC and suddenly a full megademo magically appears.

Im not going to pretend Im not enjoying watching demos, even tho Im not part of that scene. And if Im not mistaken, Im not really the intended audience of demos, atleast judging by the comments by some in the documentary "The Art Of The Algorithms".

Digital art is art, and I enjoy it even tho I dont "paint"

[Britelite]

That aside; you shouldnt really attribute to the Apollo/Vampire project what some daydreamers say or think. Its not Gunnars fault that some expect you or others to press ESC and suddenly a full megademo magically appears.

Well, let's just say that Gunnar is definitely not making attracting developers to the Vampire/Apollo any easier either

[Niding]

Well, let's just say that Gunnar is definitely not making attracting developers to the Vampire/Apollo any easier either

Well, some people speak machinecode better than human, so I cant really comment on that

[Niding]

... But when I think about it;

You dont like to be told to code a demo, or what platform you use. And you have said that it takes away some of your intrest/joy of coding.

Maybe a similar reactionpattern can be attributed to a team like Apollo, that has spent xx hours producing this product, only to have xyz people tell them its not good enough etc.

Not saying thats you, just saying that a short temper comes easier if you feel a sense of pride in your work.

I know I can get testy in similar situations.

[Britelite]

You dont like to be told to code a demo, or what platform you use. And you have said that it takes away some of your intrest/joy of coding.

Indeed, it's something I do as a hobby.

Maybe a similar reactionpattern can be attributed to a team like Apollo, that has spent xx hours producing this product, only to have xyz people tell them its not good enough etc.

Sure, but as far as I can tell the Apollo Core is something they at least at some point want to make money on, in which case they might actually want to listen more closely to the people they want to attract to be able to make profit.

[Niding]

I guess I havent paid close enough attention, or the discussions have gone on thru other channels/meets;

But ignore the fact that I probably doesnt know enough about 680x0 hardware and assembly coding to understand your explainations;

What are the limitations or design directions you would want Apollo to embrace?

I get the whole "I want to code for Apollo like I code for my legacy hardware, and get the same/expected output",  but beyond that, I have a hard time to pinpoint your "requirements".

Again, you do it as a hobby, so you are not required to "explain yourself", but Im merely curious.
I enjoy the Vampire from a end user point of view. I dont develop on any platform, and computers are merely tools for me. 90% of my time is spent in office products or video rendering, while the remainder is used enjoying digital art OR just using it as a information channel.
So Im not exposed to effects of the design decisions like a developer would be.

[Britelite]

What are the limitations or design directions you would want Apollo to embrace?

Let's put it this way, I was very interested in the Vampire in the beginning when it was presented just as a speedy accelerator without any additional bells and whistles. When more and more (in my opinion unnecessary) features got added I quickly lost interest. Mainly because it seems like the aim is to achieve a vendor lock-in, hoping that developers would jump on the Apollo-bandwagon and abandon Amiga, making way for their own platform.

But as to your question, if there was a mode available that disables ALL additional stuff and mimics the 060 at 50 or 66MHz as close as possible, I would be very interested. The thing is, if I make something aimed at the 060, it runs on all 040/060 cards, UAE and hopefully Apollo Core. If I use ANY of the Apollo-features my software ONLY works on the Apollo, which for me is not good. And I know quite a few other coders feel the same way.

Maybe a 060-only mode will be available some day, who knows. But until then it's just not for me.

EDIT: And considering the core itself is still a moving platform, I wouldn't dare make any low level code on it yet and risk it not working on some later revision.

[Niding]

Thanks for your reply!

Again, as a enduser, I actually enjoy the "bells and whistles", but we obviously have different uses for hardware, and the perspective decides how we view it.

Thanks for all the beautiful demos you have developed over the years