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Apollo Team Announces the Vampire V4page  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 

Michal Warzecha

Posts 209
06 Aug 2017 20:57


Probably it's new Vampire fast clock port. Gunnar mention many times Vampires has this port. I think this time it has 3 of them.
Many ppl are sad there is no any old Amiga ports on the standalone board. I think floppy is  most important. Can one of this port be used  to connect Amiga floppy drive? Of course with some interface.


M Rickan

Posts 177
06 Aug 2017 22:36


Michal Warzecha wrote:

Many ppl are sad there is no any old Amiga ports on the standalone board. I think floppy is  most important.

If people are concerned about floppy support then they should start doing transfers.

Why add to design complexity and cost for something that hasn't been commonly used since Moses was in diapers?


David Wright

Posts 373
06 Aug 2017 23:02


I just used mine extensively the other day.
Who is this Moses you speak of?


Steve Ferrell

Posts 424
06 Aug 2017 23:10


David Wright wrote:

I just used mine extensively the other day.
  Who is this Moses you speak of?

The one found floating amongst the reeds in the Nile.



Gunnar von Boehn
(Apollo Team Member)
Posts 6207
07 Aug 2017 07:30


Thierry Atheist wrote:

There is no MHz speed of FPGAs on that page so it is not possible to see how much faster a 5CEA7 or 5CEA9 might be.

They are not faster.


Crow Mohikan

Posts 78
07 Aug 2017 08:46


Gunnar von Boehn wrote:

Thierry Atheist wrote:

  There is no MHz speed of FPGAs on that page so it is not possible to see how much faster a 5CEA7 or 5CEA9 might be.
 

 
  They are not faster.

When will layout start for V3000/4000? Any plan?



Michal Warzecha

Posts 209
07 Aug 2017 09:29


m rickan wrote:

 
  If people are concerned about floppy support then they should start doing transfers.
 
  Why add to design complexity and cost for something that hasn't been commonly used since Moses was in diapers?

Of course floppy is old stuff and not so useful today, but it gives classic feeling. I have some floppies I still want to use. People who chose v4 for existing Amigas have no problem, but if someone wave no any real commodore hw and he buy standalone version? I can understand team cannot focus on floppy drive or connectors in back of Amiga case, but it could be great if I can order standalone, new Amiga case, floppy drive, keyboard and build my own fully vampirised classic look Amiga v1200 😁


Vojin Vidanovic

Posts 770
07 Aug 2017 09:30


Steve Ferrell wrote:

 
David Wright wrote:

    I just used mine extensively the other day.
    Who is this Moses you speak of?
   

    The one found floating amongst the reeds in the Nile.
   

 
  The one that has recieveth Jah laws.
 
  We do need another Moses :-)
 
  http://www.allmusic.com/album/tell-it-from-the-heart-mw0000692785#no-js Track 4
 
  On the subject of floppy, its today more hardware based document protection then anything else. I have Catweasel and floppy on x1000 and boy that up to 30k/s speed brings us back to almost Commodore 64 days >:-)
 
  I believe SATA even as expansion, for standalone, would be a lot of beneficial.
 
  Not only drives, medias are hard to find, and even if its 1.6 MB Amiga HD format, its too little space even for documents without pics. Since I ve got HDD I ve got all floppie based installations as ADF/DMS.
 


Nick Fellows

Posts 176
07 Aug 2017 12:33


"I think floppy is  most important."

Disagree, keyboard ribbon connector would make it easier to install standalone in an existing / Kickstarter a1200 case.

Its true that this can be achieved via USB & Jens Keyrah, but its an extra cost outlay that uses up a USB port.



Sean Sk

Posts 488
07 Aug 2017 15:01


nick fellows wrote:

  Its true that this can be achieved via USB & Jens Keyrah, but its an extra cost outlay that uses up a USB port.
 

 
  Plus some design choices that really don't make sense. The USB port and the switch at the back make it impractical for use with an Amiga 1200 case, new or old, since it would interfere with neighbouring external floppy port. And I'm not the sort of person that likes to cut up a case to make a Keyrah fit either.
 
  What would be nice if a hardware designer manufactured a complete IO panel that would fit along the back of an A1200 case which included an parallel port, serial port, external floppy port, mouse and joystick ports, an DIGITAL-VIDEO port perhaps where the RF video port would have normally gone. It could then plug straight into standalone Vampire board. Obviously the areas of the case for left and right audio RCA, composite video output and RGB output wouldnt be used or filled but thats no big deal. It will still be tidy without the need to butcher anything.


Vojin Vidanovic

Posts 770
07 Aug 2017 15:21


sean sk wrote:

      What would be nice if a hardware designer manufactured a complete IO panel that would fit along the back of an A1200 case which included an parallel port, serial port, external floppy port, mouse and joystick ports, an DIGITAL-VIDEO port perhaps where the RF video port would have normally gone. It could then plug straight into standalone Vampire board. Obviously the areas of the case for left and right audio RCA, composite video output and RGB output wouldnt be used or filled but thats no big deal. It will still be tidy without the need to butcher anything.
   

Is this about V4 cards fot Classics?
   
    Even on standalone front, some strange board choices makes the new market of back panels, and dont forget the cases, to make the system complete. As well as some IDE HDDs and CD-RW/DVD-RWs,DB9 jopysticks and mouses, fast SD Cards and who knows maybe even some Classic software :-)
   
  Something similar what vendors like Amedia already do.
  EXTERNAL LINK 
    Mind that standalone was never ment to fit Classic cases. My strangeness is there arent many standard cases that would fit either.


Thierry Atheist

Posts 644
07 Aug 2017 17:30


Gunnar von Boehn wrote:
Thierry Atheist wrote:
There is no MHz speed of FPGAs on that page so it is not possible to see how much faster a 5CEA7 or 5CEA9 might be.

They are not faster.

Hi Gunnar,

Thanks for that answer. It's always great hearing from you.

Then, the right choice of FPGA was made in this case.

The hardware "as is" has yet to be fully exploited with all of the enhanced CPU functions.

I'll be getting the current Cyclone 5 standalone when it becomes available.

And you still will have an Arria 10 customer too!!!


Nadyr Nick

Posts 54
07 Aug 2017 19:02


Hola Gunnar, sorry few questions:

Gunnar von Boehn wrote:

  - The Vampire4 is a system this will come out for many AMIGA models.
  (standalone, A500, A2000, A1200, CD32, A3000/4000)

- I'm interested to buy two Vampire4 for two A4000. Will be available this model of Vampire in Q4’17 or later ? and Could I'll buy them in AmigaStore in Spain ?.

- about Digital Video Output DIGITAL-VIDEO 720p in Vampire4: Will It be better to buy a TV LED 720p resolution 1366x768 or a TV LED FHD 1920x1080 or a monitor LCD with DIGITAL-VIDEO IN (These monitors have resolution 2560x1440 or 1920x1080) ?.
I'm intrested to use the Vampire4 with apps in Workbench 3.x Picasso96 and also play games AGA/ECS PAL (and Picasso96).

thanks for your support


M Rickan

Posts 177
07 Aug 2017 20:38


Michal Warzecha wrote:

I can understand team cannot focus on floppy drive or connectors in back of Amiga case, but it could be great if I can order standalone, new Amiga case, floppy drive, keyboard and build my own fully vampirised classic look Amiga v1200 😁

Which is a third party opportunity.

The Vampire should spawn an aftermarket.


Mallagan Bellator

Posts 393
09 Aug 2017 13:29


Will the A1200 version of V4 be connected in the "channel Z" expansion slot?
Will it be compatible with mediator pci bus boards from Elbox?
What are the dimensions of the board? Would need to know, so I will know if it will fit inside my tower.
Will it have full connection to the A1200 motherboard? And also, isn't all amiga models sort of bottle necks for the FPGA? I'm thinking the standalone would be able to operate alot better than one connected to a real Amiga, but I'm not sure how fast/slow the chips inside the Amiga really are. I'm thinking it would operate better and faster on A1200 than on A500/A600, and even faster in A4000/A3000


Gunnar von Boehn
(Apollo Team Member)
Posts 6207
09 Aug 2017 13:39


Mallagan Bellator wrote:

  I'm thinking it would operate better and faster on A1200 than on A500/A600, and even faster in A4000/A3000
 

 
The Vampire has on all model the same speed.
The Vampire Chipmem of SAGA is ~ 100 times faster than AMIGA 4000 chipmem.
So it does not matter how slow your old AMIGA chipmem was - or how little it was. If you add the Vampire4 you will have 100 times faster chipmem and an "infinite" amount of this too.


Mallagan Bellator

Posts 393
09 Aug 2017 13:54


Gunnar von Boehn wrote:

Mallagan Bellator wrote:

  I'm thinking it would operate better and faster on A1200 than on A500/A600, and even faster in A4000/A3000
 

 
  The Vampire has on all model the same speed.
  The Vampire Chipmem of SAGA is ~ 100 times faster than AMIGA 4000 chipmem.
  So it does not matter how slow your old AMIGA chipmem was - or how little it was. If you add the Vampire4 you will have 100 times faster chipmem and an "infinite" amount of this too.

So in other words, the bus speed of the motherboard has no influense what so ever?



Andy Hearn

Posts 374
11 Aug 2017 10:39


that's absolutely right.
  from what I can figure, with the GOLD3 core, your amiga mainboard basicly becomes a glorified I/O board hosting your pcmcia, floppy, IDE, parallel, serial, mouse, joystick and keyboard.
  ALL graphics operations/screenmodes that run over DIGITAL-VIDEO weather they are classic OCS/ECS/AGA or RTG, are done by the Apollo SAGA core on the FPGA. hence chip ram gets allocated out of the 128Mb stack on the vampire.
  with the Vamp4 this gets quicker, and you have more ram to play with.
  But if you want to run your screens off the original ports or via  indivision, my understanding is that you are going back to using the chipram on your amiga's board. but how easy it is switching between the two is, I honestly don't know.
 


Patryk Drag

Posts 2
11 Aug 2017 18:38


when the version Vampire v4 will be for Amiga 1200???


Eric Gus

Posts 477
12 Aug 2017 02:30


Andy Hearn wrote:

that's absolutely right.
    from what I can figure, with the GOLD3 core, your amiga mainboard basicly becomes a glorified I/O board hosting your pcmcia, floppy, IDE, parallel, serial, mouse, joystick and keyboard.
    ALL graphics operations/screenmodes that run over DIGITAL-VIDEO weather they are classic OCS/ECS/AGA or RTG, are done by the Apollo SAGA core on the FPGA. hence chip ram gets allocated out of the 128Mb stack on the vampire.
  with the Vamp4 this gets quicker, and you have more ram to play with.
  But if you want to run your screens off the original ports or via  indivision, my understanding is that you are going back to using the chipram on your amiga's board. but how easy it is switching between the two is, I honestly don't know.
 

Thats how I understand it and I believe that is correct..

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