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Information about the Apollo CPU and FPU.

"Virtual Legacy Graphics Mode" Possible ?page  1 2 

John William

Posts 563
28 Mar 2019 18:54


Aron Bott wrote:

Gunnar von Boehn wrote:

 
Aron Bott wrote:

    with legacy screen modes displayed via DIGITAL-VIDEO,
   

  Have you seen Amiga OCS/AGA games on Vampire on Digital-Out?
  I think these games look really good.
   
  SAGA can mimick for these legacy modes the original look and feel of the analog/CRT display.
  This means old games look really very much like they looked originally on the A1000 + 1084 Monitor.
 

 
  I did have to check out one of the videos online, it looks fantastic!  :)
 
  However I just hope/want to do something like this, except Amiga: EXTERNAL LINK 
  Emulation software usually has such a solution, but it seems those who want to use our real hardware with wide screen setups are forced to stretch the image or leave black bars on their TV.  :/
 
  I'd love a solution for all old signals thrown on modern TVs such as an hdmi-genlock, or a smart TV with a "4:3 Overlay Mode"....
 

Grreeeat.....now you are making crave to buy a gameboy nintendo.....thaaanks aron bott :P


OneSTone O2o

Posts 159
29 Mar 2019 10:12


Grzegorz Wójcik (pisklak wrote:

Gunnar von Boehn wrote:

    The old DSP executables can not be executed by AMMX,
    but the general problems which can be solved by AMMX and by the DSP are the same.
   
    AMMX is performance wise much above the DSP.
    As a rough idea of speed, the DSP was designed for 16M 32bit operations per second. AMMX is designed for 80-100M 64bit operations per second. Its about 10 times faster.
   

   
    Well if I understand correctly this Gunnar words that should be enough power in AMMX to do that.

But then no woer left or other processes. Imagine, let's take the following comparison:

ATARI Falcon 030, original speed, runs ANIPLAYER, plays 128 kBit MP3
CPU usage: 95%. DSP usage: 100%
ATARI Falcon 030 with ct60, 68060 at 95 Mhz, DSP on original speed (32 Mhz), runs ANIPLAYER, plays 128 kBit MP3
CPU-Usage: 10%, DSP usage 100%

The second example stiull can do something in MiNT. I know, 68080 is even faster than 68060, but DSP emulation would take a lot of load from there. I think it would be sensefull to try to find that guy who already wrote VHDL code vor DSP for Suska project (giving up as at that time FPGA size and speed was not enigh), tryingv to get that code, or ask him for support, if your own ressources are too small for implementation.

I think also Amiga can profit from DSP (and PMMU *scnr*), as far as I know there were a few 3rd party extensions bringing that DSP to Amiga platform, but never popular as it was at end of official live of Amiga (Commodore / Escom closure). I expect that there might be even bigger support in Amiga community as it's bigger than Atari community, a lot of skilled peoples.)


OneSTone O2o

Posts 159
29 Mar 2019 10:36


Gunnar von Boehn wrote:

Aron Bott wrote:

  with legacy screen modes displayed via DIGITAL-VIDEO,
 

 
  Have you seen Amiga OCS/AGA games on Vampire on Digital-Out?
  I think these games look really good.
 
  SAGA can mimick for these legacy modes the original look and feel of the analog/CRT display.
  This means old games look really very much like they looked originally on the A1000 + 1084 Monitor.
 
 
 
 

Yes. That's then in fullscreen, very big. Amiga is multitasking computer, also other software running. But with fullscreen software there is a problem. You can't see what other software is doing in the meantime.

For Atari side I can tell, that unfortunatelly there are two problems:

1. Atari can not change resolution without restarting major parts of the OS (restart, AES, VDI, Dekstop) for example for ST-Low to ST-Medium. It also does not support display different screens one behind the others (I think you call that copper modes?) Changing from these color resolutions to monochrome even requires reset. If such orginal graphics modes could be redirected to an (overlay) window inside SAGA highres, there should be ways to go arround. On Falcon we have a lot of software which can change the resolution (Games, Demos), but all of that bypasses the OS, the program has to manage by itself. If software can not change resolution by itself on request (machines older than Falcon) or because of stupid programmers, that requests to user to change resolution -> reboot or restart desktop required.
2. On Atari side there is a lot of dirty software, specially old one, from time before TT released, even for serious applications, bypassing operating system to display stuff. As the Atari can not switch resolution automatically, see above, they would be allmost unusable on such machine as you have to boot it in the required low resolution before. This is not the case with more modern application using GEM properly, but old applications will not cooperate. Redirecting them in window of correct resolution could be a solution.
And to be honest, using a 320x200 game, or 640x200 software, or 640x400 application on a large DIGITAL-VIDEO connected screen in fullscreen is not looking nice. Redirecting it into "Picture in Picture" is the solution. Imagine, using your favourite old fullscreen OCS/ECS Demo/Game in a Window, besides modern application. Playing Settlers besides surfing the web. Watching famous Red Sector Demo while writing a letter.
Emulation on Vampire (STonAmiga, STonST, AmigaonAmiga, AmigaonST) could be a solution, but emulation needs a lot of power if it should be accurate, and emulating a machine on a machine which basically is still compatible to the old machine does not sound attractive.


Ingo Uhlemann

Posts 35
29 Mar 2019 10:53


1st1, that what you want does exisit already and is called MiST! The Vampire will never be downward compatible like an ST ... for what ?
Its a NEW GEM based Box like Firebee, the DSP isnt necessary anymore, the Apollo Core can do it much faster then DSP and 060 together. You have to change your point of view to that all. Of course what we need is coders wo would port or manage to get thinks working on the Vampire. Next big Step is of Course the Sound think!



Ian Parsons

Posts 230
29 Mar 2019 16:04


I always find it kind of odd when emulation is suggested as an alternative to implementation on an FPGA system. I don't know what the architecture of the Falcon interfacing with the DSP is or if the V4 standalone CPU bus interface is active but could a "DSP" add-on (either emulation or hardware) be possible? It may be nice to have an option of secondary processor like a Raspberry Pi Zero or Sipeed MAIX-I module.

I imagine priority should go to the Yamaha sound chip rather than the DSP if there is any intention to implement either.


Steve Ferrell

Posts 424
29 Mar 2019 17:51


Ingo Uhlemann wrote:

  1st1, that what you want does exisit already and is called MiST! The Vampire will never be downward compatible like an ST ... for what ?
  Its a NEW GEM based Box like Firebee, the DSP isnt necessary anymore, the Apollo Core can do it much faster then DSP and 060 together. You have to change your point of view to that all. Of course what we need is coders wo would port or manage to get thinks working on the Vampire. Next big Step is of Course the Sound think!
 
 

 
Yes, CPUs with SIMD capabilities have made digital signal processors obsolete.  That's why you no longer see DSPs in modern computer architectures.  The 68080 with its SIMD/AMMX capabilities should be able to easily outperform a DSP from the Atari era.  In this instance I think someone from the Atari community should step up to the plate and develop a software based DSP for those die hard Atari fans who insist on having a DSP.  The Vampire's FPU co-processor was initially software based, so there's no reason why a DSP can't be created in software as well.  But as I said earlier, the Atari community should step up and produce one.  They would certainly be better suited to such a task since DSPs never caught on in the Amiga scene.
 


Gunnar von Boehn
(Apollo Team Member)
Posts 6207
30 Mar 2019 06:23


Ian Parsons wrote:

I don't know what the architecture of the Falcon interfacing with the DSP is or if the V4 standalone CPU bus interface is active but could a "DSP" add-on (either emulation or hardware) be possible?

 
The AMMX SIMD instruction set is designed to solve the same problems that for which Motorola did develop the DSP.
But AMMX can cover more areas than the DSP and can solve more problems than the DSP could.
 
The new AMMX SIMD instruction is an evolution over the old DSP,
the AMMX is more advanced and _much_ more powerful.
 
Lets try to make a small example:
 
The DSP could do like 16 Million saturated Byte Operations per second.
The VAMP V2 can do 680 Million saturated Byte operations per second.

As you see from a performance point of view the DSP is obsolete now.
If you want to speed up the VAMP adding a DSP is not the right choice, improving AMMX would make a lot more sense.

If you want to run legacy software, then I see the point.
The question that I have is how many key applications on ATARI require the DSP?
On AMIGA nearly every of the thousands of games, bangs the AMIGA HW.
This means without AMIGA COPPER, thousands of games would not run.
On ATARI I think the same is for the GFX and the YAMAHA.
Without them many old games will not run.

Maybe we can quantize this topic.
Maybe someone can help here and tell us how many ATARI games need the YAMAHA (all?)
And how many applications need the DSP.

As time is always limited, numbers can help us to prioritize.




OneSTone O2o

Posts 159
30 Mar 2019 20:32


All games need Yamaha sound as this is the only sound for most machines, and it even is there in STE, TT, Falcon. STE DMA sound also should be easy to implement as it is just a kind of DMA capable D/A, and available also in TT and Falcon.
   
    DSP is "Falcon only", but a lot of Falcon specialized software uses DSP, most important desktop application is Aniplayer, which plays MP3 music and some sorts of video files (example: AVI). As far as I am informed, there is no alternative to Aniplayer. Other DSP related software on Falcon are some music editing software, games and impressive demos. As Falcon is rare, expensive, Vampire Standalone could be an alternative (even outperforms ct60), if it could be made compatile. "Falcon 080" sounds nice...! With full Falcon compatibility you could attact a lot of peoples.


Gunnar von Boehn
(Apollo Team Member)
Posts 6207
31 Mar 2019 13:22


oneSTone o2o wrote:

most important desktop application is Aniplayer, which plays MP3 music and some sorts of video files (example: AVI).

I see, but on the other hand AMMX is much much faster than the DSP.
This means a video player using AMMX will be able to play much higher quality videos.


Ingo Uhlemann

Posts 35
31 Mar 2019 14:42


1st1 you havent seen my Video ? Then you had seen that i was running aniplayer! And there is also m_player what is working better in TT but not tried on Vampire.


Vojin Vidanovic
(Needs Verification)
Posts 1916/ 1
03 Apr 2019 10:46


Gunnar von Boehn wrote:

  Maybe we can quantize this topic.
  Maybe someone can help here and tell us how many ATARI games need the YAMAHA (all?)
  And how many applications need the DSP.
  As time is always limited, numbers can help us to prioritize.
 

 
  Its very simple: While Yamaha is needed for all ST era games, their Amiga counterparts are mostly better. However, Yamaha is needed for all Atari music software, too. And Vamp needs MIDI!
 
  With DSP support you get few titles that do support Falcon (and Falcon Atari salt of users) and prize gem, Cubase Audio Falcon
  http://atarimusic.exxoshost.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=133:cubase-audio-falcon-206-and-studio-module-107a&catid=78:falcon-music-software&Itemid=343
  and few more MIDI related titles
  http://atarimusic.exxoshost.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=251:softjee-audio-software-for-the-atari-falcon&catid=47:falcon-music-audio&Itemid=205
 
  On sidenotes, Hatari was ported to OS4 and AROS and included Falcon/DSP emulation. If just DSP and Yamaha emulation could be "virtualized" as software layer, or best in FPGA.
 
  It would be interesting to see AMMX used for this.
  Somewhat is less likely that after Vamp launch, Atarists would
  write m68k Atari AMMX apps. Its best to leave them tech.
 
  Note that full Falcon emulation requires 2Ghz CPU!
 
 
  Hatari GitHub
  EXTERNAL LINK  Sources
  EXTERNAL LINK 


Xyla DuVal

Posts 1
04 Apr 2019 08:50


Vojin Vidanovic wrote:

  Its very simple: While Yamaha is needed for all ST era games, their Amiga counterparts are mostly better. However, Yamaha is needed for all Atari music software, too. And Vamp needs MIDI!

Hi, I'm new to the Vampire forum but I thought I'd chime in.  Forgive me if I misunderstand what you're saying, but... as far as I know the Yamaha chip is not needed by any Atari MIDI music software other than YM chiptune trackers and similar programs that actually generate internal sound.  The ST uses an ACIA 6850 for its MIDI interface, not the YM2149.

That said, I'm anxiously awaiting the Vampire V4 and I hope all the necessary Atari ST and Falcon hardware can eventually be added to the FPGA.  While many of the Amiga versions of games might be considered "better" than the ST versions by some, they very much have their own appeal and charm, and Atari fans such as myself are going to want to play the ST versions.

There have been multiple implementations of the YM2149 (and even more implementations of the AY-3-8910 on which it is based) in many FPGA cores... I would think it would not be super difficult to add one to the Vampire.


Vojin Vidanovic
(Needs Verification)
Posts 1916/ 1
04 Apr 2019 08:57


Xyla DuVal wrote:

  Hi, I'm new to the Vampire forum but I thought I'd chime in.  Forgive me if I misunderstand what you're saying, but... as far as I know the Yamaha chip is not needed by any Atari MIDI music software other than YM chiptune trackers and similar programs that actually generate internal sound.  The ST uses an ACIA 6850 for its MIDI interface, not the YM2149.
 

 
  You might be more right(er) then me. Then we need MIDI first. My understanding was a common one, not a Atari insider one.
 

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