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Documentation about the Vampire hardware

Vampire V2 A600page  1 2 3 4 

Ole Eitels

Posts 21
04 Jan 2016 22:39


Like Daniel Sevo, I'm also very curious about the design of the v1200.

I assume it is obvious to utilize the trapdoor and edge connector for the accelerator - and place the DIGITAL-VIDEO output connector in the rear opening?

EXTERNAL LINK


Wawa T

Posts 695
04 Jan 2016 22:45


  - and place the DIGITAL-VIDEO output connector in the rear opening?

along an usb3, network and external sata?


Ian Parsons

Posts 230
04 Jan 2016 23:26


It makes sense to keep this series of accelerators as close to each other as possible. If it was just a case of switching out the memory chips for ones of larger capacity then it might be worth doing but I think those are the largest available from the manufacturer in that package.


Michal Warzecha

Posts 209
05 Jan 2016 10:06


Daniel Sevo wrote:

  I hear ya, but here's why.
  *There are Blizzard PPC out there with 256 MB RAM, ppl don't like to "downgrade" from what they are used to.

And for what You want to use 256 MB of RAM? How many ppl still have working Blizzard (with 256MB) and how many still waiting for any working Blizzard on the market?

Think clear, this is faster and NEW, great piece of hardware for A1200, I have one A1200 with Blizzard PPC, and I want Vampire 1200 even with 128 MB, I don't care about RAM above 128MB, because I can't use it.


Thierry Atheist

Posts 644
05 Jan 2016 10:21


Hi Michal,

Q. Why?

I need the FASTER FPGA and 2 Gigabytes of RAM. However, I am willing to buy this as a stopgap measure.

A. To utterly humiliate iMuc-osX and windos users.

That's been my goal for my whole life.


Michal Warzecha

Posts 209
05 Jan 2016 14:00


So, Why not 32GB of RAM and OCTA fastest FPGA cores on one board? Why not?
It was serious question.


Daniel Sevo

Posts 299
05 Jan 2016 16:40


Michal Warzecha wrote:

 
Daniel Sevo wrote:

   
      I hear ya, but here's why.
      *There are Blizzard PPC out there with 256 MB RAM, ppl don't like to "downgrade" from what they are used to.
   
   

   
    And for what You want to use 256 MB of RAM? How many ppl still have working Blizzard (with 256MB) and how many still waiting for any working Blizzard on the market?
   
    Think clear, this is faster and NEW, great piece of hardware for A1200, I have one A1200 with Blizzard PPC, and I want Vampire 1200 even with 128 MB, I don't care about RAM above 128MB, because I can't use it.
 

 
  Granted, very little old software will use more that 128MB that much is true, but the 256MB is for luring in devs, because with this new platform that is essentially 100-150 Mhz 060 performance, it opeens up new possibilities such as ports of new browsers (or the cool ports NovaCoder was doing of Scumm VM, Odamex etc..) etc. Modern apps are all memory starved and while I don't like bloatware, it would probably make life easier for devs. So unless there was a lot more work involved and significant increase in component cost, then to me it made sense to use the extra space allowed by the 1200 trapdoor. I also assumed going from piggy-back to A1200 connector would require quite a lot of re-design, but maybe I'm wrong. -And I do understand that some want to keep this platform conistent so any software for A600 vampire will work on othe Vampires of same generation. It's a fair point.


Thierry Atheist

Posts 644
05 Jan 2016 21:06


Hi Michal W.,

If you want to continue debating, please ask me over here;
EXTERNAL LINK


Nixus Minimax

Posts 416
06 Jan 2016 14:48


How much RAM had typical x86 PCs when their processors were between 100 and 300 MHz? Probably not more than 128MB. That's the software we could also port to apollo.



Matthew Sparby

Posts 4
06 Jan 2016 17:01


100MHz x86 didn't appear until 1994 with the 486DX4-100.  At that time, 4MB to 8MB would have been the common standard.  16MB would be a power-system.

By the time we moved beyond 300MHz with the Pentium II in 1998, typical configurations were 16MB to 32MB.

128MB configurations weren't common for normal users until 2001 on systems with processors in the 500MHz+ range.


Daniel Sevo

Posts 299
06 Jan 2016 17:28


Matthew Sparby wrote:

100MHz x86 didn't appear until 1994 with the 486DX4-100.  At that time, 4MB to 8MB would have been the common standard.  16MB would be a power-system.
 
  By the time we moved beyond 300MHz with the Pentium II in 1998, typical configurations were 16MB to 32MB.
 
  128MB configurations weren't common for normal users until 2001 on systems with processors in the 500MHz+ range.

First of all - I'm sorry, but this discussion is in no way relevant - Vampire 2 is a new product that exists in 2016. If someone would try to port webkit or something to 68k it would we of absolutely no consolation whatever memory configs might have been common in certain parts of the world in 1998. Also, I said I udnerstand the reasoning of keeping the current generation V2 consistent as a unified "platform".

And just for the record. My Amiga had 80MB RAM in 1998 (64+16 on a Blizzard 060) and my work-PC was a 400MHz PII with 256MB RAM and a Permedia Open GL 3d accelerator.



Szyk Cech

Posts 191
06 Jan 2016 17:34


Matthew Sparby wrote:

  128MB configurations weren't common for normal users until 2001 on systems with processors in the 500MHz+ range.

That is not true. In July 2001 I bought AMD Athlon 1200MHz with 512MB RAM and that was not top configuration of that time (it was possible to buy Athlon 1400MHz). RAM prices was shrinking substantially of that time so I hesitate to buy 1GB for affordable price (but I don't because I think I don't use it, but Windows can as time shows)


Matthew Sparby

Posts 4
06 Jan 2016 19:15


Szyk Cech wrote:

That is not true. In July 2001 I bought AMD Athlon 1200MHz with 512MB RAM and that was not top configuration of that time (it was possible to buy Athlon 1400MHz). RAM prices was shrinking substantially of that time so I hesitate to buy 1GB for affordable price (but I don't because I think I don't use it, but Windows can as time shows)

Sorry, I may have worded that poorly.  I was reporting within the 100-300MHz constraint.  Obviously PCs exceeded 300MHz well before 2001 and they exceeded 128MB RAM before then as well.  I was only saying that the last systems with CPUs clocked at 300MHz or less were typically sold with 32MB or less.  That class of system pretty much died out by the end of 2000.  By 2001, typical systems had at least a 500MHz CPU and configurations with at least 128MB of RAM became common.

Daniel Sevo has a point, though.  The common configurations from the 1990s are not directly relevant to the Vampire discussion. I decided to respond to the question that Nixus Minimax asked because I happened to know the answer.

Everyone has their own goals and I understand the endless desire to push for bigger-better-faster-more.  Personally, the currently-planned specs will already go far beyond what is required for my goals.

That said, think about the people involved here.  They have designed something remarkable.  A lot of passion went into it over the last few years.  Soon, they will be sharing the fruits of their labor with everyone.  Then they will have to shift their efforts to correcting bugs and adapting the hardware to additional target platforms (A500/A2000/A1200).

That's all supposed to happen in the very near future.

But then what?  I can't imagine they will wash their hands and walk away at that point.  This kind of hacking is chronic.  I will be stunned if each team member doesn't eagerly start looking at the next iteration.  They will look at the success of the Vampire 2 and inevitably think, "Okay, now what can we do for Vampire 3?"

Then we get to watch the magic all over again as new features and improvements take shape.  For now, there's an old adage that is appropriate here... "shipping is a feature."


Gunnar von Boehn
(Apollo Team Member)
Posts 6207
07 Jan 2016 00:03


I agree with Nixus,
 
The amount of memory needs to match the CPU speed.
If you have a CPU with 200 Mips,
then you want to run applications matching this.
 
Look for sensible goals:
Play ScumVm games,
Play Mac games,
Play MP3,
Play some MPEG VCD videos
Emulate NEU-GEO games
...

Looking forward to port stuff which was designed
for 1 Gig of main memory and requires 3 Gigaherz CPU Speed - is just not sensible.



Wawa T

Posts 695
07 Jan 2016 11:11


gunnar, i principally agree, but 256mb or a bit beyond if doable might still be sensible. however it remains to be seen, so no demands shold be made at this point. lets the people accomodate vampire600 and see what develops out of that. it might happen that the availanility of faster hardware actually triggers the availability of more demanding software ;)


Thierry Atheist

Posts 644
07 Jan 2016 11:31


Gunnar von Boehn wrote:
Looking forward to port stuff which was designed
for 1 Gig of main memory and requires 3 Gigaherz CPU Speed - is just not sensible.

Hi Gunnar,

I'm not trying to be a smarty pants, or a pain in the rear or sarcastic, however, I just now saw on my Yahoo! email account, that I am using 1 gigabyte of their storage!

And I am trying to keep my email to a minimum of saved messages, and trust me, there really isn't much there at all. And yet there it is, I'm 1 gig "in the cloud".

So that leaves us with; 2 Gigs of RAM isn't "crazed power user" status anymore.

However, regardless, I support Apollo-Core/Vampire 2 fully.


Uros Vidovic

Posts 31
07 Jan 2016 11:45


I am reading news about Apollo project for a long time. As an Atari  (FireBee) user I am interested to it as possible CPU selection for the next Atari clone or accelerator. But without MMU ind FPU I see no use to me for now. Anyway ... really great achievment!!!

Regardin amount of memory I think 128MB is enough. I have 512 MB on my Atari clones for a long time but I never really needed so much RAM.

Apollo CPU in Vampire accelerator is fast but not that much as most of Amiga users think. Browsing the net with web browsers wont be so enjoyable as you think. Here you can see how browsing the net looks on the FireBee with the NetSurf browser:
EXTERNAL LINK  I guess CPU (ColdFire) in FireBee is still a little faster but I believe it is comparable with Apollo CPU on Vampire accelerator.

What I wanted to say is that 128 MB of memory on Vampire Accelerator is more than enough regarding its use. And congratulations to Apollo team for their achievement!

I hope there will be fully FPU and MMU version in the future it can be used in next Atari clones. I hope selling it for such use it would not be a problem.


Cunn Pole

Posts 29
07 Jan 2016 12:26


err... If your yahoo account is being downloaded in its entirety in RAM then you need to find a new mail client. I have 500GB in my mail account but only a few MB actually in use at any time.


Wawa T

Posts 695
07 Jan 2016 12:48


really if we start answering to this sort of posts then we might as well abandon the site altogether. it wont stop.


Gregthe Canuck

Posts 274
07 Jan 2016 13:19


I agree with Gunnar - the hardware is definitely "good enough" at the moment. Rather let the software mature. There is a lot of work to be done on the software side. Let's give it a static target!

Congratulations to the team on the progress so far. The progress videos are very informative.

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