My Amiga 2000 is back to the basics

[eightbit]

Well, after upgrading, accelerating, and then REALLY accelerating (via a Vampire) my Amiga 2000 I came to a rationalization. And that is I didn't like it anymore. I felt with the Vampire installed it was just not my good old Amiga anymore. Hard to explain. Yes, it was extremely fast and could do things that most Amiga's could not without a boat load of expensive hardware, but I seriously have not touched the unit outside of a few game sessions (and the annoying moving from TV inputs) to play them...and checking out low quality (for today) video playback that the Vampire offers.

 

I just don't know what it is. Probably just me knowing that the "real" hardware (the good old Motorola 68000) was not the driving force behind the computer anymore and I didn't use it like I used to anymore. Am I crazy? Most would probably say yes..

 

In any case, the Vampire was removed and sold. The original 68000 was reinstalled.

 

I still have the IDE4Zorro card with Green Alien edition Workbench installed (with WHDLoad, games, demos etc), 2MB Megachip, and 8MB of Zorro RAM. Is it slow? Yeah, but not unbearably and all WHDLoad games and demos work perfectly fine as well as everything else as expected. And it feels like my Amiga again.

 

One oddity is that I used to have a 68010 in here so that the "quit" keys would work in WHDLoad. I expected inserting the original 68000 would once again stop that from happening. BUT, the quit keys still work! Any idea why this would be? Is the Megachip providing that additional instruction to make that happen? Or was there some kind of update or fix to the latest (last) version of WHDLoad? I am not complaining...but I just don't get it!

[Keatah]

I fuck'n love it! I tell you! I experienced the same thing, with different machines.

 

486 DX2/50 -to- Pentium-90

Pentium-III -to- Pentium IV

Apple II -to- various faster-than-10 MHz accelerators and other stuff like a built-in R-Pi terminal.

 

In each of my examples I ended up with something so fast and powerful it bore little resemblance to the original machine. I was lucky I suppose that my escapades were short lived and I quickly put back the original stuff. So happy I did this with the DX2/50. I also restored the Pentium-III and continued its natural progression from a PII-266 all the way to a PIII-1400. But the PII/PIII machine feels like it did the day I put it together. The P-IV did not.

 

When using a Vampire, or any other non-period (modern day) accelerator the machine doesn't feel original or "back-in-the-day" anymore. That's fine if you want to explore and see what can be done and all that. But..

 

And there's a debate going on whether VBXE makes an Atari 8-bit not Atari 8-bit. I mean C'mon, do you want Modern-Day PC performance? Or genuine vintage performance from the 80's - isn't the the point?

 

Sometimes you want just one Propeller.

Edited December 11, 2017 by Keatah

[Sinphaltimus]

Completely Valid feelings. For me, not so much. I've never had anything but an Amiga 500. I think I expanded as far as an 03 board and 8MB ram altogether running off a GVP with a 50MB hdd. I loved it, but always yearned for a faster 200 or 4000 or even a 1200, more ram, AGA etc...

Getting back into the Amiga after so many years all i wanted to do was hunt down hardware to upgrade it again, as best as i could, faster, more ram, bigger faster HDD, etc.. everything I ever wanted.

So for me, the Vampire is a dream come true. With Core 3 right around the corner, there won't be any display swapping either as AGA is added and more features.

Stick with what you love. we all love the Amiga for various reasons and have so many options and paths to follow today that it's back to the way it was i supposed. no 2 Amigas alike. back in the day we customized them to our personal likes. I never seen another Amiga setup JUST LIKE MINE, etc... You have yours, I have mine, I love mine for my opwn reasons as you do yours.

Have fun, don't die young.

[AMenard]

My end goal is to get an A500, preferably a PAL one, with a ram expansion. I'm not really into accelerators and most of the good stuff was marketed with the A500 in mind anyway since it was the most common machine. I understand people going all out on pimpin' their Amiga to bring it into the 21st century, but in the end the experience isn't that great.

 

I did have an A1200 for a couple of month in 2016 that I upgraded with an ACA1230/128mb, and Indivision DVI output, CF card reader, Ethernet adapter, updated the kickstart, the works! But in the end I was only playing games that could have easilly run on an A500 with 1meg of ram. So I sold it and brought out my old A1000 but then I was limited to games that would run in less than 512k.

[eightbit]

Speaking of PAL machines, a lot of people do not realize that you can easily convert your NTSC machines to a PAL machine by simply swapping the Agnus chip with a PAL variant. On later model (Rev 6A) Amiga 500 boards you can cut a trace on the board to do the same thing and even install a switch so that you can hop between PAL and NTSC. On my Amiga 2000 I simply use a PAL Agnus (this was originally an NTSC machine) in my Megachip and it is a PAL system now. Since it has the 3.1 ROM I can go into the early boot menu to switch to NTSC if I want, but I literally never do that

 

Bottom line is that there are lots of ways to get a PAL machine out of an NTSC machine (even software methods) but I find that simply swapping the Agnus chip is the easiest and least damaging way. This way you only need to import a tiny chip and not a whole machine

[Nebulon]

Speaking of PAL machines, a lot of people do not realize that you can easily convert your NTSC machines to a PAL machine by simply swapping the Agnus chip with a PAL variant. On later model (Rev 6A) Amiga 500 boards you can cut a trace on the board to do the same thing and even install a switch so that you can hop between PAL and NTSC. On my Amiga 2000 I simply use a PAL Agnus (this was originally an NTSC machine) in my Megachip and it is a PAL system now. Since it has the 3.1 ROM I can go into the early boot menu to switch to NTSC if I want, but I literally never do that

 

Bottom line is that there are lots of ways to get a PAL machine out of an NTSC machine (even software methods) but I find that simply swapping the Agnus chip is the easiest and least damaging way. This way you only need to import a tiny chip and not a whole machine

 

No trace-cutting required for PAL mode when using an 8372A on a rev 6A motherboard (same for swapping an 8370 for an 8371 on that board).

[eightbit]

 

No trace-cutting required for PAL mode when using an 8372A on a rev 6A motherboard (same for swapping an 8370 for an 8371 on that board).

 

 

If you insert the 8372A in an NTSC machine it will still boot NTSC unless you either:

 

1. Soft boot into PAL mode using some software (as the 8372A is dual PAL/NTSC and can do it)

2. Or cut a jumper (JP5 IIRC?) to allow the machine to turn on natively in PAL mode

[Keatah]

Pimp'n rigs with modern hardware is fine if that's what you wanna do. I don't know where the cutoff is, at what point pimp'n ruins the original experience. At what point does pimp'n reduce nostalgia or back-in-the-day feel?

 

Again, using my Apple II as examples (that's what I grew up with), I think memory and flashdrives you can never get enough of. And I always dreamed of vast memory arrays like those supercomputers in the movies. There were times when I had like 8MB going in my Apple //e, and "felt right" even though it was idle and games certainly didn't use it. More "exotic" stuff like AppleWorks and ProDOS used it however. But it was ok, and it was back in the day.

 

So what if I put 32MB disk images on CFFA inside my Apple? It's just like back in the day. The personality of the machine is intact. And I just got to thinking, ProDOS..prodos.. there'a a lot of re-cracks and stuff coming out for ProDOS these days. Now I can for real, set up a RamDisk that would host 50+ games on GENUINE ORIGINAL HARDWARE!

 

An 8MB RamWorks III card, or GS Ram Plus.. Those are only 1/4th the size of the unofficial 32MB virtual ProDOS volumes that are gaining popularity.

 

Faster modems are cool. And printer buffers are cool, too.

 

My beef is with accelerators that replace the whole computer. Internal or external. Matters not. You may as just be using a terminal at this point. Or use unthrottled emulation.

 

While I used Apple II as the example here, It really applies to any computer undergoing pimping. Including Amiga.

Edited December 11, 2017 by Keatah

[AMenard]

Speaking of PAL machines, a lot of people do not realize that you can easily convert your NTSC machines to a PAL machine by simply swapping the Agnus chip with a PAL variant. On later model (Rev 6A) Amiga 500 boards you can cut a trace on the board to do the same thing and even install a switch so that you can hop between PAL and NTSC. On my Amiga 2000 I simply use a PAL Agnus (this was originally an NTSC machine) in my Megachip and it is a PAL system now. Since it has the 3.1 ROM I can go into the early boot menu to switch to NTSC if I want, but I literally never do that

 

Bottom line is that there are lots of ways to get a PAL machine out of an NTSC machine (even software methods) but I find that simply swapping the Agnus chip is the easiest and least damaging way. This way you only need to import a tiny chip and not a whole machine

You can also do this on some model of the C64 by swapping the VIC II, the Crystal and cutting a trace I think.

[+save2600]

I'd probably feel the same way about my A2000 with Vampire installed *if* it were my *only* Amiga… but it's not.

[eightbit]

My beef is with accelerators that replace the whole computer

 

 

This exactly. I can completely agree that (at least for me) this is not the way to go with any vintage computer. If it is replacing the computer then why have the computer at all? Standard accelerators are OK in my book as they are just providing a more powerful CPU in the same CPU family, but if you are just running old Amiga games, demos and software that you were fine with running on a stock A500 for example there is no reason to go crazy with acceleration....and depending on how far you go you may end up completely losing the original experience that made you get into this in the first place....like I did.

 

Some computers (namely one I can think of...I am looking at you IIGS!) just require some acceleration in order to use them as intended. It wasn't until I added a TranswarpGS (nothing crazy, like normal 7MHz revision) to the IIGS that I was able to actually USE the computer. Games like Zany Golf now felt like they were running at normal speed. Other games that wouldn't even run with the stock IIGS started working when accelerated. This is an odd one out tho. First computer I ever owned that feels like it was designed with 7MHz (or maybe more) in mind but was released severely crippled. The people behind much of the software must have been using accelerated IIGS's when writing them.

[+OLD CS1]

No, the WHDLoad quit key has nothing to do with the MegAChip.

[eightbit]

No, the WHDLoad quit key has nothing to do with the MegAChip.

I figured as much, but I just cannot explain why it is now working with a stock 68000. I was always under the assumption that at least a 68010 was needed as it required an additional instruction to allow it. Unless there was something changed in the last version of WHDLoad? I really didn't expect F10 to work when I pressed it to get out of a demo, but it did shockingly.

[Sinphaltimus]

I figured as much, but I just cannot explain why it is now working with a stock 68000. I was always under the assumption that at least a 68010 was needed as it required an additional instruction to allow it. Unless there was something changed in the last version of WHDLoad? I really didn't expect F10 to work when I pressed it to get out of a demo, but it did shockingly.

Aren't there different quit keys depending on the game? Asterix in some cases and Print Screen in others for instance.

[+save2600]

Have a look at the WHDLoad.config or prefs file (believe it's in S). Open with your favorite text editor and somewhere in the middle is the 'quit key' assign. Can change it to be whatever you want...

[Nebulon]

 

 

If you insert the 8372A in an NTSC machine it will still boot NTSC unless you either:

 

1. Soft boot into PAL mode using some software (as the 8372A is dual PAL/NTSC and can do it)

2. Or cut a jumper (JP5 IIRC?) to allow the machine to turn on natively in PAL mode

Just put tape over the metal contact on the PLCC socket that corresponds to the 50/60Hz switch pin on the blitter. Then it'll be permanently switched to PAL until you do a software switch back to NTSC.

 

I'm tired of people hacking up their mo-bos when they don't have to.

[+OLD CS1]

I'm tired of people hacking up their mo-bos when they don't have to.

 

And I am tired of people breaking their PLCC sockets when they can just cut a trace

 

As for the WHDLoad "QUIT" key, from my understanding the ability to quit is up to the slave.

[eightbit]

 

And I am tired of people breaking their PLCC sockets when they can just cut a trace

 

As for the WHDLoad "QUIT" key, from my understanding the ability to quit is up to the slave.

 

 

Yeah, I have seen quite a few broken PLCC sockets because people either are not using a PLCC extractor...or don't know how to use one properly. Or, sometimes the PLCC socket is just old and weak and cracks anyway.

 

The jumper just needs to be separated, so its not even cutting a trace really. It certainly is not "hacking up the motherboard" The jumper was meant to be opened (for PAL) or closed (for NTSC) by design.

[Nebulon]

 

And I am tired of people breaking their PLCC sockets when they can just cut a trace

 

As for the WHDLoad "QUIT" key, from my understanding the ability to quit is up to the slave.

 

I'm sorry guys. I'm just grumpy today.

 

I can safely say that I've yet to harm a PLCC socket.

 

And yes, I totally second eightbit on the PLCC extractor thing. If anyone wants to work on these sockets, those pullers will save you a ton of headaches (and they're not very expensive).

[Keatah]

Ohh that brings back memories. When I was a kid I'd use a paper clip to pop the PLCCs. I'd break the socket about 50% of the time. Don't worry! I used a tie-wrap to fix it. Then I discovered I could go through "extraordinary lengths" and remove the circuit board from whatever I was working on and make use of the holes some boards had. I just used needle nose pliers or scissors to "punch" the chip out. Man I was smart! THEN I discovered a proper tool to lift them out correctly.

[+OLD CS1]

 

I'm sorry guys. I'm just grumpy today.

 

I can safely say that I've yet to harm a PLCC socket.

 

And yes, I totally second eightbit on the PLCC extractor thing. If anyone wants to work on these sockets, those pullers will save you a ton of headaches (and they're not very expensive).

 

hehehe No worries, I thought I would rib you a little. Have not seen you around in a while (though, to be fair, I had gone missing for several months.)

 

I have to admit, I broke the Fat Agnus socket on my first A500 motherboard installing a Fatter Agnus. Thankfully was not a total disaster and the replacement fit snugly in the broken socket. After that I went to the local computer shop and picked up a puller for about $6. I think I still have it around here somewhere.

[eightbit]

It's worth noting that with a Megachip you can usually install it into a broken PLCC and get the machine working again...even if the socket is in very bad shape. I never broke mine (thankfully) but I knew a few people that did and used a Megachip to solve their problem. Only issue is that the Megachip costs Mega-bucks

 

The other solution is obviously desoldering the old and soldering a new PLCC socket. I've seen that work performed but the hell if I have the patience for that.

 

Or as previously mentioned...the zip tie method!

 

But lets just not break our PLCC Agnus sockets in the first place shall we?

Edited December 13, 2017 by eightbit

[eightbit]

Ohh, and back on that quit key topic. This video I think explains it:

 

 

This is exactly what I had to do some time ago in order to get WHDLoad games to exit back to the Workbench. The only changes since (that I recall) are the Kickstart 3.1 ROM and the Megachip. But, in any case, now the quit key works for me with WHDLoad on the original 68K. Again, not complaining...but I would just like to know why!

 

In any case (for me) having the original 68000 processor in this makes me feel good. I was so amazed back in the day at what this processor was capable of, and I still am. What amazing things this little 7MHz CPU can do still astound me today. What more people should try to do nowadays is to write software/demos using only the stock CPU and try to push what they can out of it. I would appreciate that much more than requiring acceleration to make it happen. They did it in the old days and I remember being blown away from demos from Budbrains, Vision, and countless others. And the games that came out of thing...man...

Edited December 13, 2017 by eightbit

[+save2600]

Do you no longer have the 030 accelerator? Before I installed the Vampire, I had been using a SupraTurbo 28 in my A2000. Very speedy 28mhz 68000 that's extremely compatible with anything I could throw at it. Had a switch mounted to disable too, but never really needed it. If you ever felt like accelerating your Amiga again, these are excellent upgrades for the money. Haven't decided whether I'm keeping mine or not yet.

[amiman99]

For me 7MHz always felt too slow. I started with A1000, then A2000, and my third one was A1200 with 030 50MHz (which I still have on my desk). I was more of a power user not Amiga gamer, I liked 3D rendering with Silver Turbo, Imagine 3D, Vista 3D,and more other applications then games, so for me 7MHz was just not adequate. I remember the time I was rendering a scene in Silver Turbo on my A2000, it took more then 24Hrs to render a 320x200 picture, that in the end I did not like (waste of time).

One day I got A4000 with Video Toaster, so I started to render Blade Runner demo scene in Lightwave, I was psyched to see the outcome. Forget it, it took longer on 040 25MHz then the 7MHz A2000.(do to complexity of the scene).

 

I would like to get my hand on a Vampire and try to render some stuff. If they ever release one for A3000/A4000, I would like to get one.