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obitus1990
USA

Posted Thu Dec 31, 2020 11:09 am

intric8 wrote:
Thu Dec 31, 2020 10:19 am


Now, I should point out that I've just sent my own personal StarDrive off to a AL site member (yesterday as a matter of fact) to be reverse engineered. But I don't think those are going to get mass produced. Just made in a very small batch if the project is successful, which I believe it will be.
Interesting. Once the small production run is made, will the source files be made available?

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Thu Dec 31, 2020 11:33 am

I'm not sure. It's not up to me. I merely donated my hardware to be analyzed, as they are in such painfully short supply (and the Parceiro has completely scratched that itch for me right now).

I think more about this project will be made public in the near future as it gets sorted out. It's very early days.

User avatar
rjd324

Posted Thu Dec 31, 2020 11:36 am

So this is a great compact device but I wonder why I couldn't just get another aca 500+. I guess that this hardware is much more compact and the fact that the Aca 500+ is not actually supported on the a1000 are two factors. Perhaps I am missing more factors.

Has anyone experienced an aca 500 that did not work with an a1000?

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obitus1990
USA

Posted Thu Dec 31, 2020 11:42 am

rjd324 wrote:
Thu Dec 31, 2020 11:36 am
So this is a great compact device but I wonder why I couldn't just get another aca 500+. I guess that this hardware is much more compact and the fact that the Aca 500+ is not actually supported on the a1000 are two factors. Perhaps I am missing more factors.

Has anyone experienced an aca 500 that did not work with an a1000?
You could...but as intric8 has stated, if you don't want a device that takes over the bus completely (like the ACA and Vampire do) nor don't want an accelerator, this is the device for you. If you want those, then it is not.

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Thu Dec 31, 2020 11:47 am

Has anyone experienced an aca 500 that did not work with an a1000?
This is complicated, but I know the ACA500+ would not work well with my machine because it does not play nice with the Rejuvenator (it has something to do with the side expansion port). I have a friend who had both installed and the machine would not boot 25% of the time.

The ACA500+, a very cool device, as you say was designed for the A500 and happens to work with the 1000. I've talked to Jens about this product before and he confided with me that he had an A1000 specific design, which he's simply never produced. You know - forward-facing, vertical, etc. He didn't think there was a big enough market for it, however, so never mashed the gas on it.

But the ACA500+, like the Vampire, in all intents and purposes will take the machine over. It really only needs the 1000 for power and input devices. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that (I have one sitting in a box... perhaps you'd like to buy it?). It's all just about what kind of experience you're after. There are lots of options out there.

And, in fact, it's the ACA500+'s design specifically that got Mr. Dunklee mapping out a potential future product.

Dunklee:
... their design got me thinking how the board can steal the bus away from the CPU. While I’d never do a Vampire hack to the A1000, I think the same technique could be used to pause the CPU, then transfer KickStart (and SD driver etc.) from disk to memory, then give the bus back to the CPU, thinking KickStart’s already been loaded. Now that would be a really cool add on…
Exciting times and lots of options on the horizon. What more could we ask for? =)

User avatar
rjd324

Posted Thu Dec 31, 2020 11:55 am

All good info.

I have a number of amiga machines and they are all accelerated. The 1000 is one I want to keep as stock as possible. I dont even care that I need to insert the KS disk first. That is also why I wanted to ask about disabling the fast memory. My reasons mainly are to test programs running on stock systems. And wanting to have an assembler on there / compiler really needs storage other than the chip memory!

Not being able to store stuff persistently is an issue and 880Kb diskettes don't quite cut it. And buying an old authentic hard drive is hard and I really need to stop spending so much on Amigas now!

I'll have to think about it. But I am more than half tempted to get this.

Thanks.

User avatar
Zippy Zapp
CA, USA

Posted Thu Dec 31, 2020 3:40 pm

What an awesome device I really like it. The A1000 has been on my list for a while but none have come up for a price I would be able to justify. I guess i need to sell one of my A1200s at some point...

User avatar
maurensen

Posted Sat Jan 02, 2021 9:43 am

Intric8 if I was in the Usa I'll buy your aca to try it with my 1000 but there's an ocean between us:-)

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obitus1990
USA

Posted Sat Jan 09, 2021 3:07 pm

Look what arrived in the mail today....
IMG_0663.jpg
Assembled, and ready for testing tomorrow....
IMG_0664.jpg

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Sun Jan 10, 2021 8:45 am

You got a kit version! Interesting...





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