User avatar
Captain Rufus

Posted Fri Dec 31, 2021 2:47 am

Anniversary of me getting one. Oh god.

(The original version of this post was done over in the Retrogames Retro Computer thread over at Something Awful. But yall get the Directors Cut version with more pics. It doesn't seem like tiny image tags work so to save huge pictures annoyance just click on the image urls I guess.)

Been working on a new old money sink I finally got off my ass to restore, repair, and give fat buffs while losing any and all screws to hold it into place.

Image

Yep.

Image

Image

I have returned to finally have an operating Amiga 500.

Image
An internal Gotek with mounting bits began the project.

Image I took out the Amiga that was working but disks never seemed to want to load and the old GVP HD with 2 megs of ram. I realized my old 500 that has the green flashing screen (the one that looks a lot better) had some cosmetic uses until I can get a diagnostic rom. Plus I needed to mooch its floppy drive power cable. Sadly my og one had the old Commodore trap door ram and it has rust from the rf shield and looked like barrel battery for clock and there is some green mung on the connector. (The other one has a coin type battery ill probably need to remove. Seems soldered in.)

Image
Pulled out the 1.3 Kickstart to give the working unit 1.3 over its 1.2. Plus after some cleaning the better case top and keyboard. I don't really recommend composite out on even a nice crt TV though. Mine doesn't have screen positioning which adds with the video output to.. be bad.

Image
However I realized I both had two Amiga to rgb din cables and my Commodore 1084 monitor accepts it. Grab some Stereo Rca cables to my 5.1 to ensure stereo sound and when I don't have to give the side of the monitor a quick light thwap when the screen goes blank every now n then and I can at least play now. (Apparently it is probably cold solder joints on the big transformer inside it. I'll need to open it up eventually and see where its at. However the 1084 has a huge rf shield soldered in and I dunno if I want to deal with that right now and I'm hoping the bits in question are maybe not under there.)

Image
I think its pretty nice though sadly PAL stuff is gonna be cut off at the bottom anyhow. But its much better than composite on the crt TV or on the HDTV. (Didn't feel like trying RF. Plus dont remotely want to deal with the shield.)

Finding out my old 486 had a battery that went boom and has probably killed the unit i wasn't going to ever use again gave me the inspiration to rip out the ram chips. Which work in the GVP giving it 4 megs instead of 2 and 70ns compared to the 120 or 100 it probably had.

Image
Sadly my 5.5 external SD2SCSI doesn't seem to want to be accepted by the GVP SCSI controller meaning an easy way to get lha stuff I can't otherwise transport over right now isn't happening which is gonna annoy me.

Image
And for now the lcd on the Gotek i just have sticking out the drive bay cuz its tiny and I can't read the thing without moving around the machine and practically sticking my face in the drive. I may in the future drill a hole for it to fit. No idea yet.

Image
A sure thing probably future buy list. I also have an extra drive power and data cable on the way plus a USB to DB9 mouse dongle that claims to use all USB mice and not just ps2 types. I can't deal with 200 dpi Amiga Ball Mouse when my main mouse is a 6000 dpi one. I have a Konix aka Epyx 500xj 2 button stick already so the few 2 button joystick games should be covered.

While I've done some scrubbing and cleaning I am not quite ready to screw it all up obviously. I may be drilling or cutting a few holes in it for both that gotek screen and the RGB2HDMI thing. (Plus probably a button to access the things menu.)

The question is.. WHAT ELSE? Do I get a compatible SD2SCSI internal to replace the physical HD with something much faster, quieter, more capacity, and probably easier to transfer all that lha stuff?

A Terrible Fire 536 which brings the RAM to 64 megs and nets a 68030 50mhz cpu plus interface for ide type drives and the SD type replacements? A ROM switcher so I can have 1.3 and 3.2 Kickstarts?

I've owned an Amiga since 92 but honestly my time using one amounts to maybe 3-4 semi active months? 6 tops? I need the wisdom anyone has for me.

Image
Its already looking good and I even have an ok but great suction cup joystick for any of those sort of titles that may need it.

EXTRY DIRECTORSY CUTNESS:

Image
While I got myself a new trapdoor ram the one in my currently working Rev 5 board is also working but I need to remove this ol battery. Do I need to solder it out? I wouldn't mind putting in a slide in and out CR battery just for QoL.

Image
I passed on the 3.2 rom and OS from Retro Rewind in Canada for now, but got some stuff I need for nice big video.

Image
A week later and from Pishop US I get the Zero to go into the RGB2HDMI. Sadly I still get to solder because of the pin headers. At least no desoldering. I have a decent iron but not really anything for desoldering.

Also on the way are extra case screws and a db9 USB mouse dongle that can take any sort of USB mouse that i mentioned.

While waiting on all this stuff I've been going through Retro 32s curated Tosec and deleting most of it. From 8 gigs unzipped to 2.15 or so during what is currently my 4th pass through the games. (Pass 1 got rid of obvious things I have zero interest in like most Sports, Puzzle, Adult, Sim, Adventure, Foreign Language and similar. Pass 2 and 3 involved popping up Lemon Amiga and diving through looking for what looked neat and wasn't stuff I didn't know was in my uninterested sections. 3 was then going through each game and looking at Lemon's user and old magazine scores. Pass 4 is me having UAE set up with my machine specs and seeing what works without even needing a Pal conversion program.)

Given the weakness of Workbench 1.3 and the realities of figuring out how to get old stuff that is happy in both NTSC and ADF has been a challenge. Aminet is mostly LH type archives. Some things I need are only easily in said archives. Plus things that can do things are both in archives and require stuff to go in Libs or whatnot and thus I must learn how to use either Filemaster or Dopus and they are weird to my Mac and Windows familiar self. (Making a hard disk folder and a UAE 3.1 os boot plus getting that adf program thats 4 bucks online helps with a few things but not all the things.)

So that's where I am right now. Trolling through uk Amiga Coverdisk adfs looking for programs to help me on my way for now until I lock in what my 500 is gonna be.

Thus me joining here to get wisdom I may not know or have run into with quick searches.

Like: "Can I take the R6 Agnus and put it in my R5? If so how do you safely get them out? Might I just get a UK 1mb Agnus and effectively be done worrying about pal issues? Should I hunt down 2 4mbyte 30 pin simm ram chips to max out the Gvp ram? What Sd2scsi could I pop in and replace the 120 meg or so almost 30 year old scsi hard disk? Internal 5.1-2s aren't expensive at all. Would 8 mb ram and a big SD hard drive equivalent be good enough for WHDLOADs? Should I just get a Terrible Fire 536 and then have a smaller footprint less noisy less power plug using machine with MAXIMUM BEEFLORD stats? What of 3.2 ROM and the newest WB? Would I be dealing with extra compatibility issues or would it make life better n easier either with or without a TF 536?"

These are the questions that try my soul and possibly suck away large amounts of time and money plus or minus requiring holes drilled into 30 year old plastic computer shells.

Perhaps together we can answer them and actually have me use the Amiga as more than a dust collector...

User avatar
Captain Rufus

Posted Mon Jan 10, 2022 3:58 am

Image

I'm still working on things. Got both scsi2sd 5.2 in my gvp hd AND got rgb2hdmi set up. The former seems to be eating up RAM (probably need to lower buffers or something) and the other has the odd bit of video garbling that randomly pops up. Its minor but I notice it.

Getting WB 1.3 on the hd was an ordeal. I did it but it involved both Gvp Prep programs, using both partitions, and a bit of annoyance.

Image
Maybe my first solder job in 30 years wasn't good enough, maybe it's the hdmi connectors, maybe its my settings? The mini hdmi to normal plus normal hdmi cable isn't gonna work in there for size reasons so I'm gonna try a different cable before reflowing 40 pins.

Image
Its nice having 2 beefy partitions.

All i'm waiting on is my RAM chips and the setup is basically complete outside of maybe drilling cable holes.

User avatar
McTrinsic

Posted Mon Jan 10, 2022 4:50 am

Awesome story, thanks so much for sharing!

The missing RAM might be due to buffers. AmigaOS assigns small bits of RAM to buffer disk access.

The larger the disk, the more memory this requires.

You can check the difference if you auto-mount both partitions at boot and then again auto-mount only one partition. There should be a respective option in advanced option in HDToolBox.

For my setup I eventually only auto-mount one partition and add others if i need them with ‚mount‘. The mountlist I created with giggledisk from Aminet.

Have fun with such a wonderful machine!

McT

User avatar
Captain Rufus

Posted Fri Feb 04, 2022 4:36 am

I finally made an accelerator decision, the Aca 500 Plus!

I have chosen my accelerator for the A500. Its one that should I get even dumber in the future I can get more idiotic upgrades for if I want to be an even bigger dumbass with my funny money.

I chose this one because its an external mount. Its full of QoL stuff like double CF drive slots so one can be pc formatted for easy file transfer. I can overclock it from its default 14mhz up to 42 or so while still being a true 68000. Has options for multiple Kickstart flashes on the board so you can basically make the board not exist in some ways for the most persnickety of software. Pal/Ntsc switch options. Action Replay built in. Options to turn trapdoor to chip in some cases. Its almost everything a 500 needs in one card!

Basically outside of maybe an ACE2 card for a newer Agnus chip with 2 megs chip ram (should I not be able to fix my other broken R6 Amiga and do a little tweaking for 1mb chip) I think my Amiga 500 project is approaching completion!

And if I so choose I could probably sell off the GVP HD for some cash and then put the sd2scsi 5.2 in my Mac iisi. I'm trying to buy less stuff that takes up space in my house and never gets used or collects dust. (Like Transformers and Tabletop gaming things. Plus TFs are going up in cost again. What was a 10 dollar price in 01 is now 23. And arguably not as good.)

Upgraded old computers provide fun and all for those of us too stupid or obstinate to just use an emulator.

So while I wait I've been going through TOSEC Amiga curated and seeing what works on my current NTSC spec machine. Its currently turned an 8 gig unzipped file into around 500 megs. That's been fun. Hunt down manuals and such too.

Yes its all silly and ridiculous but its also amusing and neat just to see what can be done while still making Bank Account Numbers Go Up.

I won't link directly but Retro32 has a couple links to said Curated Stuff it in an article. There is still a lot of repeats and trainers and some foreign language stuff but 8 gigs is easier to do a couple deletion runs with Lemon Amiga and then UAE with one's Amiga build up. (And let's not forget about the preset WHDLoad files.)

-- SA Thread Bit End --

I'm still coming to grips with the Aca 500 Plus and the Workbench 3.2 I decided to grab at the same time. So far both are HUGE improvements. But sadly until I get a plcc extractor or the Ace2 2mb Agnus most of Whdload is off limits. And an Ecs Denise also seems like a get if just to get it all done and maybe even pretty up 3.2 a bit.

See I have used DIAGROM on my R6 500 and it doesn't come up on the screen. The light green screen generally but not always means ram if I understand it but there is no warm feeling chips but there is some mung on the trapdoor ram connector that probably isn't helping things even with a bit of Deoxit and cleaning. Tried reseating a few chips and looking for anything out of sorts but im not quite sure. I'm about to write it off as a for parts machine and once said plcc tool comes in seeing about popping it into the working R5 to get that sweet ECS Agnus action going, ideally saving me from another 200 dollar upgrade. (Tho for all I know said Agnus is the broken part.)

But right now I want to take a quick look at my current upgrade bits and give em a 1-10 rating in Price, Ease of Use/Installation, and QoL to the machine.

Usb mouse dongle from Amigastore.eu : 9, 10, 9. Its pretty much awesome, reasonably priced, and makes life 100x better. If the circuit board came with a little cover and a stand so its not poking out it would be nearly perfect.

Rgb2Hdmi: 7, 7, 6. I get graphical interference from time to time that I don't know is due to the board, my settings, the firmware, or my soldering of 40 pins. It needs this that and the other but it does work. Just not super flawlessly and has lots of hidden costs like a menu button, micro SD, mini hdmi cable, soldering the pi zero pins. Add a point to price if you can get a 10 bucks or less Pi Zero with the pin connector already built in.

Internal Gotek with lit lcd screen, 2 buttons, and 3d printed mount: 8, 8, 8. Not perfect but its a must have for pretty much any 500 owner in 2022. 3.5s are dying. Swapping disks is annoying. Its just a bit irksome fitting it in and getting it to stay put, especially with the 3d printed mount. Sometimes gives Write Errors or the LCD boots up with garbage (though it still works). No turbo mode its just og speed. No sound on mine hurts feeling stuff is working even when its drive light and the Amigas are active. And you more or less have to have the lcd plate flopping out of the drive hole to actually see anything. On the upside it is a great place to feed the mini HDMI cable through. Helped by my TV having its inputs on the right side anyhow.

Aca 500 Plus: 5, 8, 10. Its expensive. Its not 100% easy to set up especially given CF cards need to be carefully inserted to avoid bending all those poking out pins. Some stuff doesn't seem to auto save which can cause issues. Adding KS roms involves typing and the CLI. Its an exposed board that doesn't like to easily plug into the left side expansion port it now owns. But every 500 owner needs one. Its everything you want its everything you need. Hot swap one cf for easy file transfer! Pal/Ntsc switching. Keep different cfs for different Amiga HDs. Kick rom switching. Cpu from 7-42 mhz. Select only chip Ram. Use trapdoor as chip with Ecs Agnus. Has WB 3.1 on board to either use for initial hd install or just to boot from. 8 megs of Fast Ram. Action Replay built in. Multiple profiles to set your Amiga up as you need including pretending its not even there! 1200 Accelerator and other card connections and settings. Use external floppy as boot floppy option. Its not perfect but its very very great and you could grab this and a gotek and you are almost done in many cases! Just read the little manual it comes with and print out the page on Individual Computer's Wiki about what everything does. Trust me.

AmigaOS 3.2: 7, 8, 8. Do you have a pc with a cdrom drive? Do you want many things that both pretty up and improve Workbench built in? Are you willing to deal with installation, online registration for patches, and some issues with when you use 3.2 kick roms instead of 3.1? Then you should probably save up a few bucks for this and make your life simpler in the long run. Lots of things modern Gui Oses have had for decades are now standard in Amigaland. Or things that were in a bazillion add on programs that all wanted x y or Z in Libs or whatever the heck else. Its still not perfect but if you are basically coming from 1.3 like me? Yeah its good albeit still no MacOS 6, or 7. (9.22 and X10.4-6 are too modern machine to really be a fair comparison.) Unless you are an Amiga Vet with your WB set with all the fixins this gives us what we need mostly.





Return to “Hardware”