Heya!
Since the combination of a PiStorm/RPi and a CDTV is probably a quite exotic one, I thought I'd tell a bit about my own experiences with this.
A few weeks ago, I installed the OS on my RPi, removed my 7 MHz 68K CPU from the CDTV and plugged in the PiStorm.
The configuration did present me with a few challenges, but a few site visits and questions later, the very kind and helpful people there had provided me with the answers needed... so in case any of you should decide on this upgrade, here's what should be done in order to make it work:
-J15 (CDTV functions) has to be removed as of this moment. There should be a new CPLD firmware underway, which fully support the CDTV, but until then we need to remove that jumper.
- The main CPLD firmware edition WON'T work with the CDTV; the experimental one is needed.
- The config setting "physical-z2-first" should be used. It may be unnecessary, but I couldn't make mine work without, however.
Now, for the fun part:
- My CPU speed according to SysInfo is higher than the A4000/25 shown.
- I now have 256 MB Z3 Fast RAM on my CDTV (!)
- My SD card hdf files' transfer rates are around 22-23 MB/sec; about 10 times faster than I had with my SCSI adapter.
- I also have hi res graphics with RTG, AHI should soon be available, too, USB port, wi-fi, and bluetooth.
- Kickstart and extended ROM's can be loaded from an image file; thus, a kickstart switch is now merely a matter of editing the config file and then reboot. And there's no need to replace the physical chips anymore.
When the new CPLD firmware (hopefully soon) is available, along with the soon-to-come extended ROM 2.35, all CDTV specific functions should be available once more.
All in all, combined with the very acceptable price for a RPi and a PiStorm, this is definitely an upgrade I can recommend!
Are you able to close the lid? I was tempted a while ago but saw reports that it had to stay open.
I haven't yet tried, since I had a relocator installed as well (long story), but it *looks* as if it might be a problem. However, I've bought a Hakke flexible relocator as well (with cable), that should solve the problem. They installed square pins on the socket part however, so I'll have to replace these before I can use it. In any case, it should be possible to solve that problem somehow; both the PiStorm nor the RPi 3A+ are quite slim.
My own setup will still be rather atypical, however, since I assembled an old, black desktop case for my 40x Toshiba SCSI CD-ROM drive, SCA hard drive and PC floppy drive... I'll probably install the PiStorm there as well, so that I have direct access to USB/SD card and can install a fan on the RPi CPU.
My own setup will still be rather atypical, however, since I assembled an old, black desktop case for my 40x Toshiba SCSI CD-ROM drive, SCA hard drive and PC floppy drive... I'll probably install the PiStorm there as well, so that I have direct access to USB/SD card and can install a fan on the RPi CPU.
Another option could be to somehow lower the GPIO header or install some sort of "relocator" in between. If they can somehow be separated instead of stacked, that'll solve the problem.
That subject got my attention, so I digged into it a little further. It turns out there are actually GPIO extenders available so the CDTV lid problem can easily be solved. E.g. adafruit.com has one, and at 3 USD that won't exactly break anyone's budget. c",)
Actually I think about using a Pistorm in my CDTV also. As my CD-Drive is beyond repair (it was already tinkered with), original CDTV-mode and (original)CD-Support not needed. Anyway, of course I want a CD-Drive inside the CDTV to read the Amiga Future CDs. I thought about placing an Slot-In slim CD-Drive behind the front-plate, so without big difference in apearance, instead of useing a caddy you simply put the CD directly to the drive.
Such drives are quite cheap; I bought a CD/DVD one about a year ago. While it is an external USB DVD-Rom, internaly it is an IDE-Drive for notebooks, using notebook-ide2USB Adapter. The actual "new" drive was produced 2007, so I would call it "NOS"...
So I can connect it via USB or IDE (with cd-ide to 44pin IDE-adapter).
Has anyone succesfully mounted a cd-drive by piscsi to the pistorm? I simply tryed to use /dev/sr0 in config, but this did not work.
The other possible way should be using ide64k, to connect the drive there. But that would be an incredible high sandwich, to stack ide64k inside the CPU-socket, pistorm on top and pi even higher. Also 3 extra rows of pins needed to get needed distance for the connectors. CDTV now looks more like a pyramid now, so I would much prefer an usb-cd solution on the pistorm...
Have not found the CD/DVD-drive to test now. I saw a CDTV-Version somethere, wich simply connects Pi and Pistorm side by side to fit into cdtv. Of course not available at the moment.
But adding ide68k also between socket and pistorm would not fit in my opinion. Maybe desoldering the socket, solder a precision one with long pins and puting the ide68k under the mainboard might work (after cutting the shielding).
Such drives are quite cheap; I bought a CD/DVD one about a year ago. While it is an external USB DVD-Rom, internaly it is an IDE-Drive for notebooks, using notebook-ide2USB Adapter. The actual "new" drive was produced 2007, so I would call it "NOS"...
So I can connect it via USB or IDE (with cd-ide to 44pin IDE-adapter).
Has anyone succesfully mounted a cd-drive by piscsi to the pistorm? I simply tryed to use /dev/sr0 in config, but this did not work.
The other possible way should be using ide64k, to connect the drive there. But that would be an incredible high sandwich, to stack ide64k inside the CPU-socket, pistorm on top and pi even higher. Also 3 extra rows of pins needed to get needed distance for the connectors. CDTV now looks more like a pyramid now, so I would much prefer an usb-cd solution on the pistorm...
Have not found the CD/DVD-drive to test now. I saw a CDTV-Version somethere, wich simply connects Pi and Pistorm side by side to fit into cdtv. Of course not available at the moment.
But adding ide68k also between socket and pistorm would not fit in my opinion. Maybe desoldering the socket, solder a precision one with long pins and puting the ide68k under the mainboard might work (after cutting the shielding).
@ole42, i don't have a solution for you, but there is a SCSI module available for the CDTV that auto-configs (?!) and has both an internal 50-pin ribbon connector, and external DB25 connector. I wonder if you could find a slot loading SCSI drive (impossible?) and use one of those in place of your broken standard drive?
@brufnus - did you ever get new CPLD FW on your pistorm, along with support for kick 3.x and CDTV extended roms 2.30 or 2.35, for example?
@luvwagn
Hi, sorry about the delay; I've been quite busy. No unfortunately there's not yet an update for the cpld, so I still lack access to my HDD and the CD-ROM drive (the latter needs new capacitors however, so it wouldn't make much difference right now).
I'm using the 2.30 extended rom at the moment, but what to expect with the 2.35 certainly sounds promising.
Hopefully they'll soon have the bus arbitration added to the cpld fw.
Hi, sorry about the delay; I've been quite busy. No unfortunately there's not yet an update for the cpld, so I still lack access to my HDD and the CD-ROM drive (the latter needs new capacitors however, so it wouldn't make much difference right now).
I'm using the 2.30 extended rom at the moment, but what to expect with the 2.35 certainly sounds promising.
Hopefully they'll soon have the bus arbitration added to the cpld fw.
@luvwagn
I used a 40x Toshiba SCSI CD-ROM drive with my CDTV using a std. SCSI adapter for the expansion port, and that works fine.
However, access to the SCSI adapter and thus the drives attached, are lost if the Pistorm is being used, since the bus arbitration has not yet been implemented.
I know some work is being done on the Atari bus arbitration which may open the door for the Amiga one as well, but personally I don't think it will happen anytime soon - when I started the project a couple of years ago, it was said that it would "soon" be implemented - so I guess "soon" in this case means 8 or 10 years, haha
Anyway, it's still an extremely good and innovative upgrade, and I hate the thought of reverting to the stock 68k CPU and 8 MB RAM... the speed, graphics, storage options, etc. are simply so much better than what I had with the CDTV before. I do miss the CD-ROM drives though, but using an USB version as mentioned here, could of course be an option.
I used a 40x Toshiba SCSI CD-ROM drive with my CDTV using a std. SCSI adapter for the expansion port, and that works fine.
However, access to the SCSI adapter and thus the drives attached, are lost if the Pistorm is being used, since the bus arbitration has not yet been implemented.
I know some work is being done on the Atari bus arbitration which may open the door for the Amiga one as well, but personally I don't think it will happen anytime soon - when I started the project a couple of years ago, it was said that it would "soon" be implemented - so I guess "soon" in this case means 8 or 10 years, haha
Anyway, it's still an extremely good and innovative upgrade, and I hate the thought of reverting to the stock 68k CPU and 8 MB RAM... the speed, graphics, storage options, etc. are simply so much better than what I had with the CDTV before. I do miss the CD-ROM drives though, but using an USB version as mentioned here, could of course be an option.