amigadave,
Quote:
There are several reasons why it can not:
1) Both WarpOS and PowerUP are proprietary. Much of WOS is in powerpc assembly, making it harder to work with it even if they could obtain the source code
2) The FPU issue isn't specific to the OS or kernel being run. The CPU just doesn't implement the Power ISA category FPU. You cannot execute any regular PowerPC FPU code on it.

> P10xx and PPC460ex are affordable PPC chips, others are not.

Compared to the PPC460EX (PPC440 core), the newer Applied Micro chips with PPC464FP or PPC465 core are much cheaper.

> IIRC, some P10xx and P20xx are pin compatible.

Yes, P2010 and P2020 are pin compatible with P1011, P1012, P1013, P1020, P1021 and P1022. They all have e500v2 core.

http://www.freescale.com/files/32bit/doc/brochure/PWRARCHQIQSG.pdf

> P2041 has e500mc core (compatible FPU), but not sure how easily
> it fits in place of 1013.

P1013 and P2041 are not pin compatible.

> Any specs around of T1xxx chips yet?

I'm not aware of any.

> I don't even know if Woz was involved with the company when the
> G4 Macs were produced.

12 years passed between :-)

Andreas_Wolf,

Thank you for the pin compatibility info.

Untill someone does some Book-E spec FPU emulator for P10xx series.... or untill T1xx chips appear...

"newer Applied Micro chips with PPC464FP or PPC465 core are much cheaper."

Meaning APM86290 and APM86190? http://www.apm.com/products/embedded/multicore460/apm86290/
I once read very low price estimates on some early press info. (below 30 eur in high volume, IIRC)
But are those available yet?
I have not seen those being sold yet.
Perhaps you have a link to the price & availability info?


[ Edited by KimmoK 29.05.2012 - 16:13 ]

> Untill someone does some Book-E spec FPU emulator for P10xx series

Emulating standard Book-E/PowerISA FPU on e500v2 might be hard (or impossible even?) as this is not simply about missing instructions here but about instruction overlappings, i.e. same instructions doing different things on different cores. This seems similar to m68k vs. ColdFire. For an exhaustive and detailed comparison of the programming models of e500v2 vs. e600, refer to:

http://www.freescale.com/files/32bit/doc/app_note/AN3531.pdf

Btw, even the (ex-)maintainer of Debian for PowerPCSPE calls it a "braindead FPU design":

http://lists.debian.org/debian-powerpc/2012/05/msg00025.html

>> newer Applied Micro chips with PPC464FP or PPC465 core are much cheaper

> Meaning APM86290 and APM86190?

Yes, my statement was mainly about the Mamba chips (PPC465 core), but also APM82181 (PPC464FP core, although with only one single PCIe x1 interface and no PCI that SoC would probably not be satisfying).

> I once read very low price estimates on some early press info.
> (below 30 eur in high volume, IIRC)

I guess you might be confusing this with the APM821xx announcement from some months before:

"Limited sample quantities of the APM821xx family are available at less than $20 for quantities of 10,000 pieces."
http://investor.apm.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=78121&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1414268

AFAIR, nothing of that kind was ever announced for the APM86x90 chips.

> are those available yet? I have not seen those being sold yet.
> Perhaps you have a link to the price & availability info?

"Avnet is quoting $77 for the single-core APM86190-1200 and $120 for the dual-core APM86290-1200 for qty 120."
http://amigaworld.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=31667&forum=33&start=260#619403

I just had a look at Avnet and saw that APM86x90 chips (still only available up to 1.2 GHz) became cheaper since that statement quoted above was made:

1.2 GHz APM86190 at qty of 120: 58...64 USD
1.2 GHz APM86290 at qty of 120: 87...96 USD

Piru,
Quote:

So my uninformed assumption that this board is useless appears to be true.

Either the two guys working on it are unaware of how futile their work on this project is, or this whole thing is just a joke they are playing for some strange reason.

Given the fact that at least one of the two has completed successful projects in the past, the lack of knowledge that it can't work is puzzling and the assumption that it might be just a joke does not make any sense either.

Oh well? Someone will figure it out eventually and I will read what is really happening somewhere.

Unless someone designs a new Cyberstorm accelerator with a 1.5GHz G4, or faster CPU, plus 1.5gb RAM, USB2.0 and a SATA controller built-in, I don't see the point in creating any thing less than that for the A3000/A4000 Classic Amiga models.

I have a feeling being HW developers they didnt consider SW side carefully... PPC could run UAE under Linux or perhaps AROS so you could run 68k software emulated on this card but then there is question why have that 68040 there at all.

Perhaps APM82181 would be the best option for UlitimatePPCaccelerator kind of HW and for some PPC-efika killer ultra-low-end below 200 eur HW. (perhaps there also exist some suitable mobile GPU for miniPCIe connector, inside bigbox classic, or ePCIe should be used on classic accelerator kind of HW) http://www.hwtools.net/jpg/PE4H-PM3N-ver2.4.jpg http://i.imgur.com/zFKr3.png (3d bench, red is for separate PCIe card and blue is laptop internal, more info http://i.imgur.com/4B7hU.png )

And APM86190/290 start to look like the best chip for low...mid range HW around 200...300eur.

Too bad that for now there is no good options for single board computer designs (Rasberry like). Unless APM86x90 is built with some mobile Radeon onboard.Finnish page for the rest.

[ Edited by KimmoK 30.05.2012 - 09:07 ]

KimmoK,

For Rasberry pi alike designs there's still the 5125. It's not classes beyond and cheap enough. But there are actually two major show stoppers: no hw video decoding unit and no cache coherence (and this is at least a fail for MorphOS). But apart from that a mini board for really little money would be pretty possible. About a year ago I was really considering starting such a project, I spend quite some hours reading a lot and calculating this and that, but eventually I decided against that project for several reasons.

> Perhaps APM82181 would be the best option [...] for some PPC-efika
> killer ultra-low-end below 200 eur HW. (perhaps there also exist
> some suitable mobile GPU for miniPCIe connector [...])

As you'd need audio as well you'd have to attach some combined (2D) graphics/audio solution to the PCIe x1 interface, similar to the SM502 on the Sam460ex ...or use the APM82181's SPI interface with a CPLD acting as SPI-to-I²S bridge and connect an audio chip via this I²S ;-)

About audio: yes, solving the audio problem without loosing PCIe of the 3D expansion is one issue. Nice idea about that SPI. Perhaps audio via USB could be another or Audio via localbus connected xcore.

"spend quite some hours reading a lot and calculating this and that"

I think I'm going through same hobby engineering/research fun ...

For me, I would like the HW to be a little faster than my curent SAM440@667Mhz.
(goals 1:learn HW 2:do some designing 3:try to make/get a prototype & OS running on it 4:see if I could manage to find means for actual production run 5:provide affordable opensource PPC HW 6:keep it PPC AmigalikeOS compatible, just in case if one day....)

I'm going to be buying one of these, it is perfect for my needs.

I still enjoy using my 3000 for some functions even though I can do that same on my Peg II. It will be fun to put some new hardware in it.

For me:
- 33 MHz 040 is plenty fast for what I use the classic hardware for.
- 3000's are very picky about accelerators and this looks like it will fit and give modern I/O and fast memory.
- 3000's with a failed 030 can use this to bring it back to life.

I would think that these guys who are developing these, understand this target market potential. Great idea for them to come up with and hope they sell tons of them...

Even if the PPC chip is incompatible with others, PPC part could be usable on opensource SW use...
If they manage build a dongle to replace A3k/4k motherboard, they might have some extra market from PPC Linux / PPC AROS fans.

(the dongle could come with NATAMI/miminmig FPGA....)

> If they manage build a dongle to replace A3k/4k motherboard, they
> might have some extra market from PPC Linux / PPC AROS fans.

But then, PPC Linux or PPC AROS users won't need the m68k part of the board which only makes the board unnecessarily expensive for them. If PPC Linux or PPC AROS users for whatever reason really want to run their OS on QorIQ P1013/P1022 (or any other e500v2-cored chip) there are already numerous solutions out there.

matt3,
Quote:

I'm glad you're such an optimist.
Personally, i think this is an elaborate hoax.

BTW - What do you intend to do with the PPC (since its incompatible with existing software)?

>> This thing is completely useless if all it can run is WarpOS software or
>> PowerUP software. Can it even run those?

> There are several reasons why it can not:
> 1) Both WarpOS and PowerUP are proprietary. Much of WOS is in powerpc assembly,
> making it harder to work with it even if they could obtain the source code
> 2) The FPU issue isn't specific to the OS or kernel being run. The CPU just doesn't
> implement the Power ISA category FPU. You cannot execute any regular
> PowerPC FPU code on it.

From the current status update:

"Both delevopers [...] brought along Samo Jordan, original developer of the WarpOS/WarpUP! software. Current status is:
[...]
- Active talks with Hyperion for supporting AmigaOS4.x.
[...]
- Support for WarpUp/WarpOS through support pledged by the original author"
http://www.amiga.org/forums/showpost.php?p=696776
http://www.a1k.org/forum/showpost.php?p=528160

Addendum:

> Emulating standard Book-E/PowerISA FPU on e500v2 might be hard (or impossible
> even?) as this is not simply about missing instructions here but about instruction
> overlappings, i.e. same instructions doing different things on different cores. This
> seems similar to m68k vs. ColdFire. For an exhaustive and detailed comparison of
> the programming models of e500v2 vs. e600, refer to:
> http://www.freescale.com/files/32bit/doc/app_note/AN3531.pdf
> Btw, even the (ex-)maintainer of Debian for PowerPCSPE calls it a "braindead FPU
> design":
> http://lists.debian.org/debian-powerpc/2012/05/msg00025.html

To the point:

http://moobunny.dreamhosters.com/cgi/mbmessage.pl/amiga/219881.shtml
http://moobunny.dreamhosters.com/cgi/mbmessage.pl/amiga/220016.shtml

Update:

> http://moobunny.dreamhosters.com/cgi/mbmessage.pl/amiga/219881.shtml
> http://moobunny.dreamhosters.com/cgi/mbmessage.pl/amiga/220016.shtml

"As we have the prototype boards in our hands we have been actively working on booting a basic kernel on the PowerPC core and interfacing the board to the Amiga bus. Parallel we are starting the software development side of things, with WarpOS support being worked on - as well as first contact with Hyperion regarding AmigaOS4 support. We also keep an eye on feedback from the community and are evaluating the choice made for the P1013 CPU.We knew that the FPU in this processor is incompatible with the ones found on older PowerPC boards. Our original plan to fix these incompatibilities in software turns out to have more impact that we had foreseen. For this reason, we will reconsider the choice of PowerPC CPU, while continuing the development work of other important stuff on the current prototype."
http://eab.abime.net/showpost.php?p=828684
http://www.ultimateppc.nl

Ermm, what sense makes WarpOS being ported to the e500v2 core when they will attempt to redesign the board for a CPU with a different core anyway?

"WarpOS support being worked on" doesn't necessarily mean the porting phase.

Review of the original code, project plan, negotiating money (preliminary work which would be common to any such update/port regardless of the specific target) could fall under such a vague description.

World peace is being worked on... ;)

> "WarpOS support being worked on" doesn't necessarily mean the porting
> phase. Review of the original code, project plan, negotiating money
> (preliminary work which would be common to any such update/port
> regardless of the specific target) could fall under such a vague
> description.

Okay, this might be the case here.
I'm really eager to know which CPU they seek to "replace" the QorIQ P1013 with. As far as I'm aware, the main reasons for going with the P1013 was that it provides USB, SATA, Ethernet and a DIU.
Finding a suitable non-e500v2 Freescale PPC SoC with a DIU will be a problem I'm afraid. The MPC8610 has a DIU but lacks USB, SATA and Ethernet, and the MPC5121e/MPC5123 has all of that but is rather slow compared to the P1013. And while Applied Micro's APM86190 has USB, SATA, Ethernet and an on-chip LCD controller, I don't know the bandwidth (i.e. what resolution at which colour depth and which refresh rate) of the latter.

https://myapmold.apm.com/MyAMCC/jsp/public/productDetail/product_detail.jsp?productID=APM86190
https://myapmold.apm.com/MyAMCC/retrieveDocument/SNP/APM86190_PB_20120216.pdf

Addendum:

> I'm really eager to know which CPU they seek to "replace" the QorIQ P1013
> with. As far as I'm aware, the main reasons for going with the P1013 was that
> it provides USB, SATA, Ethernet and a DIU. Finding a suitable non-e500v2
> Freescale PPC SoC with a DIU will be a problem I'm afraid.

Freshly announced e5500-based QorIQ T1020, T1022, T1040 and previously announced T1042 all show a DIU in their block diagrams:

https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=7001&forum=3&start=746

Apart from that, those SoCs each comes at up to 1.4 GHz clock rate and with 2x SATA2, 2x USB2 and Ethernet ad nauseam.
Sample availability is supposed to start with the T1042 in first half of 2013, which might not be soon enough for the UltimatePPC.

Addendum:

> QorIQ T1020, T1022, T1040 and previously announced T1042 all show a DIU in their
> block diagrams:
> https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?topic_id=7001&forum=3&start=746

Confirmation and more details:

http://www.freescale.com/files/training/doc/dwf/DWF13_AMF_NET_T0232.pdf (page 8)
http://www.freescale.com/files/training/doc/dwf/DWF13_AMF_NET_T1026_Ottawa.pdf (page 9)
http://www.freescale.com/files/training/doc/dwf/DWF13_AMF_NET_T1034_Ottawa.pdf (page 10)
http://www.freescale.com/files/training/doc/dwf/DWF13_QorIQ_Portfolio_SanJose.pdf (page 12)

"DIU supports video at up to 1280x1024x32bpp"
"LCD and HDMI interface (DIU) with 12 bit dual data rate"
http://lists.denx.de/pipermail/u-boot/2013-September/162473.html
https://lists.ozlabs.org/pipermail/linuxppc-dev/2013-September/111231.html


Edit: added more PDF links

[ Edited by Andreas_Wolf 27.11.2013 - 23:37 ]

Official announcement of discontinuation from a week ago, only some years late:

"About 7 years ago Gideon and I reconnected and kicked off this great adventure to build cool new hardware for the Amiga. We vowed to be better than all the other vaporware in the amiga history and create something cool. Unfortunately I failed. At the time of creating the prototype (which stirred a lot of comments on nearly everything) I got a new job that consumed all of my available time and some things happened in my personal life that upset nearly everything. Gideon plowed along on the design and PCBs but I was not able to support him on that, and the software part (my part) stalled, and then stopped. [...] I'm officially declaring the UltimatePPC the best project ever that did not make it past the prototype phase. I'll see what I can and will do with the boards we have, maybe they will go to Folkert for the future Amiga museum. As for all the other work, it might end up in another project someday."
http://www.ultimateppc.nl

Quote:

Don't forget to mention SharkPPC and Dragon, anything else?

Those days I bought a second hand Blizzard 1260 with SCSI instead of a Blizzard PPC. Few software were developed and most of them with 68k version. Later 603e I didn't think was enough for the new DVD age.
Recently I've heard about some FPGA cards for Amiga Classic and I think those make more sense than anything else for Classic today. Amiga is only 68k for me while PPC was just like a second FPU. I've never believe in OS4 PPC as well as all those managers selling gadgets. I've never understood why then some of those managers were interested in having a new AmigaOS PPC when I guess they've never spent one penny to fund Phase5 or team with them. There's a saying in my country: only who knows an art can do a company then. For sure I don't know what exactly happened, many software house passed by but that's unbelievable how someone has been always trying to market the Amiga zombie brand!

Quote:


Help compile giant list of Amiga hardware vapor


A/box
a3400
A1000+
A2200 (Computer Answers)
A5000 MK1
A5000 MK2 (Power Computing)
A6000 (Power Computing)
AA3000 (Commodore)
AHT STB
Amiga 1400 (Commodore)
Amiga 3000+ (Commodore)
Amiga 4030L Portable (Quickpak)
Amiga 4060L Portable (Quickpak)
Amiga 4040L (Quickpak)
Amiga 4060L (Quickpak)
Amiga 5050T (Quickpak)
Amiga 1630LD (Quickpak)
Amiga ED (Viscorp)
Amiga MCC (Gateway - Amiga Inc)
Amiga MCC 1000
Amiga MCC 1200
Amiga Nyx
AmigaOne 1200
AmigaOne 4000
AmigaONE 1GHz CPU module (ACK)
AmigaONE 1.7GHz CPU module (ACK)
AmigaONE Dual 7410 Cpu Module (eyetech)
AmigaOS 4 Concept Developer System (Gateway - Amiga inc)
AmiJoe
AmiRage K2
Amy05
Apollo ViperPPC
Blizzard2604
BlizzardG3
BlizzardG4
BoXeR
Brainstormer
BSC MemoryMaster 1230
BSC TurboMaster 3050
BuddhaFlash A500
C5300 workstation
C5400 workstation
CD1200 (Commodore Amiga)
CD32 Game System 030 accelerator (Commodore)
CDTV Arcnet controller
CDTV CR
CDTV CR Mpeg card
CDTV2
Coldfire4000 (1)
Commodore 2631
Comspec Arm 1000 (Amiga Rom Module for A1000)
Comspec SA500 (A500 SCSI Expansion Adapter)
CV3D Mpeg card
CyberstormG3
CyberstormG4
daVinci Gfx card
Delfina Flipper - original Zorro/PCI "flipper" board
DKB Talon - Zorro gfx
DKB Inferno - gfx addon for Wildfire
Dragon1200
Dragon4000
eClips
eflash1200
Elbox EM8400 MPEG-2 hardware decoder
Elbox ISDN PCI card
Eureka Afterburner
G-MCC
Gigatron Amiga laptop
GVP A4098
Harms TurboJet 4000
Harms TurboJet 5000
HiQ "Alpha Project"
Hombre
Hurricane
I-MCC
Impulse Multiprocessing system
Inside Out
iPhantom
Kickflash (Individual Computers)
Lepord
M-Box
Martina Sound Card
M.A.S.T Infinity Machine - expansion box for A500 with 030
Melody CDTV soundcard
MicroA1 XC
MicroA1-I
O'Connell 68K™ "classic" Amiga® compatible notebook computer
Panda
ParaGlide
Pegasos I G4 cpu boards
Pegasos I Dual cpu boards
Pegasos II Dual cpu boards
PIOS One
PowerAmiga (Escom)
PowerVixxenLT
PowerVixxenTL
Pre/box
SharkPPC
Siamese PCI
Silicon Studio - Zorro III sound
Sunrize DD-524 - optical I/O for AD-516
TeronPX (AmigaOne)
TransAM
Tsunami
UltraBus USB Zorro Card (Creative Development)
Unnamed A1200 accelerator (ACK 2004)
Unnamed A1200 modular busboard & Accelerator combo (ACK 2004)
Unnamed A500 PPC accelerator + AGA (DCE)
Unnamed Amiga compatible laptop (BoXer developers)
Unnamed Amiga PPC computer (H&P)
Unnamed Supra 040 accelerator for A3000
Unnamed Z-III AGA upgrade card
Unity Zorro PCMCIA slot
Universal Internet Television Interface - UITI (Viscorp)
Unnamed PPC405 based PDA (Amiga Inc)
VideoToaster - PAL version
Wonder TV A6000
Walker