This probably isn't interesting to many users here, but just thought I would pass on some information I thought was interesting. I heard from a good friend who keeps up with all the latest news about any of the Amiga related platforms, and he told me that sales of the Vampire500 v2 have already surpassed 4,000 units.

I was unaware that they had fixed their manufacturing problems, and were able to produce the Vampire500 v2 so quickly. My friend has the older and less powerful version for the A600 Amiga computer, but he raves about the power it has, and how it has transformed his Amiga experience.

I am waiting until next month to order my own Vampire500 v2 board, and have not yet decided which old Amiga of mine to install it into. If it fits into my CDTV and still allows the case to be closed and look stock, as well as allows the CD drive to be used and run all of the original CDTV software, I will probably put it in that system. If not, I will probably install it into one of my A1000 systems, which is my favorite computer case design of all time.

I was wondering how many MorphOS users are planning on, or who have already purchased a Vampire600, or Vampire500 accelerator board, or if any members here are waiting to purchase the stand alone Vampire board, or the Vampire1200, if/when they are available for sale? Many people think that the stand alone Vampire board will be the next design to be produced.

I will go for the stand alone.

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Maybe it is like that for the people who haven't experienced a highend Amiga before, but for us who had an expanded RTG classic Amiga, and now much quicker PPC setups with the updated OS, I don't think it gives that kind of kicks anymore. I'm happy with my 030/50 and 060/60 classics and then MorphOS for a (big) step forward. But of course it is good to have alternatives when classic HW starts to die, but otherwise it's quite funny to see that "raving" :)

I sooner or later, will buy one for my miggy A600

I have a Vampire 600 V2 in my A600.
It really puts this old system to new heights.
Compared to my A4000 with 68060 it's a lot faster.
The digital display output can only do a stable 800x600x16. I have heard the Vampire 500 can do more as they have changed something at the hdmi connector surroundings on the board.
All in all it is my system of choice of the classic ones because I can actually do development on it and have compile times that are acceptable. With Gold2 core it's all pretty stable.
Most of the WHDLoad games work as well. So that's nice, too.

I'm currently getting my A1000 renovated to put a Vampire in.

Don't know about the standalone. Will see when it's there.


Manfred

I think it's a cool project for all the "hardcore 68k" fans. To me - it's got nothing to offer. Neither a "true retro" (for that I keep an A1200 with Blizzard IV) neither an "everyday fun/utility" machine (my PowerMac G5 stands for that). That said - there's a chance some of the "hardcore 68k" userbase will taste a fast system and crave for more (maybe MorphOS?) and apart from that many new 68k ports will work flawlessly on MorphOS.

> Vampire sales pass the 4,000 mark!!! [...] a good friend [...] told me
> that sales of the Vampire500 v2 have already surpassed 4,000 units.

Have there been only marginal sales of the Vampire 600 V2?

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The V500 board currently fits the CDTV with a special riser, which is not available yet.
See some pictures from a teammember: https://goo.gl/photos/CkMyi5ebcLerkQBF7
Also the CD drive isn't working yet, since the bootroms aren't mapped.

Yeah, this all is more or less hobby, as long as only AmigaOS3 is involved.
However, they claim that the Apollo core is as fast or even faster (considering Hyper-threading) than some of the PPC accelerators or even some of the lower spec G4s.
Together with AROS could be a nice combo.


Manfred

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I've seen those comments too, but I think they are overreaching.

Hey, enjoy it for what it is, a way to elevate the performance of legacy hardware and its OS'.
I still use legacy hardware, so I can understand the appeal.
Plus, '060 and PPC accelerators are virtually unobtainable.

AND, even though some of the Apollo team might be a little (ahem) eccentric, they did push on a get a product produced.

Good for them, and a lesson for any naysayers that think this can only be done with the funding of a corporate backer.
We CAN build what we want, if we are committed to doing so.

I'll get the Vampire 1200 when its out.

it is only a matter of time until the FPGAs are faster than any PPC accelerator. Maybe they'll pass even G4s someday, who knows. I'll buy a Vampire 1200 as soon as they are available.

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Affordable FPGAs?
At the rate they are going, I don't know that I'll live that long, so it doesn't worry me.
And to get to the level of a decent G4, they are going have to clock above 1GHz.

In the meanwhile, we have 64 bit PPCs already operating at above 2 GHz.
With a charted future of moving to X64, where the cpus top out at over twice that.
Throw in Ryzen 8 core 16 thread capability (or higher with the new ThreadRipper cpus), Intels new high core count cpus coming in September...

I honestly don't think they are ever likely to actually catch up.

BUT, its a neat move for 68K. It will make it less painful to revisit after moving to higher performing hardware.

> I honestly don't think they are ever likely to actually catch up.

As a matter of principle, FPGAs will never be as fast as the fastest then-concurrent ASICs. But then, the prospect was given for G4-type performance, not even faster PPCs.

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True, but they first G4 I owned was a 733 MHz Quicksilver that I quickly upgraded to a 933 MHz cpu then a 1GHz dual cpu, so I'm biased.

Theoretically, they might be able to match the earliest PowerMac G4s with some advances on their cpu.
But it doesn't even feature a cache yet, and I keep hearing these scaling fantasies as if all you do is turn up the clock speed and things will work correctly.
That is not how its worked in the past, and it won't work that way for the Apollo core.

> it doesn't even feature a cache yet

It does feature a 16kiB I-cache and a 32kiB D-cache:

http://wiki.apollo-accelerators.com/doku.php/apollo_core#features

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Cool. This thing evolves quicker than I can keep track.
That is a definite plus for it scaling higher.

I've always felt somewhat cautious about Gunnar's tendency toward hyperbole, his somewhat scatter-shot focus, and the feature creep (and occasional premature promises), BUT as this is shaping up its hard not to give the development team the credit they are due.
And they are advancing my all time favorite microprocessor.

Since it can already run AROS 68K, they questions about it being able to handle backported NG OS' no longer seem as unrealistic as they once might have.

Anyone feel like a return to the 68K?
I'd love to see a Amiga-like OS with a micro kernel.

And it might be...fun.

The Apollo team will really have something interesting, if they ever get the core to the point where some company or big organization that is still using 680x0 CPU's, could use a faster 680x0 CPU chip for their products, and who thinks that Gunnar's soft core 68080 is worth the financial risk to turn it into a new ASIC 680x0 CPU chip.

I'm guessing that the expense to create a new ASIC CPU is too high for what remains of the Amiga 68k community to fund, and would need to be done in larger numbers than the Amiga community can purchase, so additional parties with deep pockets, that are interested in having a faster new 680x0 CPU chip, would need to be found to make the production of such new ASIC CPU chips feasible.

How fast could Gunnar's soft core 68080 be clocked, if produced as a new ASIC cpu chip, I don't know, but I'm guessing that it could easily be 2 to 5 times faster than any FPGA available to put the soft core into today.

I know there has been some discussion about the possibility of a new ASIC cpu chip being produced, but I don't know how feasible such discussions have been. Easy to dream of stuff, but much harder to make the dreams become real hardware. I think it is impressive that the Apollo team has gotten as far as they are today, and that they still have room to improve the design, as well as use better and faster FPGA chips to make it go faster. I also think they were smart by including Picasso96 compatibility, and getting HDMI output to work (apparently with some limitations).

[ Edited by amigadave 29.06.2017 - 16:26 ]

The Vampire will definately be fast enough one day to run MorphOS 3.x on it in a good speed. Maybe a 68k Port wouldnt hurt and we would gain some more MorphOS users :P

68060 speed, no MMU, no FPU, no 3D.
There will be no revolution. Vampire is too slow, too overpriced for people outside Amiga community.
Market will saturate, and sales will drop.
For Amiga NG users Amiga OS 4 and MOS still offer better performance.

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10 years ago, gvb and his grouppies wrote the same.
10 years passed and performance is still 68060 level.

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They have just demo'd a soft fpu package that, while it isn't as fast as an '040 or '060 fpu, is faster than a 68882.
MMU I'm not that worried about.
And unless you go RTG, 68K doesn't really have 3D.

I'm surprised they sold 4000 without saturating the market.
How many functioning Amigas are left on the planet?

And of course PPC NG users get better performance.
You're preaching to the choir again.

> They have just demo'd a soft fpu package that [...] is faster than a 68882.

In tests performed by ALB42, the 50 MHz 68882 is between 1.8 and 17 times as fast as Vampire SoftFPU:

https://blog.alb42.de/2017/06/29/an-replacement/

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Worthwhile correction, 1.7-17 times, eh?
Missed that and went by a post on YouTube.
I stand corrected.

Maybe they ought to talk to Thomas and see if he has any of those relabeled '133FE' cpus left (although those didn't have an fpu did they, or was it just the MMU missing?).

Ah well, whenever their 'charismatic' leader gets around to it (a real fpu).

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@Cego, NO, just plain NO! Don't try to preach fantasy crap here, stick with the facts and reasonable opinions please. MorphOS users already have a better solution for running Amiga 68k software natively, and games through E-UAE. Unless a MorphOS user still has an old Amiga computer stored somewhere, they are not likely to become a Vampire customer.

@ppcamiga1, Your just pissed off that the Vampire is such a success, and has sold almost as many products as the entire PPC NG Amiga communities combined (I predict that they will easily surpass all AmigaOne and MorphOS sales, if they ever release an A1200 version of the Vampire). Get it through your head that the Vampire is not directly competing against PPC NG Amiga-like systems, and no matter how much fud you try to spread about the Vampire and Gunnar, no one is listening, and the users seem to be happy as they can be with the product and the progress being made.

@Jim, just think how much the sales will increase once they come out with an A1200 version of the Vampire, or the stand alone unit. There are probably still millions of Amiga computers still being used or stored by current and former Amiga users. Sure, most of the remaining working Amiga computers are held by a few thousand Amiga hoarders (like me, though I have paired down my collection in recent years, Trevor Dickinson, and many others, who have a dozen or more Amigas in their collections. In Trevor's case, it is dozens and dozens of old computers in his collection).

Personally, I don't think that the Apollo guys are even getting close to saturating the market for the Vampire products, but I do agree that there is almost zero interest in a Vampire accelerator outside the existing active Amiga community, or former Amiga users who still have an Amiga or two stored in their attic, basement, or the back of their closet.

The hardest part to keep sales going will probably be figuring out how to get the news about the Vampire accelerators out to those former Amiga users who might have unused Amiga computers stored somewhere in their house, or their parents houses, and enticing them into bringing those Amigas out to play again.

One of the greatest thing about the Vampire products is that development appears to be very active, and it will continue to get better in the future.