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  • Jim
  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Jim
    Posts: 4977 from 2009/1/28
    From: Delaware, USA
    Yes, we pretty much knew the SB600 was the likely choice for the X1000, before the full specs were released (in fact it was spotted in photos before Aeon released those specs).

    Andreas and I had been discussing a 8640/8640 based system and the SB600 looked like the only well documented Southbridge that could be used as a substitute for the ULi Southbridge that Freescale had been using on their evaluation boards.
    I actually have a notebook filled with notations for the pin equivalencies between the SB600 and the ULi Southbridge.

    Basically, at the time the SB700/750 wasn't well documented, and the latter chips hadn't been introduced yet.

    The SB600 was a really good option. I liked it as it was fully documented, available, and had agood feature set.

    What else would have been used at the time of development?
    "Never attribute to malice what can more readily explained by incompetence"
  • »03.03.18 - 16:36
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  • Caterpillar
    Caterpillar
    xilinder
    Posts: 39 from 2018/2/1
    From: USA
    > Can you make a photo of yours and upload somewhere?

    When I pull the cooler off I will, but it might be awhile.

    I have not dug into what the various southbridge, specialty chips contain. Perhaps one of them has more easily supported network or sound or something(?).

    If for example one was connected to one or two PCIe lanes it might have provided two more PCI slots for lower demanding add in cards splitting the load on the other chip.
    Or also connect the XMOS chip to the second 'southbridge' instead of the localbus.
    Speaking of XMOS, it sure would have been nice if its xena slot were PCI.

    I do like the PA6T. Its kind of a desktop oriented POWER series chip.

    I guess cost was a big factor.
  • »03.03.18 - 17:12
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  • Jim
  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Jim
    Posts: 4977 from 2009/1/28
    From: Delaware, USA
    >Perhaps one of them has more easily supported network or sound or something(?).

    Nah, the PA6T isn't an SOC like the P5020 (where networking is built into the processor).
    And the X1000 uses a standard PC Southbridge and NIC.

    The only thing that might have made support easier is using a more common NIC.
    Obviously the controller built into the PCI cards was fairly easy to support.

    And from the POV of necessity, only the Tabor with its P1022 cpu really must have a driver for the on chip NIC, because that system has limited expansion capabilities.

    The X1000 and X5000 can easily use plug in network or wireless boards.
    "Never attribute to malice what can more readily explained by incompetence"
  • »03.03.18 - 18:18
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  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Andreas_Wolf
    Posts: 12079 from 2003/5/22
    From: Germany
    > I have not dug into what the various southbridge, specialty chips contain.
    > Perhaps one of them has more easily supported network or sound or something(?).

    The M1575 offers Ethernet, but as Jim said, it wasn‘t available anymore when the Nemo board was designed.
    You previously bemoaned that with a PCI NIC connected to the SB600, the network traffic would have to go through the southbridge. How would that be different with a southbridge incorporating the Ethernet controller? And what‘s wrong with the SB600‘s audio?

    > If for example one was connected to one or two PCIe lanes it might have provided
    > two more PCI slots for lower demanding add in cards

    As said, all of the PA6T’s PCIe lanes are in use, so dedicating some to PCI would have impacted the PCIe capability. Also, two more PCI slots would have required the space of at least two of the PCIe slots, resulting in only few PCIe expansion options. I don‘t think that would have been welcomed by potential customers. And I believe two legacy PCI slots should suffice.
    Btw, a southbridge chip is extreme overkill just for providing PCI slots. A mere PCIe-to-PCI bridge chip (as used on Cyrus Plus) would do.

    > Or also connect the XMOS chip to the second 'southbridge' instead of the localbus.

    A-Eon seemed very fond of Xena’s tight integration with the PA6T.
  • »03.03.18 - 20:57
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  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Andreas_Wolf
    Posts: 12079 from 2003/5/22
    From: Germany
    > the PA6T isn't an SOC like the P5020 (where networking is built into the processor).

    The PA6T has a GbE controller, which is precisely what‘s supported by Linux with no problem and by OS4 with a non-public beta driver. That‘s why normal OS4 users have to use a supported NIC in a PCI(e) slot.

    > The only thing that might have made support easier is using a more common NIC.

    Nemo has only one on-board NIC, and that‘s the GbE one built into the PA6T.
  • »03.03.18 - 21:15
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  • Jim
  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Jim
    Posts: 4977 from 2009/1/28
    From: Delaware, USA
    Quote:

    Andreas_Wolf wrote:
    > the PA6T isn't an SOC like the P5020 (where networking is built into the processor).

    The PA6T has a GbE controller, which is precisely what‘s supported by Linux with no problem and by OS4 with a non-public beta driver. That‘s why normal OS4 users have to use a supported NIC in a PCI(e) slot.

    > The only thing that might have made support easier is using a more common NIC.

    Nemo has only one on-board NIC, and that‘s the GbE one built into the PA6T.


    I wasn't aware of that feature of the PA6T, but they could have incorporated a separate NIC.
    Still, the network card seems like an entirely adequate solution.
    "Never attribute to malice what can more readily explained by incompetence"
  • »04.03.18 - 04:47
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  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Andreas_Wolf
    Posts: 12079 from 2003/5/22
    From: Germany
    > I wasn't aware of that feature of the PA6T

    It also has 10GbE, btw.

    > but they could have incorporated a separate NIC.

    Yes, in that case they would surely have used an OS4-supported GbE NIC like the RTL8169.
  • »04.03.18 - 09:38
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  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    amigadave
    Posts: 2794 from 2006/3/21
    From: Northern Calif...
    Quote:

    Andreas_Wolf wrote:
    > the PA6T isn't an SOC like the P5020 (where networking is built into the processor).

    The PA6T has a GbE controller, which is precisely what‘s supported by Linux with no problem and by OS4 with a non-public beta driver. That‘s why normal OS4 users have to use a supported NIC in a PCI(e) slot.

    > The only thing that might have made support easier is using a more common NIC.

    Nemo has only one on-board NIC, and that‘s the GbE one built into the PA6T.


    Do you happen to know what the limitations, and/or problems are with the "non-public beta driver" for the PA6T's built in NIC are, which are keeping it from being released as the default NIC to use while running AmigaOS4.1FE? IIRC, that beta driver is included on one of the AmigaOS4.1 installation CD/DVD's, but is not included as the default driver, and must be installed, or configured manually, if the user wants to try out the beta driver for the PA6T's onboard NIC. I would like to try it out the next time I decide to turn on and use my X1000 (which I must admit, has seen very little use for a long time, but now that I have updated my Hollywood programming language to the latest versions, I am hoping to use my X1000 several times a week, to learn more about programming with Hollywood).
    MorphOS - The best Next Gen Amiga choice.
  • »22.03.18 - 16:34
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  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Andreas_Wolf
    Posts: 12079 from 2003/5/22
    From: Germany
    > Do you happen to know what the limitations, and/or problems are with the
    > "non-public beta driver" for the PA6T's built in NIC are [...]? IIRC, that
    > beta driver is included on one of the AmigaOS4.1 installation CD/DVD's

    See comment #981. What's linked from there is all I know.
  • »22.03.18 - 20:52
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  • Yokemate of Keyboards
    Yokemate of Keyboards
    Andreas_Wolf
    Posts: 12079 from 2003/5/22
    From: Germany
    >>> Cyborg [...] was never sent another Nemo board to complete it.

    >> If you take the time to read his posting to the end you‘ll find
    >> that he writes he was sent a replacement by A-Eon in 2015.

    > Yes, few years late when he was under heavy x5000 development
    > or similar. This gap to task wait seems to be crucial since there
    > seems to be no one else assigned to task.

    It seems that whenever he retells the story, the time he got his replacement board keeps being 2 years in the past ;-)

    http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&u=https://www.os4welt.de/viewtopic.php?p=37316%23p37316
  • »12.01.20 - 16:55
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