Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
adrianchadd.blogspot.com
Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
1–10 of 30 posts
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#2This is an excellent way to preserve classic machines. There are lots of projects out there for new PCBs, new accelerators, new replacements for Amiga custom chips and so on, just as there are new updates to AmigaDOS (up to 3.2.1, which was released last year). For example:
https://github.com/endofexclusive/deniser
https://github.com/LIV2/Bluster
https://github.com/jbilander/ReAgnus
https://www.tindie.com/products/bobsbits/a500-amiga-500-repl...
https://github.com/terriblefire
Add the PiStorm, and you've got multiple ways to keep old hardware running while enjoying advantages of new hardware.
Lots of people are too young to remember using Amigas, but any programmer of modern systems could learn lots from seeing firsthand how incredibly efficient Amigas are.
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#3There is a great series on YouTube about "Building the Worlds Newest A500". It looks to be the same PCB, but with a different case.
Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECu6i6WR7mo
Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87q-TTG48Ew
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#4This is an excellent way to preserve classic machines. There are lots of projects out there for new PCBs, new accelerators, new replacements for Amiga custom chips and so on, just as there are new updates to AmigaDOS (up to 3.2.1, which was released last year). For example: https://github.com/endofexclusive/deniser https://github.com/LIV2/Bluster https://github.com/jbilander/ReAgnus https://www.tindie.com/products/bo…
> but any programmer of modern systems could learn lots from seeing firsthand how incredibly efficient Amigas are.
Agreed. Much of the Amiga's OS was quite elegant in my opinion. Everything was reachable by a linked list. Start with AbsExecBase (0x00000004) and traverse the linked lists from there to find virtually anything/everything. (Intution objects included).
If it wasn't for bit planes and lack of memory protection, I think it would have had a fighting chance (oh, and if not for C= incredibly horrific management).
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#5This is an excellent way to preserve classic machines. There are lots of projects out there for new PCBs, new accelerators, new replacements for Amiga custom chips and so on, just as there are new updates to AmigaDOS (up to 3.2.1, which was released last year). For example: https://github.com/endofexclusive/deniser https://github.com/LIV2/Bluster https://github.com/jbilander/ReAgnus https://www.tindie.com/products/bo…
> but any programmer of modern systems could learn lots from seeing firsthand how incredibly efficient Amigas are. Agreed. Much of the Amiga's OS was quite elegant in my opinion. Everything was reachable by a linked list. Start with AbsExecBase (0x00000004) and traverse the linked lists from there to find virtually anything/everything. (Intution objects included). If it wasn't for bit planes and lack of memory protec…
Obviously, the lack of memory protection was what enabled the global AbsExecBase implementation to begin with. I guess it would be possible to implement as a shared read-only page mapped into each process in a protected environment, but not sure about how the details would look.
Of course the highly integrated custom chips were also a great thing to have, and made very low-level programming fantastically easy and powerful. The OS was great, but there was also the almost parallel universe of low-level programming. When you hit the bare metal on an Amiga, it sings.
And it sure felt like it had a fighting chance, it was easily the best computer platform for a number of years. Oh to be young again, and so on. :)
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#6Love this. Kind of inspired me to take another look at my Atari ST... good times.
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#7This is an excellent way to preserve classic machines. There are lots of projects out there for new PCBs, new accelerators, new replacements for Amiga custom chips and so on, just as there are new updates to AmigaDOS (up to 3.2.1, which was released last year). For example: https://github.com/endofexclusive/deniser https://github.com/LIV2/Bluster https://github.com/jbilander/ReAgnus https://www.tindie.com/products/bo…
>deniser
GPLv2, OSH, great.
>Bluster
CERN OHL 1.2, OSH, great.
>ReAgnus
CC-By-SA. Not the best license for hardware, but technically OSH. Good.
>A500++
I understand directly based on A500+. Might be legally dodgy. But it is good that it exists, for preservation.
>TerribleFire
Mix of licenses in their projects. Some of them are OSH (great).
But some of them are not, due to restrictions on commercial use and/or derivatives.
From the above, I gather the one remaining big item that's not yet covered is the PAULA chip.
It seems we're getting close to an open hardware chip-by-chip whole ECS Amiga remake.
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#8This is an excellent way to preserve classic machines. There are lots of projects out there for new PCBs, new accelerators, new replacements for Amiga custom chips and so on, just as there are new updates to AmigaDOS (up to 3.2.1, which was released last year). For example: https://github.com/endofexclusive/deniser https://github.com/LIV2/Bluster https://github.com/jbilander/ReAgnus https://www.tindie.com/products/bo…
> but any programmer of modern systems could learn lots from seeing firsthand how incredibly efficient Amigas are. Agreed. Much of the Amiga's OS was quite elegant in my opinion. Everything was reachable by a linked list. Start with AbsExecBase (0x00000004) and traverse the linked lists from there to find virtually anything/everything. (Intution objects included). If it wasn't for bit planes and lack of memory protec…
>(oh, and if not for C= incredibly horrific management).
I believe that to be the real, non-surmountable problem.
Newer generations with better hardware and memory protection would have been totally possible.
Virtualization could have taken care of backwards compatibility.
Some practical modern examples include:
- Whdload, which patch and wrap floppy-booted games so that they can run from the harddisk, allowing for returning back to multitasking when done, with optional MMU protection.
- AROS, an AmigaOS-like open source OS, which can run classic Amiga software through reasonably well integrated emulation.
- MorphOS, a PowerPC AmigaOS-like OS with similar slick emulator integration.
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
> but any programmer of modern systems could learn lots from seeing firsthand how incredibly efficient Amigas are. Agreed. Much of the Amiga's OS was quite elegant in my opinion. Everything was reachable by a linked list. Start with AbsExecBase (0x00000004) and traverse the linked lists from there to find virtually anything/everything. (Intution objects included). If it wasn't for bit planes and lack of memory protec…
Obviously, the lack of memory protection was what enabled the global AbsExecBase implementation to begin with. I guess it would be possible to implement as a shared read-only page mapped into each process in a protected environment, but not sure about how the details would look. Of course the highly integrated custom chips were also a great thing to have, and made very low-level programming fantastically easy and pow…
>I guess it would be possible to implement as a shared read-only page mapped into each process in a protected environment, but not sure about how the details would look.
The main issue is the passing of pointers to physical memory through exec messages.
Of course, with a flag day and some virtualization to make up for it, it would have been possible to run old software on new hardware and a protected AmigaOS.
Re: Damnit I slipped and (mostly) built an Amiga 500
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
> but any programmer of modern systems could learn lots from seeing firsthand how incredibly efficient Amigas are. Agreed. Much of the Amiga's OS was quite elegant in my opinion. Everything was reachable by a linked list. Start with AbsExecBase (0x00000004) and traverse the linked lists from there to find virtually anything/everything. (Intution objects included). If it wasn't for bit planes and lack of memory protec…
>(oh, and if not for C= incredibly horrific management). I believe that to be the real, non-surmountable problem. Newer generations with better hardware and memory protection would have been totally possible. Virtualization could have taken care of backwards compatibility. Some practical modern examples include: - Whdload, which patch and wrap floppy-booted games so that they can run from the harddisk, allowing for r…
memory protection would be hard I think, right? The whole OS was based around message passing by just linking a message to the target process message port pointer.
edit: but, as per your other comment, you know that. How do you see protection working in amigaOS? Just share the pages that are needed for messaging and protect everything else?