Just noticed that there is a "new" 030-board for the A1200 available from AmigaKit and Vesalia.

http://www.vesalia.de/e_aca1231-42.htm

Anyone got any experience on these boards? Never heard of them before I accidently came over them when searching for something else in their webshops. (Yes.... I'm out shopping classic Amiga-hardware again) =)

I own a Blizzard 1230IV card in one of my A1200s, but it could be cool to get my second A1200 accelerated too......

@firestone

I'd like one of these boards as well.

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@thread

I would like to know anyones experiences with these cards too.

I know its clocked slower than a Blizzard Mark 4 (50Mhz verses ACA 42Mhz) but does the faster RAM (im guessing it has faster ram access???) make up for it?

Its a similar speed to most Vipers, Apollos & other cards on ebay.

And with prices online being a little higher for an Apollo/GVP/Viper and much higher for a Blizzard, this look attractive given it will also have a warranty & 64MB Ram (most cards online are around 16MB with 32MB seeming to add alot to price).

But im looking at setting up a second 1200 mainly for classic gaming with a compact flash card and a fast 030 on my 42inch LG, so if price:performance is just as good as a blizzard I might get one of these ACA cards.

(my "Power" 1200 is for playing the more demanding games ala Napalm, Foundation, Nightlong etc).

However what I would ultimately love is this:

Apollo 060 66Mhz!

But at £440 buy it now, i think im going to have to pass & see if I can get my own 060 working (its on the fritz again & the second SIMM socket doesnt seem to be working).

Anyone know anyone whose good at fixing Apollo boards & fitting fans/heatsinks???

(Guess I should hold out for a NatAmi........................)

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@firestone

Quite a number of people have bought these boards and all give very favourable reports on them (check out posts by Runequestor on Amiga.org)...

I've got a few Blizzard 030 boards myself and from what others have said about the ACA boards they compare very well to the Blizzard boards (just slightly slower in some benchmarks)...

Considering you would pay this price or more in the UK on eBay for a Blizzard 030 50Mhz _ 64Mb RAM, then it would probably be better purchasing the ACA board than taking a chance on an old second hand board that may or may not work...

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@Amiboy

Nice Apollo 060, I could buy that as I just sold my BlizzardPPC 040/25/603e+/160 for £490 :) although that would put me back in debt lol

Last edited by TheAMIgaOne on 10-Apr-2012 at 12:44 AM.

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@TheAMIgaOne

Noticed the prices you got for the Blizzard & The BVision...

Gawd... wonder how much my Blizzard060/PPC 60Mhz/240Mhz + 256MB ram would fetch...

Was surprised at the price the BVision went for though as one about seven months ago only got around £130 and I dropped out at £120...

Would never sell my Blizzard060 though no matter what price it could fetch, too valuable to me personally...

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Quote:

then it would probably be better purchasing the ACA board than taking a chance on an old second hand board that may or may not work

I'd say the exact opposite. The Blizzard cards are the best made, most compatible, and most reliable amiga cards. (phase 5 what do you expect?) Go look at all the threads of problems with ACA cards..

@firestone

I bought the ACA1230/56 with 64meg when they came out from Amigakit. My 1200 runs like clockwork and I have not had one single problem with the board since the day I got it and I use my 1200 every day.

I also have a blizzard 1220 in my 2nd 1200 which is not getting used at the moment. If given the choice I would always buy the ACA over the blizzard due to having the warranty from Amigakit and the board being brand new.

My 1200 runs super fast on the ACA

@Amiga1200Mark

Thanks for that Mark! Glad to hear that the cards are reliable.

Where abouts in LPool are you mate? I am only just accross the water in B'Head.

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@realize

Quote:

Go look at all the threads of problems with ACA cards..

From what I read at EAB some people had stability issues with the recent ACA 1231. Didn't Jens resolve the issue with the addition of a passive cooler?

Good board, no FPU though. I have the ACA 600 board, which is ACE! I use an Apollo 030/40 with FPU and 50ns RAM (zero wait state) on the A1200!

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@Rob

Quote:

From what I read at EAB some people had stability issues with the recent ACA 1231. Didn't Jens resolve the issue with the addition of a passive cooler?

He tried to:

http://www.amiga-news.de/en/news/AN-2012-03-00031-EN.html

but it didn't work:

http://www.amiga-news.de/en/news/AN-2012-03-00049-EN.html

Jens' last assumption (German) was that only A1200 boards with mounting errors ("Fehlbestückung" - don't ask me for details) are still having stability issues. He's currently checking that.

Wow! What a response ;)

Good to hear that there are some positive experiences with these boards. I'm completely aware that they will never be the same as the old Blizzard boards, they are awesome! I own a few of those. Had problems with boards like the Apollo 1240/25Mhz back in the days, and the Blizzard 1240/40Mhz had heatingproblems in a A1200 desktop-machine. (Anyone got solutions for that?)

I really would like my Blizzard 1240-board to work well in this machine. It works stable as soon as I open the trapdoor under the machine, and while placing the machine on a book or two to get some space between the machine and the table. (Yes, I know weird solution:) )

One last thing.... how can they still produce 030-cards in 2012? Are the processors new, or old refurbished ones? Anyway, it's a good thing to see that someone still care about these fantastic machines :)

Of course, it will never be like the old Phase5-days :)

Last edited by firestone on 11-Apr-2012 at 12:07 AM.

@firestone

i thought it was 83mhz..

With its CPU clock speed of 42 MHz* and its on-board memory clock speed of 25 x 3.333 MHz (= 83.325 MHz!), the ACA-1231 plays in the top league of 68030-based accelerator cards.

oddly written allright :D

i'll buy one too, sadly they don't have that other faster model anymore.

Last edited by Toaks on 11-Apr-2012 at 06:18 AM.

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