@m3x

The Amiga ransom system strikes again! I'm more than willing to contribute time and material resources to an open project, but I've already given money to both ACube and Hyperion. Cheers to you and ACube for complying with the GPL and posting the Sam400ep U-Boot source, but Hyperion really needs to step up and play by the rules (read: law) where the AmigaOne is concerned.

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Sam440ep-flex 733 MHz/1 GB RAM/Radeon 9250/AmigaOS4.1 Update 2
borked A1200/Blizzard1260+SCSI-IV/Z4+MediatorZIV/Deneb/Voodoo3/CatweaselMk3
more borked A1200/MBX1200z/Indivision
A500/clockport/RRNet
A600/A603

@Trev

Quote:

Re: PCI bridges, the specifications published by PCI-SIG are quite easy to find. Also, most of MindShare's books on system architecture, e.g. ISA System Architecture, PCI System Architecture, and Universal Serial Bus System Architecture, are posted on their web site in PDF form. Google is your friend. (Is that a mantra now?)

I also have a pile of PDFs from teh PCI SIG from the PCI-Express 1 days, and PCI-32. I no longer have access to that stuff for newer spec releases though. :( But that and the few books I have should be a good start.

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@billt

Just do a quick search. A lot of universities have the specifications posted on public servers. If you have a bit of cash to spare each year, membership in the ACM or the IEEE Computer Society is useful as well.

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Sam440ep-flex 733 MHz/1 GB RAM/Radeon 9250/AmigaOS4.1 Update 2
borked A1200/Blizzard1260+SCSI-IV/Z4+MediatorZIV/Deneb/Voodoo3/CatweaselMk3
more borked A1200/MBX1200z/Indivision
A500/clockport/RRNet
A600/A603

@number6

I'm starting to feel like a bounty spammer. :p And how many of mine have been accepted, vs how many are stagnant?

Besides, bounties need a decent description of the goals. A bounty that only says "update uboot" isn't likely to be acceptable. What needs updated? What needs added? What needs fixed? Perhaps after we have a lot more of this figured out we can consider a bounty.

My requests that I can remember at the moment:
1. If possible fix any known remaining Articia bugs. Hans mentioned recently a PCI 33MHz slot graphics problem I wasnt' aware of. What others?
2. Fix/Add device scanning across heirarchical PCI bridge/switch trees.
3. Implement software workaround for detecting PCI-Express gen1 devices on a PCI-Express Gen2 switch, where the Gen1 device does not honor certain gen1 reserved bits. See PLX Technologies website for more info.
4. Add boot support from additional SATA/IDE devices. I have one in particular in mind that I want to play with, but a couple others as well.
5. Update x86 BIOS emulator to latest version. Consider if fixing ATI AIW8500-DV (any others??) unimplemented instruction(s) is worth doing if not already in current codebase.

What else?

Last edited by billt on 02-Feb-2010 at 07:25 PM.
Last edited by billt on 02-Feb-2010 at 12:01 AM.
Last edited by billt on 01-Feb-2010 at 10:51 PM.

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

Another thing I remember having an issue with in the past was an unimplemented instruction error in the x86 BIOS emulator for an ATI All-In-Wonder 8500-DE (includes a Firewire port) model. hadn't seen that with anything other than that one model. Maybe doesn't even matter anymore as we're better off with newer models, but perhaps we should consider if anything is lacking in that part of things as well.

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@Trev

I've thought about joining the IEEE Computer society. I bought an article on FPGA partial self-reconfiguration a week or two ago from them. Don't know the ACM. I'd really like to join IEEE proper and have access to more things, but it's also more expensive. The wife is encouraging me to think more of our expectant baby than things like that. Don't tell her about this project. :)

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@billt

The x86emu implementation should probably be kept in sync with the current X.org implementation (EDIT2: now that SciTech is defunct). I'll check later, but is ours the only U-Boot board dependent on x86emu (EDIT3: not counting the Sam400ep or other U-Boot forks)?

EDIT: Well, being an ACM or IEEE member isn't a bad thing. Looks good on a CV/resume, regardless. My wife has been encouraging me to join IEEE, as she's in the sciences (PhD in pathology). I prefer the ACM, though, as their focus is on computation. For the money, the ACM also provides better resources. We get access to IEEE docs through her university association, too.

Last edited by Trev on 01-Feb-2010 at 11:09 PM.
Last edited by Trev on 01-Feb-2010 at 11:08 PM.
Last edited by Trev on 01-Feb-2010 at 11:07 PM.

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Sam440ep-flex 733 MHz/1 GB RAM/Radeon 9250/AmigaOS4.1 Update 2
borked A1200/Blizzard1260+SCSI-IV/Z4+MediatorZIV/Deneb/Voodoo3/CatweaselMk3
more borked A1200/MBX1200z/Indivision
A500/clockport/RRNet
A600/A603

@all

I think I've found the real reason things move so slowly around AmigaOS 4 development. All of Belgium's computing resources have been devoted to this.

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Sam440ep-flex 733 MHz/1 GB RAM/Radeon 9250/AmigaOS4.1 Update 2
borked A1200/Blizzard1260+SCSI-IV/Z4+MediatorZIV/Deneb/Voodoo3/CatweaselMk3
more borked A1200/MBX1200z/Indivision
A500/clockport/RRNet
A600/A603

@billt

Quote:

Besides, bounties need a decent description of the goals. A bounty that only says "update uboot" isn't likely to be acceptable. What needs updated? What needs added? What needs fixed? Perhaps after we have a lot more of this figured out we can consider a bounty.

Sound advice imo. A little research could save a lot of agony later.

#6

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This posting, in its entirety, represents solely the perspective of the author.
*Secrecy has served us so well*

@number6

Quote:

number6 wrote: @billt Quote: Besides, bounties need a decent description of the goals. A bounty that only says "update uboot" isn't likely to be acceptable. What needs updated? What needs added? What needs fixed? Perhaps after we have a lot more of this figured out we can consider a bounty. Sound advice imo. A little research could save a lot of agony later. #6

Have a look at the bug list. Having bug number 148 fixed would be great.

Hans

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http://hdrlab.org.nz/ - Amiga OS 4 projects, programming articles and more. Home of the RadeonHD driver for Amiga OS 4.x project.
https://keasigmadelta.com/ - More of my work.

@Trev

Quote:

Trev wrote: EDIT: Well, being an ACM or IEEE member isn't a bad thing. Looks good on a CV/resume, regardless. My wife has been encouraging me to join IEEE, as she's in the sciences (PhD in pathology). I prefer the ACM, though, as their focus is on computation. For the money, the ACM also provides better resources. We get access to IEEE docs through her university association, too.

For me the decision to choose the IEEE was a no-brainer because I'm interested in more than just "computing machinery." ACM and the IEEE Computer Society work closely together on a lot of things, and I think that you'll find that most papers are available in both of their respective digital libraries. Having said that, I've never been an ACM member, so I don't know what else they offer. If you're interests include other parts of electrical engineering, and/or robotics/mechatronics, etc., then IEEE is the way to go, IMHO.

Hans

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http://hdrlab.org.nz/ - Amiga OS 4 projects, programming articles and more. Home of the RadeonHD driver for Amiga OS 4.x project.
https://keasigmadelta.com/ - More of my work.

@Trev

Quote:

The x86emu implementation should probably be kept in sync with the current X.org implementation

Where in the x.org source does this thing live?

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@m3x

Any chance we can get a description of what all is involved? Sure, gcc, but what additional steps are there to take compiled code, and convert it to a flash image to our chips and the floppy/iso/ftp image files as we've used for previous updates and into our yet-to-be secondary flash chips?

I suppose you can't show us how to add the OS4 dongle code, but a flow for everything we can do for a Linux uboot would be good to know.

And an address to jump to dongle code would be sweet, if sharable, so we could make a smart flash switcher to jump to the protected 1.1.1 uboot we already have with the OS4 stuff in it. Though I'm not sure that would be allowed to share, it'd be great if you can.

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@Geri

Quote:

I was thinking about ordering these PLCC plugs:

What about asking DCE where they get PLCC plugs for the MiniMegiChip, or whoever else makes such things in our world? The pics of this thing at AmigaKit it looks like a smaller height, possibly more commercial build PLCC plug than the pics I've seen at these other two sources. Are thre other products that have plugs, or is this pretty much it these days?

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@billt @Geri

Here's a European source, is this what you're looking for?
Richard.

@Geri

What PCB software do you use?

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@Draby

I've emailed them about buying in USA where I am as well. I was hoping for SMT version, the W9324, but he pix at your site of that one look double-stacked and tall. I think we want as thin and low-profile as possible. I've asked about their thinnest version (smallest E dimension in datasheet) of 7.2mm which is smaller than the epboard ones I ordered at 10.16mm tall.

Though with currency exchanges, the epboard ones look a lot cheaper from my US$ point of view. :)

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!

@billt

Quote:

Where in the x.org source does this thing live?

http://cgit.freedesktop.org/xorg/xserver/tree/hw/xfree86/

I don't follow the X.Org v. XFree86 mess, so one could have fixes or functionality the other doesn't have.

Many of the modules are related, and the code in the xfree86 directory covers a wide range of display adapter topics.

_________________
Sam440ep-flex 733 MHz/1 GB RAM/Radeon 9250/AmigaOS4.1 Update 2
borked A1200/Blizzard1260+SCSI-IV/Z4+MediatorZIV/Deneb/Voodoo3/CatweaselMk3
more borked A1200/MBX1200z/Indivision
A500/clockport/RRNet
A600/A603

@billt

I use the ELDK 4.2 package, freely available from Denx (ppc-linux-x86 version)

About the steps required to build a flash image, as already happens with the Sam version, it will be as simple as typing:

"make AmigaOneG3SE_config"
"make && make updater"

to have an u-boot updater as we're used with the previous AmigaOne updates (this mean everybody will be able to recompile and create an updater at will, linux version only)

I cannot share any info on the AOS4 dongle-code, apart that IMO, it's not possible to make a flash switcher in the way it was suggested before.

_________________
Massimiliano Tretene, ACube Systems, Soft3

@m3x

Quote:

IMO, it's not possible to make a flash switcher in the way it was suggested before.

Bummer. At least we can test in Linux before proposing OS4 tests for things to you or whoever else can help with that part.

Last edited by billt on 02-Feb-2010 at 08:15 PM.

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All glory to the Hypnotoad!