Poster | Thread |
Raffaele
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 9:17:55
| | [ #21 ] |
|
|
|
Super Member |
Joined: 7-Dec-2005 Posts: 1906
From: Naples, Italy | | |
|
| @olegil
Thanks for explaining that costs of FPGA are ridicolously high. I was not aware of that.
So to be realistic, what about a 60/70 max 79 US$ Minimig then? _________________ "When the Amiga came out, everyone [at Apple] was scared as hell." (J.L. Gassée, former CEO of Apple France and chief of devs of Mac II-fx, interviewed by Amazing Computing, Nov 1996). |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Rob
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 10:49:26
| | [ #22 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 20-Mar-2003 Posts: 6351
From: S.Wales | | |
|
| @Raffaele
FPGA costs are ridiculously low compared to an ASIC with an error or just an ASIC if you aree doing small runs. |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Raffaele
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 11:14:01
| | [ #23 ] |
|
|
|
Super Member |
Joined: 7-Dec-2005 Posts: 1906
From: Naples, Italy | | |
|
| @Rob
And this gratuituos exit about ASIC chips what does it means? Are there ASICs in Minimig? _________________ "When the Amiga came out, everyone [at Apple] was scared as hell." (J.L. Gassée, former CEO of Apple France and chief of devs of Mac II-fx, interviewed by Amazing Computing, Nov 1996). |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
broadblues
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 11:22:43
| | [ #24 ] |
|
|
|
Amiga Developer Team |
Joined: 20-Jul-2004 Posts: 4446
From: Portsmouth England | | |
|
| @Raffaele
He's pointing out that the thing you complain about be "ridculously expensive" is by far the cheapest solution to the hardware emulation problem, certainly at the volume you would be selling minimig types products at.
_________________ BroadBlues On Blues BroadBlues On Amiga Walker Broad |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
TRIPOS
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 12:00:50
| | [ #25 ] |
|
|
|
Super Member |
Joined: 4-Apr-2014 Posts: 1205
From: Unknown | | |
|
| |
Status: Offline |
|
|
TRIPOS
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 12:04:19
| | [ #26 ] |
|
|
|
Super Member |
Joined: 4-Apr-2014 Posts: 1205
From: Unknown | | |
|
| @kolla
Quote:
kolla wrote: The so called NG OSes are just as retro as their ancestor, there's fundamentally nothing different about them |
Not true, there were many updates to make them run on modern H/W and many other updates as well, especially in MorphOS. This is definitely not minor at all. But I know you mean stuff like 64-bit, SMP, etc. Which can't be there in a binary compatible Amiga environment. |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
TRIPOS
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 12:11:07
| | [ #27 ] |
|
|
|
Super Member |
Joined: 4-Apr-2014 Posts: 1205
From: Unknown | | |
|
| @Chuckt
Quote:
Chuckt wrote: In about 24 hours, this project was funded 640% with 28 days to go. People want this made. The target was $50K and it has surpassed $320K. |
Demand-driven development instead of wierd tech driven development ("Hmm, let's use PPC, not because it's fast, cheap or good in any way, but because it's not Intel, and let's use this cool CPU called PA6T that I have read so much about, it's mythical, doesn't matter that it's dead and end-of-line, and let's make something that will make people think of the old Zorro expansion, hmm, "Xorro" - "What is 'X'?", WOW now we have something, this can be used for... eh... uhm, well I'm sure there will be lots of use of it. Oops, the system now cost €3000, but hey, Amigas has always been expensive, right?")
Quote:
This is why new hardware is needed. |
Not really. New H/W comes all the time. There are plenty of H/W everywhere, including this $9 machine!
|
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Fransexy
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 13:10:21
| | [ #28 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 8-Jun-2004 Posts: 2334
From: Elche (Alicante), spain | | |
|
| @TRIPOS
Quote:
let's use this cool CPU called PA6T that I have read so much about, it's mythical, doesn't matter that it's dead and end-of-line |
PA6T was very good choice back then and not dead or end of line; it was pity that Apple buy it but this was "AFTER" the choice was made. Remember that the iphone ARM cpu (that probably you admire) are designed by the PA6T team. So if the purchase was not been made all these skills would have been used in impove the PA6T line and now would have PA semi PowerPC line of cpus with more cores, more powerfull and much much more electricity efficients. Blame Apple on this and not to A-eon_________________ No PowerPC, No Fun Make Amiga Great Again |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Fransexy
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 13:54:39
| | [ #29 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 8-Jun-2004 Posts: 2334
From: Elche (Alicante), spain | | |
|
| |
Status: Offline |
|
|
smf
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 14:43:51
| | [ #30 ] |
|
|
|
Regular Member |
Joined: 15-Mar-2003 Posts: 333
From: Växjö, Sweden | | |
|
| This device might sound cheap but with the international shipping added it will cost me almost as much as a raspberry2. I hope they can lower the shipping price somehow, $20 dollars to ship this is way too much.
|
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Kronos
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 15:07:17
| | [ #31 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 8-Mar-2003 Posts: 2562
From: Unknown | | |
|
| @Fransexy
Not sure what your talking bout (but must be something very different to what TRIPOS wrote)....
PASemi and it's P6T were dead in thw water YEARS before Trevor even thought about doing a motherboard.
It was only available as NOS (military) surplus and thats why prices went sky high even on the tiny demand created by AEon.
What if PASemin had not been bought of by Apple ? Just as dead/obsolete as "current" PPC chips by FreeScale or AMCC as their whole modus operandi was based on the flawed idea that Apple would need a dual core PPC chip to update the PowerBooks in 2006 and beyond when in reality Apple had allready had decided much earlier to drop PPC.
With Apple dropping PPC there was no market for desktop/laptop suitable PPC-CPUs and even the market share in embeeded has been declining eversince. _________________ - We don't need good ideas, we haven't run out on bad ones yet - blame Canada |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
amigang
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 15:08:22
| | [ #32 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 12-Jan-2005 Posts: 2024
From: Cheshire, England | | |
|
| I have been more and more tempted with a raspberry pi for some little project but just dont have the time and the fact that actually sometimes an old PC is better and cheaper, in fact there are places that give you old computer for free, ( http://www.freebyte.com/free_computers/ ) ok the size and power of these new little computers are great, and maybe I might get into it. _________________ AmigaNG, YouTube, LeaveReality Studio |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Hillbillylitre
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 15:26:49
| | [ #33 ] |
|
|
|
Regular Member |
Joined: 4-Apr-2015 Posts: 270
From: Unknown | | |
|
| @Fransexy Quote:
PA6T was very good choice back then and not dead or end of line |
PPC was a wrong choice already in the nineties. The right choice would have been to follow the marked and the software developers choice of hardware platform, me think.Last edited by Hillbillylitre on 09-May-2015 at 03:27 PM.
_________________ Using: One Commodore C64 - One Commodore Amiga 500 - One Commodore Amiga 1200 with BVision and Blizzard 68060 with PPC coprocessor running Amiga DOS - One Hellbillylitre Amigatwox86x64x6000x running Windows7 |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Fransexy
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 16:18:50
| | [ #34 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 8-Jun-2004 Posts: 2334
From: Elche (Alicante), spain | | |
|
| @Hillbillylitre
Quote:
Hillbillylitre wrote: @Fransexy Quote:
PA6T was very good choice back then and not dead or end of line |
PPC was a wrong choice already in the nineties. The right choice would have been to follow the marked and the software developers choice of hardware platform, me think.
|
as a proverb in my country says: "to past bull we are all bullfighters"Last edited by Fransexy on 09-May-2015 at 04:20 PM. Last edited by Fransexy on 09-May-2015 at 04:19 PM.
_________________ No PowerPC, No Fun Make Amiga Great Again |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Chuckt
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 17:14:56
| | [ #35 ] |
|
|
|
Regular Member |
Joined: 22-Feb-2008 Posts: 445
From: Unknown | | |
|
| @TRIPOS
Quote:
TRIPOS wrote: @Chuckt
Quote:
Chuckt wrote: In about 24 hours, this project was funded 640% with 28 days to go. People want this made. The target was $50K and it has surpassed $320K. |
Demand-driven development instead of wierd tech driven development ("Hmm, let's use PPC, not because it's fast, cheap or good in any way, but because it's not Intel, and let's use this cool CPU called PA6T that I have read so much about, it's mythical, doesn't matter that it's dead and end-of-line, and let's make something that will make people think of the old Zorro expansion, hmm, "Xorro" - "What is 'X'?", WOW now we have something, this can be used for... eh... uhm, well I'm sure there will be lots of use of it. Oops, the system now cost €3000, but hey, Amigas has always been expensive, right?")
Quote:
This is why new hardware is needed. |
Not really. New H/W comes all the time. There are plenty of H/W everywhere, including this $9 machine!
|
I was reading about the Commodore 64 and how people who programmed on them are called Old Fogies. I guess I am an old fogie now. The fact is they were perfect on teaching programming and if you ever got an old computer magazine, there were pages long programs that no one wanted to type in so I would type for three days and save my program to the disk drive. I practiced my typing on that.
Now those days are gone. You are all consumers instead of programmers (mostly). How boring. You're all waiting for someone to give you a product instead of make one.
Hardware doesn't come all of the time. How many of you are into hobby electronics? Writing code at the system level is not the same as using a compiler. Most of you would say, "no..we can't program or do electronics" so you will never get machines. You have to stop clinging to your old machines and realize they can stop working at any time and then you won't have one.
The Old Hardware rules are keeping you in prison because you need new hardware and sometimes that means abandoning the past and using Amiga / Commodore themes and incorporating that in new off the shelf hardware and being free. Or you can buy an IBM and web surfing and setting up email in the nursing home will be your computer club.
|
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
olegil
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 18:28:20
| | [ #36 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 22-Aug-2003 Posts: 5895
From: Work | | |
|
| @smf
Not to mention the extra card for VGA or HDMI. _________________ This weeks pet peeve: Using "voltage" instead of "potential", which leads to inventing new words like "amperage" instead of "current" (I, measured in A) or possible "charge" (amperehours, Ah or Coulomb, C). Sometimes I don't even know what people mean. |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
Nameless
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 9-May-2015 18:42:36
| | [ #37 ] |
|
|
|
Regular Member |
Joined: 10-Nov-2008 Posts: 315
From: Unknown | | |
|
| @olegil
A sub $100 Amiga (ideally around $50-$75, and a handheld), could sell if it was marketed properly. That means a toy company, or at least a real company, who could get products onto store shelves somewhere, and bundled with 100s of games/old applications. It wouldn't need to be superfast, or have modern graphics... nor do anything modern computers do. It'd be a retro game system whose appeal would be based on nostalgia.
Spectrum is doing it at an even higher price than $100 (for initial backers) and there was that Neo-Geo remake that was a tad pricey too. So anything sub-$100 could sell.
I know folks here sometimes come up with their 'dream' Amigas from time to time, which invariably are things like super modern Amigas, Quantum CPUs, or made up stuff that has no basis in reality.
My dream Amiga would be a 3-4" gaming handheld, perhaps slider keyboard or flip style (Nintendo DS), full backwards compatibility, proper 3.1 OS with Roms, and if going fancy, touchscreen + the ability to download adf files/check email/rudimentary web browsing.
With ARM JIT becoming a reality, I guess something like that could be a possibility on the cheap too. I mentioned one idea in the past for the slower Pi, and perhaps it wouldn't make sense as much now, but I've also wondered if it'd make financial sense to pair a slow ARM using JIT emulation just for the CPU and pair it up with a super cheap small FPGA that handles the sound/graphics chips. It could mean a higher level of compatibility and sort of has the 'cool factor' of not just being a straight emulator type of system ... a certain amount real hardware, even in FPGA, just seems to appeal to people more. |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
olegil
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 13-May-2015 11:42:39
| | [ #38 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 22-Aug-2003 Posts: 5895
From: Work | | |
|
| @Nameless
handheld means it has to include a screen, which adds cost.
So again, instead of being realistic you increased the cost and decreased the price, making the project impossible.
Here's what I mean: A NG Amiga (without OCS/ECS/AGA support other than through emulation, which will be slow) can be made for sub 100 USD. Included in this price is a slow CPU, a few PCIe slots, maybe even some SATA ports, USB, ethernet. NOTHING ELSE. This is apparently not interesting to people. Either because it's not going to be fast enough, or it doesn't have onboard WHATEVER, or it isn't a laptop.
A classic clone exists and it's called minimig, very little margin exists here for making it cheaper, due to needing a medium sized FPGA plus a CPU or possibly just a single big FPGA.
It simply is not realistic to start with the minimig, add cost and then sell it for half the price in thousands of unit numbers. This is a pipe dream.
_________________ This weeks pet peeve: Using "voltage" instead of "potential", which leads to inventing new words like "amperage" instead of "current" (I, measured in A) or possible "charge" (amperehours, Ah or Coulomb, C). Sometimes I don't even know what people mean. |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
KimmoK
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 13-May-2015 12:27:57
| | [ #39 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 14-Mar-2003 Posts: 5211
From: Ylikiiminki, Finland | | |
|
| @olegil
>A NG Amiga ...) can be made for sub 100 USD. Included in this price is a slow CPU, a few PCIe slots, maybe even some SATA ports, USB, ethernet. NOTHING ELSE. This is apparently not interesting to people. Either because it's not going to be fast enough, or it doesn't have onboard WHATEVER,
With 1,4Ghz 1...4 e5500 + 2...4GbRAM (with or without onboard GFX), it is interesting to some.
>or it isn't a laptop.
If the backplate and components are not too tall, that board sould fit in DIY laptops (at least)? ( http://www.mini-itx.com/projects/itx-laptop/ )
And AGA fan(atics) can always plug FPGAGA in via PCIe... / mPCIe Last edited by KimmoK on 13-May-2015 at 12:28 PM.
_________________ - KimmoK // For freedom, for honor, for AMIGA // // Thing that I should find more time for: CC64 - 64bit Community Computer? |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|
olegil
| |
Re: The First $9 Computer Posted on 13-May-2015 12:47:46
| | [ #40 ] |
|
|
|
Elite Member |
Joined: 22-Aug-2003 Posts: 5895
From: Work | | |
|
| @KimmoK
sub 100 means sub-25 for the CPU alone, so the 1.2GHz 2-core T1 is too expensive for such an endeavor.
But sub 200 as a handheld device could theoretically be done (add touchscreen, battery, enclosure and the higher CPU cost plus margins and taxes to the equation).
Of course, now you lost the graphics card option so you're stuck with the rather slow 2D framebuffer. But for a handheld maybe that's good enough. _________________ This weeks pet peeve: Using "voltage" instead of "potential", which leads to inventing new words like "amperage" instead of "current" (I, measured in A) or possible "charge" (amperehours, Ah or Coulomb, C). Sometimes I don't even know what people mean. |
|
Status: Offline |
|
|