A1200 accelerator cards: A buyer's guide

Is it worth to mention that the 1240 cards have some incompatibility issues ?
I read a lot of opinions about the 1240 cards, and people are avoiding them.
What are the reason:
Games Compatibility ?
WHDLOAD problems ?
Heat ?
PSU ?

Or is different from Blizzard to Apollo ?

As for the 1260 too, some people are running theyr Amigas with the original PSU. ( the heavy one ).
 
Does anyone know whether full 020 has got a MMU or that feature is only from 030 up?
 
020 CPU lacks a MMU, they are only present in the full 030.

That said, there an external MMU for the 68020 (also works on 010 processors), called 68851. But as far as I know, the only card that make use of the external MMU is the Commodore A2620 (intended for the A2000).
 
Is it worth to mention that the 1240 cards have some incompatibility issues ?

I never heard of that. But I only have experience with 2 040 cards so I am not some kind of expert.

---------- Post added at 23:05 ---------- Previous post was at 22:49 ----------

High-end 68040 and 68060 cards
Be aware that once you get to this level you will likely find you need a bigger PSU for your Amiga and you should give some thought to air-flow and cooling...These CPUs get hot!

Would you please change that. That is just not right.

Amiga 68040 accelerators get very hot! 040s need heat sink and/or fan. The 040s used are based on 5v technology. They drink a lot of power and get hot.

There were later editions of the 040 based on 3.3v tech but I never heard of any accelerator ever using them.

Amiga 68060 accelerators are very cool! 060s do not need heat sink or fan. 060s are based on 3.3v technology. My Motorola manual says the original 50Mhz 68060 only dissipates 4.9 watts. (Compare that to your so-called "state-of-the-art" Intel Core i5. Ha!) But later editions of the 060 were die-shrunk and use less power. Because the later editions do use less power, they can be overclocked into the 80-110 Mhz range.

68060. The Green CPU for the Green Amiga. :)

---------- Post added at 23:42 ---------- Previous post was at 23:05 ----------

Apollo 1260's require an uprated PSU ...

Don't all 040 and 060 and 030 accelerators need an upgraded Power Supply for guaranteed 100% reliability?

I mean, sometimes you can get away with not upgrading the power supply... but sometimes you can't.

The way I remember it, my A1200 came with a pathetic 40W powersupply and my A500 from many years before came with a 60W powersupply. The way I remember it I just tossed my A1200 power supply and plugged in the A500 one. But this was all a long time ago so this paragraph is fuzzy.


Does anyone know how many watts a 50Mhz 030+128MB accelerator dissipates?

Or how about 50Mhz 060+128MB?

If you are trying to make a short simple guide and you are only going to recommend an upgraded powersupply for 1 thing then it should be for 040 cards. 040s drink the most power of any Amiga CPU.
 
020 CPU lacks a MMU, they are only present in the full 030.

That said, there an external MMU for the 68020 (also works on 010 processors), called 68851. But as far as I know, the only card that make use of the external MMU is the Commodore A2620 (intended for the A2000).


Thanks for that. I just wanted to be sure and now it's clear. Cheers
 
High-end 68040 and 68060 cards
Be aware that once you get to this level you will likely find you need a bigger PSU for your Amiga and you should give some thought to air-flow and cooling...These CPUs get hot!

Would you please change that. That is just not right.

Amiga 68040 accelerators get very hot! 040s need heat sink and/or fan. The 040s used are based on 5v technology. They drink a lot of power and get hot.

There were later editions of the 040 based on 3.3v tech but I never heard of any accelerator ever using them.

Amiga 68060 accelerators are very cool! 060s do not need heat sink or fan. 060s are based on 3.3v technology. My Motorola manual says the original 50Mhz 68060 only dissipates 4.9 watts. (Compare that to your so-called "state-of-the-art" Intel Core i5. Ha!) But later editions of the 060 were die-shrunk and use less power. Because the later editions do use less power, they can be overclocked into the 80-110 Mhz range.

68060. The Green CPU for the Green Amiga. :)

That's not right either. It's true of both 68040 and 68060 CPUs that the earlier revisions ran quite hot, whereas the later revisions tended to be much cooler. My A3640 in my A3000 doesn't get hot because the CPU was swapped for a newer revision. Conversely, my old Cyberstorm II/060 had a heatsink on the '060 because it was an earlier revision that did get hot. Don't forget that a lot of Amiga accelerators have early XC-core CPUs that run very warm.

A lot of it is to do with cooling and airflow in the whole machine. In a great big spacious A4000 tower with airflow, you can probably run an '060 without a heatsink. I'd be far more wary of ramming one into the tiny trapdoor slot on an A1200.
 
you can use a 040 thats 3.3 volt with a regulator in an amiga accellorator.

it was only the early revisions of 040 and 060 that got hot even when not overclocked.
 
what's the max amount of memory you can install on apollo cards?
 
what's the max amount of memory you can install on apollo cards?


64mb's if its an 1200 card, 128mb's if its a 3000 and 4000 card.


some 030 apollo cards for the 1200 can only have 8mb on board.


so it depends on what apollo card your talking about.
 
what's the max amount of memory you can install on apollo cards?
64mb's if its an 1200 card, 128mb's if its a 3000 and 4000 card.
some 030 apollo cards for the 1200 can only have 8mb on board.
so it depends on what apollo card your talking about.


I'm interested in apollo 1240/1260 cards and I like possibility to have 128MB RAM, but I can see it's not really possible
 
you can use a 040 thats 3.3 volt with a regulator in an amiga accellorator.

it was only the early revisions of 040 and 060 that got hot even when not overclocked.

Indeed. I've amended the first post to be a little clearer on that point.

(y)
 
what's the max amount of memory you can install on apollo cards?
64mb's if its an 1200 card, 128mb's if its a 3000 and 4000 card.
some 030 apollo cards for the 1200 can only have 8mb on board.
so it depends on what apollo card your talking about.


I'm interested in apollo 1240/1260 cards and I like possibility to have 128MB RAM, but I can see it's not really possible

I think you need a Blizzard if you want more than 64MB. If you get the SCSI kit as well, you can have up to 256MB FastRAM.

Although, if you're being honest, do you need all that RAM? Or are you just doing it to make the numbers bigger? (A perfectly reasonable justification)
 
64mb's if its an 1200 card, 128mb's if its a 3000 and 4000 card.
some 030 apollo cards for the 1200 can only have 8mb on board.
so it depends on what apollo card your talking about.


I'm interested in apollo 1240/1260 cards and I like possibility to have 128MB RAM, but I can see it's not really possible

I think you need a Blizzard if you want more than 64MB. If you get the SCSI kit as well, you can have up to 256MB FastRAM.

Although, if you're being honest, do you need all that RAM? Or are you just doing it to make the numbers bigger? (A perfectly reasonable justification)



i do!:LOL:
 
I'm interested in apollo 1240/1260 cards and I like possibility to have 128MB RAM, but I can see it's not really possible

I think you need a Blizzard if you want more than 64MB. If you get the SCSI kit as well, you can have up to 256MB FastRAM.

Although, if you're being honest, do you need all that RAM? Or are you just doing it to make the numbers bigger? (A perfectly reasonable justification)



i do!:LOL:

What do you do with it all? Install all of Workbench onto a RAM disk?! :blink:
 
ah i see,but dont expect it to be playable though in aga.
i have quake 2 and run it in minigl on a voodoo on an 060 at 100mhz,and i only get about 13fps.:)

I see, you're right I don't need it.
But what about linux? If I'd like to run it on Amiga then more memory better.
Anyway I prefer 128 to 64 ;)
 
Back
Top Bottom