Hello folks,
We all love our Amiga A500, we clean them, we tune them, someone retrobright them, while other's are cutting, drilling and painting them to fit owners needs..
However, there are some things we all missing on A500 for use them more comfortable: more memory, IDE interface and maybe faster CPU..
Please let me introduce You a brand new Amiga A500 accelerator card - Terrible Fire 530*
TF530 was designed and created by one single person: Stephen Leary from Glasgow, Scotland. As the prices for Vampire A500 cards are dramatically rised and became unattractive for European users – he decided to create this low budget card to be able to reach excellent performance on our beloved A500 for everyone. The best part of it – he really did it in a very short time, and even more – he decided to opensource his project! I think everyone know what does it mean. It means: - we can install new super hardware in our A500, making it two times faster as a stock A3000 Amiga!
Technical information:
TF530 runs on 68030 Motorola CPU/FPU (25 - 50Mhz)
2Mb memory onboard FastRAM,
IDE interface
SPI port
Boards are arrived, production started at 17.03.2017
About production:
As Stephen has no time to support this project - he has published all necessary stuff on github, so everyone who can solder - can build his own card, also everyone can sell them
(please read GNU Licence carefully).
I've waited some time with the hope someone will offer them, but as I see – there is no one. I can’t belive no one is interested, that’s why I decided to write this message and introduce this card here. Maybe the information wasn’t available yet, or some interested persons missed it..
I have ordered a bunch of pcb’s and all necessary parts to build these cards. To keep prices low – I have ordered almost all parts in China, so delivery time will be about 1 month. will produce some cards and offer them here. If the interest still present I will build a second bunch. I can’t say exactly now how much the card will cost, need to calculate first. Hope You understand, can’t do it for free (i have work and family, so please respect it), but I will do my best to keep the price low as possible. i think it can be sold at approx. 150€ relocator board, CF adapter & ribbon cable INCLUDED!
Maybe even I can sell some cards without CPU if someone have the processor already. CPU's and memory chips are the main problem, as these parts are most expensive.
I do Amibay support, and i donate to this site from each board I sell. It’s the nicest place in the net to communicate about retro, and we need to support it, if not us – who will?
Technical information of the boards i am offering:
CPU: 68030 40Mhz (Running on 50Mhz)
FPU: 68882 40Mhz (running on 50Mhz)
Memory: 12ns
Relocator: Yes (included)
Ribbon Cable: Yes (included)
CF Card Adapter: Yes (included)
Power splitter Yes (included)
so basically You need only CF Card with Workbench insalled to start to use it.
*You need Kickstart 2.05 and above (or any with scsi.device driver present), to be able to use IDE boot function of the TF530
Asking 150€ for the ready built fully populated board
PayPal as a friend/family or add 4% to cover fees
Also IBAN payment is accepted
Postage fees are 6,50€ to any country (tracked & insured)
Have also some A500 Amigas with TF530 installed, recapped PSU, and original tank mouse
perfect for the persons who doesen't have A500, but like to step into Amiga world.
Ask me, if You're interested
I will update information as soon as I have any news, please express Your opinion about this project, and please let me know if You are interested, to be able to plan and order spare parts for the next bunch.
will try to combine postage (max 500g) if several parts are purchased!
Added @03.11.2018:
Dear TF530 users!
Stephen - the creator of Terrible Fire cards has released a new firmware
with a LOT of bugfixes!
https://github.com/terriblefire/terriblefire-binaries/blob/master/tf530/tf530_2018_11_4_beta.zip
Verified working with a 4Mb GVP ZII card installed A2000-HC+8
Both revisions working on the A2000 @ 50Mhz, 33Mhz and 25Mhz now
1,5MB Slow RAM issue fixed, Graphic issues on A2000 @50Mhz fixed
2-6MB Zorroll RAM cards working in pair with TF530 now if these have correct Autoconfig settings
(not occupy all Zll space)
Im strongly recommend to update Your TF530 cards!!!
see Wiki to get more info about updates:
https://github.com/terriblefire/tf530/wiki
Also some limited support may be found on the Exxos forum:
https://www.exxoshost.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1335
-Your 8 Bit Dreams-
We all love our Amiga A500, we clean them, we tune them, someone retrobright them, while other's are cutting, drilling and painting them to fit owners needs..
However, there are some things we all missing on A500 for use them more comfortable: more memory, IDE interface and maybe faster CPU..
Please let me introduce You a brand new Amiga A500 accelerator card - Terrible Fire 530*
TF530 was designed and created by one single person: Stephen Leary from Glasgow, Scotland. As the prices for Vampire A500 cards are dramatically rised and became unattractive for European users – he decided to create this low budget card to be able to reach excellent performance on our beloved A500 for everyone. The best part of it – he really did it in a very short time, and even more – he decided to opensource his project! I think everyone know what does it mean. It means: - we can install new super hardware in our A500, making it two times faster as a stock A3000 Amiga!
Technical information:
TF530 runs on 68030 Motorola CPU/FPU (25 - 50Mhz)
2Mb memory onboard FastRAM,
IDE interface
SPI port
Boards are arrived, production started at 17.03.2017
About production:
As Stephen has no time to support this project - he has published all necessary stuff on github, so everyone who can solder - can build his own card, also everyone can sell them
(please read GNU Licence carefully).
I've waited some time with the hope someone will offer them, but as I see – there is no one. I can’t belive no one is interested, that’s why I decided to write this message and introduce this card here. Maybe the information wasn’t available yet, or some interested persons missed it..
I have ordered a bunch of pcb’s and all necessary parts to build these cards. To keep prices low – I have ordered almost all parts in China, so delivery time will be about 1 month. will produce some cards and offer them here. If the interest still present I will build a second bunch. I can’t say exactly now how much the card will cost, need to calculate first. Hope You understand, can’t do it for free (i have work and family, so please respect it), but I will do my best to keep the price low as possible. i think it can be sold at approx. 150€ relocator board, CF adapter & ribbon cable INCLUDED!
Maybe even I can sell some cards without CPU if someone have the processor already. CPU's and memory chips are the main problem, as these parts are most expensive.
I do Amibay support, and i donate to this site from each board I sell. It’s the nicest place in the net to communicate about retro, and we need to support it, if not us – who will?
Technical information of the boards i am offering:
CPU: 68030 40Mhz (Running on 50Mhz)
FPU: 68882 40Mhz (running on 50Mhz)
Memory: 12ns
Relocator: Yes (included)
Ribbon Cable: Yes (included)
CF Card Adapter: Yes (included)
Power splitter Yes (included)
so basically You need only CF Card with Workbench insalled to start to use it.
*You need Kickstart 2.05 and above (or any with scsi.device driver present), to be able to use IDE boot function of the TF530
Asking 150€ for the ready built fully populated board
PayPal as a friend/family or add 4% to cover fees
Also IBAN payment is accepted
Postage fees are 6,50€ to any country (tracked & insured)
Have also some A500 Amigas with TF530 installed, recapped PSU, and original tank mouse
perfect for the persons who doesen't have A500, but like to step into Amiga world.
Ask me, if You're interested
I will update information as soon as I have any news, please express Your opinion about this project, and please let me know if You are interested, to be able to plan and order spare parts for the next bunch.
will try to combine postage (max 500g) if several parts are purchased!
Added @03.11.2018:
Dear TF530 users!
Stephen - the creator of Terrible Fire cards has released a new firmware
with a LOT of bugfixes!
https://github.com/terriblefire/terriblefire-binaries/blob/master/tf530/tf530_2018_11_4_beta.zip
Verified working with a 4Mb GVP ZII card installed A2000-HC+8
Both revisions working on the A2000 @ 50Mhz, 33Mhz and 25Mhz now
1,5MB Slow RAM issue fixed, Graphic issues on A2000 @50Mhz fixed
2-6MB Zorroll RAM cards working in pair with TF530 now if these have correct Autoconfig settings
(not occupy all Zll space)
Im strongly recommend to update Your TF530 cards!!!
see Wiki to get more info about updates:
https://github.com/terriblefire/tf530/wiki
Also some limited support may be found on the Exxos forum:
https://www.exxoshost.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1335
-Your 8 Bit Dreams-
Last edited: