A4000 Buying/Upgrade Advice =D

[fitzsteve]

Hey Ya'll,

I just typed this up for a friend at EAB, I thought it would be useful here too as a FAQ if you like and peeps could add to it with more info

So here we go!

Firstly, great choice the A4000 is an awesome machine. Just be sure to get one without battery damage if possible, i.e if the battery has already been replaced thats a good thing. Worst comes to worst then there is a chap going by the name of Hikey on these boards/Amibay, etc who refurbs A4k boards to a very high standard.

Right, lets talk about upgrades. Firstly CPU

The base model has an EC030 CPU, and the Motherboard can take 4x 4mb Simms for a maximum of 16mb Fast Ram. The first upgrade to this would be an A3640 which is an 040 CPU clocked at 25mhz and gives a nice boost to the A4000. These however do not give the option of extra Ram and as such the only way to expand Ram further is a hens teeth x-calibur board or ZorroIII Ram such as ZorRam/DKB3128 or Z3 Fastlane which also gives you Fast SCSI.

Next up are the CPU expansions that include Fast Ram as an option and this is what I'd go for as the Fast Ram on the CPU is much faster than ZIII or Motherboard Ram.

Most come in 040 or 060 the Apollo 4040/4060 is a nice option, I found both these cards very fast and the Memory interaction seems to be much faster then the DCE cards. They take up to 128mb Ram (4x 32mb)

Another 040 option would be the Warp Engine, it has faster SCSI than the Apollo and comes at around the same price, of course this also takes up to 128mb.

Now, these are the most saught after, the Cyberstorm Cards. I'm lucky enough to own a MkII + SCSI Kit and it is indeed a very nice card and the SCSI makes a nice boost to my system. But as I said the Apollo at least to me seems a little faster. Anyway the choice you have here are the CSMkI which again all these have 040/060 options depending on budget and take up to 128mb Ram (4x 32mb) The MkI has seperate boards for Ram/SCSI and will be the cheapest of the Cyberstorms.

The CSMkII has the Simm Sockets on the single board, much like the Apollo and has the option as I said before of adding SCSI by seperate adapter. It will cost you a little more than the MkI

The Holy Grail would be the CSMkIII/CSPPC these are the same board, the MkIII is just without the PPC chip so they both have UW SCSI on board and a PCI connector for the CyberVision Graphics card, these will set you back some serious money

Ok, I think that covers us for CPU and would be your biggest financial outlay.

Next up you have the choice of keeping the system ZorroIII and getting Zorro RTG Cards like the PicassoIV or CyberVision 64/3D plus many others

There are also Zorro Network Cards, Sounds Card, etc available such as the Toccata 16bit Soundcard and X-Surf Network Cards.

Or you can go PCI with a Mediator/Prometheous or the hens teeth G-Rex (The G-Rex requires a CSMkIII/CSPPC)

The initial outlay on the PCI Bus will be re-couped with cheaper PCI Cards such as graphics, sound and networking. Plus the Mediator PCI boards still have Zorro slots & AFAIK you can still use the Zorro slots with the other options, however beware the Prometheous is quite messy as you have to use PCI risers and extenders. The Mediator replaces the whole daughter board.

Finally for every A4000 I'd suggest a Deneb USB, this really is a must have addition to any A4k project. Fast USB 2.0 will open a whole new world!

Next up OS

Well if you have upgraded to an 040 or above and have 3.1 Roms (or a Deneb for loading custom kickstart modules) I'd suggest OS3.9 and the version I have is Classic Workbench OS3.9

If you have a basic 030 A4000 without RTG look at the lower end CWB packs.

But I'm guessing you'll be adding RTG and the likes to your A4000 and the CWB OS3.9 pack lends its self well to this, you just need to install the drivers for your RTG card and you'll be enjoying 24bit workbench in screen modes like 1024x768

With RTG comes the issue of switching between RTG screens and native screens (for games and such) the most simple option would be a Monitor switch box or LCD TV with Scart/VGA inputs.

I wont go into too much detail but there are options such as Indivision AGA and RTG cards with passthrough or built in/optional Scan Doublers. The PicassoIV for example is a true one monitor solution as it has built in SD/FF

The other option would be a Video Slot Scan Doubler or DCE Flicker/Scan magic. These options are not always 24bit though and you may loose colours with AGA outputs! So check before you buy.

Compatibility wise we have WHDLoad for our older games so on most setups you'll be covered here, 040's tend to have a few more issues with games than the 060's and of course 030's are the best for gaming. But for fast RTG A4000 look for 040+

You can still use you A1200 with Blizzy1230 for gaming right

So that leaves us with pro's and cons vs A1200T

Pro's:

A4000 is a flagship system, not a custom cased A1200
A4000 has ZorroIII (A1200T can only have ZorroII or PCI)
A4000 has the option of 16mb Motherboard Ram

Cons:

A1200 can take up to 256mb real accelerator Ram (Blizzard+SCSi Kit)
IMHO the PCI/Mediator options seems to work better on A1200

I hope that helps, if you have an questions just ask! I have two A4000 projects, I guess you've seen the posts but here are the links just in case - feel free to borrow ideas from them

https://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?t=7140

https://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?t=10442

Oh and have fun!

Steve.

 

[Tajmaster]

+1 Steve

 

[rkauer]

To amend this awesome guide: using a Mediator with a graphics card (mandatory for this busboard!) you can reserve some of the video card memory for Workbench use!

So if you have a Radeon 9200/9250 you can reserve 15 to 17Mb to graphics memory and the leftover will automagically turned into System Zorro3 memory! Notice this memory is a lot slower than even on-board memory, but invaluable if you lack enough memory to run OWB (the newest Amiga browser) and other memory-hungry applications.

 

[User1301]

Fantastic guide (as always) Steve - and exactly the kind of thing I want us to have in the Amibay Almanac (once I get back into it).

Cheers

John

 

[fitzsteve]

Thanks for the extra info & support guys, here's a little Q & A from the reply at EAB:

Question:
Out of interest what do you use your A4000 for steve?

Mostly apps/games that require more power like Doom/Quake and CD games such as Payback.

I have installed Toccata Sound Cards and want to use them with Octamed Sound Studio.

I've had a lot of fun too just with the Hardware side, the A4000 is great to work with and probably where 75% of my satisfaction from the projects come!

I also want to build a custom Rom/Mudules from the Deneb and kick @ss workbench with AfA_OS, Masons/Kens Icons.

Question:
Did C= bring out '30 and '40 A4000s? What do these upgrades actually give you, like zorro? Never upgraded my original A1200, so even accelerators were new to me?

Yes the A3630 which is the basic 030 CPU and A3640 with is the 040 but these are just CPU's and not accelerators as they do not have any extra Fast Ram.

Zorro is the dughter board attached the A4000 as standard has Zorro III some expansions need Buster 11 as duga has mentioned.

The Zorro board can be replaced with a Mediator PCI or you can add PCI slots with one of the other solutiuons I mentioned.

The Zorro Cards are the expansion cards like Graphics/Sound/Network, etc.

The standard daughter board also has ISA slots but I don't know what upgardes you can use with them and also has a Video slot, which you need for a PicassoIV or Video Slot Scan Doubler.

Mediator PCI does not have a Video slot so you would need another Scan Doubler such as Indivision AGA.

Question:
And does the pci voodoo 3500 would in an A4000 with a mediator? Is that better or worse than the amiga specific gfx card, I would imagine that the voodoo is easier and cheaper?

Of course the Voodoo cards are much faster then the old Amiga Zorro cards but there really isn't much software that makes use of it. There are a hand full of Warp3D games/apps that you will need at least an 040 to run but they're slow on anything less than 060/PPC.

You can run a much higher resolution Workbench at higher colour depth on Voodoo's/Radeons though. And with the latest Mediator drivers you can use some of the Graphics Ram as system Ram so if you have 256mb Radeon that can make a real difference!

PCI cards are much cheaper but you have the initial outlay of £200 or so on the Mediator PCI.

Question:
Thanks so much for all of this great advice... Also what monitor suits it best, I am think that I can use a VGA one?

I swear by LCD TV's with VGA and Scart inputs to use on multiple miggy's but its up to you what you prefer, a CRT Multisync Monitor is great on an A4000 if you have a Scan Doubler.

Or look for something like the M1438s. It connects right to the RGB output.

 

[User2921]

Hey man, you seem like the a4000 guru, so I am going to ask you a few questions

I have recently acquired a Power Tower mk II with the Mediator. Here's what I've also got with it:
Sound Blaster PCI128 CT4750
Spider High-Speed USB 2.0 host controller
Ethernet
3dfx Interactive, Inc. Voodoo3 3000 16MB SDRAM

Now, in my a4000D (the one that will be towerized) I have a CV64/3d and Scandoubler. Currently that is going into a dell lcd and I can only seem to get it work with 320x240 (if memory serves). Anything else and it looks all screwed up...I'm sure that I'm doing something wrong. I plan to get a different TFT/LCD monitor in the near future for the computer, though.

Now, this Mediator card has 1 video slot. I want to use this as a Toaster machine, so I suppose that the cv64/3d is out, but the Voodoo3 should be fine, right? It'll display at 31khz? Or am I not understanding something here? And is the Voodoo3 card going to be a one-monitor solution, or will I need the 1084 for WHDLoad games?

I appreciate all your help.

 

[rkauer]

Toaster software does not run in OS3.9 (required to run Mediator patches).

 

[cugar124]

my penny worth

my penny worth

Hi Guys
Just to reinforce what Steve has said get a board without battery leakage these are common enough if you are willing to wait. My machine which has near driven me mad had severe battery damage and it is only because of Hickey I got it running.

Second point if you are buying a Mediator don't buy the desktop 4000DI get the towered one. I found that getting a non Elbox 9200 radeon is a nightmare plus you will have heat problems as well if you are using an Indivision AGA scandoubler as the Mediator PCI controller card sits right above the indivision and they heat each other up.

Third try to get a Zorro IDE controller if possible you will find things like the CF cards work better plus you will get better speed as well or go with Steve's option of a SCSI system or even his Denub I reckon it would be the best money spent and when I can afford it I fully intend to get one. it has a boot Rom area that can load from a USB pen drive which means with a good PC you can use UAE too I loved that my CF card could be used in the pc with UAE as a hardrive its handy for things like file downloads from Aminet or from amiga os de which has all the boing bags for os 3.9.

Here's my little baby and yes for the sharp eyed my CF card is not fitted waiting on a SCSI card coming soon also if you look at the AGA scandoubler shot you will see a little rubber insert I use to keep the mediator controller from touching the top of it. https://www.amibay.com/showthread.php?t=17803

my current system will never be my old A4000 Cyberstorm PPC from 8 years ago but she is coming close LOL.

Good luck everyone

 

[merlinkv]

Second point if you are buying a Mediator don't buy the desktop 4000DI get the towered one. I found that getting a non Elbox 9200 radeon is a nightmare plus you will have heat problems as well if you are using an Indivision AGA scandoubler as the Mediator PCI controller card sits right above the indivision and they heat each other up.

That's true.

And after one bad experience . It's sure some 4000Di boards don't want to work with Elbox Radeon's 9200 .

I'm not sure if this is a problem of some 4000Di boards or maybe the "mod" maded by Elbox on Radeon's (I know about different hw mods & Bios). :shrug:

But, in anyway, is like a "lotto" to put the Radeons working on 4000Di

In the other hand. I have two Mediators 4000D and one Mediator 4000D MK-II. The three boards works with Voodoo 3 3000 & Elbox Radeon's 9200 like a charm

About IDE solutions, the FastATA MK-V is, in my opinion, one of the best.

Advantages:

- Two buffered & terminated IDE channels
- The embebed scsi.device is available at boot time and works without any driver installed.
- Real LBA48 at boot time.
- Works 100% at PIO4
- No issues detected in systems with SCSI-II or UW-SCSI devices installed.

Disadvantages/issues:

- Not DMA, just PIO mode.
- AmigaOS 4.1 Classic incompatible
- Some issues with cables of 80 wires. Best is to use cables of 40 wires and no more longer than 50cms.
- A bit expensive

----
Just my two pennys for now :roll:

Best wishes

 

[fitzsteve]

Hey man, you seem like the a4000 guru, so I am going to ask you a few questions

I have recently acquired a Power Tower mk II with the Mediator. Here's what I've also got with it:
Sound Blaster PCI128 CT4750
Spider High-Speed USB 2.0 host controller
Ethernet
3dfx Interactive, Inc. Voodoo3 3000 16MB SDRAM

Now, in my a4000D (the one that will be towerized) I have a CV64/3d and Scandoubler. Currently that is going into a dell lcd and I can only seem to get it work with 320x240 (if memory serves). Anything else and it looks all screwed up...I'm sure that I'm doing something wrong. I plan to get a different TFT/LCD monitor in the near future for the computer, though.

Now, this Mediator card has 1 video slot. I want to use this as a Toaster machine, so I suppose that the cv64/3d is out, but the Voodoo3 should be fine, right? It'll display at 31khz? Or am I not understanding something here? And is the Voodoo3 card going to be a one-monitor solution, or will I need the 1084 for WHDLoad games?

I appreciate all your help.

Hi!

Sorry for the delayed reply! I read you message on my Phone and to reply on that with the little touch screen would have damn near killed me

Ok, first thing you should be able to use your CV64/3D with RTG screens on a normal VGA monitor. I have mine quite happily running at 1024x768 (native of my 15in screen) and it works very well indeed.

The key here is to set the correct horizontal and vertical sync rates in the CGX4 driver (or Picasso96 if you use that)

CGX4 has VESA modes that you can choose and these should work on most VGA screens so take another look at the CGX Mode/Picasso settings

I don't know much about Toasters sorry, but your Voodoo PCI would not be a one Monitor solution because it cannot display native screens. There are some things you can promote to RTG using NewMode but this does not work with WHDLoad games for example so you will need the second monitor or a scan doubler/monitor switch box.

The Voodoo 3 of course will be perfect for VGA screens and as long as you set them up correctly in Picasso96 you can very large screens like 1280x1024 or Widescreen Modes like 1360x768. With Mediator/Voodoo you can only use P96 drivers, CGX is not supported.

Have fun with your projects

Steve.

 

[Justin]

I'd also recommend the Promethous for the A4000 as a entry level easy to set up pci expansion.

 

[lostrego]

...
The standard daughter board also has ISA slots but I don't know what upgardes you can use with them and also has a Video slot, which you need for a PicassoIV or Video Slot Scan Doubler.
....

Just a clarification (only as an anecdote ) : Those ISA slots , that are present on every big box amiga since the A2000, are only a passive ISA bus, they aren't really connected to anything on the amiga's circuitry, except for power signals and ground.

Their main purpose was intended to be used with a kind of cards made by Commodore, called Brigdgeboards.

Those Bridgeboards were simply "a full PC on a zorro card" that transform any big box amiga in to a real IBM-PC clone, there were various versions of those cards including 8088, 286 and 386 CPUs.

So with this, you can use any kind on ISA card from the PC side (say an ancient VGA to a separate monitor, an ISA sound card, an ethernet NIC or whatever else).

Even there is a small program on aminet which managed to share, thru one of those Bridgeboards, an ISA Etehernet NIC, and and so you could use it also as a real amiga network card.

But IMMO that option is not worth the effort unless you already have one of those Bridgeboards around.

Just my two cents of, nowadays pretty useless, historical amiga's hardware stuff.

 

[fitzsteve]

@lostrego

Thanks for the info, we have some great advice in this thread now

 

[Xanxi]

Interesting post, thanks for this summary.

My own A4000 is also a nice setup with a WarpEngine, a Deneb, a Cybervision 64/3D + Indivision AGA, the A2386 bridgeboard with a 486 upgrade + a 2 MB STB Nitro VGA board and a SoundBlaster 16.

I prefer the A1200 though as it is a more reliable computer.

Perhaps you should discuss in this thread the problem of the A4000 PSU. The original PSU is too weak and is not capable of powering a full expanded A4000. I wonder why Commodore has included so much zorro ports if they are unusable.
I am using for now a small ATX PSU of about 200 Watts modified by Cosmos and it is still not enough. Symptoms of weakness are in my case that sometimes the A2386 works at boot and sometimes not. With the normal A4000 PSU that i also have (120 Watts i believe), the A2386 does not work at all). It seems my other boards drink all the juice.

A good PSU ready to go would be a great improvement for A4000 users, if someone is willing to build them and sell them (Amigakit maybe?), rather than adapter cables with the need to hunt a suitable ATX PSU and mess with dangerous electronics.

 

[merlinkv]

@Xanxi

Yes, for a fully expanded A4000D, I think the best is to use a PSU from 350 to 500w and with 22A or more at the +5v.

 

[fitzsteve]

Thats interesting, I have stock PSU in my A4000D.

PicassoIV, Thylacine USB, Buddha IDE and Toccata on Zorro. CSMkII + SCSI on the CPU slot.

All running fine

 

[merlinkv]

Hi Steve, mi friend

Yes, you're right, but.....

- CSPPC 060/50 233Mhz 128MB
- CSPPC UW-SCSI in use (4 devices)
- Indivision AGA
- Mediator 4000D
- ZoRAM 256MB
- Voodoo3 3000 16MB
- Radeon 9200 256MB
- DENEB
- FastATA MK-V (2 devices)
- Toccata
- VLab Motion

........

Stock PSU don't suply the minimum power to run all boards/devices....

 

[fitzsteve]

He he, but no-one ran all this back in the day so stock PSU was OK for most users.

Its definately good advice that if you're going to make an ultra system to invest in a decent PSU

I forgot to mention 1 HDD 1x SCSI-IDE and 1 Floppy/1 DVDRW.

I guess I'm going to be close to maxing out my PSU and probably only safe because before me this A4k had little use.

Steve.

 

[Xanxi]

@fitzsteve:

Why would you use a Buddha board in an A4000 by the way?

 

[fitzsteve]

@fitzsteve:

Why would you use a Buddha board in an A4000 by the way?

Its just to run my CDRW

I was going to replace with a FastATA but my unit turned out to be faulty

So still got the Buddha which was always meant to be a temp solution...

Steve.