Upgrade Apollo 1240 to 060

[tiffers]

Hi all (especially Zetr0 ),

I've just had an A1200 dropped into my lap which has a Paragon '040 accelerator in it. From what I can tell, the chip is a 25MHz part, but the oscillator seems to be 56MHz. That makes me think this '040 is overclocked to 28MHz.

Aside from that though, I went looking for info on this card and AlexH in a post on EAB said this was really a re-badged Apollo 1240. So I went looking for info on the Apollo 1240 and came across a nice thread at EAB (starring Zetr0 and others) detailing how to upgrade a 1240 to an '060 @ 80MHz. :wooha:

This would be really cool! But, I read the the 80MHz setup was slower than running it at 50MHz because of the halved bus speed for the memory at 80MHz (ie 40MHz memory bus) while @ 50MHz, the RAM coped very well at full CPU clock speed. 50MHz parts also seem to be much cheaper. (Maybe I could keep the 56MHz osc. and have a 56MHz '060? :nuts

So now I'm all fired up, and interested in finding out if anyone is capable and interested in upping my Paragon 28MHz '040 to an Apollo 1260 50MHz '060, and how much it would cost me to get this done?

I don't want to spend outlandish amounts of cash on the upgrade, but I'd like to do it, as I want to propose a swap for a SAM-Flex board (This particular A1200 has some VERY nice additions to it ) for this and an A500 I've been building up for the last 12 months (and mayeb a little cash if need be).

I don't know what version (130 / 131) of that logic chip I have is installed. I will need to find out I guess. I'd also like to have the 2nd SIMM slot added, for future expandability.

So.. anyone? I'm in Australia, so that has to be taken into consideration.

Thanks,

tiffers

 

[chain]

Nearest will be probably Anthony Hoffman (NZ), you can try to contact him at http://amiga.serveftp.net/
Mach131 is really crucial for that upgrade.
50mhz vs 80mhz is a matter of view, my feeling votes for 80mhz as its faster in workbench and other basic usage.

 

[Zetr0]

Hiyas Tiffers

I see you found my other not-so-secret hangout =D

As you have begun to suspect the Paragon is in fact a re-badged Apollo 040 made by ACT.

There are only 3 differences in the 060 and 040 cards -

• Mach Chip Logic (old 040's had -130 / the 060's and newer 040's has -131)
• 3.5Volt Regulator daughter board
• Different Boot Rom

The CPLD (MACH) rom chip is the large chip in the bottom corner of the card, it will read somthing like -

MACH131-15JC
9619MPM A

The above is a 060 compatible Mach chip, so this would be upgraded without the need to source another.

If however it stated somthing like

MACH130-15JC
9619MPM A

Then you would need to source another mach chip for it before you could up grade it.

you will also need to source a 3.5 volt regulator, ofcourse these can be easly constructed my friend DIMLOW designed his own and there are plans to so online.

however this all insigificant to doing the physcial upgrade. the original 040 must be desoldered from the board, (no easy feat there!) then a socket is reccomended to be installed, then you have to find an 060 cpu, preferably a full core.

yeah... daugnting isn't it.

As Chain quite rightly states Anthony Hoffman is closest, if he need any thing like 060 Boot rom code let me know and I will send him a message =)

However I do believe your better bet would be contact Per Gunnar on www.amiga.org give him some time to respond, he gets very busy!

I believe he can help you in te best way possible in this venture. The last person I spoke with about this it only cost £60 + postage for the upgrade and everything was provided, so best to give him a gentle PM or two -D

hope that helps =D

 

[tiffers]

Dang! I checked mine out. It's only got the mach 130 chip. Oh well. '040 it is.

 

[rkauer]

Don't loose your hope.

If you have enough $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$, I'm sure Jens Schoenfeld can provide you all the three MACH 131 chips for a humble, symbolic sum of 50 Euro a piece...