Two is always better than one (unfortunately not for my wallet)
Category Archives: Amiga hardware
A2386SX – Amiga PC bridgeboard replica
This is an amazing replica of the Commodore A2386SX PC bridgeboard, you can find out more about the project here. There is also a discussion forum about the card on the German A1K forum (just use auto translate in your browser if you dont speak German).
Background
The A2386SX was the best PC bridgeboard Commodore made for the Amiga, it was based on a 386 CPU, could be expanded to 8 MB and enabled you to transform an Amiga in a multi CPU system that could run tasks in parallell on both CPUs, one in Amiga Workbench and the other in MS-DOS on the bridgeboard – at the same time. You could for example hop in to MS-DOS and run your programs and then multitask back to Workbench while programs where running in both environments.
This is a beautiful replica of the A2386SX PC bridgeboard by Commodore.
I got my PCB late in Q1 after contemplating if it was even possible for me to build this card at all. Building it was not the problem. The main problem was finding all the parts and programming some of the chips. But I quickly came to realization that it was actually possible to locate almost all the parts if I pulled the trigger at the right moment since some of the rare parts this build required was disappearing fast on Ebay.
My main goal of running the card is to have access to multi channel module players such as Cubic Player and to be able to play PC modules in MS-DOS with a Sound Blaster 16. I would also like to dive into some old MS-DOS applications I used to use 30 years ago and play some old DOS game or two. But the main attraction is PC music without having to get a separate PC just for that.
Some notes on parts and building the A2386SX project
There are some very rare parts required for the A2386SX bridgeboard. The rarest chips are the two socketed PLCC84 Commodore chips and the PC chipset in the middle of the card.
The Commodore chips (MOS 5718 and the chip besides it) can be taken from 2088 and 2286 Bridgeboards (they are the same), they might pop up on eBay, but consider that a miracle if they show up. I got my chips from a cheap 2088 that I bought second hand last year. Did not know what to do with that card at the time, but it was too cheap to pass up on and I am glad that I got it now.
The PC chipset should in theory be easy to find online, but so far, I have only been able to locate one of the chips. The other chip needs to be ordered in bulk from a specialist in rare chips and is costly. I thought it was possible to find an old motherboard and desolder them from there, if you find a motherboard that has them – consider that a miracle!
Then we have other obscure chips such as the floppy controller, programmable chips (that needs a special vintage programmer or someone with better skills than me in understanding how to program them with a modern device) – not really a problem to find them.
ZIP Memory can be found from obscure part specialists (remember you need two types of memory). The CPU is available on eBay, but if you want the faster 486 that is compatible with the card, good luck, as said, miracles can happen!
A difficult to find item is the capacitor networks, you can cheat and use adaptors instead. I wonder if those are needed if you wont use a floppy drive with it though.
Bracket was sourced from another enthusiast who ordered a batch. 646 was taken from my donor A3000.
Full socket build
I did a full socket build, thinking it would make it easy to error check or replace chips. And if by miracle I would build a second card I will be able to test the chips before building it.
486 CPU instead of 386 CPU
So while this is a 386 bridgeboard it uses a 486. I did some research earlier this year when I built my card, unfortunately I have forgotten the exact details, but it is possible to use a special 486 CPU on the board as they are the same physical size. I think what is most important is that the voltage level is the same as the 386 that it is supposed to use and you need to fiidle with the BIOS.
This mod works on the original Commodore A2386SX card also. This is a nobrainer for me since I grew up on 486 PCs.
Failed test run and successful test run!
So after having received more than 10+ packages containing parts for this build from around the world and a the main passives from Mouser I decided to finally build it up. How exciting!
I was really looking forwards doing the first test run after I got the programmed chips back from a friend in the hobby who could program them. But disaster happened – Bummer – The first test run failed – the card refused to run!
Most of my projects I build usually run fine on the first go, if there are any errors it is usually a bad solder joint on a surface mounted component, a dirty board or something that is missing.
In this case I knew I would never figure it out myself, especially after visually inspecting it 10 times, So I sent it off to another friend in the hobby to get it checked.
Turned out that I had used the wrong memory (I had used the memory from my donor Amiga 3000) and there was some small difference between the type of ZIP mem I used and the one that worked with the card. There was also an error in the BOM that has since been updated where bussed resistor nets where specified instead of isolated (or was it vice versa).
Once I received the card with the correct memory and resistors I did another test run and could confirm the card to be fully running!
Next steps
I probably did not realise how much work it would be to set this card up so thats why I will do it after summer. But the plan is to get MS-DOS 6.22 up and running with Windows 3.1. I will run an ISA graphics card and an ISA sound card and will also try to run the HDD off a partition on the Amiga HDD. But as it stands now the A2386SX is fully working and ready to take its place in the big box Amiga that will be its home in the future.
Would also love to build a second card, hopefully there will be an up to date model with chips replaced with CPLDs in the future!
Update 20251222 – Here is A2386SX card replica #2
The second card is exactly the same as the last one, a different color though. This time it is black instead of red. Another difference is that I built it with less sockets this time.
Here are the PC system chips. Pay attention to the 486 chip. It was marked as a 486-66, probably an error when relabeling it.
And here is the rare 5718 MOS chip and the less but still rare TC17G032AT chip. No PLCC sockets this time!
Multifix AGA purple PCB build
Here are five beautiful Multifix AGA purple PCBs. The Multifix AGA is a great Amiga scandoubler and flicker fixer. I will build two of these and sell the remaining cards once the built cards are tested, or do I build them all for myself (lol).
I plan to use them in the upcoming AmigaPCI (I will for sure build one once it is fully developed) and in my A4000T.
Wireless networking in AmigaOS 4.1 with Vonets Wireless Bridge
Finally got my Sam440EP that is running AmigaOS 4.1 online with no ethernet cable, wireless, with a Vonets WIFI bridge, no more ethernet cable!!
Currently, I dont have a permanent place for my Sam440EP on my desk at home. That will change in the future. But for now, whenever I want to use it, I set it up on my desk. Since it is a tiny computer, that is not really a problem as its very portable.
But having to run a long ethernet cable between the SAM440EP and the main ethernet switch is such a hassle.
Its not 1999 anymore and WIFI is great these days! So I went looking for a wireless solution for hooking up my next gen Amiga to the home network.
Finding a solution is a bit tricky though. After having spent a couple of evenings researching the topic I decided to order a supposedly supported card by AmigaOS 4.1, only to have it be cancelled by the seller. Disapointed but also relieved because I did not fully expected the card to work – I Instead opted for an ethernet to WIFI bridge.
Thinking, if that works, I could get a second and hook up my A4000TX to the home WIFI network with one also since there is no WIFI card for Zorro Amigas..
There are a couple of nice solutions for wireless bridges these days and the prices has gone way down since last time I was in the market (2005). The Vonets Wireless Bridge that I got from AliExpress cost around 20 euro.
Setting up the Vonets wireless bridge on the Amiga
Setting up the Vonets VAP11G-300 WIFI bridge reminded me why I chose not to go down the network admin/sysadmin route back in my university years. Or it reminded me of how much simple everything these days usually are to set up.
Surprised I was, it did actually come with a real manual (something I did not expect from cheap China stuff)!. However the manual was a bit poor in quality and clarity, I think it was better if it did not come with one.
Anyways, just so that I wont forget how to set it up, here is how to set up the Vonets wireless bridge to be a WIFI bridge for ethernet:
- Connect the Vonets wireless bridge to a PC. Connect both USB and ethernet so it gets power and can be found by the computer.
- On the Vonets adapter: Green light should come up (that is the ethernet port), blue light should come up (that is WIFI).
- Disable wireless on the computer if active. Else you wont be able to log into the bridge. Make sure ethernet is active and not disabled.
- Go to Chrome and type in the IP adress as specified on the device to connect to the Vonets bridge.
- Disable AP functionality of device and click save (if you dont want to use it as an AP). Device defaults to both an AP and a bridge if not.
- Change password of device and save.
- Go to main panel and scan for SSIDs.
- Chose SSID, type in password and save.
- Reboot Vonets device
It wont be possible to setup the device again on the IP number after rebooting the device. If you need to configure it again you need to reset it with the little button on it.
Once rebooted it should now be possible to browse the web on the PC where the Vonets wireless bridge acts as a bridge.
In theory it will work with any device that has an ethernet port. Read on…
Troubleshooting the Vonets VAP11G-300 WIFI bridge
So this is where the fun began (or not if you belong to the ones who do not see sysadmin/network admin tasks as a fun).
At first it did not work at all on my Sam. But it worked fine on my workstation.
I then figured out that if I changed the internet settings in AmigaOS 4.1 in Prefs and saved the new configuration the internet came to life! I thought I had solved it but as soon as I rebooted or restarted AmigaOS 4.1 then network access dissappeard.
I suspected the problem was that I had to configure the Sam to use a static IP, but that was not it either. However I got to familarize myself with subnet masks and ip ranges again, how much fun!
Soon I found the problem!
The Vonets adapter takes power from the USB port, the USB port on the Sam is disabled during startup (or delayed) so once Workbench is loaded the network has not fully been initialized. It takes a bit of time for the Vonets adapter to fully start, I suspect it must be running a minimal OS that handles all backend tasks. Which explains why restarting the network works. But until the network in AmigaOS4 is restarted, the network is down.
I quickly tried to come up with a solution, the solution was to run the adapter from 5v from the internal PSU. And that lead me to wonder if it was possible to place it inside the case too. I could route the ethernet cable through the hole for the VGA port on the Sam backplate.
The Vonets WIFI bridge was placed under the SSD on the Sam440EP motherboard. There are no components on that side of the motherboard so no chips will get cooked as the Vonets adapter heats up a bit and I was worried that I would introduce more heat to the system.
Would it work, yes it did. The Morex 557 case that the Sam440 is mounted in has mesh sides so signals from the WIFI bridge passes through the case fine (and also aid in ventilation of the setup).
Summary
All in all I am pleased with the setup and will order a second one for my Amiga 4000TX, and my A1200 is already running WIFI with the PicoWyfy. While I am pleased with the setup, much has happened with the web in 15 years. I remember browsing the web back in 2009 on my Pegasos 2 and having a great experience. But the modern web is built on JS and needs SSL. There is no way this 533Mhz system would keep up even if there was a modern browser. While the main goal was not to browse the web but to enable file transfers between fileserver and the Amiga on the local network, I would not mind browsing the modern web on it if there was a modern browser and more up to date hardware.
Some Amiga activities from the week
Donor Amiga 1200
I won an Amiga 1200 on a local auction website. I put in a max bid but surprisingly it got sold for cheaper than I anticipated. I think it was for a couple of reasons. First the case was painted in a weird cement like textured paint, more on that later, secondly it was sold as-is and not working. I have heard of a new Mini-ITX AGA A1200 clone being developed so this broken A1200 will be the donor for that future project (if the chips works).
The value in this computer (for me) lies in its chips. I am mainly interested in Alice, Lisa, the two CIA chips and the Paula. I am also interested in the memory chips as those can be used on various projects. There is some value in the 23-pin video socket also.
I did some math and took a gamble on both winning the Amiga 1200 and on the chips working. As the CIA chips, the paula and Alice has been socketed, that is a clear sign someone has messed inside this A1200 before. Could both be good news or bad news as sockets can be the reason for the computer not working.
Anyways, here is how I calculated the value:
- Alice: 100-135 euro
- Lisa: 20-35 euro
- CIA (2x): 35-80 euro
- Paula: 25-35 euro
- Memory (4x): 10 euro
- 23-pin D-SUB: 10-20 euro
Total min: 200 euro
Total max: 315 euro
Note, I am not calculating this on Analogic prices!
Lets hope the chips are working, will test them later in the year as the motherboard has been cleaned and is archived in my Amiga hardware stash now.
And the reason why i dont count any value in the case: it was sadly painted in this horrible “paint” that gave me a terrible itch in my fingers for two hours after touching it for a few minutes. I will probably throw it away in the trash since I suspect the paint is toxic.
Changing memory chips on a GottaGoFaZt3r
I built two GottaGoFaZt3r Zorro 3 memory cards late last year, only one card worked. The other refused to work, it still showed up as “working” in my Amiga 4000TX but the memory was nowhere to be seen. I got the recommendation to check for errors in the memory chips one by one. Instead of doing that I got four new chips instead from a reliable source.
I removed the memory chips with a hot air station. Then I cleaned the pads and soldered on the new memory chips.
And once all chips was replaced the card finally worked 100%.
Both cards are built as 256 MB cards. 256 MB might seem like a lot of fast mem in an Amiga but it is actually very usable. I run a bit more buffers on my partition than a stock HDD setup so that consumes some of the fast mem. But the main usage is off course to have a large RAM disk (as there are already 128 MB on the turbo card).
And here is a pic from sunny Stockholm today!
Amiga 3000 daughter card
And finally all parts for my ReAmiga 3000 build is now soldered with the daughter board being finished. It still needs to be flashed, but that will happen another day!
MouSTer 3D printed shell
I have used a MouSTer USB mouse adapter with a wireless mouse on my Amiga for 3-4 years and I have been very happy with the adapter. Only thing I was not happy with was the heat shrink tubing that was used as the shell. It looked so cheap.
I was surprised to find a 3D printable shell for it online. I ordered one to be printed on JLC (in resin). I got a couple of warnings that the walls was too thin and may not be able to be printed. But all worked out better than I anticipated!
It looks so much better with the 3D printed shell.
The fit is perfect. I just superglued the two halves together, there are no user servicable parts on the MouSTer so no point in making it possible to open the case again.
I dont remember exactly where I found the files but you should probably be able to find them here if you search for them.
Purple BFG 9060 Amiga 68060 accelerator card
I just finished building this beautiful purple PCB BFG 9060 accelerator card for the Amiga and thought I would share a picture of it. As it was mostly already finished it just took an hour to solder on the KEL connector, fan header and voltage thing (regulator I think?).
I finally get to use the original spec Motorola 040 CPU heatsink that came from an old 040 C= 3640 CPU card I had 20+ years ago. Just have to get some thermal tape, will also add heatsinks to the CPLDs. This card will not be overclocked as it is fitted with a rev 5 68060.
I would like to take the opportunity to thank everyone involved in making this project a reality!
Here are some links related to BFG 9060:
PicoWyfy WIFI adapter for the Amiga
I just got a PicoWyfy and has spent a day playing around with it in my Amiga 1200. I am very happy with this device as it has helped me get my Amiga 1200 online and onto my network at home.
The PicoWyfy is a “wireless network interface controller” and it connects to the clock port on the Amiga (either on the motherboard or on a Zorro card or other clock port solutions). Read more about PicoWyfy here, you will also find instructions on how to get one there.
Wireless networking has been a possibility on the A1200 and A600 for a long time on the PCMCIA port. I got a NetGear MA401 for this purpose years ago, but the though of having an ugly PCMCIA card sticking out of the side of my Amiga 1200 meant I never bothered to install and configure it. I would rather just put all my files I wanted to transfer on a CF card on my PC and put the CF card in a PCMCIA to CF converter making it easy to copy files of off the CF card to the Amiga HDD.
In comparison with PCMCIA solutions the PicoWyfy is placed on the clock port, so it is fully internal. As you can see on the images, the PicoWyfy is based on a Raspberry Pi Pico W.
Installing PicoWyfy in my Amiga 1200
Installing the PicoWyfy in an A1200 was very simple. If you are reading this, chances are that you already know about the clock port in the Amiga 1200 and what to take care of when mounting hardware here. So no point in going through that. If not, I will eat my hat.
My Amiga 1200 already had a Solas RGB LED Amiga controller inside it that was placed on the clock port. The Solas has a clock port expander integrated into it, so installation was as simple as putting the PicoWyfy on one of the free clock ports on the Solas (and configuring the PicoWyfy for that clock port address). Where to put the actual clock on the Solas is another issue I will have to figure out in the future as the PicoWyfy takes up space for it.
As the A1200 case is plastic, there wont be any signal strenght problems. If you wonder what I have in my (main) Amiga 1200, specs are listed below:
- ReAmiga 1200 1.5 motherboard
- Indivision AGA MK3
- TerribleFire 1260 @ 100Mhz / 128MB
- FlashROM
- Solas RGB LED controller
- LED adapter (so that TF1260 IDE activity is seen on the case LEDs)
- Buffered CF interface / 4GB CF
- MicroniK 1.76 MB floppy drive
- And finally, the latest addition: PicoWyfy
Setting up the software and drivers for PicoWyfy
Installation of the PicoWyfy is straight forward. All you have to do is put some files in the right places in the Workbench drawer. Then it is possible to run the program picowyfyctl to scan for wireless networks, connect or disconnect to wireless networks and to view status of the PicoWyfy. There is no GUI here but it is so simple to configure you wont need one.
In the picture above I have run a scan to look for wireless networks to connect to in my area. I can see my WIFI network here so thats what I am going to connect to.
Here I am connecting PicoWyfy to my home network and as you can see, the connection attempt was successful! I have also removed my WIFI password, if you must know it is “12345679abcd”.
Off course I have to test the connection by browsing the information super highway in an ooooooold version of Aweb, if you type something wrong in the URL field it goes to Altavista by default. How nostalgic. As the modern web runs on HTTPS the browsing session was very limited, but I think it is possible to set up HTTPS in some way or another. Possibly would need to investigate this.
But browsing the web wont be my main activity on the A1200 other than browsing Aminet – Having access to Aminet directly from the Amiga 1200 is such a luxury!
I should mention that I use Roadshow as the TCP/IP stack. It is a great modern TCP/IP stack for the Amiga. Once everything was working I wanted my A1200 to connect to the wireless network automatically at startup. To do that it was as simple as adding the line: “picowyfyctl connect ssid key quiet” before the TCP/IP stack was called in s:user-startup.
So lets test how quick the card is on my system. There is a piece of software on Aminet called AmiSpeedTest you can use for this. Here is the URL.
So here is the test done. To be honest here I dont have a clue how good or bad these results are. Downloading stuff from Aminet is fast though so I am happy. Will test some transfers between my workstation and A1200 in the future also.
Average download speed was 4509 kb/s and average upload speed was 4259 kb/s
Before I close off I also want to quickly introduce Roadie, it is a GUI for Roadshow you can find on Aminet. It has come in handy when testing the PicoWyfy and I think this one will go into the default toolbox on all my Amigas. Find Roadie on Aminet.
And here we are after a reboot of the Amiga 1200. There is no sign of it but my A1200 is connected to my wireless network at home!
Conclusion
I am very happy with the PicoWyfy, its a great addition to my A1200 and to be honest I would like to equip all my Amiga computers in the fleet with one or a card with similar functionality. Great work everyone involved in this project! Highly recommended!
Typically I like to use wired network, but as the years has passed I think wireless networking is perfectly fine. Even for non mobile computers.
I dont run WIFI on my main desktop workstation, but for everything else, why not, one less ugly Cat 6 cable to pull out everytime one wants to hook up something to the internet.
The reason for wanting to connect an Amiga to the internet or a LAN is primary just to move files to the Amiga. But I have some future plans of having all files centralized on a main server and then sync that share with my Amigas. That way I have multiple backups of my Data folder on all my Amigas while I have a central location that I primary update.
FlashROM 40 & 42 pin Kickstart Flash EPROM
There are a couple of different hardware Kickstart solutions for the Amiga. The most proven one seems to be 27C400 chips that you can program in a T48 (with an adapter) and erase with UV light. If you buy a Kickstart from a retailer, that chip is probably an 27C400 EPROM. I dont like the UV light eraser, and the 27C400/27C800 chips are expensive, so I went looking for another solution that had the possibility to scale up in volume fine.
I don’t know what it is about burning Kickstarts for the Amiga but the topic is highly confusing at first. Not only do you have to have the correct byte swapped file (or build the ROM file correct if you want to run a custom ROM) but you need some kind of adapter to be able to program some of the solutions on modern cheap programmers.
This is not a tutorial in how to burn a Kickstart or how to build your own Kickstart, I suggest you schedule a weekend to do a deep dive into that topic. Then it sort of makes sense (I think).
No doubt in the future something like the KickSmash will probably be the defacto standard and I contemplated ordering a batch of PCBs and building a suite of KickSmashes for my fleet of Amigas. Instead I went with the FlashROM, because right here and now, it is possible to run FlashROM on all Amiga models while the KickSmash fits the Amiga 1200, Amiga 3000 and Amiga 4000 (and A4000T).
With new Kickstart ROMs being released fairly regularly these days. And the need to be able to build your own Kickstart so you can f.e. add ehide.device for a TF1260 system or PeterKs Icon library to the Kickstart, an easy way of updating Kickstart is IMHO, a must have, these days!
What is the FlashROM?
The FlashROM is basically a Kickstart replacement that you can program yourself – FlashROM has 1024 KB of space, meaning it can take two Kickstart files. This is great as it is possible to run one Kickstart ROM and one DiagROM rom on the same chip.
You change what bank you want to be active by setting a jumper on the pinouts between GND and A18.
If you do not need dual ROM functionality, just concatenate the same ROM twice and flash it to the EPROM.
Programming a Kickstart to the FlashROM
I use a T48 to program chips, an adapter was needed to be able to flash a Kickstart ROM to the FlashROM. I actually chickened out and just ordered a ready made programmer to reduce the complexity of this project, you can find out more information about the FlashROM adapter on Levo’s website.
Using the adapter is a breeze, just have to connect the wires correct and everything works just like programming any other chip. Erasing the EPROM is no different.
40 pin FlashROM
Here is the 40 pin FlashROM, this will go into my Amiga 500, Amiga 2000 and Amiga 4000 and so on.
42 pin FlashROM
Here is the 42 pin FlashROM, this will go into my Amiga Denise clone, Amiga 4000TX and Amiga 1200. One benefit of running it in a ReAmiga 1200 is that the jumper on the motherboard select which bank you want to be active.
Indivision ECS V4 Amiga scandoubler
I had the opportunity to add a second hand Indivision ECS V4 scandoubler to my collection of Amiga hardware this week.
I am familiar with the Indivision family of scandoublers for the Amiga, the first one I had was the Indivision MK1 AGA for the Amiga 1200 more than 15 years ago. I was very happy with that one.
Currently, I am running an Indivision AGA MK3 in my Amiga 1200 and an Indivision ECS V3 in one of my Denise Amiga clones. Being able to hook up a standard HDMI or VGA screen to another one of my Amiga computers is a real luxury.
I have always thought that not being able to view all Amiga screen modes on a VGA monitor without any expensive hardware was one of the Achilles heels of the Amiga. In my “must have list” for an Amiga computer, a scandoubler is a necessity and not an optional extra.
That perhaps explains why in my current hardware stash I now have 6, now 7 scandoublers.
The elephant in the room is off course RGB2HDMI. But I think, untill there is a good solution for auto switching between two HDMI ports (scandoubler/P96) and untill there is an affordable/open hardware HDMI graphics card I prefer VGA. Because…
The picture quality from the Indivision is really good. As someone on an Amiga discussion forum described it, “it looks like an emulator”. And…
If you take the time, and really invest a chunk of time into reading the setup manual, you can even configure them to display an even better image on your specific monitor.
Replica A3630 Amiga 4000 030 CPU card build
Today I built a replica of the A3630 030 CPU card. The A3630 CPU card came with non CR Amiga 4000D models (the card works on the A4000T and on the A3000D/T also). The CPU card replica PCB is made by Chucky, read more about it here if you are interested in getting one yourself!
I got an (original Commodore made) A3630 in 2005, mainly for testing purposes. It was placed in storage for 15 years and I failed to check the capacitors on it. Sure enough the capacitors had leaked, the board had a fishy smell to it.
When I recapped the genuine C= A3630 board one solder pad lifted off the PCB (very common if capacitor have leaked for a long time). Sure, that is not a big issue, can be fixed quite easy with a bodge wire. But I thought rebuilding the A3630 it with a new ReA3630 PCB was a better option.
I decided to use the CPU and the KEL male edge connector from my current card instead of wasting a new mint in box unobtainium KEL connector from my stash on such a low end card. I removed the CPU from the card by using a hot air rework station. I used a desoldering gun to remove the KEL connector by desoldering each of the 200 solder points for it.
As you can see it is a quite simple card, especially if one do not mount the socket for the FPU. Since my main usage of this card is for testing purposes, the 33MHz FPU and crystal will be used on my ReA3000 instead.