TF530 with Fast RAM from another card

[SukkoPera]

Sorry for the long absence, but when I did some more tests I broke some pins of the RAM card, so I had to hunt them down, order them and replace them. I finally resumed testing last week but basically ended up nowhere, as SysTest (or should I say Amiga Test Kit, it even changed name in the meantime!) still fails the memory test. I think I'm done with this card, it's really frustrating.

Anyway, as I was doing this I thought I'd just try to clone Kipper2K's RAM expansion, which is deemed to be supported. As I dug deeper I found it's basically a 1:1 implementation of an old and somewhat open design by lvd/NedoPC. So I set down and made a few boards:
- One for the A500, which can be used in either a 4 or 8 MB configuration: https://github.com/SukkoPera/OpenAmiga5 ... mExpansion
- One for the A600, 4 MB only to avoid issues with PCMCIA: https://github.com/SukkoPera/OpenAmiga6 ... mExpansion

I have ordered PCBs, assembled some boards and tested them, they seem to work rock-solid.

The final step was to test the A500 4 MB card with the TF530, as I thought this would be the very same card Kipper had made, but bummer, it doesn't work . I think I even know why, as the CPLD firmware assumes the card is placed at $200000, and does not care for the actual address Autoconfig assigns to it (See here).

I think I can try to hack the Verilog and fix this, but then I wonder: did Kipper use a different firmware? Is it available anywhere?

On a side note, I would like to use the IDE code from the TF530 to add IDE support to the 8 MB A500 card, do you think it is feasible?

[terriblefire]

You simply can’t use these cards with the TF530.. the TF534 was designed to get past this limitation.

The TF530 does work with proper zorro Ii cards on the a2000 such as the GVP.

[SukkoPera]

So is the Kipper card different? What design does it use?

[terriblefire]

The kipper card doesn't work with the 530.. it works with the 534.

[SukkoPera]

Well, so what have we been discussing in this thread for the last few months?

If that's a way to say you don't want to waste your time with this old board, well, that's fine, I understand and I'll be happy with that, but please just say so, as I had really understood that a 4 MB ZorroII card would work with the TF530 too.

[dalek]

I think it was stated that the kipper (redesign) expansion doesn't follow autoconfig properly. So the TF534 using ZIII space makes it "compatible" by not using ZII space. I can understand not wanting to screw with the TF530 firmware just to make a non-compliant expansion compatible, even though they were quite prevalent.

The sidecar RAM expansions that were tested working would all follow the autoconfig protocol correctly.

Hardcoding that expansion at a different address would avoid the conflict on the TF530. I'd suggest a jumper that RAM board so that when it is limited to 4MB you can move it to the end of the 8MB ZII space and add it with addmem.

Or just toss them both and get a TF536

[SukkoPera]

I never asked anyone to screw with the TF530 firmware, but I had understood that ZorroII RAM cards up to 4MB (and the Kipper card, I'm pretty sure this was clearly stated here and there) would work alongside this board and, if this is correct, I really want to get one going.

I came up to the point of redesigning a card, getting prototypes made and get them working, without asking anyone for help. It looks like I am still missing one bit to achieve my goal and *I* would like to go that extra mile.

I have studied the Autoconfig protocol, and see two problems with the implementation on this card:
1. It will reply to any Autoconfig request, as it only "listens" to the address bus for them, it does not have a /CONFIG_IN pin.
2. It will assume it is placed at $200000 and not listen to the actual address Kickstart assigns to it.

Now, as far as I can see, #1 will only be a problem if there are other Autoconfig boards in the system. As the board is targeted at the A500, this is likely not to be the case, so I don't see it as impacting. It will NOT work on the A2000, but you have other choices there, as a real A2058. The initial Autoconfig requests used by the TF to configure its onboard RAM should not interfere either, as they never get outside the TF itself, as I understood.

On the contrary, #2 is definitely impacting. I can hardcode the actual address, but I can also try to fix the Verilog so that it gets the correct address in all cases. *I* will do that, I DO NOT want Stephen to do any modifications to the TF530 firmware (well, unless we find out it has bugs, lol ), but just a few guidelines on what I should do. And, as my board is 100% Open Hardware, this would benefit the whole community.

[project23]

I'm curious... does it currently work with addmem, if the whole upper 4mb is available?

[terriblefire]

Well, so what have we been discussing in this thread for the last few months?

If that's a way to say you don't want to waste your time with this old board, well, that's fine, I understand and I'll be happy with that, but please just say so, as I had really understood that a 4 MB ZorroII card would work with the TF530 too.

A proper zorro II card does work. The kipper card is not a proper zorro ii card. I went over this on a livestream years ago.

EDiT: we have been discussing a card other than the kipper card. The it suddenly changed to the kipper card which does not work due to autoconfig issues

[terriblefire]

I will repeat one more time here. I already said this a few times in this thread but I’ll sum it up one more time.

Unless a card can have its base address set to $600000 during autoconfig it will not work with the TF530.

I tried to rewrite the kipper firmware for this but it didn’t work. I spend a month on this issue. I also don’t want to support a firmware update for someone else’s card.

If you use the non autoconfig firmware you can add the ram manually with addmem.