Put an Amiga on Wall St
9 messages in this thread
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files among these various platforms, as well as driving a fax server once the
Novell net is in. I may need help getting this all to work. Any tips?
Any and all suggestions, tips, etc. would be appreciated. If my boss follows
through (and I have no reason to believe he won't) I want to be able to
smoothly and professionally show them what desk top computing can really do for
the company. I'm open to any help I can get.
Ray Lewis
Ray:
We've been running several "power" systems like you describe around here for
several months. First, make absolutely sure that you get the upgraded PROM set
for the AT bridgeboard. If you don't, you're probably going to have bootup
problems with the Janus library. Secondly, make sure to get the "cachecard"
program from Dave Haynie so that you can disable 68030 caching of the
bridgeboard's dual-port memory. Third, think very carefully about the PC side
cards you're putting in there, remember that there are ONLY 2 "AT" style slots
in an A2000, and the AT bridge takes up at least 1. You might want to go GVP
for the 030 card, and put an AT harddrive on there to save the slot the SCSI
controller would take up. This might allow you to put the bridge in the
rightmost AT slot, giving you more PC side space.
We don't use anything but Mitsubishi AUM-1341's for monitors here, but I know
someone who just bought a NEC 3D and is quite happy with it. We use Flicker
Fixers with every system.
The 68030 cards do just what they're supposed to, working with a lot more
software nowdays than they used to. I think this has a lot to do with the
length of time the A2620 has been out. There is no effective difference in
compatibility between the GVP 030's and the A2620's, both of which we use here.
If it won't run on the 030, it most likely won't run on the 020 either. Most
of what doesn't run is game software.
Anything else?
Ariel
Actually one can have 4 16 bit(AT) slots. All we have to do is solder in the
other 2 36pin slots and the xt slots become at slots.
Phil
Ariel — thanks for the input.
Could you give me a bit more info on the "cachecard" thing? I don't quite
follow what the problem is.
Also, am I reading correctly that you all have the hard drives on the IBM side?
(i.e. "AT harddrive") I thought you could have the bridgeboard share an Amiga
drive. You don't have to have a controller on the AT side to do that do you?
(Or is this, in fact, what you are suggesting I do?)
Ray Lewis
Also — are your machines on an ethernet? If so, which ethernet card do you
use?
We did not have too much success when we first tried to combine a 68030
accelerator with the AT bridgeboard. While analyzing our difficulty, it
occurred to somebody that the bb used dual-port memory to pass data between
the PC and the Amiga sides of the machine. Without intervention, it would
be possible for the 68030 to cache internally data that might be changed by
the 80286 in a subsequent operation. Since the 68030 would have no way to
know that the data had been changed (it thinks only *IT* can change the
contents of memory), the next time data is read from the dual-port ram it
may well come from the unaltered cache, not from the altered ram. In
reality, the cache is updated from various other data areas (from multiple
processes) so much that misreads are infrequent. I worried mostly about
the values that were used for handshaking, which might be looked at several
times in succession. Cachecard solves this problem by disabling 68030
caching when referencing memory belonging to certain cards. By specifying
the AT bridge, you can stop the dual-port memory from being cached.
We run our bb off of the Amiga-side hard drive using PCDisk. What I meant
by "AT harddrive" is that the GVP 030 accelerator card has an "AT" disk
interface, not SCSI. Therefore, by buying a hard drive with an "AT" type
interface, you could attach it to the accelerator instead of a separate
SCSI card, thus saving a slot.
Yes, all of our machines are attached to each other through the Ameristar
Ethernet interface. We run TCP/IP, and have our own primitive file/data
transfer mechanism hooked up as a development net.
The man you want to talk to is Tom Holaday. He's in EXACTLY your situation –
it's uncanny.
I have a Multisynch 3D with a FlickerFixer, and it's just plain superb!
*** SLY ***
Edmonton, Alberta
Thanks for the kind words Sly, one minor point in favor of the NEC 3D for use
with flicker fixer is that it comes with the proper cable adapter. There is no
need to buy a special cable.
Peter.