The MIST FPGA


@EvilDragon, you may want to look at the Stand-Alone Vampire being developed by the Apollo Team, expected release in later Q4. It's going to blow the MiST out of the water performance wise. Although it's mostly geared for Amiga only use, although it can run Atari ST TOS via EmuTOS, and 68k Mac via emulation. So it's likely not a perfect replacement for the MiST as it won't emulate other systems outside of the m68k realm.


They're will also be other version like the prior vampires that fit into the socket of the classic Amigas.

http://www.apollo-accelerators.com/files/V4_announcement_v1_5.pdf
 
If it has a more capable fpga shouldn't it be able to handle the same stuff as the MiST?

I am checking both out as soon as I get caught up on recent posts.
 
It looks rather like it; they both use an Altera Cyclone FPGA (although I assume the one in the Vampire is newer), and the Vampire has more RAM. I guess it's the 16-bit amiga focus that's stopped people porting as many systems as they did on the MIST to the older Vampire boards (not to mention that they're physically hosted in an Amiga case - unlike the standalone Vampire V4). Both have dual DE-9 sockets for joysticks, the Vampire has microSD rather than full size, so it sounds as if they could be used in similar ways.
 
Yeah, when I looked into both, and based on the FPGA (an area I only have basic understanding of) it seems the standalone Vampire V4 should be able to be used like a higher end MiST. I don't know how easy it is to bring over cores designed for something else or an older FPGA of the same family. I can't remember which numbers are most important, but the one mentioned in the letter suggests it should be able to handle what the one in the MiST does, plus much more.

Of course a big part is probably the community, and also how easy the hardware makes it to do whatever. I can totally understand the community wanting the Vampire V4 to be strictly for Amiga fans, so not going out of their way to open it up for other uses (I would rather not have Windows on the Pyra for many reasons). The price could also be a barrier for many people. The MiST seems to be right at the sweet spot imo, as it can do a lot of what I want (although I have most of those consoles and some of those computers), and is fairly affordable for all that it can do, especially since I would get hardware, and could, in theory, use it to replace the consoles.

I will just continue to wait and see what happens. At the moment, MiST looks like the better option for me, what I already own (why restrict myself to the standalone version?), and my limited knowledge/understanding. If anyone wants to send me both to try out, that would be great. ;) Oh, and if you are sending me cool hardware, there is an analog synth I will be getting eventually, so might as well make it happen sooner. :p
 
comradekingu said:
Will the standalone one fit an amiga case? Or brackets available?
Still love the amiga.
Click to expand...
I doubt it given they plan to make Vampire boards without the DE-9 sockets to put inside amigas. There's a planned bracket to use the 500 board inside a 600 apparently, but other than that it's different boards rather than brackets.
 
@EvilDragon, once all your current projects are in production you should consider making an FPGA thingy. Maybe one that can replace the Pyra CPU board (MiST specs are fine, especially if we can use their cores). I know I am underestimating the complexity of such a thing.
 
rygD said:
If it has a more capable fpga shouldn't it be able to handle the same stuff as the MiST?
Click to expand...
Except the people behind the vampire only really care about developing a modern 68000 processor with Amiga compatible Custom cores. And you won't be able to just wedge cores created for the MiST or even the same Cylone Series FPGAs and have it "just work". Someone with real skills and familiarity with the vampire hardware would need to adapt those cores for the vampire, I don't currently see that in that community at the moment.

comradekingu said:
Will the standalone one fit an amiga case? Or brackets available?
Still love the amiga.
Click to expand...
Likely, I mean people are wedging all sorts of things in them. There is however V4 Vampires that will be out for the classic amigas, that will allow use of the traditional ports, RGB, Floppy controllers and such.
 
levi said:
They're quite old now aren't they? Isn't there anything better out these days?
Click to expand...

To avoid the obvious irony: clearly original hardware will always be better...

They are still good. Check the GitHub page and you'll see there are still regular updates.
 
@levi apparently the mistFPGA has sort of reached it's peak and most core developers have moved on to a similar platform called "MiSTer"
see here: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel
There are couple more cores available for it, but you need to either buy one from a forum or build your own from (mostly) readily available parts. It seems some people have had to wait for quite some time to aquire the compatible FPGAs though. I think there are a couple of people on Atari Age who use and sometimes sell these.
I run a MIST setup at home and I am quite happy still. The cores get updated frequently but there isn't much room for additional features or new cores. But when I want to use a pimped out Amiga, I turn on my actual Amiga so that's not a show stopper for me.
 
Well this kinda sucks. I updated the firmware, and now the Amiga core won't boot, the yellow light just blinks and the screen flashes red. Sometimes it shows a Software Error screen.
 
Silent-Hunter said:
Well this kinda sucks. I updated the firmware, and now the Amiga core won't boot, the yellow light just blinks and the screen flashes red. Sometimes it shows a Software Error screen.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the tricky thing is that you need to ensure that the MiST firmware, and the core are compatible. I don't upgrade unless there's a specific reason based on the cores I use (ie. The last update I made was to the BBC core which improved sound support).
 
xnopasaranx said:
@levi apparently the mistFPGA has sort of reached it's peak and most core developers have moved on to a similar platform called "MiSTer"
see here: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel
There are couple more cores available for it, but you need to either buy one from a forum or build your own from (mostly) readily available parts. It seems some people have had to wait for quite some time to aquire the compatible FPGAs though. I think there are a couple of people on Atari Age who use and sometimes sell these.
I run a MIST setup at home and I am quite happy still. The cores get updated frequently but there isn't much room for additional features or new cores. But when I want to use a pimped out Amiga, I turn on my actual Amiga so that's not a show stopper for me.
Click to expand...

I checked the MISTer, but there are too many downsides for me to sell it.
Apparently, not having 9pin joystick ports is one of the biggest ones - and they're still a lot of DIY stuff.

I still prefer the MISt :)
 
ClockworkCoder said:
Yeah, the tricky thing is that you need to ensure that the MiST firmware, and the core are compatible. I don't upgrade unless there's a specific reason based on the cores I use (ie. The last update I made was to the BBC core which improved sound support).
Click to expand...
Oh, so how do I find out the newest firmware that's compatible with a specific core?
[doublepost=1540325581,1540312355][/doublepost]Nevermind, the SD card was going bad. I put the core and kickstart rom and other things on another card and it works perfectly with the latest firmware.
[doublepost=1540335553][/doublepost]Does anyone have an exhaustive list of USB gamepads that work with this? I'm surprised it doesn't support the Xbox 360 style ones. My Commodore 64 joysticks hurt my wrists, and I can't find any 9 pin gamepads, only joysticks.
 
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