68060 sources

News & updates for the upcoming 68060 accelerator

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arkadiusz.makarenko
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by arkadiusz.makarenko »

terriblefire wrote: Fri Jul 03, 2020 1:17 pm
Cyprian wrote: Fri Jul 03, 2020 1:02 pm

is there any 060 FPGA core around?
Not open source.
Sorry for off topic. How many hours of work do you think fpga 060 implementation would take?
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by terriblefire »

arkadiusz.makarenko wrote: Fri Jul 03, 2020 2:01 pm
terriblefire wrote: Fri Jul 03, 2020 1:17 pm

Not open source.
Sorry for off topic. How many hours of work do you think fpga 060 implementation would take?
It would be years of effort unless we got the coldfire verilog sources.. which is where i think some other projects started from.
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by Cyprian »

terriblefire wrote: Fri Jul 03, 2020 2:21 pm It would be years of effort unless we got the coldfire verilog sources.. which is where i think some other projects started from.
V....re one? :)
anyway sounds really cool
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by nibiru »

terriblefire wrote: Fri Jul 03, 2020 11:56 am
nibiru wrote: Fri Jul 03, 2020 11:40 am I think this would be the greatest project ever. Full Rev6 060s are close to depletion, prices have skyrocketed already, and all the new boards are going to be sold without an 060, possibly reducing a lot the interest in them (or making them way more expensive than they could have been).

Whereas a FPGA core would provide way more reliable hardware, built in 2020, more features, speed, and probably cost the same if not less.
I'd make a Kickstarter out of it. Perks: once the core is done, a socket + CPU to all backers :mrgreen:
No i'll never do a kickstarter.. It puts me under too much pressure and its not like i need money.
Yeah I agree with that. It's not for the money but at least to cover the effort and expenses in sourcing components, testing, assembling,
etc.
My idea was more: once it's done and working, collect orders from KS, so the only pressure would be making the final boards, not to deliver a working core. But it still involves pressure, so... back up!
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by terriblefire »

I've no problem getting boards once i have a working core. Thats the easy bit.
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by nibiru »

terriblefire wrote: Sun Jul 05, 2020 5:06 pm I've no problem getting boards once i have a working core. Thats the easy bit.
I agree, but I said that since I believe extra money is a way to say "thank you for your hard work and dedication". And I think people would gladly spend quite more for a FPGA 68060 than it actually cost as they are already doing now to find decent CPUs.

But I guess this also goes against the open-source spirit, and that would be quite necessary in developing a new core from scratch.

Then to add something to the topic: DO REALLY Amigas/STs need FPGA 68060s?
Wouldn't a pumped-up 68030 be somewhat easier to accomplish?
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by amimjf »

Hi,

The 060 and even the 030 designs are complex, that's because due to manufacturing process limitations you had to go complex to get performance, caches, pipelining, etc

With modern FPGAs the 30 years of process improvements means we get clock frequency for free. So you don't need complexity to get performance, we just brute force it with clocks.

Designs like the Vampire 1 and Mike Sterling's designs are pretty much the tg68 open core, clocked fast, and they deliver performance past 060s.

Tg68 does 020 at 40mhz with very fast ram and a single cycle cache access. Remember that CPUs have to fetch instructions from memory unless they are cached, and older devices had very small caches compared to today.

Basically no point doing a complex CPU architecture on a FPGA, the Vampire4 has pushed it pretty far as they want to stay on a, relatively cheap FPGA.
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by terriblefire »

nibiru wrote: Mon Jul 06, 2020 4:38 pm I agree, but I said that since I believe extra money is a way to say "thank you for your hard work and dedication". And I think people would gladly spend quite more for a FPGA 68060 than it actually cost as they are already doing now to find decent CPUs.

But I guess this also goes against the open-source spirit, and that would be quite necessary in developing a new core from scratch.

Then to add something to the topic: DO REALLY Amigas/STs need FPGA 68060s?
Wouldn't a pumped-up 68030 be somewhat easier to accomplish?
Kickstarter is more pain to me than a help. So i'll never do one.
amimjf wrote: Mon Jul 06, 2020 5:18 pm Hi,

The 060 and even the 030 designs are complex, that's because due to manufacturing process limitations you had to go complex to get performance, caches, pipelining, etc
Incorrect. 030 is linear. 060 is superscalar.
With modern FPGAs the 30 years of process improvements means we get clock frequency for free. So you don't need complexity to get performance, we just brute force it with clocks.

Designs like the Vampire 1 and Mike Sterling's designs are pretty much the tg68 open core, clocked fast, and they deliver performance past 060s.

Tg68 does 020 at 40mhz with very fast ram and a single cycle cache access. Remember that CPUs have to fetch instructions from memory unless they are cached, and older devices had very small caches compared to today.
Mike's core doesnt get to 060 levels. Nowhere near the last time i checked. It clocks to 66Mhz but has no super-scalar pipeline. Its good but its not good enough for me. Also no FPU and no MMU.

The Apollo core is a complex design and given its closed source we want a new FPGA design to break the monopoly. Its superscalar and pipelined.

Basically no point doing a complex CPU architecture on a FPGA, the Vampire4 has pushed it pretty far as they want to stay on a, relatively cheap FPGA.
Yes there. Because Vampire is not open.
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by amimjf »

My information based on https://www.mike-stirling.com/2020/03/a ... m-sd-card/

Results against 040 show it's pretty close to what an 060 would do, and that's on a pretty standard/cheap FPGA.
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Re: 68060 sources

Post by terriblefire »

amimjf wrote: Mon Jul 06, 2020 8:13 pm My information based on https://www.mike-stirling.com/2020/03/a ... m-sd-card/

Results against 040 show it's pretty close to what an 060 would do, and that's on a pretty standard/cheap FPGA.
But no 060 instruction set... no FPU.. no MMU.

So you cant play the 060 demos' which is the whole point.

EDIT: also please dont tell me not to do a project. I've been working and planning on doing this 060 FPGA since 2012.
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indicates how much hurting you shall receive."
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