User avatar
SnkBitten
South Carolina

Posted Mon Sep 04, 2017 1:11 pm

Here's my A4000D, another project Amiga I'm working on. This one was initially going to be my Amiga.....with Video Toaster and Flyer, WarpEngine and whatever else would fit. I actually picked this one up of eBay while I was working on my Amithlon setup. The Amiga 30th anniversary hit which flooded the internet with news articles and stories so I searched for a few Amiga sites and that in turn had me downloading and installing WinUAE. It had been years since I had used an Amiga and it was a bit of a challenge with all the options in WinUAE and then remembering how to use AmigaOS. Reading on emulating the Amiga I kept hearing about Amithlon and I went on the search for that.......but that's another story.

Playing with Amithlon, I was using real hardware....and this made me want to put my hands on real Amiga hardware. My initial desire was to rebuild the system I had let go years ago...an A4000 with WarpEngine4040, a Toaster 4000 card, an Emplant card, a GVP Spectrum RTG card....a walk down memory lane so-to-speak.

I started watching Amibay but was always too late to post interest or the systems were too complete and pricey. Watching eBay I saw an A4000 pop up that looked okay...though it would need some work. The ROMs were 3.0, the Buster was version 9, the memory socket clips were broken. It was a "Buy it Now" item and wasn't too expensive but more than I wanted to spend. I watched it and watched it until I watched it end "unsold". A few days later it was re-listed for a lesser price, still a buy-it-now item. I again watched it for the entire two weeks it was listed until it ended "unsold". A few days later it appeared again, a little less than last time, not quite the same drop as the previous time. I had told myself, if it shows up again I'm buying it. So I watched...and was actually considering seeing if it would end again unsold and perhaps relist at a lower price. I had been watching a few other listings but those all seemed to end very quickly (buy-it-now) or go for high numbers (auction). Another day of thinking and my mind was made up, click "Buy it Now". Now I waited for it to arrive.... I went through all my friends/family in search of a monitor that would work. I knew it was AGA and could do DoubleNTSC if needed but I wanted a quick and easy test booting. I had read a number of Dell monitors would sync to 15k modes even if they didn't list syncing down that low, I had an old Dell monitor...maybe I would be lucky. Nope....no such luck. However my dad had an old Commodore 1950-B monitor which worked, not well, but well enough. The system booted, and all 18 MB memory checked in (2mb chip plus 16mb fast). The monitor had seen much better days, but the system worked! I had already ordered 3.1 Roms so those were changed out immediately. I also ordered an Indivision AGA MkII for an A4000/CD32 which allowed me to use a standard monitor for the Amiga modes. Downside, I was used to using high resolution, high color modes in WinUAE and Amithlon. 256 colors on 1024x768 (HighGFX Monitor driver) was just too slow....so a 32 color Screenmode was used.

The A4000D only had a standard DD Amiga drive and it was on its last legs as well. A 3.5" floppy drive from AmigaKit was soon on order as well as a Buster 11 and Cocolino USB mouse interface. I knew the Toaster/Flyer combo was going to be a pain with the cramped A4000D so I held off installing those for the moment. WarpEngine in, Picasso II in and the X-Surf (jumpered ZII) + RapidRoadUSB (all later transplanted to the A4000T).

I was using a standard 5.25" DVD-RW drive and a 3.5" HD along with the 3.5" floppy drive. The A4000D as purchased didn't have the rear drive mounting plates included and I also had a 4-way adapter for the IDE interface and an IDE CF-Card reader (a back slot mount bracket type). The had me searching for a 5.25" bracket that can hold a 3.5" drive and a Slim optical drive, I believe I had seen someone post a picture of the Amiga with one of those slim drives and I thought it looked sweet. I also didn't like the idea of my IDE CF-card sticking out the rear of the computer so I found a Startech 3.5" mounting IDE CF-Card reader that works well. Here's a picture of the front of the A4000D (at the time) with the Slim optical drive and IDE CF-Card reader in the 5.25" slot, then a 3.5" multi-usb card reader and 3.5" floppy below that.
A4000Ds.jpg
As the A4000T showed up, a lot of what I had started on the A4000D moved over to it. With the Toaster/Flyer no longer a concern in the A4000D I have removed the Zorro daughter board and have installed the Mediator PCI/Zorro daughter board along with the mediator bridge board. I haven't had much time to configure it, initial results for adding a PCI card have been met with failures. I hope to get back to working on this setup soon.

Currently the A4000D as sits:
A4000/040 @ 25 Mhz, 2 MB Chip, 16 MB Fast
Mediator 4000di, Picasso II
Slot loading Slim DVD-RW drive with 2.5" 80 GB IDE drive.

On hand and waiting to be installed:
ROMY 1 MB Kickstart, PIO2 Mode gals, Buster 11 and new Simm sockets.
I have another Starteck 3.5" IDE CF-Card reader I may install along with the 4-Way IDE adapter.
I have for the Mediator a Radeon ATI 5v Graphics card and a Realtek 8139 ethernet adapter.

I haven't spent a lot of time with this one as it really needs to be recapped and I need that Buster upgraded. The Simm sockets hold the memory in for the most part but moving the system can make a few no longer register. I'm waiting on finances to improve and then sending both the A4000D and A4000T motherboards off for recapping and upgrading. Until then, I tinker around with it from time to time. My primary focus has bounced between my Video Toaster/Flyer system and my Amithlon system......I just need to take a break from those two and dedicate some to the A4000D.

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Mon Sep 04, 2017 3:46 pm

What a cool journey to read about - thanks for sharing that history! Your machine and my Amiga 2000 / 030 @ 40Mhz (16MB RAM) probably feel about the same at the end of the day, except for the fact that I've intentionally kept mine running OS 1.3. But speed-wise they they probably feel very similar.
I haven't spent a lot of time with this one as it really needs to be recapped
By the way I contacted Acill about recapping services. I'm not familiar with the 3000 or 4000, but when it comes to recapping he almost entirely focuses his attention on the all-in-ones like the 600 and 1200. I had an email exchange with him and when I was done, I was convinced my 1000 and 2000 didn't need a re-cap, even though they are very old machines.
Acil:
Well only if your audio and video is looking weak. I don't do many 2000 in less needed or strictly to preserve.
In other words, if it ain't broke I really don't need to do it unless there's an obvious issue.

User avatar
SnkBitten
South Carolina

Posted Mon Sep 04, 2017 5:58 pm

Yeah, I've had some email exchanges with Acill as well and apparently 4000's pretty much need recapping. He will be getting both mine to do and it's going to be a bit of money to do so. I may do one at a time, starting with the A4000D since it is in worse shape and is used less. Start really working on it when it all new and recapped while the A4000T is down for recapping. Plus I need to get my eprom burner working since the WarpEngine will be getting a full 68060 before I send it all off to Acill.

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Mon Sep 04, 2017 9:26 pm

Oh I see. I never scrolled down on Acil's site to see there was a special section just for the 4000. That's interesting. And he has a very specific SIMM section, too, which is right up your alley.

He can basically get you future-proof all across the board (no pun intended).

I may shoot him my 1200 later on but I'm in no rush. Just so glad there's someone like him around to do these very rare tasks.

User avatar
SnkBitten
South Carolina

Posted Tue Sep 05, 2017 6:01 pm

Well I pulled the A4000D back to a place I can work on it.....the A4000T is waiting on some SSD drives (well money for SSD drives) for the Flyer so it's not getting much use so I can use the monitor it uses for the A4000D.

I had just installed the OS before putting it away (I think) so I have some updates and programs to install/configure.

I tend to install my OS using WinUAE and connecting a physical IDE drive with a IDE>USB adapter. It's significantly faster this way, I can setup large drives without issue (setting the 1st 4 GB as the boot drive partition) and I can do it using .adf files or just straight install of OS 3.9 from the disc image file. I use a WinUAE 3.9 setup that is fully patched and then add the IDE physical drive as an A4000 IDE device and one in AmigaOS I partition the drive, install the OS and then shutdown WInUAE, move the drive over and boot on my physical Amiga.

I know I installed recently to this 2.5" IDE drive I have in it, just not sure how far along I was. The previous drive I had a 3.1 boot and a 3.9 boot partition so I could switch between the two OS's.

I have a Picasso II in it currently, I may try the ATI Radeon 9250 PCI again in the Mediator so I can get the RTL8139 10/100 card working as well. Mediators are near useless if you don't have a PCI video card working as it uses some of the cards ram for DMA transfers.





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