Kickstarter.. Retro Styled Modular IPS Display

As posted on Stephen Jones kickstarter page..,,,

Checkmate 19″ IPS Retro Monitor Overview

What we are building is a modular display platform to take us into the future of retro computing and gaming or as we say, “Yesterday’s Technology Tomorrow”. It’s the base on which to build your own future proof display solution based on what you need, and with great build quality and good looks. And it’s flexible and upgradable enough for it to last you a lifetime.

“Checkmate really helps in keeping the Amiga alive and relevant. Professionally made new hardware products like these are so encouraging to see. The monitors give a clear and vivid display, providing an ideal all-in-one retro computer solution.”

Amiga Addict Magazine

CRT displays of the kind we all grew up with are terrific displays, but they come with a price. They are not modern tech and as such they are expensive and difficult to maintain, like classic pinball machines or arcade games. We knew we had to come up with a better, more future proof solution going forwards and what we’ve designed is the Checkmate Retro Styled Modular IPS Display platform. Modular inputs and modular outputs.

Modular outputs – it doesn’t come with a panel as standard, you have to add that afterwards depending on what you need. We had to do it this way, start with a base and add options. It’s the only way to be all things to all people.

More info: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/checkmate1500mini/retro-styled-modular-ips-display-for-old-and-new-systems/description

New Amiga Tank Mouse funded  

Tank MouseTank Mouse is a brand new computer mouse, inspired by the famous Commodore Amiga 1352. However under the classic look a modern technology is hidden. Tank mouse blends retro-computing passion with everyday tasks. This modernized version is a wireless optical mouse, which received a touch panel, placed between the two buttons, for scrolling. Tank Mouse operates under Bluetooth or 2.4GHz, which makes it possible to connect to almost any kind of device, but more importantly it can be used with your original Commodore Amiga computer! The mouse connects directly to all computers supporting Bluetooth, for other computers a small USB receiver is included. The iconic bold design makes the mouse not only unforgettable but also suitable for left and right-handed people.

More info here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lukas-remis/tank-mouse-your-new-amiga-mouse/

My X5000 with AMD RX570 and HD5450 graphics

As you could have read in one of my previous posts is my AmigaOne X5000 equipped with an AMD RX570 graphics card. The use of the RX line of cards allows us to use the VA library. The Video Acceleration Library has been created to support hardware video decoding on Radeon Polaris (RX) cards. For us AmigaOS4.x users this is a very welcome addition to the use of our beloved OS and X5000.

The downside to switching to an RX based graphics card is not having support in the Linux kernel for this. This results in losing the ability to use LInux on the X5000. The only option I could think of was adding a second graphics card to bring Linux back to the machine.

As there are some posts on the hyperion forum referring to the setup of two graphics cards in the X5000 I thought it would be nice to write about my own setup.

Choosing what card to use.
Since the PCIe X16 slot is already in use for the RX570 card it leaves us with the PCI and PCIe X1 slots to choose from. The PCIe X4 slot in the X5000 is due to bad design blocked by the PCIe X16 graphics card so cannot be used. As PCI graphic cards are hard to find and very outdated (like Radeon 9250) a PCIeX1 card would be the better choice . Finding a PCIe X1 radeon/amd based graphics card is an option, but I tried using a PCIe X16 to X1 converter as those converters are easy to find and cheap due to the whole crypto mining landscape these days. As having a usable linux system for me is more important than the ability of playing games, the performance is not a big issue and a PCIe X1 slot would be good enough.

By using a converter you have many cards to choose from. I started with a Firepro RV620 based normal size graphics card but eventually got it replaced. I could not find a decent way to fit the card in my X5000 case.

For me the best way was to use a low profile Radeon graphics card (MSI HD5450), as this card leaves us the space we need for use of the converter board.
This card also has DVI and HDMI outputs so any monitor can be used, and the connectors are where I want them to be, on the back of the machine.

The monitor.
I first made the choice of attaching both graphic cards to the same monitor. As this is usable, the downside is having to switch input when starting up Linux. As my Philips monitor does not have great buttons and an OSD menu to do the switching, I am using a second monitor attached to the new graphics card just for Linux use.

The result.
So there we have it. The AmigaOne X5000 with RX card for the best OS4 experience and the option to run Linux by using a second graphics card. All stuffed away in the X5000 case and ready for action.

To do.
At the moment the Linux graphics card (HD5450) is using the FBdev (driver) in the Xorg.conf so hardware acceleration is limited… (i think there is a way to make use of hardware acceleration by using the GPU) The other thing will be making use of just on big Linux drive with several partitions instead of two drives.

Thanks.
Big thanks go to the captain of the Amiga Linux Development community, Christian Zigotzky and of course all forum members who keep the scene going. Thank you!

17/2/2022 UPDATE!

As mentioned before the FBdev issue has now been solved. This means that we now have Hardware 3D support. YEAH!!! It was hard to find the correct xorg.conf values needed to get things going…

 

GLXINFO!
OpenGL vendor string: X.Org
OpenGL renderer string: AMD CEDAR (DRM 2.50.0 / 5.17.0-rc4_A-EON_X5000, LLVM 12.0.1)
OpenGL core profile version string: 3.2 (Core Profile) Mesa 21.3.3
OpenGL core profile shading language version string: 1.50
OpenGL core profile context flags: (none)
OpenGL core profile profile mask: core profile
OpenGL core profile extensions:
OpenGL version string: 3.1 Mesa 21.3.3
OpenGL shading language version string: 1.40
OpenGL context flags: (none)
OpenGL extensions:
OpenGL ES profile version string: OpenGL ES 2.0 Mesa 21.3.3
OpenGL ES profile shading language version string: OpenGL ES GLSL ES 1.0.16
OpenGL ES profile extensions:
My Xorg.conf to get it up and running!
Section “Monitor”
Identifier “Monitor0”
EndSection
Section “Device”
Identifier “Device1”
Driver “radeon”
EndSection
Section “ServerFlags”
Option “AIGLX” “on”
EndSectionSection “Module”
Load “dri”
Load “dri2”
Load “dbe”
Load “glx”
Load “type1”
Load “freetype”
Load “record”
EndSection

Section “DRI”
Mode 0666
EndSection

Section “Extensions”
Option “Composite” “Enable”
Option “RENDER” “Enable”
Option “RANDR” “Enable”
Option “DAMAGE” “Enable”

Option “GLX” “Enable”
EndSection

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Screen0”
Device “Device0”
Monitor “Monitor0”
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection “Display”
Depth 24
Viewport 0 0
EndSubSection
EndSection

The Checkmate A1500 Case

Amiga Cases – A500, A1200 and A600The new case is designed as an homage to the beauty and power of the Amiga 3000 and has the optional keyboard garage like the original Amiga 1000. The modular design is capable of building a highly powerful, True Amiga, based on the A500, A600 and A1200 motherboards with all of the extras that are available for these amazing computer motherboards like the Vampire accelerator/24bit graphics upgrade. http://www.apollo-accelerators.comThis video shows inside the case with components mounted with version two prototype testing.

Source: www.AmigaSystems.com

KEY2 LE First Look by Crackberry Kevin

BlackBerry KEY2 LE is here! We’re at IFA2018 in Berlin where BlackBerry Mobile is launching their brand new smartphone in three vibrant new color options: Slate, Champagne, and Atomic! Hit play and let me know in the comments which color option you’d like. Any other thoughts on the device leave them below, will PIN the best feedback for others to enjoy.

A1222 Tabor Talk.. Drivers.. and Status.. From Trevor’s Amiga Blog

AmigaOne A1222 updateTalking about communicating, I receive a lot of requests for information about the release date for the AmigaOne A1222. At AmiWest 2017 and Amiga32, in agreement with Hyperion Entertainment, I was able to present the first public showing of the AmigaOne A1222 running a pre-release beta version of AmigaOS 4.1. I was able to demonstrate that AmigaOS4.1 is very stable on the A1222 which also fully supports the latest RadeonHD 3.x, including the new 64-bit VRAM feature, along with Warp 3D Nova and Warp3D-SI. However, I did reveal that work was still ongoing on the Audio and Ethernet drivers and well as FPU optimsation. The A1222 has not been totally cut-off from cyberspace since the AmigaOS 4.1 beta iso included a driver for an inexpensive USB-to-Ethernet device which allowed the A1222 to connect to the web. A number of the beta testers, including me, have been using the device for online access and I even wrote and posted an earlier blog using the device/driver. The USB-to-Ethernet device was a good stop-gap measure but obviously not suitable for the final AmigaOne A1222 release.Remote Desktop on AmigaOne A1222 to Windows PCI’m actually writing this blog using a combination Odyssey and Remote Desktop on my AmigaOne A1222 to test out a new on-board Ethernet driver written by AmigaOS 4.1 developer Rene’ Olsen. 🙂 .I’m pleased to report that Rene’s driver appears to be very stable and works well. I’ve downloaded multiple copies of the latest Enhancer Software v2.x beta archives and installed numerous programs and utilities from AMIStore and transferred gigabytes of data over my LAN without any problems.Running OWB on AmigaOne A1222Even better the driver appears to be on par and perhaps a little faster that the standard OS4 network driver for my RTL8139 Ethernet card. Incidentally, Rene’ also wrote the driver for the USB-to-Ethernet device so I suppose it’s no surprise that the initial release of his Ethernet driver works so well. I’ve attached a couple of screengrabs showing Remote Desktop and Odyssey on my A1222, two programs which are always a good tests of network performance. The driver has now been issued to the A1222 beta testers for thorough stress testing. Rene’ received some help from Justin Hibbits who was recommended to Steven Solie by Alex Perez. Alex is another A1222 & X5000 beta tester who has a particular fondness for Linux. Justin is a committer at FreeBSD who, according to Steven, is looking for help with the FreeBSD port. If any Linux motivated A1222 beta testers want to help Justin complete FreeBSD for Tabor/A1222 please make contact and I will pass on your details. We already have the Atlantis and Pathfinder Tabor boards working 24/7 building Debian SPE thanks to the work of John Paul Adrian Glaubitz.

Source: Trevor’s Amiga Blog

A New Case for your Amiga 500 & Plus … Check it out..

Amiga 500 New Case MoldThe New Compatible A500(+) case is the perfect replacement case for your aging yellowed Amiga 500 case. Manufactured with the same quality standards as the New Compatible A1200 cases, it comes with extended support for Apollo boards as well as USB/HDMI/SD cards ports. No more hassle opening the case to replace or connect anything. Treated Anti-UV, it will stay fresh and as new for the next 50 years.

Source: New Compatible Case for Amiga 500 & Plus | Indiegogo