rasteri wrote on 2023-01-25, 11:29:

Eivind wrote on 2023-01-25, 09:27:

I'll be getting my hands on a Voodoo 3 PCI card hopefully tomorrow, curious to see how that'll perform in combination with the Vortex86EX and the PI7C9X118 bridge...

I am very interested to see how/if 3D accelerated games work 😀

I did manage to get Windows 98 working on my EX but I can't remember how or how long it took

Yeah I got it up and running as well, but I didn't get sound working. I'm sure it's probably just a question of drivers though.

Taking a step back, I don't really see the point of running Windows 98 on the current TinyLlama - there are no drivers for either the Vortex86VGA or SM750, so the experience is rather sluggish. I'm excited to try other graphics cards on it, but only to get a sense of what's possible using the Vortex chips with a proper motherboard ("FatLlama") in the future. I would never run the frankenstein-setup of adapters and PCI cards spread out on the table outside of testing! 😀

Eivind wrote on 2023-01-25, 11:53:

Taking a step back, I don't really see the point of running Windows 98 on the current TinyLlama -

Just to test the Voodoo! I wouldn't recommend it as a general thing.

rasteri wrote on 2023-01-25, 12:00:

Eivind wrote on 2023-01-25, 11:53:

Taking a step back, I don't really see the point of running Windows 98 on the current TinyLlama -

Just to test the Voodoo! I wouldn't recommend it as a general thing.

Yep for sure! Though the nice thing about the Voodoo is that it should work with Glide in DOS as well! 😀

Yeah S3 chips work very well with this.

I might try to make a mini PCIe S3 card if I ever get good at designing PCBs... But yeah for now I should focus on portig the esp and the hidman to v1.1 boards

Deksor wrote on 2023-01-25, 13:38:

Yeah S3 chips work very well with this.

I might try to make a mini PCIe S3 card if I ever get good at designing PCBs... But yeah for now I should focus on portig the esp and the hidman to v1.1 boards

I Will be here when the Hidman is Done 😀 would like to have it also 😀

I managed to get my Voodoo working by underclocking the EX to 200MHz (with 33MHz PCI clock). It's still pretty crashy and performance is bad, but it's 3D accelerated.

GLQuake gets 14.6FPS at 512x384, and 14.1FPS at 640x480 - significantly worse than winquake on the same clock speed (20.5FPS). GTA ran slightly faster but still not great. I didn't try any other games or different miniGL versions.

In other news, I tried some windows 98 games on the SM750 (EX back up at 300MHz) using the VBEMP 9x driver. 2D games like Starcraft work very nicely. Just don't expect to run Unreal on it.

rasteri wrote on 2023-01-31, 17:19:

I managed to get my Voodoo working by underclocking the EX to 200MHz (with 33MHz PCI clock). It's still pretty crashy and performance is bad, but it's 3D accelerated.

GLQuake gets 14.6FPS at 512x384, and 14.1FPS at 640x480 - significantly worse than winquake on the same clock speed (20.5FPS). GTA ran slightly faster but still not great. I didn't try any other games or different miniGL versions.

In other news, I tried some windows 98 games on the SM750 (EX back up at 300MHz) using the VBEMP 9x driver. 2D games like Starcraft work very nicely. Just don't expect to run Unreal on it.

Nice!, ye i think the hole project for the vortex86ex is perfect for 2d games and for the size 😀
As you said there is alot of good 2d games for windows which this covers.

Doh it is still cool to see all the crazy ass cards you guys try with it 😁

and ps, will you do a video on youtube on the crazy testes? 😜

Eivind wrote on 2023-01-25, 09:27:

For older games, the Vortex86VGA is pretty good! Reasonably cheap and power-efficient. For more demanding games (Quake-era stuff), SM750-based Mini PCIe cards are way faster, while keeping the tiny physical size. They're usually pretty expensive though, because they're almost always sold as industrial components.

When testing my SM750 card, I experimented with removing the Vortex86VGA VBIOS from the SOM's ROM - didn't make any difference. I think the BIOS will pick the graphics card's VBIOS if present. Also, I don't really think the graphics card would work at all if paired with the wrong VBIOS. As an aside - my SM750 card's VBIOS came with a horrible font set, but I managed to swap that out with the "standard" IBM PC font from my BIOS during boot (INT 10h, AX=1110h, for those interested).

I'll be getting my hands on a Voodoo 3 PCI card hopefully tomorrow, curious to see how that'll perform in combination with the Vortex86EX and the PI7C9X118 bridge...

FYI these guys again have stock of the SM750! for cheap. 10 pounds (https://secure.chamsys.co.uk/shop/index.php?r … &product_id=155)

And it's out of stock again, dang it !

Deksor wrote on 2023-02-02, 18:45:

And it's out of stock again, dang it !

I happy would exchange one for a hidman to v1.1 boards pcb design 😉

Any chance anyone has a extra GD-SM750 PCIe i could buy? cant seem to get them in the US and dont really want to get the vortex86 one as its slower then the sm750

Xargon321 wrote on 2023-02-04, 18:27:

Any chance anyone has a extra GD-SM750 PCIe i could buy? cant seem to get them in the US and dont really want to get the vortex86 one as its slower then the sm750

If they get back in stock i could buy one for you, as for now i dont have any extra sadly.

TinyLlama rev2.1 is out!

Everything needed to build your own is in the Github repo.

For those wanting a system more or less ready to go, I'll be selling a few assembled and tested boards this time around.

Price is as follows:
Rev2.1 board with Crystal CS4237B, GY-PCM5102, Wemos D1 Mini v4 and SOM pin headers all soldered, everything programmed and tested: $250
Rev2.1 board with the above included, but you have to do the soldering and programming yourself: $200
Shipping: Norway: $15, Europe: $35, outside of Europe: $40

Both options comes with all SMT and THT components, except those specified above, already soldered in place. Ie, capacitors, resistors, regulators, etc etc.

I also have a few spare SOM-128-EX and Vortex86VGA boards lying around, let me know if you're interested in those as well.
Note that it'll be cheaper to order these yourself, because I have to add the cost of shipping and import taxes to me before I can send it to you! 😀

As before, orders can be sent to ordertinyllama@gmail.com

EDIT: To be 100% clear, the SOM (86Duino Vortex86EX, "SOM-128-EX") module and the Vortex86VGA card are NOT included in the prices quoted above.
You'll have to order these yourself from DMP.

Eivind wrote on 2023-02-12, 10:49:

TinyLlama rev2.1 is out!

I should add - if you have problems with keyboard/mouse, feel free to submit bug reports in the hidman thread or on the hidman github.

rasteri wrote on 2023-02-12, 13:34:

I should add - if you have problems with keyboard/mouse, feel free to submit bug reports in the hidman thread or on the hidman github.

❤️ Thank you!

I'll try to put together a youtube video where I showcase the new board and walk through all the features + a separate one for setting it up and configuring it.
Takes a bit of work though, hope to get it done next week! 👍

Nice work 😀

Just a question i am trying top open the kicad but it says that it is created in a newer version of kicad, but i am runing 6.0.11 😀 do you have any other special version? 😉

tabm0de wrote on 2023-02-12, 18:13:

Nice work 😀

Just a question i am trying top open the kicad but it says that it is created in a newer version of kicad, but i am runing 6.0.11 😀 do you have any other special version? 😉

The final release of Kicad 7 is just around the corner, the files are saved using version 7.0.0rc2 (release candidate 2).

Eivind wrote on 2023-02-12, 18:17:

tabm0de wrote on 2023-02-12, 18:13:

Nice work 😀

Just a question i am trying top open the kicad but it says that it is created in a newer version of kicad, but i am runing 6.0.11 😀 do you have any other special version? 😉

The final release of Kicad 7 is just around the corner, the files are saved using version 7.0.0rc2 (release candidate 2).

thanks, was so blind that it took some time to find version 7, as i am not high tech on boards i just wanted to check where the kb/ms was to be connected as i am temporary going to add a HIDman-mini for now on v1.1 😉

w00t! I'm going to see about doing a small run (5-25) of these through JLCPCB. Once I get all the stuff uploaded to JLCPCB I can see what the manufacturing cost is and how many I can afford to have done for redistribution in the US 😉 I just got the BoM put together in their format, gotta generate a PnP file now.