ACA500plus - an accelerator card for the Commodore Amiga 500/500+

[@jonasrullo2590]

That cover is awesome! Great idea. I'm stealing that one for my projects. Excellent comprehensive review as well. If I didn't already pick up a Vampire, I would be ordering an ACA now.

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@kukko83]

This is how reviews/tests should be, thorough. Also, that casing is genius!

[@gerion79]

Thank you very much for your super nice feedback! ;)

[@DeLoreanBandRocks]

An excellent and very thorough review - thank you so much for this! I placed my order for an ACA500 Plus this morning :) Would love to see some detailed photos of the VHS case holes / dimensions so I can make a similar case

[@gerion79]

Thank you very much for your nice feedback! ;)

[@BigSupes81]

Awesome review. I've just ordered one of these so this video will be a godsend! Subscribed. 😊

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@turtleryde9365]

Loved your benchmark test that's what I want to see great job Gerion

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@GadgetUK164]

Great video =D Very thorough review!

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@johnwiesen4440]

I have got one to use on my A500+ it will let me use my 2mb chip ram. I also use my ACA 1232 card as well when I want to play some games. What I like is the hot swap, so I can make CF cards form my A1200 and having the option to put kickstart 3.1.4 on it as well. Then when you just want a normal A500 just take the card out. I have put a heat sink on the CPU it does help.

[@gerion79]

Thank you for the infos. ;)

[@thomassmith4999]

With the action replay on the Amiga you can do _anything_ edit every register in the machine

[@gerion79]

Thank you for the info! ;)

[@thomassmith4999]

I used to love it back in the day, I learnt so much from playing around with the action replay while I was learning assembler. Thanks for the video btw I need one of these now.

[@iberiuspred4906]

I rarely experienced any noticeable performance issues with computer games on the original Amiga. The only things I can remember are down in the dungeons in Eye of the Beholder II where you encountered a large number of monsters. It was pretty early on in the game. Another occasion is in Indiana Jones 4 Fate of Atlantis in the market in Egypt. Syndicate could get a bit sluggish too. I think the game Ambermoon had explicit support for faster hardware. So if it detected that you had a faster CPU, it unlocked certain features and you had a better 3D experience. This was pretty rare among games though.

[@gerion79]

Yeah most Amiga games played perfectly fine on a normal Amiga 500, which I always appreciated. But some games (especially later releases) performed better on faster Amigas, like you already mentioned. ;)

[@RETROCENGO]

Really nice and detailed review, well done sir 😄👌🏻

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@CelentAle]

Amiga and AmigaOS4, ruleeez for ever! ✌️🇮🇹

[@Skauber]

Cool idea on the casing! During the video I had the idea of mounting it in a Amiga 500 HD enclosure, though it would be a shame to gut one of those since they're quite rare. :) Perhaps if one was broken beyond repair it could be justified... :) Would make it fairly stealthy, though perhaps not practical in the way of accessing the card to plug in stuff etc.

[@gerion79]

Thanks! I had the same idea, but like you already said it would have to be broken. Otherwise it would be a shame. ;)

[@MrSEA-ok2ll]

I was thinking about a Wicher 500i, but considering what it offered, the price and that it could work with an A1000 as well, I ordered one this morning...looking forward to it.

[@gerion79]

I hope it's the right hardware for you. ;)

[@RETROCENGO]

Mr. SEA Have you tryed it on A1000? Jens says its not built for that, but if it works, then its a great upgrade for that system

[@TableWolfMusic]

If you have not already (and you may already know this) you should definitely look at the Open Source version of things like this from the youtube channel TerribleFire (and give him a shoutout) which is a scottish chap called Stephen who has made affordable (open source) accelrator boards and even a IDE+RAM cd32 expansion. I want a load of geeks to make an amiga PCI (with flipboard zorro edge too) graphics card with graphics like a voodoo or voodoo2/banshee open source so that graphics on a 50mhz amiga look approximately like an nintendo64, and that graphics card design should be made looking at whatever Hombre (that unreleased amiga graphics before commodore went dead) documentation exists and combining it with the open source information 3dfx relased (about voodoo or voodoo2/banshee) before they went to nvidia. The card should be able to be plugged into a sidecar caddy that converts the pcmcia into a PCI port and adds a couple of USB ports, one for a bootable USB CDROM and the other for a usb-hub into which a flash-memory usb stick can go) so that even a teenager can work it with no need for scary soldeing irons. It would allow CDROM booting, even if that needed a floppy disk to piggy back that, and I think 4meg to 8meg RAM requirement is a fair minimum so a floppy can unpack compressed information and get the remainder drivers and OS from the thereby booting CDROM game wihich ,as an agreed standard always has about 50meg to 100meg of drivers for known hardware such as plip parallel ethernet dongles by lallfa. This open source "Homebrew" of "Hombre" card should be namde as some sort of pun, mixing those two words to call it HomBrew or HomeBre or maybe dding the Hold And Modify graphics mode into the pun to call it the HAMbrew or HAMbre. I truly think, such epansions hould be as easy to plug in (and thereby when unplugged leave the amiga in its original state as if nothing has changed) as a sega32x and a megaCD and games should not require any scary soldering or the poening of a case to put in a harddrive (which has caused some a1200 to die when the traces on motherboards get cut accidentally) and so a sidecar caddy and the trapdoor should be enough because even a teenager can manage that with guidance. Games should be able to be booted from CDROm, even if that means using a floppy disk for piggy backing that boot (and floppy disks can be used for save games anyway) and basically games should boot as easily as a playstation game would boot. Such a HAMbrew sider car graphics card/CDROM cady would have that usb port anyway so a usb flashmemory stick would just about do for most amiga harddrive usages. Any people who have fancier hardware (such as an internl IDE harddrive) can have optional extras in the game menus to install it (but only as an optoinal). Well that is for those complying with my HAMbrew standard I am alluding too. If you think about it, if such a standard required the above and 4meg to 8meg minimum RAM and a 68030 minmum, an a4000 would be able to run this too.

[@belgavox]

Excellent video, thank you!

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@Smartphonekanalen]

Great review! I like your approach. I guess that the results of overclocking are different from card to card. Gotek and df boot not necessary with this card - saves money and time.

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@ignavago]

Excellent review of ACA500plus. Thank you very much. I liked the case. But I use a Blizzard 1230iv. It would not work for me. :-) I do not know why Individual Computer does not make a case.

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;) My only guess is to keep the costs (production and end price) as low as possible.

[@ignavago]

Individual Computers could sell the case separately. If it is for costs, they could create a 3D design and give companies that make 3D designs to order. There are many possibilities :-)

[@johandenhertog6878]

Far important can you get with the ACA1221ec extra CHIP RAM boost. With the A500/ACA500plus. Got 970Kb CHIP RAM and 6.7MB FAST RAM. Can’t run Cannon Fodder 1088Kb with WHDLoad. And can iit run Maniac Mansion is used 68020. Have a re-capped A500 revision 5 with ECS 8372A Fat Angus upgrade, Kickstart 3.1 upgrade and the A501 revision 6C Expansion. And the ACA500plus with Classic WB 68K and WHDLoad v. 18.3.

[@amigadude6409]

These are available to pre order again !

[@gerion79]

Cool. ;)

[@warp9988]

My first thought: Why didn't they include a 5 dollar plastic cover?

[@weepingscorpion8739]

I ask myself that with virtually any new tech, not just Amiga (like the modern CVX4 Covox Speech Thing clone and the new OPT2LPT Ad-Lib clone, both for a PC's parallel port)

[@averagegilo]

Shame it doesn't have a Perspex housing to keep the circuit board protected

[@SuperMoleRetro]

I just bought the ACA500+. Can you show how to use the CF card slots and how you move files back and forth?

[@gerion79]

Sorry but this will be the only video about the ACA500plus, at least for now. But maybe this will answer your question: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gHLEkmmng62lqtk The video is in german but at 6:55 the person who made the video shows how easy you can get files on the CF card.

[@Channel-Zx]

The VHS case is the best idea i have seen for the ACA500 very creative just like the Amiga!

[@gerion79]

Thanks! ;)

[@giediprime4664]

Hi, Regarding the CF card slots, what's the biggest size card you would recommend to use in each? Also, what make do you suggest would be the best one to buy? Thanks very much.

[@gerion79]

As far as I know you can use up to 8GB CF cards, but a 2GB or 4GB card would be more than enough. In terms of the manufacturer I can't give you really any suggestions, but from what I've heard the ACA500plus has no problems anymore with specific cards. (This was a downside with the ACA500) ;)

[@giediprime4664]

Thanks for your reply. I think I'm gonna go for SanDisk. :)

[@gerion79]

No problem. ;)

[@nosebeareatsfudge3275]

and it also plays hollywood poker music in the background :-)

[@gerion79]

XD

[@alchemyveggie3170]

The stupid thing is, it's outside from the A500 Case.

[@TableWolfMusic]

Just just put a case on it to make it a sidecar caddy, like you would do a raspberry pi.

[@user-jp1yd2ut9r]

well you could just solder alot of wires to the expansion port and move it into the case

[@thewizard1438]

Great video , I have the Aca 500 plus but i could never over clock beyond 14mhz :(

[@gerion79]

Thanks and sorry to hear that.

[@cholomiseravle2630]

Patruc eichen sabarella Amiga czusalturo we!

[@jfs2761]

40 mhz mode doesn't works well , heavy heating and glitches, Ntsc mode doesn't work ( it does on aca500), installing workbench 3.1 fails while loading... a lot of promises, but maybe i have to send the card back with warrenty. maybe a bad luck.

[@gerion79]

That`s sad to hear. Like I showed and said in my review, my card works 100% so far. So my guess would also be, that you had bad luck and got a faulty one. I hope you can return it and get a fully working card as well. Good luck.

[@skyhawk77]

The lack of an enclosure for this is inexcusable given it's intended connectivity design and cost. As it is, there's possible electric shock, damage to the card and or computer, short circuit, exposure to any moisture, fluid, other solid falling objects, animals, dust, hair, accumulation. This would not pass safety regulations in the UK/USA.

[@MrSEA-ok2ll]

Actually, regarding cost, this is the lowest cost solution for all that it offers...in fact, this will not only work in an A500, but an A1000 as well. I was thinking about a Wicher solution, but for the price? I'll make my own protection for this device.

[@AmigaWolf]

You can buy a enclosure for the ACA500plus at amiga-shop.net, but they have non in stock. But plexilaser.de has them in stock and cost only €22,95: www.plexilaser.de/Acryl-Gehaeuse-fuer-die-ACA500plus-Teilesatz Here you can see someone that bought one from Plexilaser put it together, supper simple: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jZKYh6WJqryHaaM But you can make it yourself very cheap from a TFT Digital Oscilloscope Acrylic Case. Just like this guy did: www.aaneton.net/~tommi/aca500case/ www.aliexpress.com/item/2-4-DIY-TFT-LCD-Digital-DSO138-SMD-Set-Measuring-Instruments-Oscilloscope-STM32-Tester-with-Acrylic/32893304581.html?spm=2114.search0104.3.15.201e5cedvJbOBC&ws_ab_test=searchweb0_0,searchweb201602_1_10065_10068_319_317_10696_453_10084_454_10083_433_10618_431_10304_10307_10820_10301_10821_537_536_10902_10843_10059_10884_10887_321_322_10103,searchweb201603_55,ppcSwitch_0&algo_expid=570d7473-a209-4b6b-b092-9e15fe3b810e-2&algo_pvid=570d7473-a209-4b6b-b092-9e15fe3b810e Or just but plexiglass and make it yourself.

[@MrRobbyvent]

Exausting to follow video

[@gerion79]

Sorry to hear that. But I know that my videos are not for everybody.