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From: lkoop@pnet01.cts.com (Lamonte Koop)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware
Subject: Re: Mega-Midget Racer
Message-ID: <8449@crash.cts.com>
Date: 8 Apr 91 05:36:04 GMT
Sender: root@crash.cts.com
Organization: People-Net [pnet01], El Cajon CA
Lines: 39

peterb@intacc.uucp (Peter James Bowmar) writes:
>
>Well, I got the Mega-Midget Racer, and I can't say I'm sorry. I had some
>hassles actually getting the thing (I couriered my money order down,
>and they shipped 3 weeks later) but once it finally arrived it has
>performed well. I have the 33mhz '030 and 33mhz 882 version, with the
>non-MMU 68030. (it's cheaper, that's why). I have no, as yet, 32bit
>memory or the static ram ROMS thing, but it still speeds up Lightwave
>renders by about 6x. Not too bad, although Lightwave is still too slow
>to be useful. I haven't tried Imagine to see how fast it speeds that up
>but it seems to move along quite nicely. 
>     What's more interesting is what it doesn't speed up: ED is still
>brutally slow, Falcon (in the ads it says it'll speed it up) is the same
>as always, and multitasking is pretty much the same. Essentially, the
>FPU speeds things up but I guess I need the 32 bit Ram before I see
>anything else speed up.
>     By the way, can anyone explain to me exactly what the MMU on a
>68030 is for?

The main reason the programs you mention are not faster is that they are
utilizing CHIP RAM quite a bit.  Since the accelerator has to in effect
"throttle back" when operating out of this domain you won't see a tremendous
speed increase.  Now, on MMU-equipped systems, the ROM image can be relocated
into FAST RAM for quicker access....however, since you have a non-MMU 68030,
and apparently no FAST RAM (yet), you are unable to do this particular
operation.
I would recommend acquiring some 32-bit accessible memory for your accelerator
as soon as possible.  The 68030 is very limited when running solely out of a
16-bit environment, and having 32-bit accessible memory on the system will
greatly enhance performance.  This should also improve performance of the
programs previously mentioned.  Without an MMU, you cannot transfer the ROM
image to this FAST RAM, but this will only affect ROM routine speed.
 


                             LaMonte Koop
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