3.11.99 Double your A3640 Processor?
                  In response to recent mailing list questions, loyal AO visitor, Daryl Holley sent us a pointer to
                  Sonnet's "QuadDoubler" product. Originally intended for the Macintosh Quadra series, the
                  QuadDoubler upgrade card "uses a high-quality Motorola 100/50 MHz 68040 processor".
                  Several people have now confirmed that it also works with the Amiga.

(Sourced Czech Amiga Page)
 

This was the original message posted on the well known resource page Czech Amiga Page and Amiga.org. The product produced by Sonnet was initially designed for use in Apple Macintosh computers - same as the good ol' Amiga 68k accellerator cards. It took someone like Daryl Holley to try this on him Amiga - just out of curiosity.

According to Daryl he has used this product for some time will little to no problems. No software, No hacks - simplicity itself. After contacting more people I soon discovered that it works so far (tested only thus far) on the A3640 cards as used in most A4000 but can be used in with A3000 aswell.
The Quaddoubler measures a small 4" Long by 2" Width circuit board. Half of the board has the neccessary pins on the bottom to match the pins on the bottom of a 68040. The other half has 68040 with a gnarly heat sink on top. There is additional circuitry to make the 68040 run at twice the clock speed of the 68040 25Mhz Accelerator (Mac's Centris or Quadra) it's plugged into. (There are four different models. The BST-40F, for the Centris 610, costs $200; the BST-50FA, for the Quadra 610, and the BST-50FB and FC. The cost, about $200.
Daryl personally owns a BST-50FA.
(Prices quoted in US Dollars)

"Installation is pretty simple. The instructions that come with the Quad Doubler are clear and well illustrated. You open the case and remove the original CPU. The kit comes with a little tool you use to gently pry up the CPU. Then you plug the Quad Doubler into the CPU socket. You have to first remove the expose CPU -- but surprisingly enough, there is room for it to go back, even with the big heat sink on the Quad Doubler. Put the case back on, plug everything back in, and you're in
business. "

On a personal note I'd probably recommend adding sonme sort of fan or replacing the heatsink with some decent cooling fan. This would especially apply to hotter climate countries like Australia - especially in my area.

Specifications

          CPU: 100/50 MHz 68040 Motorola processor.
          (for the Centris 650 & 660AV; Quadra 610, 660AV, 700 & 900; and
          Workgroup Server 60/25)
          CPU: 80/40 MHz 68040 Motorola processor.
          (for the Centris 610 & Workgroup Server 60/20)
          PMMU: Integrated Paged Memory Management Unit.
          FPU: Integrated with 68040 processor.
          Part #: BST-40F, BST-50FA, BST-50FB, BST-50FC.
 

So will it work with the BoXer?
Well at this stage thats anybodys guess but I will be emailing both Sonnet and Mick at Access as this would provide a cheap accleration alternative. Fair enough it's not PowerPC but not everyone requires PPC. While one qwould imagine it would and perhaps it would be nice if it did, theres also the jumpers on the BoXers mainboard to take into consideration but if it's possible then there are various models to test to provide good cheap possible alternatives.
Why - I'd certainly like my BoXer to run at 100Mhz - especially if it will be some time before a PPC addon module is to be released.
More to come soon...
 

Daryl Holley
Email: dgholley@uswest.ne
Web:  www.bison21.bizland.com

Sonnet
Email:
Web:
 
 
 

Last Updated: 07th April 2000