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Lost, all in one, controller card

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Crypticalcode0

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Ruined one fine Controller card.
One of my AT/ISA machines is now without FDD / HDD / LPT/ COM controller.

I have found the XT IDE thread and saying it's interesting is a understatement.
Because of above mentioned loss, I am looking for a simple single replacement card.
If the need arise I am even willing to make one of such said cards.
I would like some info on how to interface all of the above the XT IDE thread was a good start of point.
LPT and COM i have a good gist of how to do it but floppy disk controller in TTL?

Q. Can anyone give me a heads up on where to find the info, or replacement?
 
ISA is a 16bit standard AFAIK although it's backwards compatible if you inserted a 8bit card intended for a XT.
But yes i mean AT compliant 16Bit card, and i was giving reference to (P)ATA. (IDE is easiest to interface on ISA)
The initial Idea behind XTIDE is usable it's a simple direct application of the specifications a ISA version of the initial version could be done with 2 less chips.
That is what i like about it, it's a effective design no nonsense very little that could go wrong and very few things that could die on you.
The only thing i have against it is that it went for a CLPD instead of standard components but that is a subject for a different thread. ;)

My reference manual is The Indispensable PC Hardware Book in this matter 2nd edition.
Plus what i have on the 5150 BIOS.(which is not allot)
 
Hi,
There are at least a couple of the XT-IDE versions about. The original XT-IDE V1 was made with all 74xx TTL chips as is the XT-IDE V2. There are a couple of new XT-IDE versions coming along and both of those use CPLDs I believe. Several people have requested more XT-IDE V2 PCBs so I am keeping a waiting list and when there is sufficient demand for the XT-IDE V2 I'll order another small batch of PCBs.

Thanks and have a nice day!

Andrew Lynch
 
EE, choices, choices, choices!

EE, choices, choices, choices!

The advantage of the 74 logic is that over a decade i can still find replacement parts of the CLPD i cannot be sure i will find the same part.
And besides that what was the mayor factor to go for HC parts over ACT parts?(ACT are more recent, and switch faster then HC parts)

The reason i am not going for a XTIDE is simple i need a integrated floppy drive controller, and i have a ISA slot available. ;)
 
Crypticalcode0 said:
Ruined one fine Controller card.
One of my AT/ISA machines is now without FDD / HDD / LPT/ COM controller.
<snip>
Q. Can anyone give me a heads up on where to find the info, or replacement?
Click to expand...

Ok, so what you are saying is that you are looking for an ISA card that will support FDD, HDD, LPT and COM ports? And that you have a free 16 bit slot?

Sounds to me you need a ordinary IO card that came in just about every AT system made. Check out this page for some makes and models then you can search ebay or other places to see what you can find. They are pretty common, and would offer you better performance than the XT-IDE card would.

Now if you need the same card with it's own BIOS then that would be a different matter.
 
I know my EE what i meant with the XTIDE being a good starting point with info and such is that it has been done and it works.
What i can do different for instance is add another 74HC245 so i have the full databus width and remove the 74HC573 because they no longer have a function.(that sorta thing)

I do not know what happened with my previous post in which i stated my controller card brand wasn't listed ah well.
 
It is a straight forward design to interface an IDE header to a 16-bit ISA card edge. It's essentially 3 '245s with the necessary combinatorial logic to decode standard IDE addresses. But as mentioned, you still wouldn't have floppy and 16-bit multi-I/O IDE controllers are very common. XT-IDE adds the necessary latch logic to mux-demux 2 8-bit ISA bus cycles into single 16-bit IDE cycles. There are still XT-IDE v2 boards available. My intent with the CPLD version was to allow memory mapped operation operation without filling a large board with 74xx chips. This offers a potential performance improvement for vanilla 8088/8086 machines. I'm sure there will be many that prefer the 74xx solution simply for part availability reasons. But an extra choice doesn't hurt.
 
The CPLD has some advantages, like for example being able to be simply re-programmed to accomodate 'chuck mod' or memory mapped IO. Descrete socketed components are of course easier to replace if needed.
 
Crypticalcode0 said:
I know my EE what i meant with the XTIDE being a good starting point with info and such is that it has been done and it works.
What i can do different for instance is add another 74HC245 so i have the full databus width and remove the 74HC573 because they no longer have a function.(that sorta thing)

I do not know what happened with my previous post in which i stated my controller card brand wasn't listed ah well.
Click to expand...

But why are you going to re-invent the wheel, when the card you need is one of the most common and easy to get cards out there?
 
what re-invent?
ISA to IDE is like 6 chips, and in the caps and switches the most expensive thing i can think of is the resistor bench.

FDC, hm It is a little too complex to do in normal 74 logic chips and still fit on a standard ISA card, perhaps if i would use SMD components i could...
Perhaps i can work around it with just a 256KB EPROM, I am still working on this.

I could always use a chip to emulate another
 
Trust, it's a funny thing don't you think?

I am someone i don't completely trust packages that need to be posted half way across the globe.
My last card died on ESD, your not gonna be the guy or gal that tells me paper and cardboard boxes people on Ebay use are ESD approved.

Besides that i have all the components in a draw here all i need to do is design and etch a board or mill one.
 
Ahh, so it is sort of a "because I can thing", I get it now and I can respect that. Make sure you take pictures and let us know how it turns out.
 
The reason is two fold to me it's not just because i can, no it's because i don't want to rely on aging equipment, To me this is to learn the inner workings of my system.
 
Well, all the ones I've sold (and, strangely, they were all out of North America), seemed to arrive alive (sealed in anti-static bags) and, from the feedback, worked fine.

As has been mentioned, they were fairly common (I have a box of them), especially the 16 bit ones.

I have some 8-bit ones that are a little less common (as they were damn expensive), I think one had a HD contoller, but, they all had battery-backed clocks on them, a function most XTs lacked.

A lot of stuff from FeeBay is a crap-shoot and those are probably boards that were discarded because they were defective. Someone with no knowledge of computer finds them, has no way of testing them and just puts them up on FeeBay because they can read "multi-I/O card" off the PCB.

So, if you insist on buying cheap, you get what you deserve, but, if you want to spend a little extra money, you get tested and working, shipped and packed right and something that is going to work right and last.
 
@druid6900 Your right and you just about summed up my dislike for Ebay.

ESD is redundant in most cases but there are some things you need to keep to.
One is a climate room, with some humidity.
Two Earth Thy Self!
Three Never touch unconnected contacts on a PCB.

Even worse if i got a test report of a broken card i could probably fix it if the components are still available.
Hence my love for 7400 logic and 4000 logic.

Hm, back to my point at hand 6 IC's for a HDD controller(XTIDE modified for 16bit), for LPT i am on about 11 IC's 3 data-latches for registers 3 bus drivers some combination logic and a address decoder.
UART in 74 is a bit harder then i initially thought, and for a FDC is am Stuck literally.

If anyone has a simpler way for the LPT please let me hear about it i am still in school.(not for this though)
I think by the time i make my next post i have a functional UART Idea.
 
I has two 16550s and a bi-directional parallel port interface. You just need to add EIA-232 level translators to the com ports and RC networks to the parallel lines.
 
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