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Forthcoming XT-IDE Board - Cast Your Vote

Forthcoming XT-IDE Board - Cast Your Vote

  • As original XT-IDE, with a 40-pin header only

    Votes: 4 10.5%

  • With a 44-pin header and board space to mount a 2.5" IDE HDD (i.e. a hard-card)

    Votes: 7 18.4%

  • With an optional Compact Flash socket (as master or slave) and a 40-pin header

    Votes: 26 68.4%

  • With a Compact Flash socket only

    Votes: 1 2.6%
  • Total voters
    38
  • Poll closed .
Chuck(G) said:
Doesn't pearce_jj's XT-CF board do just that? I believe it supports both 8-bit DMA and programmed I/O modes. 3 ICs--you can't get much simpler than that.
Click to expand...

I might be mistaken, but I think it uses the true IDE mode (just like XT-IDE does). One of the ICs in XT-CF is a CPLD, which is OK, but it is more expensive than a 74LS688, available only from one manufacturer (Xilinx), and must be pre-programmed using a JTAG + appropriate software. Which makes it less suitable for people building these boards themselves. (Using surface mounted parts is another issue... unfortunately it seems that most CF card slots are SMT with 0.635 mm pitch).
 
sergey said:
Using surface mounted parts is another issue... unfortunately it seems that most CF card slots are SMT with 0.635 mm pitch.
Click to expand...

Hence the decision to just go SMT altogether, the theory being there would be orders enough to get a short-run done by SeeedStudio, thereby bringing the cost down and supplying the finished boards that it seems the community prefers. Of course those that want to make their own can do so (and I have PCBs available for free for anyone wanting to do so).

Re transfer modes, the board as the samples stand uses 16-bit PIO at media always for either 16-bit port-mapped IO or 16-bit memory-mapped IO on the host side, or 8-bit PIO at the media and 8-bit DMA on the host side. This is where the CPLD really scores since it can do all that plus ROM decode for the flash chip - it's a very cheap board to make.

I'm trying to move it to 8-bit PIO always on the CF side but for some reason can't get it to work at the moment. I think I've spent too long starring at the diagrams and code and have lost sight of the wood for the trees basically.
 
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ChrisCwmbran said:
I would ideally like is one of these boards that has sampled sounds for the hard drive spinning up, and seek sounds from say an ST-225...How hard would this be to achieve?
Click to expand...

Very!!! I suppose the BIOS could include sound via an attached SB; but it would need unique access to it.
 
WAY beyond my capabilities, certain other forum members could probably pull it off though :)
 
Well Jim, on cclist we're (fortunately) at the end of a long debate on "should a museum operate and maintain old iron or simply exhibit it? Is simulation good enough to recreate the experience of coding and running programs on a 7090?"

The subject of sound came up. Just imagine the sound of a bank of IBM 729s and the screaming of a 1403 in true Dolby TrueHD sound!
 
What was the result of the debate? (I don't do cctalk any more). My personal vote is that museums should do both. You can't get a real sense of history if you can't see it functioning.
 
Quick update on this (I'm conscious that this project is beginning to drag on a bit).

The V2 hardware remains 'current' with development time over the past couple of months having been on CPLD logic and the BIOS. As mentioned above, I've changed the design to utilise 8-bit transfers on the media side always, thereby avoiding the inherent timing problem of latching the byte being stored (and this is now working).

Things are moving along nicely but I could use some help developing tools for the card, in particular a flash utility that can enable the unused 24K on the card to be used as a universal ROM, allowing different ROM images to be selectively programmed (or erased) from the card without impacting the IDE BIOS. The basic idea is to divide the space into 2K 'slots', and use the first such slot to store a directory enabling the utility to list out what is on the ROM, and add or remove data as required.

That's it for now.
 
To anyone waiting for the XT-CF board - problems identified in compatibility testing have delayed the project. I need to restart the testing cycle with some more prototypes. Hence if you're waiting for an XT-IDE board, please don't put off purchasing Andrew's excellent XT-IDEv2 PCBs for that reason (my launch is some months away).

However, if you would like to test a board and can assemble one yourself, please get in touch via PM. PCBs are available and free-of-charge; you'll need to buy the components (about $15), assemble it and program the CPLD via JTAG interface. BIOS & CPLD sources and compiled code will be made available shortly.
 
Update on the status of this board. Testing results (and my thanks for those involved) have been coming in and things seem positive at this stage. Chuck has found what I believe to be a previously undocumented error in the design of an AT&T PC because of it, but that can be accomodated. The BIOS is nearly done.

The PCB design seems OK so I'm turning back to how to move this to a reality as a professionally made board. I'm targeting an initial 'beta' run of 20 boards (although cost is yet to be determined). Any beta testers will need to meet the total cost of their boards - but I will continue to offer PCBs free-of-charge to anyone interested in assembling their own (please PM if interested; component cost is under $20).
 
Quick update - I'm working with a source (in the UK) for the production of the first 20 boards. I'll post back once a sample is back and pricing confirmed :)
 
I'm ready to open this up to public beta of 10 boards!

Each board is £44 (GBP) via PayPal - this is a fully assembled, programmed, tested and shipped (US, UK and EU) price and everything is at cost. Assembly is being undertaken by a 'sole-trader' in the UK.

Each board will be shipped in a working state - i.e. the CPLD programmed and the flash programmed with the (then) current XTIDE Universal BIOS V2 build, and tested to work as described in my wiki using an IBM PC/XT 5160 and a SanDisk Ultra II 2GB CompactFlash card.

Just to be clear, this is a community project with zero margin - so like the other XT/IDE and XT/FDC projects, please engage on that basis. Please PM if interested and if you're able to commit to a purchase. Boards should be ready in 4-6 weeks.

In summary, over the original XT/IDE card, this board is faster (up to 500KB/s in a PC/XT), works in PC/XT slot 8, has spare ROM capacity for user ROM code (24KB free), can be used in AT class systems with reduced wait-states (1MB/s in a 12MHz 286), is powered entirely from the ISA slot so needs no molex power supply for the media, and we're currently working on BIOS autodetection of IO ports, so that no BIOS re-flash will be needed if the IO port is changed.

Many thanks!
 
pearce_jj said:
I'm ready to open this up to public beta of 10 boards!

Each board is £44 (GBP) via PayPal - this is a fully assembled, programmed, tested and shipped (US, UK and EU) price and everything is at cost. Assembly is being undertaken by a 'sole-trader' in the UK.

Each board will be shipped in a working state - i.e. the CPLD programmed and the flash programmed with the (then) current XTIDE Universal BIOS V2 build, and tested to work as described in my wiki using an IBM PC/XT 5160 and a SanDisk Ultra II 2GB CompactFlash card.

Just to be clear, this is a community project with zero margin - so like the other XT/IDE and XT/FDC projects, please engage on that basis. Please PM if interested and if you're able to commit to a purchase. Boards should be ready in 4-6 weeks.

In summary, over the original XT/IDE card, this board is faster (up to 500KB/s in a PC/XT), works in PC/XT slot 8, has spare ROM capacity for user ROM code (24KB free), can be used in AT class systems with reduced wait-states (1MB/s in a 12MHz 286), is powered entirely from the ISA slot so needs no molex power supply for the media, and we're currently working on BIOS autodetection of IO ports, so that no BIOS re-flash will be needed if the IO port is changed.

Many thanks!
Click to expand...
As a current XT-IDE owner/user, I would definitely commit to one, however there may be more deserving or qualified beta testers, so if I am not in the initial beta, my feelings would not be hurt.
 
Please, could you confirm if that "sole-trader" in uk is going to continue selling assembled boards when the test phase would be finished?

Many thanks!!!
 
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Hi, since everything is both open-source and available (or will be very shortly), anyone is free to make these.
 
Hi,
I would be interested in getting an already assembled board to test it on my Amstrad PC1512 8086 computer.

Regards.
 
Thanks, you're on the list!

All boards are allocated now. But PM any further interest.
 
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