monahan_z
Experienced Member
For the past few months I have been working on a very special S100 bus board that contains an Intel/Altera Cyclone IV FPGA board with circuitry that allows it to be used to construct a wide range of S100 boards. One third of the board is available for custom circuity. These would typically just be I/O connectors, a Micro SD card or LCD display etc. The bulk of the functionality will reside in the programmed gates of the FPGA.
A board like this (at least in theory), could be configured to behave on the S100 bus just like any previous “classical” S100 board. All the S100 bus lines interface with individual FPGA IO pins (Input, Output or bi-directional). The next step will be to program the FPGA for UART, SD card drives, Ethernet I/O, CAN Protocols, FireWire, PDP tape and disk drives etc…. Many could exist on this one board alone. A section on the web site will be reserved for users contributions.
I glad to announce that I received the final version of this board from PCBCart and it behaves as best as I can tell exactly as planned.
The board is described here:-
http://s100computers.com/My System Pages/FPGA Board/FPGA Board.htm
I am now opening the board up for a group purchase. Most people here are familiar with the process. (In fact anybody that has not gotten a S100Computers board in the past should contact me directly first) . Please indicate here /URL] if you would like to receive one or more boards. Will take about 3 weeks. Usual PayPal payment when you get your board. The master list will be here. Do not e-mail me directly.
Every few days I will transfer them to here:-
[URL="http://s100computers.com/News%20Page.htm"]http://s100computers.com/News%20Page.htm
from which I will order the boards.
One important point. This is an expensive board to build. The board is a 4 layer board with extra thick copper traces. It will probably run about $32/board (depending on volume). However there are other expenses. The WaveShare Cyclone IV adaptor is $40 (https://www.waveshare.com/coreep4ce10.htm). It requires special sockets from DigiKey ($20), and you will need a “USB Blaster” to program the FPGA (https://www.waveshare.com/product/fpga-tools/altera/usb-blaster-v2.htm) .
That may be the least of your issues. If you have never worked with FPGAs programming them is a whole new world. I use Intel’s Quartus Prime with .bdf files. The above web page introduces you to the approach, but be prepared to sink some time into the effort.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that unlike many of our previous board this is not one where you order a few 74LSxxx chips, slap them on a board with solder and you are up and running. Programming and using FPGAs is a much bigger effort. That said once you get the hang of it the benefits are enormous. After 3 months I’m hooked! The circuit layout capacity of even a Cyclone IV is enormous. One feels like a kid in a candy store!
Please reply on the Google Forum Page ASAP. I anticipate a large “order” volume and will leave the first round open for about one week.
John Monahan
A board like this (at least in theory), could be configured to behave on the S100 bus just like any previous “classical” S100 board. All the S100 bus lines interface with individual FPGA IO pins (Input, Output or bi-directional). The next step will be to program the FPGA for UART, SD card drives, Ethernet I/O, CAN Protocols, FireWire, PDP tape and disk drives etc…. Many could exist on this one board alone. A section on the web site will be reserved for users contributions.
I glad to announce that I received the final version of this board from PCBCart and it behaves as best as I can tell exactly as planned.
The board is described here:-
http://s100computers.com/My System Pages/FPGA Board/FPGA Board.htm
I am now opening the board up for a group purchase. Most people here are familiar with the process. (In fact anybody that has not gotten a S100Computers board in the past should contact me directly first) . Please indicate here /URL] if you would like to receive one or more boards. Will take about 3 weeks. Usual PayPal payment when you get your board. The master list will be here. Do not e-mail me directly.
Every few days I will transfer them to here:-
[URL="http://s100computers.com/News%20Page.htm"]http://s100computers.com/News%20Page.htm
from which I will order the boards.
One important point. This is an expensive board to build. The board is a 4 layer board with extra thick copper traces. It will probably run about $32/board (depending on volume). However there are other expenses. The WaveShare Cyclone IV adaptor is $40 (https://www.waveshare.com/coreep4ce10.htm). It requires special sockets from DigiKey ($20), and you will need a “USB Blaster” to program the FPGA (https://www.waveshare.com/product/fpga-tools/altera/usb-blaster-v2.htm) .
That may be the least of your issues. If you have never worked with FPGAs programming them is a whole new world. I use Intel’s Quartus Prime with .bdf files. The above web page introduces you to the approach, but be prepared to sink some time into the effort.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that unlike many of our previous board this is not one where you order a few 74LSxxx chips, slap them on a board with solder and you are up and running. Programming and using FPGAs is a much bigger effort. That said once you get the hang of it the benefits are enormous. After 3 months I’m hooked! The circuit layout capacity of even a Cyclone IV is enormous. One feels like a kid in a candy store!
Please reply on the Google Forum Page ASAP. I anticipate a large “order” volume and will leave the first round open for about one week.
John Monahan