linuxlove
Veteran Member
If you want, I can host the manual on my vintage computing archive.
How did that smily get in my post? It was supposed to be V9938. Like I said, I'm new...
Hi everyone, I was a pleasantly surprise to find this forum with such recent activity about the Cortex.
I was one of the developers of the Cortex along with Jim Gill, Neil Quarmby, Colin Hinson and Ian White so I can fill you in on a lot of the history behind the Cortex and info on both the hardware and the software.
I still have 2 of the machines up in the loft somewhere although they haven't been powered up for a few years.
If you happen to type an 8 immediately followed by a ) it shows up as a 8)
I just add an extra stupid space between the 8 and the )
like V9938 )
Do you possibly have a datasheet/the compete function pin-out for the 74LS2001 used on the E-Bus interface? Information on that one seems to be completely lacking on the net or anywhere else. I haven't even been able to find a source for the E-Bus System Design Handbook (MP402) from TI. One source in Poland apparently still has some of the chips, but I haven't been able to confirm that yet. If they do have any, they are likely the last source on Earth with any quantities of them. . .
And thank you for dropping in here--information on the Cortex is always useful, and any data you can provide on its background is invaluable! Right now, the sum of what I have are the articles from ETI that appeared in NOV 1982, DEC 1982, JAN 1983, FEB 1983, JUN 1984, AUG 1984, and SEP 1985. I also have the construction manual from Powertran (for the minimal setup without any options) and the POWER BASIC manual (which I converted to an editable PDF from a series of GIF images). Any additional documentation (with or without the associated software) would be greatly appreciated.
I'm in the process of trying to build the options into my Cortex. I have acquired a number of the TMS9909 and TMS9911 ICs to work on the disk system, but the E-Bus has been a hard nut to crack into. With enough data, I may have to try and reverse-engineer it in VHDL and roll my own. . .
I do have the E-Bus patent description with the internal logic and timing, but not where the signaling should go (some of it will become obvious from tracing signals on the Cortex, but not all--as that is my next planned attack vector).
TMS9995, one of your earlier comments reminded me of something I haven't thought of in ages. Marinchip Systems also built a TMS9900 board for the S-100 bus. I was looking for one of those for a long time but never did encounter anyone who'd ever heard of it or them. Thanks for the reminder. . .one more vintage 9900-family system for me to track down.