> From: David Bridgham
> Just the bus interface takes over half the area of a dual-height board!
In part because the level converters are SMD, and we had to mount them on
(modified) wide DIP carriers to use them in a wire-wrap board.
> I've played around with laying out what might be
On 10/22/2016 06:40 PM, David Bridgham wrote:
> On 10/22/2016 12:44 PM, shad wrote:
>
>> What kind of bus transceivers did you used for the QSIC, specially
>> because you have
>> to go from 5V open-drain logic to 3.3V logic?
> To add to Noel's answer, here's a picture of our current prototype b
On 10/22/2016 12:44 PM, shad wrote:
> What kind of bus transceivers did you used for the QSIC, specially
> because you have
> to go from 5V open-drain logic to 3.3V logic?
To add to Noel's answer, here's a picture of our current prototype board.
http://pdp10.froghouse.org/qsic/qsic-wirewrap.
> From: shad
> they can run linux for the software side
Maybe it's just me, but running Linux on an interface card strike me as
somewhat grotesque. It's bad enough running a far faster chip than the vintage
CPU, but... a majorly complex operating system to boot?
> I'm trying to f
Hello Dave,
exactly!
But in place of a plain FPGA, nowadays I would choose a FPGA-ARM board,
for example
the ZedBoard MicroZed or the Myirtech Z-turn, both of them have a Zynq
onboard,
and they can run linux for the software side and programmable logic for
the interface side.
Very nice and fle
Hello Dave,
exactly!
But in place of a plain FPGA, nowadays I would choose a FPGA-ARM board,
for example
the ZedBoard MicroZed or the Myirtech Z-turn, both of them have a Zynq
onboard,
and they can run linux for the software side and programmable logic for
the interface side.
Very nice and fle
I'd trust the later documents. They went through a lot of pain in the 70's
pushing the limits of what the bus could do.
If it were me, I'd build the stuff on Eurocards with a cable running to a
Unibus paddle.
On 10/21/16 12:23 PM, Noel Chiappa wrote:
> > From: Paul Koning
>
> > 1976 Peri
To solve the loading problem a division of Tektronix built their own Unibus
repeater.
We not only had a lot of stuff attached to the Unibus but was in multiple
rack instruments.
We also went with round cables the Tektronix made internally. We also made
our own Unibus
cables and added a few LEDs to
> From: Paul Koning
> 1976 Peripherals Handbook, page 6-4. It specifies the driver output
> low voltage at 70 mA sink, not 50...
Differing editions give slightly different numbers. I was looking at the 1972
edition (which was the one that was closest to hand, no other reason); the
num
> On Oct 21, 2016, at 2:50 PM, Guy Sotomayor Jr wrote:
>
>
>> On Oct 21, 2016, at 11:41 AM, Paul Koning wrote:
>>
>>
>>> On Oct 20, 2016, at 6:05 PM, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>>>
From: David Bridgham
>>>
the right threshold voltage to meet the receiver spec
>>>
>>> The UNIBUS spec s
> On Oct 21, 2016, at 11:41 AM, Paul Koning wrote:
>
>
>> On Oct 20, 2016, at 6:05 PM, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>>
>>> From: David Bridgham
>>
>>> the right threshold voltage to meet the receiver spec
>>
>> The UNIBUS spec says the 4 crucial receiver parameters are input thresholds
>> (high and
> On Oct 20, 2016, at 6:05 PM, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>
>> From: David Bridgham
>
>> the right threshold voltage to meet the receiver spec
>
> The UNIBUS spec says the 4 crucial receiver parameters are input thresholds
> (high and low), and the input currents (high and low); the crucial
> transmi
> Oh that blinkenlights panel is excellent! All emulators should have
> one! :-)
Yeah, isn't that fun? Once I got it running, I just sat and watched it
for about fifteen minutes while it ran our disk exercising program. And
then I noticed a bug. It apparently wasn't causing a problem but the
On Fri, Oct 21, 2016 at 2:45 AM, David Bridgham wrote:
> On 10/19/2016 06:48 PM, shad wrote:
>>
>> One of my retrocomputing dream is to design an Unibus universal board,
>> probably based on FPGA because of precise timing requirements,
>> to emulate one or more disk/tape interfaces, and possib
> From: David Bridgham
> the right threshold voltage to meet the receiver spec
The UNIBUS spec says the 4 crucial receiver parameters are input thresholds
(high and low), and the input currents (high and low); the crucial
transmitter parameters are the output low voltage (at 50 mA sink),
On Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 05:32:07PM -0400, Noel Chiappa wrote:
> For Unix, tweaking the RP11 driver to handle the extended RP11 should
> take all of 12 minutes, tops! :-)
well played.
mcl
> From: Paul Koning
> That's fine if your target is an OS for which you can write drivers. It
> wouldn't help RSTS users.
Right, they're stuck with exact clones of DEC controllers. (For Unix, tweaking
the RP11 driver to handle the extended RP11 should take all of 12 minutes,
tops! :-)
On 10/20/2016 04:27 PM, Paul Koning wrote:
> I would treat this as an analog problem, putting some op amps and comparators
> to work. It doesn't seem to rise to the level where D/A devices are needed.
> :-)
Clearly op amps and comparators could do the job, probably really
nicely, but it seems
On 10/19/2016 07:23 PM, Eric Smith wrote:
I prefer NOT to use ENIG, as I find HASL tin-lead better for hand
assembly, though the lead is a problem due to RoHS regulations in much
of the world (but not in USA). I haven't tried HASL lead-free.
I did **ONE** board with some kind of gold flash tha
On Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 4:31 PM, Paul Koning wrote:
> Q22 disks existed on MSCP, of course. And RL02 also, if I remember right.
There is the 2 board RLV11, which is 18-bit, and the preferred 22-bit
single-board RLV12. I have both. I started with a BA11-N box in 1986
and didn't mind one bit pay
> On Oct 20, 2016, at 4:27 PM, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>
>> From: Paul Koning
>
>> I'd suggest the Massbus series, they are just about as simple as
>> anything and that's where you find the largest capacities short of MSCP
>> devices.
>
> If you want to exactly emulate only DEC controllers, yes.
> On Oct 20, 2016, at 4:14 PM, Ethan Dicks wrote:
>
> On Wed, Oct 19, 2016 at 7:46 PM, Paul Koning wrote:
>> Actually, Unibus has very straightforward timing. It certainly should be a
>> breeze with an FPGA, but the original designs (nicely spelled out in the
>> back of the early Peripherals
> From: Paul Koning
> I'd suggest the Massbus series, they are just about as simple as
> anything and that's where you find the largest capacities short of MSCP
> devices.
If you want to exactly emulate only DEC controllers, yes. (Of course, such a
project should do that, for bin
On Wed, Oct 19, 2016 at 7:46 PM, Paul Koning wrote:
> Actually, Unibus has very straightforward timing. It certainly should be a
> breeze with an FPGA, but the original designs (nicely spelled out in the back
> of the early Peripherals Handbooks, or later on in the Unibus Handbook) take
> just
>
>
>> From what I understand, there could be a great demand of a such
>> interface here around?
>>
>
> Been thinking about this for more than 10 years :-(
>
> Isn't Noel working on something related?
>
> Btw, MSCP isn't really as complex as its reputation... While I'm not an
> expert, the hard par
Hello,
I read several posts about Unibus disk interfaces and emulation.
One of my retrocomputing dream is to design an Unibus universal board,
probably based on FPGA because of precise timing requirements,
to emulate one or more disk/tape interfaces, and possibly something more.
The real storage c
OH yah
Bill Degnan
twitter: billdeg
vintagecomputer.net
On Oct 19, 2016 6:48 PM, "shad" wrote:
> Hello,
> I read several posts about Unibus disk interfaces and emulation.
> One of my retrocomputing dream is to design an Unibus universal board,
> probably based on FPGA because of precise timi
On 10/19/2016 06:48 PM, shad wrote:
>
> One of my retrocomputing dream is to design an Unibus universal board,
> probably based on FPGA because of precise timing requirements,
> to emulate one or more disk/tape interfaces, and possibly something more.
> The real storage could be based on SD car
On Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 12:48:18AM +0200, shad wrote:
>
> From what I understand, there could be a great demand of a such interface
> here around?
>
I think so yes, not everyone is so lucky as to have massbus or SDI disks
lying arround. Loose CPU boxes seems far more common.
/P
On Oct 19, 2016 6:48 PM, "shad" wrote
Hello,
I read several posts about Unibus disk interfaces and emulation.
One of my retrocomputing dream is to design an Unibus universal board,
probably based on FPGA because of precise timing requirements,
to emulate one or more disk/tape interfaces, and
On 2016-10-19 6:48 PM, shad wrote:
Hello,
I read several posts about Unibus disk interfaces and emulation.
One of my retrocomputing dream is to design an Unibus universal board,
probably based on FPGA because of precise timing requirements,
to emulate one or more disk/tape interfaces, and pos
On Wed, Oct 19, 2016 at 4:48 PM, shad wrote:
> The board itself wouldn't be cheap at all, because PCB would be big,
>
True. From a Chinese vendor such as PCBway, a DEC quad size double-sided
PCB without ENIG (immersion) gold surface finish but without hard-gold edge
fingers costs $15.10 each
> On Oct 19, 2016, at 6:48 PM, shad wrote:
>
> Hello,
> I read several posts about Unibus disk interfaces and emulation.
> One of my retrocomputing dream is to design an Unibus universal board,
> probably based on FPGA because of precise timing requirements,
> to emulate one or more disk/tap
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