New memory & next steps 6

New memory & next steps

Jun

27

2012

I have been unable to spend much time on the project lately, so there is no important milestone to report today. Still, some time ago I soldered the new memory board, implementing the banked model described in this post, and extending the original idea. It worked at the very first attempt, so I have no ...
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Construction · Design · Design - ISA

UART board soldering and bring-up 2

UART board soldering and bring-up

May

5

2012

The UART board from BatchPCB must be cursed. First, it took it (and the accompanying new memory board) over four months to get here, then it silently refused to cooperate when I finally soldered it. I was surprised, as it was really an easy board to design and solder, with only few components and lots ...
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Construction

New boards arrived

New boards arrived

Mar

14

2012

Finally, after a very long wait, I have found an envelope from BatchPCB in my mailbox. I placed an order on November 1, 2011 for two euro sized boards in a hope that I would receive them after three to four weeks. I received them last week, so after more than four months. That’s way too long. ...
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Construction

IDE interface works

IDE interface works

Feb

17

2012

Believe it or not but I am still waiting for memory and UARTs board from BatchPCB. I am waiting for a redo after my last shipment was lost but looks like these guys assign lower priority to redo jobs. All in all, I have been waiting for two boards since November 1 last year. My ...
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Construction

New memory and UART boards

New memory and UART boards

Nov

1

2011

It is difficult to lay out boards properly. This task requires a lot of patience and experience, otherwise you end up with poorly routed boards, hundreds of vias or lengthy signal traces. Somehow I am still unable to avoid all these imperfections and my boards are not quite how I would like them to be. ...
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Construction

It talks! 5

It talks!

May

28

2011

I now have a computer with support for RS-232 serial communications. Since my last post I managed to build and preliminarily test the new device card with two 16550 UART chips. Somehow it makes me very excited, because for the first time I will be able to communicate with my system by means of keyboard ...
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Construction