4MB Upgrade & 16MHz Booster progress

[spiny]

cheers

[spiny]

Exxos, do you have a list of which pins on the ribbon cable go to which pins on the shifter socket ?
I can't seem to get this working, and although the ribbon connetor -ppears- to be soldered ok, I want to check continuinty (if thats a real word) to make sure the socket end is good.

cheers

[exxos]

Exxos, do you have a list of which pins on the ribbon cable go to which pins on the shifter socket ?
I can't seem to get this working, and although the ribbon connetor -ppears- to be soldered ok, I want to check continuinty (if thats a real word) to make sure the socket end is good.

cheers

um. not off hand, but I can email you the pcb layout of the shifter board which shows what goes where..

Are you sure you got the cable silver parts "top side" its caught me out plugging in the cable in upside down a couple of times, which causes that fault

[spiny]

yeah, cable is good, I checked which way up it should go when soldering it, if you can send the pcb layout, it'll help me check my soldering, it was quite fiddly!
I'm going to try another ST too, just in case something is odd with this one, it has Ralcools HD floppy kit fitted, and a non factory 1meg upgrade with the additional 512meg in sockets.

[exxos]

yeah, cable is good, I checked which way up it should go when soldering it, if you can send the pcb layout, it'll help me check my soldering, it was quite fiddly!
I'm going to try another ST too, just in case something is odd with this one, it has Ralcools HD floppy kit fitted, and a non factory 1meg upgrade with the additional 512meg in sockets.

Sounds like a lot of RAM in there ? It should be all taken out or disabled else it will conflict with the new 4MB kit as it replaces all ST-RAM.

[spiny]

all fixed

I'd poorly soldered three of the tiny pins on the ribbon cable connector, carefully reflowed them, and now I have 4meg

[exxos]

all fixed

I'd poorly soldered three of the tiny pins on the ribbon cable connector, carefully reflowed them, and now I have 4meg

You are now officially the first customer to install that kit

[spiny]

cool

some pics then

tiny resistor and edge connector:

01.jpg

socket:

02.jpg

'main' board fitted:

03.jpg

shifter board (extra wires are for the HD floppy kit by Ralcool)

04.jpg

ST Info :

05.jpg

[exxos]

Images not showing up here ?

[DarkLord]

Pics are working here...

[spiny]

should be fixed now, they were in the wrong order.

[exxos]

Nice

I suppose I should add a small note about testing the socket on the shifter board as it may be useful for others also


RE: V1.5 booster progress.

Not been much work on this of late as it turns out my programmer won't program philips GAL's Those are the only SMT ones I can find in 7ns. So Long story short, I ended up buying a load of those SMT chips and sending them off to a programming place in the UK to program them for me. I should get them next week. So all being well I can start production on them soon. The DIP version of the booster has been on test for a few weeks now. I had been using it while testing out the 4MB kits. So its a solid design

[spiny]

the pinout diagram you sent was very handy, perhaps list the pins in the docs too ? it helped me

[exxos]

the pinout diagram you sent was very handy, perhaps list the pins in the docs too ? it helped me

Yeah, If I list the pins on the shifter socket, to the pins on the cable itself, then it tests the whole line out then. The connector is the hardest part of the kit, so I will look into adding a image for testing it out

[exxos]

Some small news on the boosters as I have not posted anything for a while. It just to let people know current status.


V1 BOOSTER
I am going to keep selling these at the same price as they are for now. I plan to build up a new batch as soon, Though likely once this last batch is done I will discontinue them. This booster is good enough for people who just want a boost in games rather than boosting GEM/TOS. Of course GEM does get a boost in speed anyway, but of course not as much as TOS running at 16mhz. So if anyone wants to grab one of these lower cost boosters then they should do fairly soon.

V1.5 BOOSTER
Is 99% completed. The hold up against it going on sale is I have noticed a reset line problem on some motherboards. The V1.5 uses the reset line to clear the flipflop (though not necessary really) though I noticed some random crashes on the V1.5, but turned out it was down to the reset line generated on the motherboard. When I checked this on my scope, one motherboard had about 1V noise, another motherboard had about 2 volt noise. So the signal was randomly floating between 3-5volts. While this is still classed as a logic HI, I suspect when the booster is running in 16mhz speed, it can react to noise on the reset signal and causes the ST to crash. Though I assume at crash point the voltage goes even lower triggering the GAL flipflop to reset and upset the 8/16mhz switching. The booster which GadgetUK had from me, I hard wired the rest line to avoid the problems. Though at this point in time, I need to investigate this reset line problem some more before I start shipping out the boosters. So either the motherboard needs some fix, or I will just avoid using the motherboard reset line. Either way, I need to look into the matter a bit more yet. Aside form the reset line problem the V1.5's are actually ready to ship. Though of course I want to get to the bottom of the reset problem on the motherboard before I start shipping out.

V2 BOOSTER
Holger Zimmerman has been kind enough to help solve the /AS isolation problem. I was so close to the solution but never quiet got there What Holger suggested was using /BG to actually isolate the ST /AS line, before I was isolating it purley on changes to /AS itself. So using BG isolates the signal sooner and solves no end of problems. So currently the V2 is actually working

The hold up on the V2 now is I am trying to get 32mhz working. I had a simple GAL hardwired ontop of a DIP CPU a few months ago and got 32mhz out of it. Though it was running for a few hours then I broke something trying to add 32mhz access to ROM. Though at the time, it was using the iffy V2 code so random problems were expected. Though 32mhz on the V2 itself causes a row of bombs on power up. As to why the V2 isn't working, when my mock test did, I have no idea. I have not had time to spend on this yet as I have been busy working on the 4MB kits, and of course the V1.5 booster. Now I have got distracted with reprogramming gembench, all while I have no much time due to "out in the garden" stuff which needs to be done. So my free time isn't much this time of year.

4MB kit is classed as completed now and is already on sale in my store so there will be no more news about that. In fact there is a new thread for those now anyway. http://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=27796#p273313

[DarkLord]

Holger Zimmermann - he helped so much on my STacy, what with Ralcool's 1.44 mod and the Pak 68/3 board,
it's not even funny.

Can't say enough good things about the man.

[exxos]

Realised I updated the wrong thread about this yesterday

http://www.exxoshost.co.uk/atari/last/16mhz/index.htm#AUG132015

There is a small update there. Basically the proposed design for the development booster system

[exxos]

Current build of the development board. Finally got it routed

This one has a lot of resistor networks to clamp down on noise problems on everything. Also headers for every pin on the CPU and every re-routed pin going via the PLD. I have TOS on there for TOS104, TOS206. Expansion header for IDE or Fast-ram (when they get developed). Of course if anyone wants to develop a addon card for the V3 series of boosters then they are free to do so

vdev.png

[exxos]

The PCB is about to go into production, so if anyone is interested in obtaining one of these dev-boards then now is the time to speak up. Then you basically come either a developer or a beta tester. This way you will be the first to try new features as they are developed and each new feature is free for you to program on your dev-system. You will also need a Atmel programmer to program the PLD.

The price for the PCB only depends on how many people want one. Probably around $50 each. Most parts are generic such as resistors, PLCC sockets etc, but I can work on a price for other items another time if needed.

[exxos]

Deadline to order a dev-system PCB is Monday morning 24th. Price for PCB is $50. So if anyone wants to get one of these dev-system boards then send me a PM and I will send a paypal invoice. Also please say where you are in the world as postage will vary.

Its a cheap way to get the latest boosters for a low cost, when the final boards go into production they will be built and assembled with SMT parts, and the cost will be a lot higher than the dev-system which is essentially the prototype of the final product. Please note you need a Atmel programmer and you will need to obtain parts and assemble it yourself. There is nothing SMT on this board, and all basically "off the shelf" parts.

1uf 2mm capacitors x 6
100uf 5mm capacitor x2
10k resistors x3
2x50 way 1.27mm header x1
AT27C4096-55ns x1
ATF1508AS-10AU PLCC84 x1
PLCC84 socket x1
PLCC44 socket x1
10K DIP resistor array isolated x8
10K sil resistor array bused x5
2.54mm header pins
PLCC68 socket x1
PLCC 68000 CPU 16mhz
1.27mm jumper links x2

I think that is pretty much the parts list. The ROM will need to be programmed, any good universal programmer should be able to program them.

I will have a stock of most parts in the near future, so they can be obtained from me if needs be. I will price up all parts if needs be for anyone who wants to get the whole kit.

I would also suggest the resistor arrays be put in sip/dip sockets/headers as they might need to be changed or removed depending on "unknowns" in the development phase.

[exxos]

PCB order has been sent off Will be about a week while await for them to arrive.

I will post assembly instructions on my site (probably have a new page just for developers or beta testers) with the various firmware updates as they happen.

Initial firmware will be simply to prove the assembly and PLD programming is all good. So it should act like a stock machine. At least then everyone knows that is working stable before building in various updates like CPU boosting etc.

[exxos]

Just got this image from PCB company, so just waiting for them to be shipped

PCB.jpg

[exxos]

PCB's arrived

dev1.jpg

[DarkLord]

Sexy.

[1024MAK]

Post delivered on a Sunday

Mark