Ingo Korb has released a minor update to sd2iec (used in uIEC, among other solutions). Users are encouraged to update to this release. Fixes/Features include:
U1/2, B-R/W commands now work without a trailing CR character (reported by Draco)
UI now always reports the dos version no matter what characters are following unless it’s a + or -. Previously anything but ±/nothing would result in a SYNTAX ERROR which doesn’t match what a 1541 would do. (reported by skoe)
JiffyDOS timing optimized, now loads a massive 1.8% faster!
Although parts were delayed due to a Blizzard in the Midwest this past weekend, I was able to construct ZoomFloppy #1 Monday night. Though one hopes for first attempt success, that is not often the case. It was indeed not the case for this construction.
When I designed the board, I knew the 0402-sized surface mount components were small, 1/4 the size of the 0804-sized components I normally utilize for SMT designs. Still, it’s a bit academic until one actually tries to solder the parts. At a size that is seems near my eye’s minimum ability to resolve details, the components truly tested my soldering abilities. For comparison, my finest iron tip is 1/32″, and the parts were about the same size as the tip. Still, I was able to place each component on the board.
When first powering up the unit, it did register as a USB device, and I was quickly able to load the required firmware. However, upon re-insertion, the unit registered as “xum1541 (ZOOMFLOPPY)” and demanded USB drivers I did not have. Since it was late, I left the project at that point and solicited help from Nate (the project designer) and others.
Tuesday night, I had learned what version of OpenCBM to load on the PC, the correct USB drivers had been sent to me in a ZIP file, and progress was made. The correct drivers were loaded, and OpenCBM commands were issues to the device.
Sadly, initial tests failed. Before assuming the worst, I checked all solder joints, and measured impedences, on the assumption I had soldered a component incorrectly. During the inspection, I noticed two resistors attached to the IEC lines were shorted to each other, thus effectively shorting the IEC lines together. After resolving that issue, the unit successfully passed the tests by transferring data from the drive ROM to the PC.
With no need to spin a new PCB, I released the 98 first batch units to production and ordered the required parts for assembly. The plan is to quickly assemble 25 units and potentially ship before end of year, with the rest coming quickly in January. Since the 2×8 header X3 was nominal in cost, I ordered it for inclusion in assembly.
Sale price target is $35.00, and I will add a pre-order option in the store shortly. Given the ease of installation and configuration, I predict significant sales. This device eliminates the need to fiddle with parallel port settings, trying to remember a myriad of differently lettered adapters, and a need to maintain older systems with legacy ports for disk access purposes.
PCBs for ZoomFloppy are finished and the first 2 are enroute to the US for manual assembly and testing. Those following the blog for a while or having chatted with me at shows know the sequence for a new product:
Initial prototyping
Unit and system testing
Schematic capture
PCB CAD design
PCB manufacturing
Limited run hand assembly
Final testing
Automated Assembly
Key commitment points include step step 5 and step 8. Before step 5, little expense is involved, and truly, many projects cease before that step. Step #5 has become much more economical, so much so that initial production board runs approximate the cost for limited quantity prototype manufacturing. Thus, I don’t often run a true prototype phase. At worst, the design has an issue and I need to run another batch of boards, which costs no more than a prototype run + production PCB run. At best, the first revision works fine, and the money saved can be used elsewhere.
Step #8 is a larger commitment. Whereas a board run of 100 boards might cost a couple hundred dollars, parts acquisition alone for step #8 can easily cost 1 to 2 thousand, more if the design is a higher end product. Thus, it makes sense to, in the absence of a prototype PCB phase, hand assemble a few production boards to check final placement, fit, and function.
One the design passes testing, it becomes a waiting game for final assembled boards to arrive for sales. As in all things, there are 3 criteria: speed, quality, and price. You can select 2 of the 3 for your project. I select quality and price, so I typically wait a bit longer for assembly. In perspective, some assembly houses can do 100 units in 5-10 days, while I typically figure 15-20 days.
Still, things should progress smoothly and quickly once the final testing is done.
QuadPortIEC boards arrived today from the manufacturer. They look very clean, though the design didn’t exactly push the envelope. At $100.00 for 100 sq inches of PCB (shipping included), they were not cheap, but I saw much less competitive offerings in the marketplace. Test fitment in the Hammond case looks good, though I need to order a few DIN sockets to test for sure.
While true innovation might be lacking in this project design, it serves a valuable need. Many months ago, I helped a forum reader with a design for a multi-port IEC hub that allowed individual ports to be “disabled” to disconnecting the ATN line for that IEC port. Months later, Jim Peters, another enthusiast, started conversing with me about a vanilla multi-port IEC hub project he was attempting to design. I brushed off the earlier design, showed Jim the results, and solicited feedback. After revamping the design to fit in a standard Hammond Black 1591XXCSBK or Translucent Blue 1591XXCTBU case, I submitted the design for prototype production this evening. Though I’m happy with my current board manufacturer, there’s not as economical on prototype runs, and I thought I’d try a new company. The finished units should arrive in 2 weeks. I’m only ordering 10 units, but if there is sufficient interest, I’ll consider a production run.
Though I rely on the storefront for sales management, I have not tried out some of the features of the system. I’ve noticed for quite some time that the storefront offers coupon management, and I’ve wanted to put on a sale during the Holiday season. Thus, I’m trying out the coupon system by offering a sale from now until the end of December 25th, 2010 (or until specific stock runs out) on 64NIC+ cartridges. Use coupon ‘NICSALE” during checkout to receive $10.00 off each 64NIC+ purchase. Buy 2 or more and see if it correctly applies a $10.00 reduction for each NIC purchased.
After a couple rounds of final tweaks by myself and Nate Lawson, I’ve released the ZoomFloppy PCB to production. The board has been designed to fit inside a standard Hammond 1591XX Black ‘S’ or Translucent ‘TBU’ case. In addition to the normal IEC connector and the Mini USB Type ‘B’ connector, you’ll find a number of additional connection options:
A DB-15 “Parallel” socket. This uses the defacto standard pin mappings
A 2×8 Header. This uses RapiDOS/ProfessionalDOS pin mappings
2×20 Debug Header. This provides access to each pin of the interface and was designed to allow use of industry standard IDE cables
2×12 IEEE-488 Header. Since the IEEE-488 Centronics connector can be hard to source and expensive, this connector offers a much cheaper alternative.
IEEE-488 24 pin Centronics connector. The industry standard GPIB/HPIB/IEEE-488 connector.
User Port Edge Connector. This allows the use of older parallel drive cables that assume a connection to the C64 user port.
Only the Mini USB, IEC, and DB-15 connectors will be populated standard. The IEEE-488 connectors will be stocked when ZoomFloppy adds IEEE drive support, though they will be optional.
Sales at the recent ECCC show depleted stock of the uIEC/SD units. Normally, I order more stock when quantities get below 20 or so units, but I was not paying as much attention to the stock level while relocating. Sadly, I ran out, but I have ordered 100 more units and they should be here in a few weeks.
It’s a sad fact that, as technology marches forward, it affects even retro enthusiasts. For years, Commodore users have archived their personal disk collections using the ubiquitous “Star Commander” and some variant of the venerable “X-1541” adapter to connect IEC-based disk drives to the PC. As parallel ports have changed through the years, designers have adapted the X-1541 design to keep up. But, with the advent of the USB port, parallel ports have all but disappeared from the marketplace. The inherent design of the X1541-style cables cannot overcome the loss of a connection to the computer!
A few years ago, Till Harbaum created the XU1541 project, designed to connect via a USB port on newer machines. However, the project was eventually cancelled, with development efforts stalled.
ZoomFloppy Prototype (Courtesy Glenn Holmer)
Nate Lawson decided to do something about that. Taking a cue from the XU1541 design and identifying its shortcomings, Nate started working on a new implementation using a hardware USB-based Atmel AVR microcontroller via a Bumble B Mini USB Development Board. I got involved in March, when Nate asked if I would be interested in helping with the PCB design. Though initial ideas were to simply build a base for the Bumble-B, cost analysis led us to simply design the Bumble B functionality into a specific-use board.
Though my recent relocation hindered the timeline, I am excited to now announce the upcoming sales of the ZoomFloppy Commodore Drive USB Adapter. The schematic is finalized, board design is nearly complete. Nate presented details on the device at the recent Chicago ECCC show, outlining the many features of the new device on his web site, including his ECCC presentation.
Brain Innovations attended the now legendary ECCC EXPO in Chicago on September 18, 2010. Given our new location, logistics became the largest area of concern for attendance.
Due to the relocation, I needed to find a new place to live (and, as previously noted, somewhere to build a proper facility for the company. As with previous career changes, the hiring company offers temporary housing of some type for a certain time period, typically 1 to 4 months. Complication matters this time was the inability to find suitable temporary housing for 2 adults, 2 children, and a dog. Pets are evidently not as welcome in Sioux Falls, SD temporary housing. Thus, our temporary home became the Residence Inn in Sioux Falls (highly recommended, BTW). This is important to the logistics, I promise.
As I prepared for the ECCC show, I asked if the family wanted to attend. In years past, the children came, not so much for the show itself, but mainly for a chance to stay in a hotel room for a few days. This time, though, they had stayed in a hotel for over a month, which diminished the uniqueness. On the other hand, our previous location, Cedar Rapids, IA, was on the way to Chicago, and staying there would allow them to visit with friends recently left behind. Thus, a decision was made to drop the family in CR, and travel onto Chicago alone. Because of the delay in making a decision on lodging needs, the hotel booked up, but a request for room sharing was fulfilled.
"Packed" for the Trip
After looking at all the options, we decided to take the RV to IA and park it as temporary housing for the family during the Chicago trip. I would trailer another vehicle behind and then drive that vehicle to the show. Obviously, I decided to trailer “Smartie”. The combination was an interesting combination of machinery:
Smartie loaded with the "essentials"
Given our relocation efforts, the business had been temporarily reduced to a few cubic feet of product, my trusty Commodore SX64 (for testing), and a ‘scope. Thus, the small cargo area of the ForTwo easily accommodated all of the equipment needed for my table at the show. Thankfully, the drive to Chicago in the ForTwo from IA was uneventful. Filling up but twice with gasoline during the trip and paying not more than $35.00 in total for fuel, coupled with the shared hotel room, certainly made for an inexpensive trip.
Given the circumstances, I was behind on project work and did not plan to show anything. I did bring what stock I had to sell, and I enjoyed the other presentations and impromptu discussions at the show.
Earlier in the year, I started working Nate Lawson to bring his USB-to-IEC drive adapter to market. Though I was not able to have PCBs done for the ECCC show, I did get to meet Nate at the show, at least to apologize. A subsequent post will detail more information about the “ZoomFloppy” project, as it is now called.
Leif and I debugging VIC-MIDI (Courtesy Glenn Holmer)
I also touched base with Leif Bloomquist, who is trying to bring a VIC-MIDI cartridge to fruition. I suggested at the WoC 2009 show that the design would be easier to manufacture if the now-obsolete and hard-to-source 6850 could be replaced with a newer 16X50 UART part. I had wired a 16450 to his prototype cart during the CCCC EXPO in May, but there were still issues. Nate and I debugged the design while at the show, though more needs to be done.
Tower of X-Panders (Courtesy Glenn Holmer)
This year, the afterparty did not include a very-drunk set of wedding guests and a fire alarm with water cascading down the hotel stairs. Honestly, as in years other than 2009, which included the aforementioned festivities, the event was very low key. Attendance looked to be healthy, no doubt influenced by the Vintage Computer Festival – Midwest event that shared space with ECCC. I’ll be back in 2011, hopefully with more to show and present.
