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| Commander Dave... |
 Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2009 10:57 am |
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Guest
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Greetings!
I wanted to add a serial port to my 1981 Gorf arcade machine. Since it is
really just a specialized Z80 computer, I was just going to tap the signals
from the Z80 pins and create a small sub-board with a UART. I haven't really
got this working yet and was since I have virtually zero experience with any
hardware design, thought I might beg a question or two.
First, you can see the schematic and other info here:
http://tinyurl.com/yfe9utm (or: http://preview.tinyurl.com/yfe9utm )
First, was there a better UART that I could have chosen? The 16C550 seems to
have been around for quite awhile. I am looking for mainly availability and
simplicity rather than cost or other factors.
Second, I have to tap all the signals from the bottom of a card cage by
running individual wires to my board. I currently have this hard wired which
is a pain for debugging purposes. I need a connector system that takes these
individual wires and turns it into some kind of plug that could go into a
socket. I'm not too great with finding what is out there. Can someone make a
suggestion on what to use to do this? There are 20 signal connections that
need to be made on the current design.
Third, I know I am a total newb with design and prototyping. If you see
obvious errors with my design or implementation, please feel free to let me
know. Please be kind though, I bruise easily... :-)
Cheers!
-Commander Dave |
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| WangoTango... |
| Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2009 9:08 am |
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Guest
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In article <29246$4adb48be$18d64d18$20380 at (no spam) KNOLOGY.NET>, cmdr-
dave at (no spam) spamcop.net says...
[quote]Greetings!
I wanted to add a serial port to my 1981 Gorf arcade machine. Since it is
really just a specialized Z80 computer, I was just going to tap the signals
from the Z80 pins and create a small sub-board with a UART. I haven't really
got this working yet and was since I have virtually zero experience with any
hardware design, thought I might beg a question or two.
First, you can see the schematic and other info here:
http://tinyurl.com/yfe9utm (or: http://preview.tinyurl.com/yfe9utm )
I see that you are using some address lines to select the UART, how do[/quote]
you know that there is nothing else mapped to that address?
[quote]
First, was there a better UART that I could have chosen? The 16C550 seems to
have been around for quite awhile. I am looking for mainly availability and
simplicity rather than cost or other factors.
There are UARTS in the Z80 Family, have you looked at them?[/quote]
You are already working with obsolete gear, getting a Z80-SIO from
Jameco is pretty easy.
[quote]
Second, I have to tap all the signals from the bottom of a card cage by
running individual wires to my board. I currently have this hard wired which
is a pain for debugging purposes. I need a connector system that takes these
individual wires and turns it into some kind of plug that could go into a
socket. I'm not too great with finding what is out there. Can someone make a
suggestion on what to use to do this? There are 20 signal connections that
need to be made on the current design.
Maybe build an adapter socket for the Z80 with your hardware on it?[/quote]
I don't remember if GORF has enough room inside the card cage.
[quote]
Third, I know I am a total newb with design and prototyping. If you see
obvious errors with my design or implementation, please feel free to let me
know. Please be kind though, I bruise easily... 
[/quote]
I just gave it a cursory glance, but it looked reasonable.
I would be worried about the IO memory map myself. |
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