1088XEL Atari ITX Motherboard DIY Builders Thread

[+Firedawg]

After some redirection, um-hum, as to using the proper flashing software I have completed the PIC programming for GTIA V-Gate, MouseSelect, Mousetari, and TK-II. The Joy2Pic-STIK & SIO2PC made this process very easy! I soldered in precision sockets for X1 & X2. I'm will be working on completing the XEL-CF-II units as I'm waiting for S-video Audio Video Combination Socket to complete the 1088XEL main board.

 

Question: Will I be able to update my Sophia from this board once it is powered up?

 

[+mytek]

After some redirection, um-hum, as to using the proper flashing software I have completed the PIC programming for GTIA V-Gate, MouseSelect, Mousetari, and TK-II. The Joy2Pic-STIK & SIO2PC made this process very easy! I soldered in precision sockets for X1 & X2. I'm will be working on completing the XEL-CF-II units as I'm waiting for S-video Audio Video Combination Socket to complete the 1088XEL main board.

 

Question: Will I be able to update my Sophia from v1 to v2 from this board once it is powered up?

 

precsockets.jpg

 

Although there is no harm, socketing X2 is not required, since that crystal can remain in place permanently. And although it doesn't get used for an NTSC set-up (as well as the associated 74HCT74), it does no harm to leave it in place for that instance. the NTSC GTIA has no internal connection for that extra clock circuit on pin 16.

 

Glad to hear that you got all of the PICs programmed ok . So as you mentioned, you discovered that process is pretty painless using the JOY2PIC-STIK and the flashing ATR's via SIO2PC.

 

To answer your question... Yes you absolutely need to have Sophia under 5V power in order to in-circuit flash it with new firmware. So installing it in the 1088XEL first would be the way to go.

 

Well it looks like you are getting pretty close to firing up your board .

 

- Michael

[flashjazzcat]

+1 for the ease of use of those PIC flashing tools.

[+DrVenkman]

Very excited to follow along with Firedawg's progress! Marlin is apparently sending out kits this week so hopefully one evening next week or the week after, I'll be able to start mine!

[+Firedawg]

I had some time today so I connected the 5v to the board after installing the LM555. Was very pleased to see that I had the Yellow LED (+5VSB) on and once I switched on the power on the Green LED (ON) came on. Also, noticed some light activity coming form BOB-12731. Checked voltage throughout the board and everything checks out. Waiting for a few other items to allow me to output to video. But getting there slowly but surely !

 

Question: Will I be able to update my Ultimate1MB from v1 to v2 from this board once it is powered up? My apologies to Michael for earlier asking him about Sophia, but it still applied.

 

• Need and have on order my PS/2 Keyboard/Mouse and S-Video/RCA stacks components.
• Need to solder in my precision socket for the crystal X1 & X2.
• Need to solder in 0.1” SIL 1-pin Male Header for SYNC.
• Need to flash update my Sophia (latest NTSC palettes) and U1MB (v1 to v2).
• Complete the build on JOY2PIC-STIK V1.1.
• Need to program TK-II (PIC16F1847), Mousetari (PIC16F1847), and Vgate (PIC12F1571). Using JOY2PIC-STIK V1.1 to complete the programming.
• Realan H80 case on order.
• Mouse Select Port boards and components ordered.
• XEL Status Panel boards and components ordered.
• Complete the build on XEL-CF-II V1.0.
• DB9s Male/Female, FC-10P , and flat ribbon cabled ordered for Joysticks and RGB/YPbPr Thru connections.
• Need to get mounting hardware (4-40 screws and nuts) to bolt down the SIO jack.
• Need to socket the remaining Integrated Circuits that are not requiring programming.

[+mytek]

 

I had some time today so I connected the 5v to the board after installing the LM555. Was very pleased to see that I had the Yellow LED (+5VSB) on and once I switched on the power on the Green LED (ON) came on. Also, noticed some light activity coming form BOB-12731. Checked voltage throughout the board and everything checks out. Waiting for a few other items to allow me to output to video. But getting there slowly but surely !

 

Question: Will I be able to update my Ultimate1MB from v1 to v2 from this board once it is powered up? My apologies to Michael for earlier asking him about Sophia, but it still applied.

 

• Need and have on order my PS/2 Keyboard/Mouse and S-Video/RCA stacks components.
• Need to solder in my precision socket for the crystal X1 & X2.
• Need to solder in 0.1” SIL 1-pin Male Header for SYNC.
• Need to flash update my Sophia (latest NTSC palettes) and U1MB (v1 to v2).
• Complete the build on JOY2PIC-STIK V1.1.
• Need to program TK-II (PIC16F1847), Mousetari (PIC16F1847), and Vgate (PIC12F1571). Using JOY2PIC-STIK V1.1 to complete the programming.
• Realan H80 case on order.
• Mouse Select Port boards and components ordered.
• XEL Status Panel boards and components ordered.
• Complete the build on XEL-CF-II V1.0.
• DB9s Male/Female, FC-10P , and flat ribbon cabled ordered for Joysticks and RGB/YPbPr Thru connections.
• Need to get mounting hardware (4-40 screws and nuts) to bolt down the SIO jack.
• Need to socket the remaining Integrated Circuits that are not requiring programming.

 

 

Wow nice!!!

 

If you have a U1MB and a UAV ready to pop in (and of course all the other chips) you could be up and running very soon . The mouse select board isn't required to test the mouse or for that matter to use it. For a quick and dirty solution I use a shorting block to select either Joyport1 or Joyport2. Since a lot of mouse apps allow for port2 to be the mouse, that is the one I'll often leave jumpered in, thereby leaving port1 free for a joystick or paddles.

 

I've never updated the U1MB from a V1 to V2, so I'm certainly not the one to answer that question, but I do believe Dropcheck wrote up a good tutorial on doing just that a little while back. Hopefully she'll read this and pop in with a link.

[Dropcheck]

Here's my adventures in updating U1MB from version 1 to 2.

 

 

U1MB.pdf

[+Firedawg]

Here's my adventures in updating U1MB from version 1 to 2.

 

 

 

Thanks Lenore. It's all coming back to me why I have not installed these U1MB! I even have your adapter and still I have not done it. Well, my back is against the wall on this one and it must be done. It is getting fun now......

[Dropcheck]

 

Thanks Lenore. It's all coming back to me why I have not installed these U1MB! I even have your adapter and still I have not done it. Well, my back is against the wall on this one and it must be done. It is getting fun now......

 

You won't need the adapter for the 1088XEL. But to do a temp install in an 800XL to verify the U1MB and upgrade the Xilinx chip you will.

 

It's not really as bad as you think to do the 800XL temp install. I think four wires from the U1MB to the motherboard.

 

The major fun is the Xilinx programming cable. Like I said cue up some soothing music.

[+mytek]

I think I would do an initial test with V1 in the 1088XEL. It should still work, but the BIOS won't be flashable via Uflash. Then if all looks good, update the U1MB to V2.

[+Firedawg]

I think I would do an initial test with V1 in the 1088XEL. It should still work, but the BIOS won't be flashable via Uflash. Then if all looks good, update the U1MB to V2.

Sounds good. I'll finds some time this weekend as she who must be obeyed has me on a tight schedule. I'll probably need to include my Sophia for video output. I'll reports back on my findings.

[+DrVenkman]

I've had my board (two of them actually) for a few weeks but I've been waiting on the rest of my kit for a couple weeks now.

 

But, despite it being a Sunday - and Christmas Eve to boot! - the USPS is hard at work delivering last-minute packages today. Lucky me! I just now received one box from Mac and other from Firedawg (Mike). Looks like I'm ready to begin my build this week. Merry Christmas to me!

 

 

 

 

Thanks to Michael for his expertise and designs, and for making them freely available, thanks to Mac for spearheading the effort to make putting stuff together for a build as painless for the masses as possible, and thanks to Firedawg for not only starting this builders thread, but also putting an extra one of Michael's JOY2PIC-Stik's together and sending it to me essentially at cost.

 

Merry Christmas, folks, and happy building in the next weeks, and the new year to come.

[+Firedawg]

Ok, everything is socketed, plugged in, going green. Oh, wait! No video cable for Sophia!!! But the board looks great. I'll work on cable this week;--)

 

Good catch Michael! I'm waiting on my Video jack to come in as well to give me composite/S-video options.

[Dropcheck]

Ok, everything is socketed, plugged in, going green. Oh, wait! No video cable for Sophia!!! But the board looks great. I'll work on cable this week;--)

 

 

1225170909a_HDR.jpg

 

 

I envy the Sophia board.

 

Merry Christmas!!!

[+DrVenkman]

Ok, everything is socketed, plugged in, going green. Oh, wait! No video cable for Sophia!!! But the board looks great. I'll work on cable this week;--)

 

 

Okay, maybe this is a dumb question but why not plug in an S-video or composite cable and get video from the UAV for testing?

[+mytek]

 

Okay, maybe this is a dumb question but why not plug in an S-video or composite cable and get video from the UAV for testing?

 

I'm glad you said that, because I was thinking the same thing . Perhaps Mike doesn't want to spoil his Christmas if something doesn't work the first go around.

 

Oh wait a minute... he's missing the video connector.

 

- Michael

[+DrVenkman]

I've spent a lot of my Christmas afternoon gathering photos, printing out the BOM and board layout, etc. in preparation to begin my build later this week. To that end, I was looking through Michael's site but unfortunately can't seem to find a link to download the 1088XEL-specific build of the U1MB firmware which Michael refers to there. Am I simply missing something?

 

Thanks.

[Dropcheck]

I've spent a lot of my Christmas afternoon gathering photos, printing out the BOM and board layout, etc. in preparation to begin my build later this week. To that end, I was looking through Michael's site but unfortunately can't seem to find a link to download the 1088XEL-specific build of the U1MB firmware which Michael refers to there. Am I simply missing something?

 

Thanks.

 

 

I don't think flashjazzcat has released the build yet to the public. Might have to scrolled back in the thread a page or two to find the latest he has posted to the thread.

[+DrVenkman]

 

 

I don't think flashjazzcat has released the build yet to the public. Might have to scrolled back in the thread a page or two to find the latest he has posted to the thread.

 

The most recent one I can find was posted June 30 (!!!) in the XEL CF adapter design thread:

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/265525-xel-cf-compact-flash-adapter-for-1088xel-formerly-xel-i3/?p=3795837

 

Surely he's got a newer version than that somewhere? But I can't seem to find it.

[+mytek]

Jon and I are still working together to get this past the beta stage. Actually it's more him than I doing this, with me just testing whatever changes he makes. Anyway when it does become available (which should be soon), it'll be hosted on his site, but i will provide a link on mine.

[flashjazzcat]

Surely he's got a newer version than that somewhere? But I can't seem to find it.

Might as well upload it here as a beta, since it looks like the only way to get more than two pairs of eyes on it:

 

1088XEL_U1MB_Firmware_261217.zip

 

Flash to "Firmware" slot. Extract the ROM out of the ATR using Altirra's disk explorer if you need to.

 

I'm not uploading the complete changelog or revised documentation today, but highlights include:

• Dual drive operation with XEL-CF (when using a dual CF adapter): enable "Slave drive" in the main BIOS and in the loader. This was certainly the toughest part to get working, not because slave drive operation is difficult (far from it), but the ramifications on other aspects of the PBI BIOS and especially the loader (both of which were originally designed around a single drive) were enormous. All the changes had to be made using assembler conditionals and without breaking the SIDE build, although as it turned out many 1088XEL changes were carried over to that build, which is why I still haven't released the mainline update (that needs testing too).
• Special fade-in cold power-on logo to compensate for the TK-II startup phase, which - along with TK-II's dramatically shortened power-on held reset state - avoids ugly random colours when you turn on the machine and makes it clearer when the system is ready to deal with hotkeys.
• Redesigned boot menu in the main BIOS (probably doesn't get used much, but it's there if needed)
• Many changes to the loader, including device numbers and FAT host partition IDs next to ATRs in the Logical Drives menu, and device numbers and APT partition IDs alongside partitions. Host partition IDs also appear alongside FAT partitions in the MBR partition menu.
• Disk Refresh function in the loader allows pseudo hot-swapping of CF cards (press F9 in the loader after a media change), and Shift+F8 or F9+F8 accomplishes the same thing outside of the loader (refreshes the partition tables on both cards)
• Recursive search in the Launch menu of the loader can now find characters at the start of a filename or anywhere within a filename (configure this in the Options menu).
• While there's no ATR swap button on the XEL-CF, you can swap ATRs via a new item in the loader's "Disk" menu.

There are other numerous cosmetic changes, too, such as three config profiles instead of two, profile number displayed in the status line, and self-clearing status messages. Under-the-hood changes too, which are explained in the revised technical docs which I'll upload when I publish the mainline builds. Mounting API changed slightly, PBI BIOS no longer automatically registers the first FAT on the disk (no need, since the loader handles everything now), etc, etc.

 

What I really want tested:

• HSIO driver, whose standard speed fallback bug is fixed. Code was optimised, so hopefully nothing else broke.
• ATR mounting. API changed and since we now allow dual CF cards, it's possible to simultaneously mount R/W ATRs not only in different FAT partitions on the same card, but different FAT partitions on different cards. You can, for instance, mount an ATR on the master and another on the slave, and copy freely between them. I'm interested to know that this works reliably in 100 per cent of situations.
• Loader should start up OK with only one card even when the slave is enabled, and even with no cards at all (subject to timeouts while it fruitlessly polls the controller). Menus should react to these situations in a seemly manner, which they appear to do. Indeed the loader is generally much better at coping with error conditions than it was before.

Anyway - let me know how you get on.

[+mytek]

Might as well upload it here as a beta, since it looks like the only way to get more than two pairs of eyes on it:

 

1088XEL_U1MB_Firmware_261217.zip

 

Flash to "Firmware" slot. Extract the ROM out of the ATR using Altirra's disk explorer if you need to.

 

I'm not uploading the complete changelog or revised documentation today, but highlights include:

• Dual drive operation with XEL-CF (when using a dual CF adapter): enable "Slave drive" in the main BIOS and in the loader. This was certainly the toughest part to get working, not because slave drive operation is difficult (far from it), but the ramifications on other aspects of the PBI BIOS and especially the loader (both of which were originally designed around a single drive) were enormous. All the changes had to be made using assembler conditionals and without breaking the SIDE build, although as it turned out many 1088XEL changes were carried over to that build, which is why I still haven't released the mainline update (that needs testing too).
• Special fade-in cold power-on logo to compensate for the TK-II startup phase, which - along with TK-II's dramatically shortened power-on held reset state - avoids ugly random colours when you turn on the machine and makes it clearer when the system is ready to deal with hotkeys.
• Redesigned boot menu in the main BIOS (probably doesn't get used much, but it's there if needed)
• Many changes to the loader, including device numbers and FAT host partition IDs next to ATRs in the Logical Drives menu, and device numbers and APT partition IDs alongside partitions. Host partition IDs also appear alongside FAT partitions in the MBR partition menu.
• Disk Refresh function in the loader allows pseudo hot-swapping of CF cards (press F9 in the loader after a media change), and Shift+F8 or F9+F8 accomplishes the same thing outside of the loader (refreshes the partition tables on both cards)
• Recursive search in the Launch menu of the loader can now find characters at the start of a filename or anywhere within a filename (configure this in the Options menu).
• While there's no ATR swap button on the XEL-CF, you can swap ATRs via a new item in the loader's "Disk" menu.

There are other numerous cosmetic changes, too, such as three config profiles instead of two, profile number displayed in the status line, and self-clearing status messages. Under-the-hood changes too, which are explained in the revised technical docs which I'll upload when I publish the mainline builds. Mounting API changed slightly, PBI BIOS no longer automatically registers the first FAT on the disk (no need, since the loader handles everything now), etc, etc.

 

What I really want tested:

• HSIO driver, whose standard speed fallback bug is fixed. Code was optimised, so hopefully nothing else broke.
• ATR mounting. API changed and since we now allow dual CF cards, it's possible to simultaneously mount R/W ATRs not only in different FAT partitions on the same card, but different FAT partitions on different cards. You can, for instance, mount an ATR on the master and another on the slave, and copy freely between them. I'm interested to know that this works reliably in 100 per cent of situations.
• Loader should start up OK with only one card even when the slave is enabled, and even with no cards at all (subject to timeouts while it fruitlessly polls the controller). Menus should react to these situations in a seemly manner, which they appear to do. Indeed the loader is generally much better at coping with error conditions than it was before.

Anyway - let me know how you get on.

 

And to add to that, here is a recent V2.2 BETA build of the new TK-II firmware that should work a bit better along with Jon's latest U1MB firmware.

 

TKprog_V2_2_BETA.atr

 

Please keep in mind that this stuff is in flux, so there might be some quirks that still need to be ironed out.

 

- Michael

[+Firedawg]

Now, it maybe possible to see something! I need to find some time today or tomorrow.

 

[+DrVenkman]

Now, it maybe possible to see something! I need to find some time today or tomorrow.

 

It’s less than a dozen solder joints including the lugs. How much time do you need?

 

I hope to get started on my build tonight but it’s awful cold in the garage this week where my bench is. I may have to find a space heater or move inside somewhere.

[+Firedawg]

True, not much work but with family here and we dropped by the house to pick up some stuff just to go back out again!!! Checked the mail and found several items required to finish off XEL-CF-II, Mouse Select, XEL Status Panel, and XEL-1088. Just have not the time to sit down, warm up the iron, and work. I would like time to test and trouble shoot if necessary;-) I'll report my progress. Awesome project! Thx Michael.