AppleTalk networking on the Atari 8-bit

[fibrewire]

How come LocalTalk was never adapted to the 8-bit Atari?

 

"When the newly-christened AppleTalk shipped in early 1985, it included a number of compromises. These included a speed of 230.4 kbit/s, 1000 feet maximum distance, and only 32 nodes per LAN...The entire networking stack required only about 6 kB of RAM"

 

AppleTalk uses a Zilog 8035

 

AppleTalk was included in some 68000 Atari computers

 

Opensource drivers for AppleTalk called Netatalk

 

The history of LocalTalk hardware

 

Looks like a similar implementation of the RS-422 Corvus OmniNet

[Sikor]

It is RS-422. Look at Atari TT spec - Atari TT (maybe mega STE also - I don't remember) has LAN port - it is Apple Talk compatible.

[kskunk]

The entire networking stack required only about 6 kB of RAM

That's a "Wikipedia fact": Based on misreading a PowerPoint slide talking about lower stack layers. Actual fact: The "entire" Appletalk stack started at over 100KB, and grew to megabytes with time.

 

Apple made a 6502 implementation of AppleTalk to go with the Apple II Workstation Card. It's just a subset, not the entire stack, but the core fits in 80KB: 64KB ROM and 16KB RAM. Of course, you also need another 80KB of disk-based software for setup and configuration.

 

Apple's workstation card adds a second 6502 to run the AppleTalk stack. It pretends to be a disk or printer for legacy software. I think this is a good approach to maintaining compatibility.

 

Translating the Apple II Workstation Card to the Atari would give you an SIO-attached device with an on-board processor and a network jack. It would pretend to be a disk or printer, and work with pretty much all Atari software.

 

- KS

[fibrewire]

Translating the Apple II Workstation Card to the Atari would give you an SIO-attached device with an on-board processor and a network jack. It would pretend to be a disk or printer, and work with pretty much all Atari software.

 

It sure would be nice to net boot the Atari over a simple network like the Apple IIe HERE.

 

How would one start identifying the chips necessary to make such a device?

 

 

Or would something like the SN75LBC775 make life a little easier?

sn75lbc775.pdf

Edited February 13, 2014 by fibrewire

[kskunk]

It sure would be nice to net boot the Atari over a simple network like the Apple IIe HERE.

How would one start identifying the chips necessary to make such a device?

 

The electronics are probably the easiest part - the software is the hard part. The Apple Workstation Card was a little computer that ran its own software and pretended to be a disk drive.

 

One popular "little computer" is the Raspberry Pi, and some popular software options are AspeQT or AtariSIO. There is a howto guide here:

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/209010-sio2pi-raspberry-pi-as-a-floppy/

 

Using these ingredients and some Linux knowledge, you could have your Atari booting over the network in a weekend.

 

- KS

[fibrewire]

 

The electronics are probably the easiest part - the software is the hard part. The Apple Workstation Card was a little computer that ran its own software and pretended to be a disk drive.

 

Why can't we just RS-232 to RS-422 with an 850? What is still missing?

[kskunk]

 

The software is the hard part.

Why can't we just RS-232 to RS-422 with an 850? What is still missing?

 

The software. It's the hard part.

 

Also, the 850 couldn't join an AppleTalk network even with new software, since AppleTalk's lowest speed is 24 times the 850's highest speed.

 

- KS