+Ksarul Posted June 7, 2014 Share Posted June 7, 2014 I got the Extender boards in this morning and they look nice. For anyone wishing to purchase one, they are $30 each, shipped to a US address. The connector is included, although you will have to do some forming (and just a touch of trimming) on the connector's pins to get them to lay nicely on the board to be soldered into place. I can do that and attach the connector for an additional $10 per board. Here is a picture of one with the connector sitting where it belongs. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted June 7, 2014 Share Posted June 7, 2014 Is this to extend a PEB slot above the top of the box? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+arcadeshopper Posted June 7, 2014 Share Posted June 7, 2014 I got the Extender boards in this morning and they look nice. For anyone wishing to purchase one, they are $30 each, shipped to a US address. The connector is included, although you will have to do some forming (and just a touch of trimming) on the connector's pins to get them to lay nicely on the board to be soldered into place. I can do that and attach the connector for an additional $10 per board. Here is a picture of one with the connector sitting where it belongs. Awesome paypal? if so send me a request to arcadeshopper@gmail for the 40+shipping Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gary from OPA Posted June 7, 2014 Share Posted June 7, 2014 sweet, they look nice. It was not for the fact that USPS has stopped EMS tracking to most places including my Dominican Republic island, I would order one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marc.hull Posted June 7, 2014 Share Posted June 7, 2014 I got the Extender boards in this morning and they look nice. For anyone wishing to purchase one, they are $30 each, shipped to a US address. The connector is included, although you will have to do some forming (and just a touch of trimming) on the connector's pins to get them to lay nicely on the board to be soldered into place. I can do that and attach the connector for an additional $10 per board. Here is a picture of one with the connector sitting where it belongs. Nice again Jim. I guess I can put my test PEB back together... Your like a lucky slot machine lately. Thanks and count me in. PayPal headed your way. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ti99iuc Posted June 8, 2014 Share Posted June 8, 2014 Oh yes... very good... one for me too.. thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 8, 2014 Author Share Posted June 8, 2014 In answer to CS1's question: this card is used as a troubleshooting aid. It extends the bus upward so that you can put a card into the connector at the top and troubleshoot it in system, without having to fight with the minimal space available inside the card cage to do so. It definitely makes following circuits on the defective card a lot easier. . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gazoo Posted June 8, 2014 Share Posted June 8, 2014 In answer to CS1's question: this card is used as a troubleshooting aid. It extends the bus upward so that you can put a card into the connector at the top and troubleshoot it in system, without having to fight with the minimal space available inside the card cage to do so. It definitely makes following circuits on the defective card a lot easier. . . I've got an interesting story concerning troubleshooting cards related to this extender board. Bud Mills never had anything like this. He sawed off the section of the Pbox that contained the drives with a hacksaw so he could easily get to the top of the card in slot 8 with his logic probe for troubleshooting. I was pretty amused when he told me that story at one of the Lima Fairs. Still smile when I think about it. Gazoo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 8, 2014 Author Share Posted June 8, 2014 What a way to mangle a PEB! The key takeaway from that is that he something that worked for him--and that was the important thing. . .I just wanted something a bit more flexible. I just finished forming and trimming the connector for Arcadeshopper's request. I'll try and solder it together tonight, since the wife is on a rampage and left me to my own devices for a while. . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+InsaneMultitasker Posted June 8, 2014 Share Posted June 8, 2014 I've got an interesting story concerning troubleshooting cards related to this extender board. Bud Mills never had anything like this. He sawed off the section of the Pbox that contained the drives with a hacksaw so he could easily get to the top of the card in slot 8 with his logic probe for troubleshooting. I was pretty amused when he told me that story at one of the Lima Fairs. Still smile when I think about it. Gazoo I wonder if this is the same contraption I saw in Buds attic TI workshop. Stayed there overnight long ago on a drive back from Connecticut and he gave me a tour of where the magic happened. My original repair/test board was a PEB backplane mounted on a piece of wood. It had been shortened from 8 to 5 slots, and for quite some time was what I ran my BBS from. I powered it with a PC Power supply and 20' power run, making it quite versatile. It was with a "naked" backplane that I fried a Geneve by inadvertently plugging it in the wrong direction. Don gave me the TI slot extender I've used since the 90s, I got rid of the backplane, and with many hours of toil the Geneve was repaired. At least Bud's device maintained the card orientation 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gary from OPA Posted June 8, 2014 Share Posted June 8, 2014 I wonder if this is the same contraption I saw in Buds attic TI workshop. Stayed there overnight long ago on a drive back from Connecticut and he gave me a tour of where the magic happened. My original repair/test board was a PEB backplane mounted on a piece of wood. It had been shortened from 8 to 5 slots, and for quite some time was what I ran my BBS from. I powered it with a PC Power supply and 20' power run, making it quite versatile. It was with a "naked" backplane that I fried a Geneve by inadvertently plugging it in the wrong direction. Don gave me the TI slot extender I've used since the 90s, I got rid of the backplane, and with many hours of toil the Geneve was repaired. At least Bud's device maintained the card orientation Yeah, I spent many a night at Bud's place working on Horizon and other projects before travelling out to Lima or Chicago or Boston fairs together. -- I spent so much time in Toledo I even had roll of bus tokens to get around the town. My test bench peb is the old Rave 99 PEB, a neat little 5 slot board that was designed to fit into those old big Turbo XT PC cases, it gives you good access to top card as they all set sideways instead of upright. This is one pcb that might be worth bringing back it even had option to replace the ti99 flex card onboard, giving you full 5 slots for ti99, or switch over to geneve mode using one of slots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 13, 2014 Author Share Posted June 13, 2014 The PayPal request has been sent, Arcadeshopper. Many thanks! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 13, 2014 Author Share Posted June 13, 2014 On the Rave PEB board, that one still has an active owner: Richard Bell. Only he could authorize a reissue of the board, Gary. That said, I could do my own TI backplane design for 5 or 10 cards. . .that's an easy kill in the CAD program, like the extender boards were. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marc.hull Posted June 18, 2014 Share Posted June 18, 2014 Got it. Soldered it and used it. Damn fine card and good inclusion of the connector. Tomorrow I put my test bed peb back together cause I don't need an exposed back plane no more. Thanks Jim. Good and useful product and a damn fine execution. Cudos to you... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 18, 2014 Author Share Posted June 18, 2014 I'm glad you like it, Marc! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Vorticon Posted June 18, 2014 Share Posted June 18, 2014 I got the Extender boards in this morning and they look nice. For anyone wishing to purchase one, they are $30 each, shipped to a US address. The connector is included, although you will have to do some forming (and just a touch of trimming) on the connector's pins to get them to lay nicely on the board to be soldered into place. I can do that and attach the connector for an additional $10 per board. Here is a picture of one with the connector sitting where it belongs. Is the card still available for sale? I'd like one as well please. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 18, 2014 Author Share Posted June 18, 2014 I still have about a dozen of them, so they are still available. Any of the folks who originally expressed interest who haven't let me know should do so soon so that I keep theirs reserved. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fritz442 Posted June 18, 2014 Share Posted June 18, 2014 Received mine yesterday, very very nice. Excellent design. Thank you, Jim Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted June 19, 2014 Share Posted June 19, 2014 Picked mine up today, but I need to trim about 1mm off one end of the prototype connector to fit the extender. Or trim out part of the extender's connector, depending upon how a real card fits into it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 22, 2014 Author Share Posted June 22, 2014 I did some fit tests between the boards and the connector this weekend after I built a few of the Extender Boards--the connection is snug, but it does fit nicely without moving in the socket. I did notice that there were two slightly high points on the inside of the socket that showed wear after inserting the board a few times, one at wach end of the connector. The wear was minimal, however, so I don't think that was the issue. It is possible that one or both of the components in the set you have is at an extreme end of the tolerance--and if it is both of them, it would be at opposite extremes. Let me know, as that will tell me whether or not I need to adjust the tolerances if I ever make another batch of the protoboards. . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted June 22, 2014 Share Posted June 22, 2014 I did some fit tests between the boards and the connector this weekend after I built a few of the Extender Boards--the connection is snug, but it does fit nicely without moving in the socket. I did notice that there were two slightly high points on the inside of the socket that showed wear after inserting the board a few times, one at wach end of the connector. The wear was minimal, however, so I don't think that was the issue. It is possible that one or both of the components in the set you have is at an extreme end of the tolerance--and if it is both of them, it would be at opposite extremes. Let me know, as that will tell me whether or not I need to adjust the tolerances if I ever make another batch of the protoboards. . . I will post some pictures tonight. I think I have a spare TI card lying around in my room I can test, as well, to determine where my short-coming is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+OLD CS1 Posted June 23, 2014 Share Posted June 23, 2014 Here you can see a TI disk controller card in the extender. The tongues line up perfectly enough. It is a little difficult to tell here, but the prototype board has etched a little bit of the plastic from the connector. It does not fit into the connector, snug or otherwise, with the tongues and traced lined up. The TI disk controller sitting on top of the prototype board, all traces lined up at the connector edge, the board matched perfectly, here. On the other side, however, with the traces lined up, you can see my prototype board is just a touch wider. This is with the traces and board lined up as in the third picture, my prototype board is just a scosh narrower. All-in-all, if I trim that extra bit from the side of the prototype connector it will fit into the extension no problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+InsaneMultitasker Posted June 23, 2014 Share Posted June 23, 2014 (edited) The TI disk controller sitting on top of the prototype board, all traces lined up at the connector edge, the board matched perfectly, here. DSC08132.JPG Unless it is the angle of the camera or some other effect, it appears the contact fingers (or spaces between them) on the TI card are slightly wider. As you go right to left, the metal 'fingers' look to be centered between the other card's 'fingers'. I would be cautious of mating the prototype card with the extender until you confirm there is no overlap in the power distribution contacts. I noticed a similar offset to a smaller degree in your first picture, where the TI card is just slightly out of alignment with the connector, though not likely to impact its use. I do not have one of Jim's cards so I'm just sharing initial observations. ( I'll take a look at my TI extender card just for giggles this week.) The offsets were related to the camera's settings and perspective. See later post by OLD CS1. Edited June 23, 2014 by InsaneMultitasker Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marc.hull Posted June 23, 2014 Share Posted June 23, 2014 (edited) Here you can see a TI disk controller card in the extender. The tongues line up perfectly enough. DSC08130.JPG It is a little difficult to tell here, but the prototype board has etched a little bit of the plastic from the connector. It does not fit into the connector, snug or otherwise, with the tongues and traced lined up. DSC08131.JPG ( The TI disk controller sitting on top of the prototype board, all traces lined up at the connector edge, the board matched perfectly, here. DSC08132.JPG On the other side, however, with the traces lined up, you can see my prototype board is just a touch wider. DSC08134.JPG This is with the traces and board lined up as in the third picture, my prototype board is just a scosh narrower. DSC08135.JPG All-in-all, if I trim that extra bit from the side of the prototype connector it will fit into the extension no problem. I don't understand your concern. Card works just fine. I have tested it with a fdc and Sid master. Are you concerned with the top of the card or he bottom? Edited June 23, 2014 by marc.hull Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted June 23, 2014 Author Share Posted June 23, 2014 I think the issue may be a tolerance thing with the cut of the Protoboard, as it looks to be just a hair wider than a TI card. The for or five of them I inserted into the PEB Extender card connector on the board I assembled for my use all line up with the fingers in the connector perfectly--but they are a bit tight on insertion, I used the same board outline that I used for the SID Master here, so there should be no difference in fit when you insert one of those or one of the protoboards into the top socket, Marc. I'll be sending one to the Insanemultitasker in any event--that was part of my initial production plan as he provided a lot of input into the final design. . .I just need a good shipping address. . .in a PM please. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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