Off the wall projects for the TI-99/4A

[Omega-TI]

Okay, there are lots of cheap Chinese electronics available in the marketplace, like Ebait for example . Has anyone given any thought on how they would interface some of this stuff to a TI?

 

Your idea does not have to be practical, logical or even useful, but fun is a must.

 

For example, cheap Bluetooth speakers exist in huge quantities, has anyone ever considered how to interface a TI with a Bluetooth gadget like a speaker? I mean really, the brain power and technical skill exists in this forum. I'm betting for many projects cheap Chinese kits and stuff could get many projects 75% across the finish line.

 

What say ye? I know somebody out there has an idea just itching to come to life.

[AMenard]

Won't a simple device that takes an RCA audio in and transmit audio via BT do the work? I don't see what advantage there would be of putting a BT transmitter inside a noisy steel cage would bring when a simple box or dongle beside the console would do just as fine...

 

It could be a small box that plug in the snuggly in the monitor out with a video output jack on the other end.

[Omega-TI]

Of course, it does NOT have to be practical. But say someone wants to play the latest Rasmus game while blasting the sound over their home stereo, without stringing wires? Say someone hooked up an F18A to a monitor without speakers, but already has a Bluetooth device ready willing and able to 'sound off'.

 

I just used the Bluetooth speaker idea as an EXAMPLE. I'm hoping to see some cool stuff come out and generate some excitement, sort of like when Vorticon showed us how to launch model rockets, or race slot cars with a TI. Anything is possible!

[Omega-TI]

I'm just now wondering if a Chromecast transmitter could be interfaced to the TI... Imagine wireless video and audio from a TI... that could be interesting.

[abecedarian]

I'm just getting back into 99/4a things but was thinking about PEB or sidecar things that could do rudimentary data acquisition using TI MSP430/432, or weather station things, or doing AIS decoding and such. Also was thinking about integrating a GPS module as an alternative to real-time clock things.

Edited December 12, 2017 by abecedarian

[abecedarian]

I'm just now wondering if a Chromecast transmitter could be interfaced to the TI... Imagine wireless video and audio from a TI... that could be interesting.

 

Perhaps interfacing to a Wi-Fi security camera...?

[AMenard]

Ethernet adapter with resident telnet/ftp client/server. Could be used to develop a new generation of TI99 hosted BBS without needing a clunky PC as an intermediary.

Edited December 12, 2017 by AMenard

[RickyDean]

Of course, it does NOT have to be practical. But say someone wants to play the latest Rasmus game while blasting the sound over their home stereo, without stringing wires? Say someone hooked up an F18A to a monitor without speakers, but already has a Bluetooth device ready willing and able to 'sound off'.

 

I just used the Bluetooth speaker idea as an EXAMPLE. I'm hoping to see some cool stuff come out and generate some excitement, sort of like when Vorticon showed us how to launch model rockets, or race slot cars with a TI. Anything is possible!

Amazon has such devices, I believe:

https://www.amazon.com/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=bluetooth+transmitter+with+rca&tag=googhydr-20&index=aps&hvadid=181969664323&hvpos=1t1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=8322962478032176988&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=b&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9010979&hvtargid=kwd-146667569571&ref=pd_sl_28arwyessn_b_p20

[+OLD CS1]

For example, cheap Bluetooth speakers exist in huge quantities, has anyone ever considered how to interface a TI with a Bluetooth gadget like a speaker? I mean really, the brain power and technical skill exists in this forum. I'm betting for many projects cheap Chinese kits and stuff could get many projects 75% across the finish line.

 

Yes. I have a Bluetooth audio transmitter and receivers of various kinds. Works about as well as you would expect.

[AMenard]

A better idea... A generic interface to an onboard arduino. The TI99 is used to communicate with software that is hosted on the arduino using a standard API. The Arduino in turn, has whatever programs that you upload to it via USB and shields that you equip it with and those programs are designed to listen and answer the TI99 commands via the PEB bus.

 

That way you make the plateform open not only to the electronician but also to the software devs.

[Sinphaltimus]

A gadget to allow us to remote desktop the TI from a windows machine. This way it would feel like emulation because you're working on your Windows box (or MAC or LINUX - not hate here) but actually working on real iron at the same time.

Give it all the capabilities of Classic 99 - Imagine loading up classic99 and selecting "My Real Iron" from the Systems menu item and having all the capabilities in c99 apply to the real iron.
Even the DSK files or directories, 32K added (from the PC), swapping out carts, etc....

I imagine at that point it would be at least 3 hardware devices, one of which being a specialized cartridge with all the interfacing software running on it.

You said imagine anything, so i did.

[Omega-TI]

I'm just getting back into 99/4a things but was thinking about PEB or sidecar things that could do rudimentary data acquisition using TI MSP430/432, or weather station things, or doing AIS decoding and such. Also was thinking about integrating a GPS module as an alternative to real-time clock things.

 

Vorticon already did a TI based weather station... AWESOME! Some of the things I see being mentioned by you and a couple of others look like TIPI territory to me. After Christmas when things slow down at work, I plan to play with the 80 column BASIC routines for the F18A. I'm hoping to make some basic programs to work with TIPI when it's finally released.

[Tursi]

A gadget to allow us to remote desktop the TI from a windows machine. This way it would feel like emulation because you're working on your Windows box (or MAC or LINUX - not hate here) but actually working on real iron at the same time.

 

That's something I actually wanted to try someday, though it's unlikely I will. A little VNC server would be pretty fun though.

[Sinphaltimus]

 

That's something I actually wanted to try someday, though it's unlikely I will. A little VNC server would be pretty fun though.

You may get your shot with TiPi...?

 

I imagine a first "concept" might be something that just duplicates what is happening on real iron while actually interacting with it. Like sending al the IO stuff via TiPi but have the PC part emulate the screen and replicate what's happening on the real iron based on user action? I dunno if that makes sense. It's a strange idea in my head I'm attempting to vocalize.

 

in other words, a headless VNC where the PC display is an emulation of the real iron screen. so you don't have to worry about streaming the video data over a TI expansion port or having to develop another piece of hardware for the video out of the TI.

 

Like for instance. A a mental test of the imagination...

 

in classic 99, whatever you type is typed on the real iron. If using a device like TiPi, classic 99 and the real iron could both be looking at the same shared directories on the TiPi for DSK assignments.

 

EDIT: So you're only actually streaming keyboard input to the real TI. If looking at c99 screen and the real iron screen, they should look like duplicates of each other.

Edited December 12, 2017 by Sinphaltimus

[+jedimatt42]

TIPI doesn't eavesdrop on data sent to the VDP, just data sent to very specific memory addresses in the DSR space.

 

But, if all the data to the VDP is accessible on the sideport, then the CPLD could be rewritten to ship that out to another PI, and a fresh service on the PI to read and stream that out as network packets... Then something like a VDP emulator shows it on the screen on some computer somewhere.

 

For keyboard input, this special PI could be programmed to act as a USB keyboard, and plugged into my USB keyboard adapter, or easier, one of Tursi's PS/2 adapters could be driven so the PI's GPIO outputs the PS/2 serial data that it receives back over the network.....

 

Maybe... I don't actually think the TIPI's line to the Raspberry PI is fast enough that protocal would become 1 way though, so it could be made much faster and maybe keep up. maybe...

 

It wouldn't be a TIPI anymore... but the same hardware might be an easy starting place, since all the magic of that hardware is software.

 

-M@

[Tursi]

Yeah, the PS2 adapter has been waiting for me to add serial support for years - that would at least enable pasting data from a PC to the real hardware. The UART is just sitting there idle.

 

For the VNC server, you two basically worked out the same plan I did - to sniff the data written to the VDP and maintain an emulation state for reproducing the display. The timing slip (unless the emulated VDP can be synced to the real one, maybe by also polling status register reads) means advanced tricks like scanline effects aren't going to work, but you should be able to support 99% of applications. Those two steps give both input and output.

 

Another way might be a video capture device (since those are cheap now) and an embedded Linux machine fast enough to convert it, but the noise of video capture would probably make a VNC connection fairly network intensive.

 

Anyway, it's never going to happen now, all I want is to finish my MPD ROMs.

[+Schmitzi]

hmm, if this USB/LAN-Server works with Jedimatts USB-keyboard-Adapter (hint hint)

then this "HDMI-Ethernet-thingy" maybe will do the rest ? (with some adapters)

 

Same is available for the RS-232 (ie the Lantronics UDS-10) and the parallel port (maybe wrong direction), but just to play around.

 

You also maybe can pass the Lotharek drive (there is a USB-version) to the PC, through the LAN (or BlueTooth)

Sending sound (to the tape port) also should be possible via LAN

 

And the whole TI-99 system could be remotely powered ON/OFF with one of these IP-based power strips

[unhuman]

I'd love a totally external / modern power supply. The original one is huge, heavy, and hot. Also, whatever power conversion goes on under the cartridge port, I'd love to get that out too.

 

As a kid, my console would get all hot and XB would lock up all the time.

[Sinphaltimus]

I'd love a totally external / modern power supply. The original one is huge, heavy, and hot. Also, whatever power conversion goes on under the cartridge port, I'd love to get that out too.

 

As a kid, my console would get all hot and XB would lock up all the time.

 

That's a feature not a problem - Hot cocoa anyone? Coffee, tea? need to keep lunch warm? lol

[AMenard]

Crazy idea for 2018:

 

- Reverse engineer and build a new run of Myarc Geneve 9640 for the completionist who missed out :-)

 

If the original IC are too hard to find, one or more FPGA could be used as long as there are good compatibility. Call it the Zurich if need be :-)

[abecedarian]

A better idea... A generic interface to an onboard arduino. The TI99 is used to communicate with software that is hosted on the arduino using a standard API. The Arduino in turn, has whatever programs that you upload to it via USB and shields that you equip it with and those programs are designed to listen and answer the TI99 commands via the PEB bus.

 

That way you make the plateform open not only to the electronician but also to the software devs.

 

This is sort of what I meant about interfacing to TI's MSP430/432 microcontrollers for data acq, but I meant to use their "Launchpad" kits, which feature a UART (serial port) that can be interfaced with for transferring things back and forth. Some of those TI chips are quite feature packed too, ranging in features comparable to any of the Atmel parts. Some even sport more RAM than most fully expanded 99/4A's. The main drawback is they're 3.3 volt parts, not 5v.

[Sinphaltimus]

 

This is sort of what I meant about interfacing to TI's MSP430/432 microcontrollers for data acq, but I meant to use their "Launchpad" kits, which feature a UART (serial port) that can be interfaced with for transferring things back and forth. Some of those TI chips are quite feature packed too, ranging in features comparable to any of the Atmel parts. Some even sport more RAM than most fully expanded 99/4A's. The main drawback is they're 3.3 volt parts, not 5v.

So what about a universal step down transformer connected to the TI's internal PSU with terminals for connecting 3.3v things?

(As an "off the wall" project)

Edited December 13, 2017 by Sinphaltimus

[abecedarian]

So what about a universal step down transformer connected to the TI's internal PSU with terminals for connecting 3.3v things?

(As an "off the wall" project)

Would probably be easier with regards to actually routing power to the end-use device, and depending on that device, to use a linear or LDO regulator in a device to pull the 3v3 from either a +12V or +5V source, like how 12 and 5 are attained in the PEB. But that just satisfies primary power supply issues; one still has to interface the logic signals and maybe even RS232 signals.

 

As an aside, there is/was a project for Arduino, and a fork for MSP430 and Stellaris/Tiva (Arm M4F) stuff, which presented a UI on the computer, with toggles and buttons, and allowed one to read analog-to-digital converters and set digital I/O, PWM, and digital-to-analog converters. Something like that with a simple scripting language to handle "processing" signals could be more than a token curiosity, no?

Edited December 13, 2017 by abecedarian

[abecedarian]

Got another OTW idea....

Wireless side port / flex cable interface using 2.4/5.8GHz ISM bands?

 

Might be able to hybridize and use 433/866MHz and 2.4/5.8GHz together, with one for some sort of parity / security and the other for signaling.

Edited December 13, 2017 by abecedarian

[jstimson]

How about finding a way to replace the "fire hose" between the TI and the PEB with either a small cable or, in a dream world, a wireless connection? Imagine not having that huge rubber inflexible monstrosity in the way limiting how you layout your computer system!