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Adding a PBI to a 1200XL


Tempest

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How difficult is it to add a fully compliant PBI to an Atari 1200XL? I have a nice 'tricked out' 1200XL that I use but if I ever get my hands on a MIO board I'll need a PBI. I read that it can be done, but how difficult is it to do?

 

Tempest

 

It's a rat's nest if you want it out the back... (look at beetle's 1250XLD internal pictures).

 

However..

 

I was thinking of making a board that plugs into the cart slot of the 1200XL, has an additional 12-wire ribbon that goes inside the machine (to connect to various points on the motherboard) and contains the logic to create the needed extra signals.

 

This board would then have a horizontal "800XL STYLE PBI" edge connector, and two veritcal cart slots (like the XE XTNDR board)... The 12 pin ribbon would plug onto a 2x6 pin header on the board, allowing for easy removal, should you ever decide to unplug the board from the 1200XL cart slot.

 

This would allow you to have the MIO to the left side of the 1200XL, which would put the MIO power switch facing you, and the hardisk connector going out the back.. I think this would work extremely well, and may even be preferable to the XL/XE configuration.

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I was thinking of making a board that plugs into the cart slot of the 1200XL, has an additional 12-wire ribbon that goes inside the machine (to connect to various points on the motherboard) and contains the logic to create the needed extra signals.

 

This board would then have a horizontal "800XL STYLE PBI" edge connector, and two veritcal cart slots (like the XE XTNDR board)... The 12 pin ribbon would plug onto a 2x6 pin header on the board, allowing for easy removal, should you ever decide to unplug the board from the 1200XL cart slot.

 

This would allow you to have the MIO to the left side of the 1200XL, which would put the MIO power switch facing you, and the hardisk connector going out the back.. I think this would work extremely well, and may even be preferable to the XL/XE configuration.

 

I would definitely buy one of those... I'd love to be able to use the new 1200xl I have. Of course I'd have to add some other mods to it - it is stock.

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Yeah I'd buy one of those as well. That would mean I wouldn't have to hack up the poor 1200XL case either. Let me know if you ever decide to go through with this.

 

Tempest

 

Its purely a question of money..

 

Which everyone is a little short of right now..

Yeah I know what you mean, and the market for such a device is pretty small.

 

Tempest

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post-8775-1232050073_thumb.jpg

 

Its gonna cost $400.00 to make 30 of them.. So $13.33US per board..

 

And thats absolutely bare.. Just the PCB..

 

I am broke.... But if everyone wanted to pay like $15.00 per PCB, I'd have them made, and throw them in envelopes and mail them out to you. But we absolutely have to have 30 orders.. The fewer we do, the more expensive it gets per board.

 

The soldering involved to assemble this is not that bad... But if anyone is ABSOLUTELY TERRIFIED to try, I could probably be cooerced into assembling a few..

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post-8775-1232050073_thumb.jpg

 

Its gonna cost $400.00 to make 30 of them.. So $13.33US per board..

 

And thats absolutely bare.. Just the PCB..

 

I am broke.... But if everyone wanted to pay like $15.00 per PCB, I'd have them made, and throw them in envelopes and mail them out to you. But we absolutely have to have 30 orders.. The fewer we do, the more expensive it gets per board.

 

The soldering involved to assemble this is not that bad... But if anyone is ABSOLUTELY TERRIFIED to try, I could probably be cooerced into assembling a few..

 

I'd take a couple. Obviously I'd need to pay extra for shipping to the UK but you can count me in for at least 2. Depending on just how much soldering is involved I might be coerced into doing a limited run of assembly for folks in the UK who didn't want to try it themselves. Do you have a source for cart connectors Ken?

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It's 88 solder joints per board if you populate the cart connectors.. The PBI will work just fine without the cart connectors populated, and in that case, its only 28 solder joints.

 

The parts list goes something like this:

 

2 cart connectors

1 14pin SIP socket

1 74HC08

1 0.01uF ceramic cap.

1 2.7k (or close) 1/4watt resistor

1 2row x 5pin header (.100" spacing)

1 2row x 5pin cinch connector (.100" spacing)

1 piece of 20awg 10 conductor flat ribbon cable (20 inches should be more than enough)

 

Theres also test points for checking /EXTSEL and PHI2... You dont have to populate these, but If you do, they each take a single standard .030" square pin.

 

The hole marked "audio" is for the analog audio signal comming from the PBI device.. AFAIK, nothing has ever used this signal but you may find some use for it, so I included a thru-hole to connect to it..

 

 

I need accurate measurements for the depth of the 1200XL cart-slot

 

Obviously we dont want the "cart slot tongue" excessively longer than it needs to be.. So I need someone (or preferebly several people) to measure the depth of the 1200XL cart slot.

 

The dimension I am interested in is from the actual inner depth of the cart connector on the motherboard, all the way to the outside "fuselage" of the machine.

 

One way to measure this is to get a piece of card-stock (or stiff paper) that will insert all the way into the actual cart connector inside the machine, mark the outside edge of the machine on the card-stock, and then remove the card-stock and measure it.

 

All my 1200XLs have 130xe motherboards, so I am unable to take this measurement myself.. If someone could help me out, its real easy for me to adjust the length of the "tongue" in the PCB CAD software..

Edited by MEtalGuy66
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Just curious why Atari didn't stick a PBI connector on the 1200 from the word go, they did for the 6 and 800xl....or did warner's get the 'tramiel disease'

 

There again, couldn't have been a cost issue, after all, according to legend warner's were fliterring gazillions away on R&D projects that they knew full well they had no intention of bringing to market

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I need accurate measurements for the depth of the 1200XL cart-slot

 

The dimension I am interested in is from the actual inner depth of the cart connector on the motherboard, all the way to the outside "fuselage" of the machine.

 

I get almost exactly 3.25" using my thin metal ruler. Only checked one of mine though as the other one is disassembled at the moment.

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