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Preannouncement: Dragon Cart II


ol.sc

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  • 5 weeks later...

Hi Everyone, finally I have the PBI version routed (4 layer board). I still have some labeling to clean up and then it's off to the PCB house to have a very limited number of alpha PCB's produced. These are already spoken for. Once we work any klinks out then a wider beta may be offered. Thanks for your patience.

 

Glenn

 

ps Drogon is just the code name not the final product name. :D

 

post-67309-0-95414400-1558398632_thumb.png

 

post-67309-0-23998800-1558398644_thumb.png

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Just to make sure there's no misunderstanding: The question of implementing "PCLINK over Ethernet" is of course equally relevant to both upcoming Ethernet solutions.

Yes, sure. As I understand it IP65 will support all the (soon) existing Atari solutions, so it can become handy to handle interfacing to the dragons.

Edited by JoSch
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SWEET!!!

 

I will also happily to test the guts out of it on my XLs... (seems like my speciality, nowadays...)

 

I do wonder about the form-factor though.... I see a PBI-type connector, but it would be great if with miminal or no modifications, it could rest inside of the 800 / Incognito expansion-bay where there is direct access to Incognito's PBI port, as well... there are ways to get the ethernet cable out of if, nicely).

 

I can only imagine the first sustained, throughput test between CPU, system-bus and D-cart... especially with the ability to offload Layer-3 processing overhead... that should be SWEET (!!!)

 

Any plans to incorporate a WiFi interface, considering that in most Atari applications, wave-propagation would not be a problem from external cart)?

Edited by Faicuai
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Yes, sure. As I understand it IP65 will support all the (soon) existing Atari solutions, so it can become handy to handle interfacing to the dragons.

 

Unfortunately it's not that simple. My statement "The question of implementing "PCLINK over Ethernet" is of course equally relevant to both upcoming Ethernet solutions." was a generic statement about a hypothetical software. IP65 isn't that software for (at least) two reasons:

 

1. The PCLINKoE software wants to be small by making use of the TCP/IP stack inside the W5100 chip. In contrast IP65 allows to use both the CS8900A chip of the existing Dragon Cart as well as the W5100 chip. The CS8900A doesn't have a TCP/IP stack so IP65 comes with its own TCP/IP stack (running in the ATARI RAM on the 6502). Even when actually working with a W5100 (in constrast to a CS8900A) IP65 doesn't make use of the TCP/IP stack inside the W5100 at all. Rather it uses the W5100 just as an Ethernet controller (like the CS8900A).

 

2. I don't see the IP65 that I provide support the Atari solution discussed in "the other" thread. You can read about the details in that thread. However to summarize: I asked about the technical details of "the other" solution necessary to support it several times and got no answer. I offered to commit to support "the other" solution with IP65 and Contiki if "they" commit to support the Dracarys with their software and got no answer. When adapting my W5100 driver code to the ATARI I had to make a choice to either have larger/slower code that could potentially support both W5100-based solutions or smaller/faster code only supporting the Dracarys. Guess which route I chose given my communication experience. By now my driver implementation is finalized so I'm by now not interested anymore in whatever whoever has to say about "the other" solution.

 

Regards,

Oliver

Edited by ol.sc
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Ok, then. We will see. Since I'm only at the beginning of my journey on Assembly waters, I take whatever help I can get. If IP65 isn't the right tool, well, perhaps we find something else.

Also, as there is neither hardware in the wild (don't know, if it's beta already), I can only speculate, how to go about it.

Edited by JoSch
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deleted as it didn't make sense it would seem :)

 

- It can be used in both modes at the same time. This allows a CS8900A-compatible user program to use the W5100 in Ethernet controller mode while at the same time some OS driver uses the W5100 in TCP/IP offloading mode to e.g. provide access a virtual disk drive hosted on some machine on the network. This isn't just some vision but actual reality on the Apple II. This give a person prior art to look at and come up with how it might work on the Atari...possibly flipping the roles one for the other depending on what works best on the Atari.

 

noted as a pseudo pbi compliant device. not providing anything in rom... which is pretty cool...and with pass thru, I can easily envision rom/bios possibilities when use in conjunction with U1M or SIDE/AVG or other devices.

Edited by _The Doctor__
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@JoSch: There are several sources of information / sample code to get started. When the time has actually come and you have issues finding the relevant info let me know.

 

@_The Doctor__: Even after reading your recent post several times carefully I still can't follow you :-( If you want feedback from my side you need to elaborate.

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@JoSch: There are several sources of information / sample code to get started. When the time has actually come and you have issues finding the relevant info let me know.

I will do. If you still need beta users, you can count me in.
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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 2 months later...

Progress continues (slowly over the summer). What you are seeing here is just the w5100 responding to the network. I have yet to code the CPLD to give the Atari access to the chip.

I just realized I have the lables swapped so TX is RX and RX is TX - which explains all the activity. ?

 

 

Drogon_Assembled_Back.jpg

Drogon_Assembled_Front.jpg

Edited by a2retro
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  • 4 weeks later...
On 8/26/2019 at 3:51 AM, a2retro said:

Progress continues (slowly over the summer). What you are seeing here is just the w5100 responding to the network. I have yet to code the CPLD to give the Atari access to the chip.

I just realized I have the lables swapped so TX is RX and RX is TX - which explains all the activity. ?

 

 

Drogon_Assembled_Back.jpg

Drogon_Assembled_Front.jpg

 

IMG_5266.MOV 11.54 MB · 14 downloads

Very nice!

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  • 6 months later...

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