masteries Posted January 23, 2021 Share Posted January 23, 2021 This week I was building a reduced PCB size version of ACSI2STM, Some hard disk writing problems were found due to my STE machine, the old history as you know; directions indicated that a low power CPU version can help on solve the original EMC problem that corrupts output data for STE machines; due to this I used a previously made hard disk image, in order to prevent writing to hard disk from my STE Results: The ACSI2STM works perfectly; loading the 3.5 MB size of current Metal Slug port takes around 12 seconds (aprox. 300 KB/s). Tested against old SD cards, such 1 GB card; 4 GB SDHC and 8 GB SDHC. All these are detected and works correctly! Photographs of the hard disk interface: The hard disk image (DOS & TOS compatible, readable on Windows) I used: http://atari.8bitchip.info/DiskImgPP1.html You can use Win32DiskImager (Windows) in order to write it. The ST / STE with a hard disk is another world! P.S. Additional materials were bought, more units can be manufactured, 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hellraiser Posted January 23, 2021 Share Posted January 23, 2021 This is a cool little device. If you build some more to sell; how much would it cost? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
masteries Posted January 24, 2021 Author Share Posted January 24, 2021 21 hours ago, Hellraiser said: This is a cool little device. If you build some more to sell; how much would it cost? Idea is to provide this device at a lower price than Satan, and much much lower than UltraSatan Performance testing: (I removed some non needed printf on the code, gain is around 6 - 8 KB/s more). SDHC 8 GB: SDHC 4 GB Normal SD 1 GB Performance depends on the SD card, some cards accept orders in less time than others. How to power the device; standar ST joystick port do not provide enough current in order to write to the hard disk; it is better to power it from the micro USB port with any mobile phone charger. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chri O. Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 Interesting is this based on ACSI2STM Atari hard drive emulator by Jean-Matthieu Coulon ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chri O. Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 I did the porting of the code to Teensy 3.5 but not sure about performance (didn't build the Hardware yet) ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ojanhk Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 3 hours ago, Chri O. said: I did the porting of the code to Teensy 3.5 but not sure about performance (didn't build the Hardware yet) ? Hi, do you have your port to teensy 3.5 available on GitHub ? I was considering a port to Teensy too (maybe even Teensy 4.x with level converters). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chri O. Posted January 27, 2021 Share Posted January 27, 2021 21 hours ago, ojanhk said: Hi, do you have your port to teensy 3.5 available on GitHub ? Unfortunately this is a work-in-progress that I had to abandon a month ago, job priorities. I was also thinking about Teensy 4.1 and the PSRAM 8 or 16 Megabytes of RAM as buffer ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Westphal Posted February 18, 2021 Share Posted February 18, 2021 (edited) Ok guys. I got two of these coming. I sent $97.65 USD for two of them ( incuding a paypal fee of $4.65 ). He has already updated the firmware twice and sent out instructions on how to implement it. You wil also need one of these : https://www.ebay.com/itm/1PCS-5v-CH340G-Serial-Converter-USB-2-0-To-TTL-6PIN-Module-for-PRO-mini-K9/222436686027?_trkparms=aid%3D111001%26algo%3DREC.SEED%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20160908105057%26meid%3D3ff01dcfb603485fae6c88dbde483ec8%26pid%3D100675%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D15%26mehot%3Dnone%26sd%3D222436686027%26itm%3D222436686027%26pmt%3D0%26noa%3D1%26pg%3D2380057%26brand%3DUnbranded&_trksid=p2380057.c100675.m4236&_trkparms=pageci%3A2dca5b84-723d-11eb-932e-96fa77c2a0d4|parentrq%3Ab7601bed1770a0f119b49628ffe3e68a|iid%3A1 Edited February 18, 2021 by Paul Westphal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chri O. Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 HI all. I have been able to buy (DB19) on Amazon. Link: D-Style Male Solder Type Connector - 19 no need for modification of DB25 connector. This will speed things up building the device.? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TGB1718 Posted February 19, 2021 Share Posted February 19, 2021 @Chri O. Nice find, shame they don't do the PCB mounted versions, I'm building one of these and had to do the hatchet job on a 25 pin The one I used was plastic, so was able to cut the plug down to size and no metal shell to worry about. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Westphal Posted February 27, 2021 Share Posted February 27, 2021 Hey MST - Have you tried using Jookie's driver with that device? He has a demo version we can try : It MAY yield faster transfer rate : http://joo.kie.sk/?page_id=266 Also - I have done some vids with this device on my YT channel : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAVWgxXEerFi51JI8SWDP5w I'm currently Waiting for my UART to USB. I'll do some further tests and vids with it ( and try Jookie's driver ) when it I update the firmware. Pretty cool product Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ParanoidLittleMan Posted February 27, 2021 Share Posted February 27, 2021 That's not Jookie's driver. It's only presented on his site. And in case of DMA/ACSI adapters transfer rate actually does not depend from driver SW. It depends from DMA chip max speed (what is btw. not correctly given in Atari DOCs) + used adapter. For instance Jookie's first design Satandisk transfer rate is about 150 KB/sec, with same driver that can over 1 MB/sec on UltraSatan - and max rate depends from used SD card type too in case of UltraSatan - funnily I got best with 1 GB Kingston, and with newer, larger capacity ones it is about 900 KB/sec in most cases - and I use brand cards. Since my transfer speed test program is shown here, just to add that will see some difference between Direct HW access speed and speed of Logical drives (partitions) . The reason for it is filesystem in TOS what adds some delays. And that is more in old TOS 1.00 and 1.02 than in 1.04 and later, for instance. And with combined R/W tests you can see how much lower is transfer speed of small data chunks/files. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TGB1718 Posted February 27, 2021 Share Posted February 27, 2021 I still have to finish build this, currently I have a 1Gb SCSI hard drive on an ICD interface, with ICD Pro, can anyone tell me what the partition sizes need/can be, my hard drive was formatted when I had my original 520STM with the older TOS, I think 32Mb Partitions, but want to use this device on my STE with upgraded TOS 2.06 and am not sure what the limits for partition size are. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snarkdluG Posted February 27, 2021 Share Posted February 27, 2021 (edited) 39 minutes ago, TGB1718 said: I still have to finish build this, currently I have a 1Gb SCSI hard drive on an ICD interface, with ICD Pro, can anyone tell me what the partition sizes need/can be, my hard drive was formatted when I had my original 520STM with the older TOS, I think 32Mb Partitions, but want to use this device on my STE with upgraded TOS 2.06 and am not sure what the limits for partition size are. Up to 256MB for TOS < 1.04 Up to 512MB for TOS ≥ 1.04 Up to 2GB for TOS ≥ 4.x (Falcon) EDIT: Source Edited February 27, 2021 by snarkdluG Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ParanoidLittleMan Posted February 27, 2021 Share Posted February 27, 2021 Some drivers have extra limit for first partition - like max 16 or 32 MB . Falcon: TOS 4.02 max 512 MB. TOS 4.04 max 1 GB . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chri O. Posted February 28, 2021 Share Posted February 28, 2021 (edited) Quote Falcon: TOS 4.02 max 512 MB. TOS 4.04 max 1 GB . This is true I am using 1GB Jaz Drive (scsi 2) currently on my Falcon 030 TOS 4.04, format compatible with WIN 10 for easy file transfer. Just love this sound of the Jaz SCSI drive ?. The biggest issues I had is trying to install SCSI adapter on WIN10. On my non PCI mother board I was able to install Adaptec SCSI 2940AU Card and the drivers ( Many thanks for this instructions ) using PCI Express to PCI Adapter Card. Edited February 28, 2021 by Chri O. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Westphal Posted February 28, 2021 Share Posted February 28, 2021 (edited) 21 hours ago, ParanoidLittleMan said: That's not Jookie's driver. It's only presented on his site. And in case of DMA/ACSI adapters transfer rate actually does not depend from driver SW. It depends from DMA chip max speed (what is btw. not correctly given in Atari DOCs) + used adapter. For instance Jookie's first design Satandisk transfer rate is about 150 KB/sec, with same driver that can over 1 MB/sec on UltraSatan - and max rate depends from used SD card type too in case of UltraSatan - funnily I got best with 1 GB Kingston, and with newer, larger capacity ones it is about 900 KB/sec in most cases - and I use brand cards. Since my transfer speed test program is shown here, just to add that will see some difference between Direct HW access speed and speed of Logical drives (partitions) . The reason for it is filesystem in TOS what adds some delays. And that is more in old TOS 1.00 and 1.02 than in 1.04 and later, for instance. And with combined R/W tests you can see how much lower is transfer speed of small data chunks/files. This is why we call you " The Great One " Thanks for straightening that out, PLM. Edited February 28, 2021 by Paul Westphal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Westphal Posted February 28, 2021 Share Posted February 28, 2021 (edited) Ok - My Mega ST4 TOS 1.04 / 4gb Sandisk Class 4 transfer speed is 277 kb/s My 4 MB STe TOS 2.06 / 4gb Sandisk Class 4 transfer speed is 278. Most games run fine! This is without the firmware update from Feb 19th. I'm still waiting for the UART to USB converter. As it stands, DMA sound is working .. but with mixed results. Megablast intro music plays, but there is no ingame.. it just goes back to the menu. The " Signal's " Demo runs for a bit then starts to skip. I DID make it though the first song, once. The Bad Apple Demo played for a bit but bombed out after 40 seconds. Getting Bad Apple, Sea of Color, Talk Talk 2 and US Policy to all run, is my goal. I'll track down a quality 1gb card and see what I get. Thanks to all involved in this project, dirctly and indirectly. sig_ste.zip Edited February 28, 2021 by Paul Westphal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Westphal Posted February 28, 2021 Share Posted February 28, 2021 What is the fastest theoretical read speed of the drive? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TGB1718 Posted April 15, 2021 Share Posted April 15, 2021 I managed to finish building one of these, but so far been unable to get it to see the SD card partitions, I've tried the evaluation version of HHDriver and PPHDUTIL to try before I buy, but neither could see the cards, I tried 2 different SanDisk SD Cards, first I partitioned and formatted under Windows, no joy, then I copied a disk image linked on this site, this also failed, I formatted the second card under Windows, still no joy. I created the partitions 32Mb for C and the others 500Mb, this is an STE with TOS 2.06UK. When I try the install or scan hard drives, the activity LED blinks on the device, but says "Write Failed" Any other drivers or ideas I could try Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ParanoidLittleMan Posted April 15, 2021 Share Posted April 15, 2021 9 hours ago, TGB1718 said: I managed to finish building one of these, but so far been unable to get it to see the SD card partitions, I've tried the evaluation version of HHDriver and PPHDUTIL to try before I buy, but neither could see the cards, I tried 2 different SanDisk SD Cards, first I partitioned and formatted under Windows, no joy, then I copied a disk image linked on this site, this also failed, I formatted the second card under Windows, still no joy. I created the partitions 32Mb for C and the others 500Mb, this is an STE with TOS 2.06UK. When I try the install or scan hard drives, the activity LED blinks on the device, but says "Write Failed" Any other drivers or ideas I could try It's not driver SW problem for sure. And you can not create with Windows or any other OS partitions good for this. Get image with demo version of driver and games, and write to SD card properly (not as file copy): https://www.mediafire.com/file/77nh2flbsc4wqia/6PartGm.rar/file If that works not, most likely adapter can not work with those SD cards. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ParanoidLittleMan Posted April 15, 2021 Share Posted April 15, 2021 On 2/27/2021 at 9:56 PM, Paul Westphal said: What is the fastest theoretical read speed of the drive? You mean SD card on Atari - generally, or via this adapter ? Generally, pick max speed of Atari ACSI/DMA port is 2 MB/sec . With real files it is about 1.8-1.9 MB/sec. As I see, ACSI2SD can max some 280 KB/sec . That's why some - for instance Xenon 2 with audio track fails - needs better speed. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TGB1718 Posted April 15, 2021 Share Posted April 15, 2021 @ParanoidLittleMan thank you for your reply, the image you linked is the one I used, I did "burn" the image to the SD card using BalenaEtcher, although I did only try it on one of the cards which is an older 4Gb card, I will try it again with the newer 32 Gb card and see if that helps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TGB1718 Posted April 16, 2021 Share Posted April 16, 2021 Just an update, after trying again with no joy, I managed to get the Serial debugger running on the STM32 on pins A9 and A10. this is the output:- So it looks like something wrong with the SD card module, will re-check the wiring, and replace the module if I have to, hope it's the wiring as getting this off the board will be a real pain. Initializing ACSI bus ... ACSI bus ready Initializing SD card 0 Cannot init SD card Initializing SD card 1 Cannot init SD card Initializing SD card 2 Cannot init SD card Initializing SD card 3 Cannot init SD card Initializing SD card 4 Cannot init SD card Initializing SD card 5 Cannot init SD card Initializing SD card 6 Cannot init SD card Initializing SD card 7 Cannot init SD card 0 SD cards found --- Ready to go --- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chri O. Posted April 18, 2021 Share Posted April 18, 2021 Are you sure you have all your SD card pins connected correctly, the (CS) chip select pins ? ______________________ /| | | | | | | | | /_|01|02|03|04|05|06|07|8| | |__|__|__|__|__|__|__|_| |09| | |__| | Use this table to match pins on the SD card port and the STM32: SD STM32 PIN 01 PA4 * CS 02 PA7 MOSI 03 GND VSS 04 +3.3V VDD 05 PA5 CLK 06 GND VSS 07 PA6 MISO 08 (nc) RSV 09 (nc) RSV If you want to use multiple SD cards, connect all SD card pins to the same STM32 pins except CS (SD pin 1). Here is the table that indicates the STM32 pin for each CS pin of the different SD cards: ACSI ID STM32 Connect to 0 PA4 SD 0 pin 1 or GND 1 PA3 SD 1 pin 1 or GND 2 PA2 SD 2 pin 1 or GND 3 PA1 SD 3 pin 1 or GND 4 PB0 SD 4 pin 1 or GND 5 PB1 SD 5 pin 1 or GND 6 PB3 SD 6 pin 1 or GND 7 PB4 SD 7 pin 1 or GND In order to detect if a SD card reader is present or not, connect unused pins in the table above to GND. For example, if you want 3 SD cards detected on ACSI IDs 0, 1 and 5: Connect PA4 to pin 1 of the first SD card. Connect PA3 to pin 1 of the second SD card. Connect PB1 to pin 1 of the third SD card. Connect PA2, PA1, PB0, PB3 and PB4 to GND. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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