Mathy Posted April 13, 2006 Share Posted April 13, 2006 Howdy Metalguy If you look at the specs of the 6551 UART, it's max baud rate is 19.2k, so I wouldn't expect it to do 56k at full speed. The 6551 can go much faster then 19.2k. IIRC it'll run at 1/16th of the frequency of a clock connected to pin 1 of the 6551. Greetings Mathy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MEtalGuy66 Posted April 14, 2006 Share Posted April 14, 2006 (edited) Yeah Im going by the specs for the original MOS 6551, used in conjunction with a 6502. No clockspeed was specified. Rockwell made some later incarnations of the 6551 as well, and I dont know if they were improved or what clockspeeds they could be ran at. So its highly possible that the 6551, as utilized in the MIO is capable of faster speeds, but I was just referring to the original specs released by MOS for the original incarnation of the chip. Edited April 14, 2006 by MEtalGuy66 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MEtalGuy66 Posted April 19, 2006 Share Posted April 19, 2006 Ok Im done with all the logic now, and its been double checked for acccuracy. With the ram, Ive decided to go with a 30 pin 1meg SIMM. This will reduce the amount of additional logic I need to add, and also reduce the footprint of the ram, itself. The ports are done too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Guitarman Posted April 19, 2006 Share Posted April 19, 2006 It's going to be killer!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Almost Rice Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 ICD may have had the design for the 80 column board complete, but at the time of actual production of the MIO, they already knew they werent going to follow through and produce it. I say this because on the MIO boards, they never actually populated the holes for the header pins for the RGB connector, or the second 50 pin row of header pins that was in paralell with the expansion bus connector. These are undoubtedly the places that the board would have pluged in. They chose instead to fill these holes with solder. My MIO has those headers. Its probably a low enough serial number #380. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen J. Carden Posted June 16, 2006 Share Posted June 16, 2006 Ok Im done with all the logic now, and its been double checked for acccuracy. With the ram, Ive decided to go with a 30 pin 1meg SIMM. This will reduce the amount of additional logic I need to add, and also reduce the footprint of the ram, itself. The ports are done too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted June 16, 2006 Share Posted June 16, 2006 I do this COMPLELTELY for the benefit of the ATARI community, and in the end, maybe we'll at least have a bit larger user base for the MIO. When I was a kid, I wanted one of these so bad, I'd have given my left nut for one. Now maybe a few more of us can have one, at a reasonable price. I think it's very cool that you are recreating the original MIO, especially the 1MB version. I had one of these a long time ago that I used to run an 8-bit BBS, and I can't even imagine doing so without the MIO. I had two 20MB hard drives hooked up to it (Seagate ST225's) via an Adaptec controller board and used most of the RAM as a ram disk (or disks, I don't recall) to store many BBS files to make the board run much faster. And of course had the modem plugged into it as well (US Robotics, baby!) Ahh, those were fun days. Anyway, if you want some additional publicity, I'd be glad to post some news about this project, which might spur some additional orders. ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mio2repair Posted June 25, 2006 Share Posted June 25, 2006 Hello, Have you found some 6551 chips? Maybe trade some for a blank board? There is the clock speed of the CPU buss and the clock for the serial buss. The 6551 has its own bit rate generator and other chips like 6850 and 8250 needed external chip circuitry. there may be some newer chips with built in circuitry but may have different internal registers from the 6551 and may need software modified or io remapped to emulate. Could it be an option to leave it out and the rest still work? Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MEtalGuy66 Posted June 26, 2006 Share Posted June 26, 2006 Ive found several sources for the 6551.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+kheller2 Posted December 23, 2006 Share Posted December 23, 2006 ICD may have had the design for the 80 column board complete, but at the time of actual production of the MIO, they already knew they werent going to follow through and produce it. I say this because on the MIO boards, they never actually populated the holes for the header pins for the RGB connector, or the second 50 pin row of header pins that was in paralell with the expansion bus connector. Are you sure about that? Here's a pic of my 256K MIO, it has both headers installed. ddez Boy.. that specific board looks mighty familiar. Got a history on this board? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ddez Posted December 23, 2006 Share Posted December 23, 2006 Boy.. that specific board looks mighty familiar. Got a history on this board? I've owned this MIO since it was new. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+bf2k+ Posted December 23, 2006 Share Posted December 23, 2006 ICD may have had the design for the 80 column board complete, but at the time of actual production of the MIO, they already knew they werent going to follow through and produce it. I say this because on the MIO boards, they never actually populated the holes for the header pins for the RGB connector, or the second 50 pin row of header pins that was in paralell with the expansion bus connector. These are undoubtedly the places that the board would have pluged in. They chose instead to fill these holes with solder. My MIO has those headers. Its probably a low enough serial number #380. My first MIO was #13. Wish I still had that one. I know who I sold it to but I suspect he got rid of it some time ago. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dopeyman06 Posted January 4, 2021 Share Posted January 4, 2021 Hello... Please excuse me for bringing up this ooooold message thread. But I was wondering what ever happened to this project? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted January 4, 2021 Share Posted January 4, 2021 http://www.rasterline.com/mio.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IndusGT Posted January 4, 2021 Share Posted January 4, 2021 4 hours ago, flashjazzcat said: http://www.rasterline.com/mio.html I wonder if he has any in stock. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flashjazzcat Posted January 4, 2021 Share Posted January 4, 2021 I guess email, or PM @MEtalGuy66. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MEtalGuy66 Posted January 4, 2021 Share Posted January 4, 2021 Yeah. We don't build those any more. At the time we did, there were very few mass storage solutions available for the ATARI 8 bit. Now there are many that are much cheaper and better in every way than an MIO. Here are a few: https://lotharek.pl/products.php?id=41 https://www.vintagecomputercenter.com/ 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Stephen Posted January 4, 2021 Share Posted January 4, 2021 51 minutes ago, MEtalGuy66 said: Yeah. We don't build those any more. At the time we did, there were very few mass storage solutions available for the ATARI 8 bit. Now there are many that are much cheaper and better in every way than an MIO. Here are a few: https://lotharek.pl/products.php?id=41 https://www.vintagecomputercenter.com/ Where have you been hiding out lately? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mathy Posted January 4, 2021 Share Posted January 4, 2021 Hello Ken 55 minutes ago, MEtalGuy66 said: Now there are many that are much cheaper and better in every way than an MIO. The same goes for computers. Still this isn't WindowsAge, LinuxAge or MacAge. It's AtariAge. Sincerely Mathy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alfred Posted January 5, 2021 Share Posted January 5, 2021 5 hours ago, MEtalGuy66 said: Yeah. We don't build those any more. At the time we did, there were very few mass storage solutions available for the ATARI 8 bit. Now there are many that are much cheaper and better in every way than an MIO. Here are a few: https://lotharek.pl/products.php?id=41 https://www.vintagecomputercenter.com/ I don't agree that a serial floppy drive emulator is superior to an MIO in any way. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BillC Posted January 5, 2021 Share Posted January 5, 2021 2 hours ago, Alfred said: I don't agree that a serial floppy drive emulator is superior to an MIO in any way. I agree with this sentiment, Lotharek also sells the SIDE2 and SIDE 3 cartridges. They can't really be considered PBI devices without a U1MB system, but they come pretty close. I don't have either, but do have 2 of the version 1 SIDE cartridges. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Larry Posted January 5, 2021 Share Posted January 5, 2021 @Simius may still have IDE+2 to sell, and I believe currently that is the only true PBI mass storage device available. But he said that he would not be making this in the future, so this may also be gone. The IDE+2 is a really nice device, but still is not a multi purpose device like the MIO or Black Box. Now there are other solutions for connectivity and big ramdisks, but those two old school devices are quite unique (and cool!). Multi-carts go a long way to fulfilling this niche, but I wish the IDE+2 was still available to users. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tillek Posted January 5, 2021 Share Posted January 5, 2021 I have to weigh in with those who still think the MIO is worth it. Ever since the TVAG hard drive went down, I had tried to get it back up temporarily until I got a new hard drive set up. The problem is, anything SIO is just way too slow in comparison. The other options fail to work 100% for some reason or another. Either some kind of incompatibility that causes something not to run right, or the fact that I need Basic XE and can't manage to work it out cart slot wise. Either way, I'd still love to get my hands on another MIO since I blew one out a few months back. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MEtalGuy66 Posted January 5, 2021 Share Posted January 5, 2021 Obviously I wasn't comparing a floppy drive emulator to the MIO when I specified "mass storage". SIDE2/3 is very stable now, works reliably, is much faster, and much cheaper. If you don't need local-bus speed, SDrive, SIO2SD, Fujinet, etc.. are all good options. I do prefer IDE Plus 2.0, although I am not aware of how/where it is still being sold. The MIO is a dinosaur. The design is based on alot of older generation power hungry ICs and it is extremely temperamental and succeptable to bus-load/timing related instability issues. Also, compatible drives are hard to find and/or expensive. It's not a real SCSI interface. It's missing an output that all but the most archaic SCSI operation modes depend on as a key part of the interface. Even modern devices that work via the firmware updates we did, do so as a result of their firmware supporting this archaic mode of operation. It's kind of "in between" SASI and SCSI-1, strandards-wise.. There's also the fact that it isn't a legal PBI device and hogs the PBI interface almost exclusively.. Let's see.. The original ICD design has pitifully inadequate heat dissipation on the power circuits.. The rectifier diodes cook themselves, along with the PCB.. ESPECIALLY on 1meg models.. I'd much rather have a device that works with ~90% of storage devices you can plug into it... Doesn't need to be fine-tuned based on bus load/capacitance/timing skew in order to reliably operate in a system with other expansions.. Can actually work with other PBI devices on the same bus... Is not a fucking HEATER.... It was fun to play with back in the day when we didn't have much better/cheaper options. Now, it's a collector's item.. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sugarland Posted January 5, 2021 Share Posted January 5, 2021 (edited) I don't understand the occational assertion that a PBI device is niche. XL/XE machines are the majority of A8 computers, no? Also a PBI device is not 'installed' and locked into a specific computer as an U1MB or Incog. There are now more XL/XE exclusive titles than 800 OSB titles afaik which IMO often makes XL/XE the primary A8 development target. An ideal PBI/ECI device might have SD hard drive, fuji wifi, cart emulation, RS232 (optional chip), RAM(if possible) and have a flashable FlashJazzCat OS integration same as U1MB/Incog. ? Swapable PBI/ECI cable if possible. Like MIO, device handlers could be offloaded onto the device? One can dream... Edited January 5, 2021 by Sugarland 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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