3 Mar
2008
3 Mar
'08
1:55 a.m.
On Mon, Mar 03, 2008 at 08:26:15PM +1100, Doug Jackson wrote:
Hi
I saw a message on the classic computer list in 2003 from Ethan saying
that he had a RB5X robot controller with a 8073 SC/MP controller on it.
Yep. I even have it with me. I need to finish debugging a problem
with the SC-02 speech board and why it acts differently depending
on what vendor and model of 8255 is used to access it.
The thread degenerated into a general car discussion
from what I have
been able to determine.
Yes... well that does tend to happen, unfortunately.
Today, I received my INS8060 and INS8073 CPU chips
from Unicorn
Nice.
I am very interested in the INS8073 (with Tiny Basic
onboard), and have
so far come across a PDF of the 807x (8070/8072), as another spare time
consuming system - My questions are;
1) Has anybody got a reference implementation for the 8073
http://www.penguincentral.com/retrocomputing/INS8073/APNOTE1.PDF
- I suspect
that it involves a 4Mhz xtal, and a RS232 line driver/receiver connected
to SA (as RXD) and F1 (as TXD) - that can be breadboarded easily, but
the real secret is what address will it be expecting the external 6164
ram to provide the 8k of massive storage...
The RAM needs to start at $1000 (Tiny BASIC lives at $0000-$0FFF).
The other trick is that you need to provide a few jumper bits at $FFD0 so
that the onboard ROM knows what baudrate to talk to you at. The reference
design, I think, makes the right bit pattern out of resistors and floats
the rest of the data bus so that the bit pattern shows up in all
non-addressed spaces. I have another INS8073 board, the MC-1N, that uses
a 32x8 PROM for address selection of RAM, ROM, and a couple of I/O chips,
plus the baudrate detector. It's far more formal than the reference
design, and might be a way to go if you want any I/O other than the two
or three bits right off the processor.
You can also put an EPROM at $8000, but that's not an essential part
of the reference design.
2) Did anybody end up reverse engineering the RB5X
board - in the words
of a somebody wiser than me -- "That'l do in a pinch"
Who needs to reverse-engineer it? The current owner of the pile of
RB5X parts sent me the schematics. ;-) I can find out if I can send a
copy to someone without a robot, or you could join the RB5X Yahoo
Group and see if what you want is in this...
<http://f1.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/EL7LR571EbdQtY-HSujUFO5g5sL8lQVjI0nR1dLy-6_El33OcDUpz6dh2aVP1rHT8JpfNYKo_6BUHC3WVWrbmgrRKSuhvw/RB5X%20Refreence%20Manual.PDF>
3) Does anybody have the basic reference guide that
indicates the
allowed word lists for this part?
For just a programmer's card -
<http://www.penguincentral.com/retrocomputing/INS8073/PROGREF.PDF>
If you want docs that delve more deeply into Tiny Basic (for the MC-1N)
ASCII - <http://www.penguincentral.com/retrocomputing/INS8073/MC-1N.txt>
PDF - <http://www.penguincentral.com/retrocomputing/INS8073/MC-1N.pdf>
All these resources are pointed to by:
<http://www.penguincentral.com/retrocomputing/INS8073/>
Feel free to send me questions directly, or post them on the list and
I'll do what I can to answer them.
Enjoy,
-ethan
--
Ethan Dicks, A-333-S Current South Pole Weather at 3-Mar-2008 at 09:30 Z
South Pole Station
PSC 468 Box 400 Temp -62.0 F (-52.2 C) Windchill -95.2 F (-70.7 C)
APO AP 96598 Wind 10.3 kts Grid 80 Barometer 686.3 mb (10391 ft)
Ethan.Dicks at usap.gov http://penguincentral.com/penguincentral.html