16 Jun
2010
16 Jun
'10
6:44 p.m.
Philip Pemberton wrote:
On 16/06/10 23:31, Keith wrote:
Sorry sorry, yes, I've got to update my stuff.
Originally I had a Parallax uC with FRAM memory. That was disk->fram,
and then fram->usb.
Now, I've got a Spartan-3E FPGA, and it basically goes
disk->fifo->USB2SER converter. The converter does USB<->TTL voltages,
up to 3mbps. I run it at 2mbps reliably.
<sarcasm> hohoho my project is better than
yours in some way. </sarcasm>
"Bender, you said 'wink wink' out loud!"
"No I didn't... raise middle finger..."
:)
My amiga floppy project will read a full disk and
write an .ADF in
around 50 seconds, total. There's still room for more optimization, too.
Interesting -- the SX2DEV can transfer data that quickly? Or are you
dumping to FRAM then reading the FRAM data back to the host in some way?
Ah wait -- that schematic's out of date. A 2Mbit serial link to an FTDI
chip, then onto USB? Not bad. I'm dumping a track at a time to static RAM, then
dumping the SRAM to
the PC over a USB link. Unfortunately it's only USB Full Speed (10Mbps
give or take), so the peak transfer rate with protocol overheads is, at
best, 500Kbytes/sec.
You are still getting 4mbps, that's pretty good. Yes, I was using
serial FRAM. Neat stuff to work with. Nonvolatile and I used the serial
version so I didn't eat too many pins on my uC.
I do note with some interest that the SPS are getting
quite far along
with the "Kryoflux" reader, which is supposedly going to be open-source.
Given the fact that their capture and analysis stuff is still very
hush-hush despite promises of OSS releases and more information on it,
I'm taking their statements with a pinch of salt...
I've tried several times to get involved. I'm an old amiga guy, working
on similar floppy projects, and my emails to them have basically been
ignored. I'm frustrated with them too. They tell us about how great
the stuff they've made is --- and then don't let us download (heck, even
a binary) of the effort. And then they say they are "preserving
software", but it's completely inaccessible to the public. (even though
you can download on the pirate networks)
I remain completely unimpressed until I see first hand exactly what
they've "accomplished."
Keith