28 Nov
2005
28 Nov
'05
7:58 p.m.
From: "Chuck Guzis" <cclist at
sydex.com>
On 11/28/2005 at 10:46 AM Dwight K. Elvey wrote:
Hi
I've used slightly modified cassette tape software
to transfer data to and from a Poly88 to a PC. The only
part I recall changing was the initialization code and
the sync detect. They used a 8251 so there was little
other modifications. The Poly88 thought it was otherwise
just doing a tape transfer. I initialized the 8251
as async to match the PC end.
I suspect that one could do a controller to controller
method but one would need to generate the index pulses.
A simple 555 circuit would most likely be enough.
You might need to add a little analog filtering to
match up the compensation that is usually added to the
write data on the higher density drives.
Dwight
Besides the HeathKit hard sectored controller
board,
used on both the H8 and the H89, Polymorphics also
used a serial chip to do data. In both of these
cases, as you state, they used synchronous serial
chips and not async.
To put a reverse twist on this, has anyone ever used two floppy controllers
to transfer data between two systems? I know it'd take a little extra
hardware (something has to provide address headers outside of a format
operation), but it should still be quite possible to do so.
I've never tried, however. Ethernet is so much easier.
Cheers,
Chuck