A new riser?

[terriblefire]

Is an RTC anywhere in mind for this new riser design?

Cheers.

There is an RTC function in the STM32 ARM chip. Just needs a battery.

[terriblefire]

Ok I suppose i should maybe put some of my thoughts about this design on the forum...

Remember i'm reluctantly doing this because nobody else is interested in getting it done so if anyone wants to do the ARM firmware for it i'm more than happy to let them.

Design is a bit sneaky.....

Screenshot 2019-12-31 at 09.18.47.png (491.11 KiB) Viewed 5317 times

The idea is

1. the ARM does all the HID stuff plus has an RTC in it. I may look at using the DACs for a sound card at some point but anyways...
2. The CPLD does all direct comms to the Amiga plus all 3.3v marshalling. It can intercept any 24bit address space address.
- It has a PUNT in, and a PUNT out so CPU cards can PUNT and override it too.
- It only has 8 bits of data bus but will just make the CPU do 2 bus cycles for reading mouse info.

There are 2 SPI channels between the ARM and CPLD. The ARM sends updates to the CPLD via these. I intend to use the MiST protocol to send data between the ARM and CPLD for RTC, keyboard, mouse and joystick data.

Plugging in a device (i.e) mouse will override the onboard mouse, unplugging will resume it again. etc.

Discuss.

[ed_dream]

Maybe scandabler and regular vga port?

I do not understand the desire to stay on db23 amiga. Or use another compact video connector. In reality, all my friends have modern monitors. For example, benq 912.

With hdmi we can use sound channels. Which will reduce the number of wires on the table.

Please forgive my opinion of the user.

I have a question on the entire line of boards for CD32. Why don't you make a cf slot on the board? You can place it on the board so that you can insert the card without removing the board. For example, if there is a hole in the riser for the card between the slots. It will not be more expensive - anyway we buy a cable and an adapter.

[terriblefire]

Maybe scandabler and regular vga port?

I do not understand the desire to stay on db23 amiga. Or use another compact video connector. In reality, all my friends have modern monitors. For example, benq 912.

Its reinventing the wheel. I use the external SCART to HDMI converters that cost £20 .. They work perfectly. Adding HDMI gives me headaches and doesnt really add anything that we cant get off the shelf.

With hdmi we can use sound channels. Which will reduce the number of wires on the table.

HDMI is v v high frequency and needs something like a Spartan 6 FPGA... for the output and and either a reimplementation of LISA or a VGA ADC to sample the CD32 video... And again it adds nothing as the picture is perfect as it is... so lots of expense and effort for nothing IMHO.

I'd considered a VGA connector but almost everyone seems happy with the DB23.

Please forgive my opinion of the user.

I have a question on the entire line of boards for CD32. Why don't you make a cf slot on the board? You can place it on the board so that you can insert the card without removing the board. For example, if there is a hole in the riser for the card between the slots. It will not be more expensive - anyway we buy a cable and an adapter.

I cant imagine how this would work because the card is inline with the MCA connector. However I dont want to add anything that eats more cpu board real estate. The boards are v tight on space as it is.

Also not everyone wants CF cards. A lot of people (me included) use SD2IDE cards.

EDIT: Another way to put it is ... do we really think me spending a year putting a scan-doubler on a riser (and a CF onboard the boards) is a good use of my time? What functional difference would that make to the end user? IMHO it makes no actual difference except to make the cabling behind your Amiga neater. Wireless keyboard, mouse and joysticks (and the much moaned about RTC) would improve the user experience vastly.

[terriblefire]

To aid my explanation ... This is how MiST sends IO data from the ARM to the cores...

https://github.com/mist-devel/mist-boar ... /user_io.v

works really well. I intend to do pretty much the same thing with the CPLD serving up data to the Amiga.

I'm sure its possible to do this without the CPLD eventually using DMA or something but my inexperience with STM32 chips has me falling back on what i know here.

[arkadiusz.makarenko]

STM32 chips

I would like to help but I am not up to speed with it yet. I have gone through general arm stuff, Gpio, interrupts, general purpose, advanced timers and DMA.
I am doing I2C just now.
I must say that I did hit the wall with usb stuff a little. Reference manual is very fragmented, and difficult to read.

It is powerful but tricky little bugger.

[terriblefire]

I would like to help but I am not up to speed with it yet. I have gone through general arm stuff, Gpio, interrupts, general purpose, advanced timers and DMA.
I am doing I2C just now.
I must say that I did hit the wall with usb stuff a little. Reference manual is very fragmented, and difficult to read.

It is powerful but tricky little bugger.

Agreed, I've installed the STM32CubeMX stuff for MacOS here.. basically i'll get 5 boards made of the prototypes and i'll do the CPLD firmware.. but then its gonna have to be a joint effort to do the ARM firmware.

[arkadiusz.makarenko]

I didn't go through CubeMX route. I took makefiles, header files and mem config from Kier Fraser projects.

[terriblefire]

I didn't go through CubeMX route. I took makefiles, header files and mem config from Kier Fraser projects.

Ok not sure how that would work. Will that setup all the HId layers and everything required? cubemx will setup everything as makefiles.

Almost finished the routing ... just need to finish the RTC stuff.

[arkadiusz.makarenko]

I didn't go through CubeMX route. I took makefiles, header files and mem config from Kier Fraser projects.

Ok not sure how that would work. Will that setup all the HId layers and everything required? cubemx will setup everything as makefiles.

Almost finished the routing ... just need to finish the RTC stuff.

I need "only" find way of initialising usb, and reading hid...
And handling ack() from Amiga after receiving input.
I will time box it till end of January. If I will not be able to progress it I will start looking at CubeMX.