ISA Slot Interfacing?
John A. Zoidberg
Posts: 514
On a Google search, I noticed that some people had interfaced an ISA card to a microcontroller, with a few supporting logic chips to expand the I/O lines.
The best thing is, there are many old ISA sound-cards, and video cards lying in the junkyard. One can simply get a few of them in a price of Starbucks coffee (I guessed).
We have the Propeller. Would it work as a good driver for these kind of cards?
The best thing is, there are many old ISA sound-cards, and video cards lying in the junkyard. One can simply get a few of them in a price of Starbucks coffee (I guessed).
We have the Propeller. Would it work as a good driver for these kind of cards?
Comments
That said, it's doable, depending on how much time and energy you want to invest. First off you'll need to extend the Prop's I/O via '595's, then figure out how to write video and sound drivers for the ISA cards and that is the hard part after looking at the C source code for the AVR example.
Links:
http://tinyvga.com/avr-isa-vga
Still, there is always room in a PC for ADC or digital data acquisition or control of lab equipment. Drivers? Ugh! I'd prefer to do all this in Linux than in Windows, but each to his/her own.
I'll post it when I can find it.
Hmm. I don't want to reinvent the whole wheel again, so instead of making an ISA graphics card or something, I connect these cards to the Propeller. That way, it's much easier. I have an ISA VGA card which is not used for a long time, and some ISA sound cards which would probably still work.
Saw that page not long ago. Hope they have some more examples and some more pictures/videos of it in action.
I heard of it, but I can't find it either. Maybe it's an old document buried somewhere in the Parallax web site.
"The Robot Builders Bonanza ; 99 inexpensive Robotics Projects" ISBN 0-8306-2800-2 (c)1987
Specifically Chapter 32 "Build a Robot Interface Card"
I have used this book extensively, and back in the day (sometime before the Basic Stamp I or II) using nothing but discrete logic IC's, I used information in this Chapter to build an 8 Channel ISA Servo receiver card.
With Gordon's permission I could scan that chapter and make it available for reference.
As others have mentioned, the hardware isn't the problem; it's the drivers. You have a lot of reverse engineering for what can now be done for a pittance in modern hardware. Instead of a sound card you can use a VS1053 breakout board (about $20), for MIDI and/or ADPCM. Extraordinarily easy to connect to a Propeller.
-- Gordon
Even though that information is well covered in a zillion places... I have come back several times to use this particular reference. :-)
Thanks for sharing some of the book information. It is very, very useful.
Yes - I agree on that one. I have the VS10xx breakout board too, haven't tested on it, and this stuff is really good.
However, the MP3/audio decoder breakout boards are very hard to get in SE Asia.
Meanwhile, the ISA cards are abundant in my place and I could grab a few of them in a price of a Subway sandwich. The thing is, writing the drivers for them are never easy. Up to now, I can't really find instructions/addresses for the SB16 (Soundblaster 16) ones.
Have a look at the Linux source code. There you can find a driver (in C) for the SB cards, this at least gives you some ideas.
Obviously, some manufacturers don't support Linux and will not release enough info for hackers, but why bother going there?
It looks as though a Propeller ISA card might be easily done with GordonMcComb's info.
Going the other direction and attaching VGA cards to a Propeller seems somewhat redundant to me as you already can generate ASCII video and limited color graphics. I am not sure there is much to be gained.