CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009
and
CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R1-03.09.2009
Updated to CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R2-12.29.2019
on
December 29, 2019
================================
CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009 - A Hardware M.I.D.I. Interface Program Pak Cartridge for the Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Color Computer 1, 2 and 3, including clones and compatibles (Tano Dragon 64, Dragon Data D32, D64 and D200, Tandy Data Products TDP-100, etcetera) by "Little" John Eric Turner and his father "Big" John Robert (J.R.) Turner. Copyright 09 March 2009. Originally released as Open-Source Hardware on March 9, 2009. Subsequently released under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License on 21 May 2019. ENJOY! Note that the original design is crap, however, a debugged version is forthcoming from "Uncle" Robert "The R.A.T." Allen Turner. CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009 has been updated to CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R1-03.09.2009 by R.A. Turner on May 21, 2019, just over ten years after the initial release of Version 1, Revision 0. Version 1, Revision 1 is Copyright (C) 2019 by the above mentioned parties and is released under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License on 21 May 2019.
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This project is an updated version of the "CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009", a hardware MIDI Interface Card for the Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Color Computer 1,2 and 3, Dragon Data Dragon D32, D64 and D200, Tandy Data Products TDP-100, Tano Dragon 64 and other clones and compatibles. The original "CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009" was designed by my nephew, "Little John", on March 8-9, 2009 as a learning excercise. He was teaching himself to use E.A.G.L.E. in order to design products for the TRS-80 Color Computer line of computers, with the help of his father, my brother, "Big John" or "J.R." as he is known to me. The "CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009" was among his very first (learning the art of circuit design) works. It is a terrible design only because he knew nothing about circuit design at the time and it does not appear that his father, "Big John" (J.R.) offered any input in regards to this particular design. I, "Uncle" Robert "The R.A.T." Allen Turner, have decided to polish up the design a bit and lay out a manufacturable Printed Circuit Board which I will release under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License. As such, I will analyze "Little John's" original design and then provide my improved version. The original "CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009" design files, as provided by "Little John" and his father (J.R.) are contained in the "Original (Deprecated)" folder of this archive and should be referenced for this initial analysis of the design.
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Load up the "CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009.sch" schematic file and have it handy for this discussion.
Starting with Page 1 of the schematic, we see the expected cartridge (program pak) plug followed by an oddly interesting series of "purported" interrupts, labeled IRQ0* and IRQ1* (the "*" indicates low-level triggering, or active low). These "Interrupts", IRQ0* and IRQ1* appear to go, through disable jumpers, to Pins 1 and 2 of the CoCo Cartridge (Program PAK) Connector. This is both ODD and INTERESTING because Pins 1 and 2 of that connector are -12V and +12V, respectively, on ALL CoCo 1's, TDP-100's and ALL Multi-Pak Interfaces. Both of these pins are +12V on the Dragon computers. Those self-same pins, however, are NOT connected to anything on ANY stock, unmodified, CoCo 2 or 3 computers. I am thus forced to draw the following conclusion: "Little John" apparently allowed for using Pins 1 and 2 of a CoCo 2 or 3 Cartridge Slot to connect to any desired interrupt within the CoCo 2 or 3. That is, a CoCo 2 or 3 might be modified to connect Pins 1 and/or 2 of the Cartridge Slot to any of the CPU Interrupts, the PIA Interrupt (CART*), G.I.M.E. (A.C.V.C.) Interrupts (CoCo 3 only), etcetera. This is an UNECCESSARY feature of the "FlexiMIDI" design and my initial inclination was to omit it from the design. However, since there are jumpers that allow these "hacked in" custom interrupts to be disabled (removed) via JP1 and/or JP2 or connected together (wire or'ed) via JP3, I have decided to leave them in the design should anyone be so inclined as to use this custom interrupt scheme for experimentation or otherwise. Also on Page 1 is a fairly standard RESET switch which I would imagine could prove to be quite convenient but potentially problematic if the device is plugged into a Multi-Pak Interface (RESET* is buffered in a single direction in the M.P.I. and should not be triggered from any cartridge plugged into the M.P.I.), Power ON L.E.D. (which I assume might be quite distracting) and some pull-up resistors for the interrupts, custom and legit. Lastly, there is a 220uF Electrolytic Capacitor for Vcc (+5V) filtering. Ideally, a low ESR Electrolytic should be used, however, paralleling a 220uF Electrolytic with a .1uF Ceramic Disc should provide approximately the same result as a single Low ESR type.
Moving on to Page 2, we see a crystal oscillator comprised of three inverters, three resistors and a crystal rated at 1 to 2 MHz. The third inverter actually acts as a buffer and "shaper". Schmitt Trigger inverters are used, although this is not actually necessary it does provide a nice, sharp square wave. Without the hysteresis provided by the schmitt triggers the waveform would appear quasi-sinusoidal at the crystal frequency if viewed on an oscilloscope, but would still function just fine. The output of that third inverter, the buffer stage, is fed into a pair of toggling D type Flip-Flops which provide a divide by two output and a divide by four output, either of which may be selected by jumper JP4. Ideally, we want a solid 500KHz squarewave as the ACIA Clock (which "Little John" labeled "MIDICLOCK" or "MIDICLK"). If a 1MHz crystal is used we would place JP4 on Pins 1 and 2. With a 2MHz crystal we would connect JP4 Pins 2 and 3. This is flexible in that it allows the use of either a 1MHz or 2MHz crystal, whichever might be handy. In my case, and for the redesign, I have a large stock of 16MHz half-can oscillators and so this is what I will be using in the redesign. The 500KHz then, will be derived from the 16MHz oscillator by using the 16MHz to clock a binary counter. At the bottom left of Page 2, we also see three inverters used to invert A7, A4 and A3. This appears to be part of the "address decoding" scheme. Lastly, we see the decoupling capacitors for the inverters and "d-flops". This page (page 2) of the design is fairly solid and well designed.
Moving on to page 3, we see the "heart" of the "CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009" MIDI Interface Pak. A 74LS133 13-Input NAND is used for address decoding. The 74LS133 in conjunction with the aforementioned inverters and the ACIA enable lines fully decode the ACIA into two consectutive memory addresses. With this, we can now decipher the addressing of the device. This will be done by writing A15 - A0 and filling in the "bit status" required to enable the ACIA, as follows:
========================================================================= | A15 A14 A13 A12 | A11 A10 A09 A08 | A07 A06 A05 A04 | A03 A02 A01 A00 | |=================|=================|=================|=================| | 1 1 1 1 | 1 1 1 1 | 0 1 1 0 | 0 1 1 x | |=================|=================|=================|================== | F | F | 6 | x | =========================================================================
Looking at the above table and noting that A0 selects one of the two internal ACIA registers, it is clear that "Little John" mapped the ACIA to 0xFF66 and 0xFF67. This seems ODD because the most popular MIDI Packs designed for use with the Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Color Computer decode the ACIA to 0xFF6E and 0xFF6F. A bit of research, however, led to the discovery that the original CoCo MIDI Pack, "The Colorchestra", mapped the ACIA at 0xFF66 and 0xFF67. The "Colorchestra" was released in 1985 by "Color Horizons" and I own two of them. The aforementioned "research" was simply me looking at the "Colorchestra" P.C.B. and deciphering the address decoding which turns out to be 0xFF66-67. I assume that "Little John" arrived at the 0xFF66-67 addressing in a similar manner as to that just mentioned. It would be relatively easy to redesign the "FlexiMIDI" to respond to both sets of addresses thus guaranteeing compatibility with everything. I have decided, however, that the redesign will feature a semi-programmable address decoder allowing the ACIA to be mapped to any two consecutive addresses within the 0xFF6n area. This will allow the "Flexi-MIDI" to be even more flexible. Setting the address decoder to respond to 0xFF66-67 will make the device "Colorchestra" compatible, whilst setting the decoder to respond to 0xFF6E-6F will make it compatible with the MIDI Interfaces produced by Speech Systems, MusicWare, Rulaford Research, Glenside CoCo Club and other CoCo MIDI Packs. As mentioned, it would be relatively easy to hardwire the decoder to respond to both the 0xFF66-67 and the 0xFF6E-6F address ranges, but I feel that this is unneccesary. Next, we see the 6850 ACIA. This is the "true heart" of the device - a hardware serial port. Looking at the 6850 section of this page of the schematic, we see yet another oddly interesting Interrupt Selection circuit. It is in the form of a 2x4 Jumper Block. This appears to allow selection of any 1 of 4 interrupts to be triggered by the ACIA. IRQ0* and IRQ1* are the previously mentioned "custom" interrupts. NMI* is the 6809 or G.I.M.E./A.C.V.C. Non-Maskable Interrupt Input. The last interrupt on the 2x4 block is the CART* interrupt. This is actually the 6809 or G.I.M.E. IRQ* line that is passed through a PIA inside the CoCo/Dragon. This, the CART* interrupt is the one that should be used for compatibility. The remaining circuitry on Page 3 are fairly standard circuits for MIDI IN, OUT and THROUGH. These go to 5-pin headers. It appears that "Little John" intended for MIDI Cable ends to be soldered to these headers. The redesign will feature 5-pin DIN MIDI connectors. I do see some potential problems with these MIDI IN, OUT and THRU connections on "Little John's" original design. The first problem that I notice is that the MIDI Ground Pins are connected to the same Ground (common or GND) as the computer and MIDI Pack circuitry. This is no good as it violates the MIDI specification and defeats the purpose of the opto-isolator. Thus, the redesign will sever the ground connection of the DIN connectors from the ground connection of the MIDI Interface Pak circuitry. Next, the 330 Ohm (330R) pull-up resistor connected to the output of the opto-isolator should probably be 270R, however, the device should work fine with the 330R resistor. The redesign will have this changed to 270R. The 10K resistor connected to the "BASE" of the opto-isolator darlington-transistor pair should not be needed. I will allow for it in the redesign for testing purposes. The output of the opto-isolator is sent through two schmitt trigger inverters before being applied to the "Receive Data" input of the ACIA. I am drawing the following conclusion in regards to those two inverters: It seems the design was originally intended for use with a Sharp PC-900 or PC-900V digital opto-isolator which has an internal schmitt trigger, the hysteresis of which provides nice, sharp waveform edges. It appears that "Little John" decided, instead, to use a 6N138 opto-isolator, which does not have hysteresis (schmitt triggering) and thus he must have included the two inverters to alleviate this perceived problem. I am relatively certain, however, that these two inverters are unneccessary and thus I will remove them in the redesign. Had I not used two of the inverters in the hex-inverter package for address decoding, I might have left these two inverters in the redesign, however, I decided the savings of one chip was worth eliminating these two inverters. Hopefully, results will be satisfactory. That is about it for the initial analysis of "Little John's" original design. I shall now proceed to design a slightly improved and, hopefully, manufacturable version of "Little John's CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R0-03.09.2009" Hardware M.I.D.I. Interface Pack. This redesign will be titled: "CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R1-03.09.2009".
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Load up the NEW design from the CURRENT folder in the archive and use it to follow this discussion.
Starting with Page 1 of the schematic, I will start the redesign with the Cartridge Program Pak Slot Plug (Edge-Card or Edge-Fingers). This is what will actually plug into the cartridge port on the computer or Multi-Pak Interface (M.P.I.). Next, I will add an edge card socket wired in parallel to the edge-fingers. This is based on "Little John's" Universal Footprint (which appears to have been based on an ancient design of my own that I used in a sound card project) which means that you can fit either a 40-pin card socket or a 40-pin header. This will allow an additional cartridge or other hardware to be plugged directly into the MIDI Interface, thus eliminating the need for a "y-cable" or Multi-Pak Interface. The +5V is filtered with a 220uF Electrolytic Capacitor in parallel with a .1uF Ceramic Disc or Dacron/Polyester/Mylar capacitor. A Power ON L.E.D. indicator is included here, along with an enable/disable jumper. Removing the jumper disables the Power ON L.E.D. should it become a distraction. Next, I'll add in the "CUSTOM" Interrupts, including their jumpers. The jumpers should be REMOVED from all of these if the device is to be used with a CoCo 1 and/or M.P.I. (Multi-Pak Interface) or with ANY of the CoCo Clones and/or compatibles, including the Dragon. In actuality, these jumpers should never be needed and thus should never be installed - they are for experimental purposes only. Removing the jumpers prevents the accidental application of +/-12V to the IRQ* output pin of the ACIA which would fry the ACIA. I have included 680R "failsafe" resistors, but it is likely that they would not prevent a fried ACIA. Lastly, I have included the RESET Switch for convenience. The RESET switch should NEVER be pressed if the device is inserted in a Multi-Pak Interface as you may blow the 74LS367 in the M.P.I. That is about it for Page 1 of the redesign.
Moving on to Page 2: This page is exclusively dedicated to the Baud Rate Generator for the ACIA. Starting at the left, we see the bypass capacitors for the 74LS590 counter. I have used both a 10uF Electrolytic and a .1uF (100nF) Ceramic Disc. This would be important for a ripple counter, however, the LS590 is a synchronous counter and so the Electrolytic could be omitted. I chose to leave it in. There is also a bypass capacitor for the 16MHz oscillator can. I created a dual-footprint for the oscillator can which allows the use of a full or half can oscillator. The 16MHz is fed into the LS590 counter which provides a choice of ten different clocks for the ACIA. For compatibility with existing standard MIDI packs for the CoCo, the 500KHz clock should be selected. Indeed, the higher frequencies will likely exceed the capabilities of any vintage 6850-type ACIA. The LS590 has an output register which is clocked by the same 16MHz that clocks the counter section. The enable pin of the oscillator is connected to system RESET* which prevents it from oscillating when the system is in a reset state. This pin could have been left floating causing the oscillator to always oscillate. It will work either way.
Page 3 is the semi-programmable address decoder. The 74LS133 in conjunction with the two inverters decodes 0xFF6n - the output will go low on any access to the 0xFF6x range. Only 12 of the 13 inputs to the LS133 were needed. The unused input could be connected to Vcc, E or RESET*. It is important to gate the E Clock in at some point and it could have been done here. I chose to connect the input to RESET*. The ACIA actually has an E Clock input which gates it with the E-Clock so it probably does not need to be gated to the address decoder, though, as you'll see, I gated the E-Clock into the next stage. The 74LS138 decodes 1 of 8 sets of even/odd addresses in the 0xFF6n range (it is enabled by the output of the LS133 and the E-Clock).) So, when any address in the 0xFF6n range appears on the address buss during the high time of the E-clock, the LS138 is enabled and decodes A1-A3 into 1-of-8 chip selects. For maximum compatibility, the 0xFF6E-F output should be selected.
Page 4: This is the 6850 ACIA. This should be either a 68B50 or a 63B50 or 63C50 for operation at up to 2MHz CPU Clocks. This should be pretty self-explanatory. The 6850 datasheet can fill in any necessary details.
Page 5: This is a fairly standard MIDI IN circuit. There are two optocouplers here: a 6N138 and a PC-900 - You should use ONLY ONE, not both. R9 is only needed if you use the 6N138. The diode is a 1N4148 or 1N914A.
Page 6: This is a fairly standard MIDI Out circuit.
Page 7: This is the final page and is a fairly standard MIDI Thru circuit. It simply echoes the MIDI In. Well, that's about it for a redesign of "Little John's" original. I am ordering some prototype boards to see if this thing will work. Updated to CC-FlexiMIDI-V1R2-12.29.2019 on December 29, 2019 - This minor update: A Universal 5-Pin DIN component was created and the GND Connection was reconnected to MIDI OUT and MIDI THRU. NO GND connection was made to MIDI IN. This should now create a proper MIDI Interface.
Although this might be considered a "bit of folly", Retro-ATX was conceived with the sole purpose of creating "ATX form factor" versions of various classic and vintage computing and other systems. Such a system might be an Altair 8800 "clone" in an ATX or µATX form factor. Certainly, a system compatible with the Tandy Radio Shack TRS-80 Model II, 12, 16 and 6000 line of computers is planned, as are ATX or µATX versions of the following systems:
- Sinclair QL
- Dragon D64 and D200
- Dragon Alpha
- Dragon Beta
- Tandy Color Computer 3
- Mattel Intellivision "Keyboard Component"
- Aamber Pegasys
- MicroBox ][
- Various Frank Hogg Laboratories Systems, including:
- FHL "K-Buss" backplanes of many sizes and configurations
- FHL Tomcat Series, including:
- FHL TC-9 6809 CPU board
- FHL TC-9 I/O board
- FHL TC-70 68070 CPU board
- FHL TC-70 I/O and all other boards
- GIMIX 6800/6809 Series Motherboards
- GIMIX 6800/6809 Series CPU boards
- GIMIX 6800/6809 Series Peripheral Cards
- SWTPC 6800/6809 Series Motherboards
- SWTPC 6800/6809 Series CPU boards
- SWTPC 6800/6809 Series Peripheral Cards
The above list represents just some of the systems that are planned for reimplementation by Retro-ATX. Any suggestions for other systems and features are welcomed. The MicroBox ][, Aamber Pegasus and Frank Hogg Laboratory systems are a priority at present, although this may change based upon feedback received. Undertaking any one of the above projects is a monumental task, requiring the expenditure of many hours of work and yet we fully intend to complete each and every one of those projects as time and resources allow. Unfortunatly, it is very unlikely that we will be able to complete all of these projects without the assistance and support of the many members of the "Vintage Computing Community". Currently in the design phase is the first such project, termed "The MicroBox ]I[". This is to be an ATX or µATX form-factor version of the "MicroBox 2" (stylized as "MicroBox ]["). Our version retains 100% compatibility with the original whilst including additional features such as High-Density Floppy Diskette Controller (HD-FDC), CAS-before-RAS refresh, optional color palette RAM and an MMU supporting up to 512 megabytes of DRAM.
We are in dire need of donations of any of the following items:
- SCHEMATICS, documentations, Theory of Operations, etcetera of any and all of the above listed equipment
- Any of the above hardware and peripherals that you may no longer have need of, functional or not
- Your expertise, experience, opinions, engineering and other skills, etcetera
Any items of interest, from the above list(s) or otherwise may be delivered to:
The Little Engineers Project/RetroATX.com
C/O Robert Turner
69 Lilly Lane
Pell City, AL 35125
Your continued encouragement and support are greatly appreciated. Other methods of potential support are contained further into this document. Thank You and God Bless.
The Little Engineers is a project began in 2011 by Robert Allen Turner (hereafter, I, Me, My, Author, or "The R.A.T."), for the benefit of foster children and their families (foster and biological). The original intent was simply to provide a means, in the form of donated cameras, of creating videos with the foster families such that the biological parents did not completely miss out on their children growing up. Providing simple to construct kits (electronics, arts, crafts, etcetera) seemed a logical choice as subject matter for such videos and these types of activities have the benefit of being educational. It is thus that those types of projects are primarily what I attempt to develop for use in such videos. This is a difficult, time consuming and expensive undertaking. Each case must be handled on an individual basis and any such videos and communications must be scrutinized and approved on a per case basis by the case workers, et alia in charge. Although this makes such an undertaking extremely difficult, it is a necessity in order to protect the children. Some are, after all, being protected from abusive family members and so there has to be a very strict set of protocols in place. This has prevented me from fully launching The Little Engineers over the past eight years, but I remain fully committed to the project with the intent of seeing it through to a fully operational entity.
"Learning is more than just what goes on in a school classroom nine months out of a year. Learning covers all the knowledge and understanding we gain through reading or observing or experiencing. Learning is discovery; learning occurs everywhere. All of us are learning all the time. - Laran Stardrake"
Again, your continued encouragement and support are greatly appreciated. Other methods of potential support are contained further into this document. Thank You and God Bless.
The logos, names and other material relating to The Little Engineers, TheLittleEngineers.org, RoboCircuits, RoboCircuits.org, Tin Cans And Duct Tape, TinCansAndDuctTape.com, TCADT, TCADT.com, Canned Logic, CannedLogic.com, RetroATX, RetroATX.com, Retro-ATX, Retro-ATX.com, Zombie Software Systems, Binary Systems, GIMEchip and GIMEchip.com are the sole property of Robert Allen Turner with All Rights Reserved. The rights to the GIMEchip.com domain and products were acquired by the author on 25 December 2018 from my brother and his son, the former owners/operators of GIMEchip.com. Please note that the author is unable to answer any inquiries, including those of support or otherwise, in relation to GIMEchip.com prior to his acquisition of same on 25 December 2018. This is primarily because the author posseses no knowlege of the site operation prior to that time. Although I have been provided with a large number of files that were originally contained on the website, it is unlikely that I will resurrect GIMEchip.com other than perhaps as a page on one of my other websites. These files are mostly HTML page files and C.A.D. files of the products designed and developed by my nephew and his father, and very little else. As part of the acquisition agreement, all products previously produced by GIMEchip.com are to be released under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License, as time and resources permit. Although many of these projects are somewhat interesting, none of them seem particularly useful or revolutionary.
DISCLAIMER:
Please Read Carefully.
This information is provided for informational purposes only. Any attempt to modify your equipment (including, but not limited to kit assembly) without the proper skills to do so may void your equipment. Any attempt to modify your equipment without unplugging it first may void you. This Information is provided "as-is" with no guarantee of fitness for any purpose, either explicit or implied. We disclaim any and all responsibility for losses incurred through the use of this information. Included with this information may be one or more C.A.D. Libraries, such as for E.A.G.L.E., KiCAD, etcetera. Any such C.A.D. libraries, except as may be noted are released under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License. You may use these libraries in your own projects, however, please take note that we CANNOT guarantee the accuracy of the components (nor any part of these libraries and/or information). We make NO guarantees that the components, footprints or schematic symbols contained in these libraries are flawless, and we make no promises of fitness for production, prototyping or any other purpose. These libraries and/or information are provided for informational purposes only, and are used at your own discretion. By downloading these libraries and/or information, you agree that we cannot be held responsible for faulty PCBs (Printed Circuit Boards). You should always check the footprints with a 1:1 printout. Neither Robert Allen Turner, The Little Engineers, TheLittleEngineers.org, Tin Cans And Duct Tape, TinCansAndDuctTape.com, TCADT, TCADT.com, Canned Logic, CannedLogic.com, RetroATX, RetroATX.com, Retro-ATX, Retro-ATX.com, RoboCircuits, RoboCircuits.org, Zombie Software Systems, Binary Systems, GIMEchip, GIMEchip.com, nor anyone affiliated with same shall be held responsible for any outcome resulting from the usage of these files and/or information. Should any errors be found, please contact us at one of the provided email addresses and we will attempt to repair them. Unless otherwise noted, content of this library and other information is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License, in memory of my Father, Robert Embry Turner, 1945-2019 - I LOVE AND MISS YOU DAD! Rest In Peace. By using this information, you are deemed to have accepted these terms and conditions of use, and you agree NOT to sue us.
CLARIFICATION:
The disclaimer states as plainly as possible that if you decide to make use of any of the information contained within this document and/or any of the accompanying files that you do so at your own risk. Designing products for the Little Engineers Project and/or affiliates is not motivated by any desire of profits. As this is a not for profit venture, obviously we can't afford not to disclaim the use of this information. Thank You for your understanding and acceptance of these terms of use.
Who Am I?
Hint: I'm Not Jackie Chan.
I Did Enjoy That Film Immensely.
The headline of this paragraph is merely an attempt at humor while allowing me the opportunity to mention a film that my son and I quite thoroughly enjoyed when it was released during his childhood in 1998, leading to his eventual love of "The Jackie Chan Adventures" animated series, which would be released some two years later in 2000. Most of the world seemed to be concerned with the overhyped "Y2K Bug" and we were just watching Jackie Chan and enjoying our lives while playing "Cosmic Ambush" and "The Crystal City" on our 512K CoCo 3. The following text serves as a general Introduction to Robert "The R.A.T." Allen Turner, Zombie Software Systems, Binary Systems, The Little Engineers, TheLittleEngineers.org, Tin Cans And Duct Tape, TinCansAndDuctTape.com, TCADT, TCADT.com, Canned Logic, CannedLogic.com, RetroATX, RetroATX.com, Retro-ATX, Retro-ATX.com, RoboCircuits, RoboCircuits.org, GIMEchip and GIMEchip.com. Please note that the GIMEchip.com domain was acquired by Robert "The R.A.T." Allen Turner on December 25, 2018 from the prior owners, who happen to be his brother (J.R. a.k.a. John Robert a.k.a. "Big John") and nephew (J.E. a.k.a. John Eric a.k.a. "Little John"). As such, "The R.A.T." is unable to answer any inquiries regarding any products or services of GIMEchip.com prior to that date simply because I have no knowledge of the site. I have attempted to utilize the Internet Archive WayBack Machine to have a look at the site at various stages of existence, but there seems to be very little there as of the date of this writing (April 10, 2019). "The R.A.T." has also acquired the rights to all products previously produced by GIMEchip.com and its previous owners. As part of the acquisition agreement, all of those products will be released as open source, under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License, as time and resources permit. Note that some of these products were previously released by my brother under an Open Source Hardware License and all of those releases remain available under that license. Making certain that any given product meets all of the requirements necessary for the OSHWA license is a time consuming task when preparing older archives for release and so I have decided to utilize a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License for any releases prepared by myself. This should allow you to utilize the releases in almost any desired manner, including commercial, within the terms of the license.
I have started writing this introduction numerous times only to get sidetracked and derailed. Hopefully, I will be able to properly introduce myself this time. I will begin at the acquisition of my first personal computer, a Sinclair ZX81 Issue 3, produced by Timex and sold as the TS1000 (Timex Sinclair 1000 or T/S1000). This would be March 30, 1982 - My fourteenth birthday. My parents presented me with a Timex Sinclair 1000 (TS1000) computer, after much begging and pleading. The TS1000 is a ZX81 with a few differences: 2K of RAM, an [ENTER] key instead of [NEW LINE] or [N/L] and Timex branding. I had wanted a computer for so long, and Sir Clive Sinclair succeeded in making it affordable. Timex made it even more affordable as the TS1000 was placed on sale for $59.99 at the local "Big B" drug store, at the time, a division of Brunos Corporation (Food World, Food Fair, Consumer Warehouse, etcetera). I was ecstatic - I finally had a computer, and as limited as it was, I still mamaged to learn a great deal from that machine. This experience with the ZX81 (T/S1000) led to the creation of Zombie Software Systems, my first computer venture. When Timex announced the Timex Sinclair 2068 (TS2068) after canceling the TS2000 (a 48K Spectrum clone), I knew that I wanted it to be my next computer and my parents agreed to buy it for me for Christmas of 1983. Then, it happened: I walked into the local franchised Radio Shack store, operated at the time by Cisco Auto Parts, and there, on display right next to the entrance, was the newly introduced Color Computer 2 with 16K of RAM and Extended Color BASIC. It took mere moments for me to fall in love with that machine and I asked my parents for the Color Computer 2 instead of the TS2068. They placed it on lay-a-way as Christmas approached. It was eventually paid off and sat under the Christmas tree until Christmas Evening of 1983. They allowed me to open it on Christmas Evening and I was up all night working through the programs in the manuals. It was wonderful. This led to the creation of Binary Systems, my second computer venture. Eventually, I came across an advertisement in Radio-Electronics from a company by the name of Unicorn Electronics (a company that remains in business until this very day). They had a set of 4164 Dynamic RAM chips with a 150nS access time for, I think $9.95 (although I seem to remember $1.50 each, so perhaps it was $1.50 per chip or 8/$9.95). The chips were used but tested pulls. I ordered them, along with a bag of keyboard switches (intended to be used for building a better keyboard for my TS1000 and adding four function keys to the CoCo 2). When they arrived, I opened the case of my Color Computer 2, installed the 64K chips, soldered in the W1 jumper and voila - I had a 64K ECB Color Computer 2. Although other systems of the time had better graphics and sound, the Color Computer line of systems by Radio Shack, a division of Tandy Corporation, would become (and remain) my favorite computers of all time. In fact, I still use them to this very day, having kept one Color Computer 3 (CoCo 3) when I passed my vintage computing collection to my brother, J.R. (John Robert) who then passed it on to his son, "Little John" (John Eric), but I will get to that after a brief reminiscence of ZSS and BS, as follows:
Zombie Software Systems was formed on my fourteenth birthday, 30 March 1982, as a sole proprietorship supporting the Timex and Sinclair computer systems.
- Sinclair ZX80
- Sinclair ZX81
- Timex Sinclair 1000
- Timex Sinclair 1500
- The PC-8300 "Your Computer"
- Sinclair Spectrum (All Versions)
- Timex Sinclair 2068
- Sinclair QL
By 1991, and in conjunction with Binary Systems, support had been added for machines from Mattel, Atari, Tomy, Texas Instruments, Tandy Radio Shack, Commodore and many others.
Binary Systems was formed on 23 December 1983, as a sole proprietorship supporting the Tandy Radio Shack computer systems.
- TRS-80 Color Computer (CoCo 1)
- Tandy Data Products TDP-100
- TRS-80 Color Computer 2 (CoCo 2)
- Dragon Data Dragon 32
- Tano Dragon 64
- TRS-80 Model I
- TRS-80 Model III
- TRS-80 Model IV
- TRS-80 Model 4/4P
- Tandy Color Computer 3
By 1991, and in conjunction with Zombie Software Systems, support had been added for machines from Mattel, Atari, Tomy, Texas Instruments, Sinclair, Commodore, Amstrad, Kaypro and many others. The operation of Zombie Software Systems and Binary Systems was a labor of love more than anything else, as it never made a profit, but it was fun and remains among the best memories of my youth and early adulthood and I am thankful that the stroke (see below) did not take these memories from me.
I continued to support these vintage machines until 2007 when I suffered a stroke. At that point, I passed operations on to my son, John (he and his cousin share both the same name and same date of birth through a very odd coincidence). My son eventually made a mess of things and finally moved on to other hobbies. A side effect of the stroke was that I lost almost all interest in computers and electronics, vintage and otherwise. It was thus that I presented my entire collection of vintage computers and electronics to my brother J.R. (John Robert or "Big John"). He took the opportunity to bond with his son, J.E. (John Eric or "Little John"). "Little John" was facing a number of health issues, but he jumped in with both feet, teaching himself all about the Color Computer and other systems. He began to develop a plethora of hardware projects for the Color Computer and other vintage systems. The earliest of his designs were rubbish due to his lack of skill, but he appears to have learned rather quickly, producing some amazing designs. I have taken it upon myself to "redo" his earliest works, hopefully producing manufacturable products from them. The first of his designs to receive the "redesign" treatment from me is the "FlexiMIDI", "FlexiROM" and "FlexiBuffer" projects. Those three designs were excellent in concept, but rubbish in practice due to his lack of circuit design skills at the time that he developed them. They are certainly worth the time and effort to redesign. He would eventually become disillusioned and abandon the hobby altogether. This was, in no small part, due to hackers repeatedly taking down his website: GIMEchip.com. They (the unknown hackers) eventually compromised his eBay and PayPal accounts, rendering them completely useless. That was the straw that broke the camels back, so to speak. He ("Little John") gave up and moved to Tennessee. He left everything with his father, my brother, and asked that his father release all of his works as open source. J.R. made several valiant efforts to honor that request, but never fully succeeded in releasing all of the works of "Little John". Fast Forward almost a decade...
November of 2018, my father, Robert Embry Turner fell ill and was hospitalized. As Christmas approached, he remained in the hospital. Many family members visited and it came to pass that I reconnected with J.R. and "Little John". They asked me if I would like to have my old vintage computing collection back. At first, I was hesitant and uninterested. As my fathers condition worsened, I began to remember how hard my father worked to buy me those first computers. Tons of memories, good and bad, began to flood my mind. I decided to accept their offer. In addition to the hardware and software, they presented me with the GIMEchip.com domain name. This became my Christmas present from my brother and his son. "Little John" asked that I finish what his father started: the release of all of "Little John's" work as open source. I reluctantly agreed, though I was unsure if I could ever manage the time and effort to do so. I honestly was not prepared to take on such a monumental task. Then, tragedy struck.
On the day of January 4, 2019, my father died as I held his hand in that hospital room. His death had quite a profound effect on me. I almost lost my job while trying to come to terms with never being able to speak to my father again. I eventually began to recover, to an extent, but I began to think of everything and everyone that I had lost over the years. For one thing, my own son, also named John Eric Turner, and I are estranged. We "speak" online, but I have not seen him in a very long time*. He was unable to be at the hospital and did not get to say goodbye to my father before he died. As mentioned, my son and his cousin are both named John Eric Turner, and there is a story behind it, however, for the moment, suffice it to say that they both were named In Memory of Jon-Erik Hexum, who died on the set of "Cover Up" on Friday, October 12, 1984. As my mind wandered, I thought of my mother in law, Sarah Ann Channell, who passed away on January 12, 2003 and my father in law, Frank Leon Channell, who passed away on August 23, 2003. Even though I was divorced from their daughter, they were still family and their deaths were very painful to me and my son. Indeed, their deaths affected my son in such a way that he never fully recovered and that is partially what eventually led to our falling out in 2007 or 2008 and the resulting estrangement. I am sure that my addled state after that stroke also played a hand in the troubles between my son and I because I became very difficult to be around. Thinking about Sarah and Frank caused me to really begin missing my son and, even more, my father. I then thought about my best friend from high school, David Ray Poe, who died on May 20, 2013. Eight days prior to his death, he had sent me an email that I did not see until after he died. That email was a single sentence: "Did you die?". You can perhaps imagine the effect that reading the message had on me. In reality, he would often send a message like that when he had not heard from me in a while. Another close friend from high school, Steve Allen Cox, died on September 6, 2016. As all of the thoughts of everything and everyone that I had lost flooded my mind, I began to spiral and was in peril of losing myself. I needed a distraction, something to keep my mind occupied and perhaps aid in my coming to terms with the death of my father. I found that distraction in the form of that vintage computing collection and the projects that "Little John" had created. It is for that reason alone that you are now reading this and seeing those products, which I have decided to release under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License. What this means is that you, or anyone else for that matter, may use the products in almost any way that you may desire, even commercially. I am doing all of this to honor the memory of my father, Robert Embry Turner, and everyone else that I have lost. I truly hope that these products provide much enjoyment to all who discover them. I should point out that I have absolutely no desire to revive the GIMEchip.com website, primarily because I do not have all of the files necessary to recreate GIMEchip.com. It is very likely that I will stumble across some or all of the GIMEchip.com website files as I begin to inventory everything that was included with my 2018 Christmas gift from "Big and Little John". I also DO NOT wish to invoke the ire of those hackers who targeted my nephew and destroyed his website, eBay and PayPal accounts. I will very likely, however, forward the GIMEchip.com domain to a page on my http://www.TheLittleEngineers.org/ website or perhaps I will forward it to the GitHub page - I am currently undecided.
So, there you have it - most of what I wanted to say about how I came to posses all of the works of my nephew and his father, as well as their domain name, GIMEchip.com. In addition to releasing all of their products under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License, I will also be releasing all of the Zombie Software Systems and Binary Systems products under identical licensing terms.
Is ALL of this really FREE?
YES!
Everything contained in the GitHub Repositories for these projects is free to use, even commercially, in accordance with the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)License. The Amazon Kindle and Paperback Publications, however, are not licensed for redistribution and are only available to our Patrons as a free ".PDF" or for purchase from Amazon. These particular publications help to generate revenue that is used for further developmental efforts. It is not necessary to purchase these publications in order to make use of the GitHub Repositories, however, such purchases provide the funds necessary for the development of future products. The repositories contain all necessary information needed to construct, assemble and use the products described therein. If you would like to support our continued developmental efforts, the remaining paragraphs detail several methods that may be used to offer support of our work.
As stated, I have absolutely no intention of charging any fees whatsoever in regards to the use of these products. Anyone who so desires may manufacture and sell any of these products, though they must state specifically that they will be providing any and all support as may be required. However, If you would care to support my work, donations are happily accepted, whether they be in the form of funds, vintage computing equipment, tools, components, etcetera. I am always in need of such items. I specifically need PAL versions of the TRS80 Color Computer series (1,2 and 3) as well as NTSC/PAL Dragon D32, D64, D200, etcetera for developmental purposes. Monetary donations help to support the hosting needs of http://www.TheLittleEngineers.org/ as well as the development and manufacture of the prototype Printed Circuit Boards.
Perhaps the easiest and most beneficial method of supporting The Little Engineers (monetarily) would be by becoming a Patron on Patreon. The following are among the benefits offered to Patrons. Patrons will receive several exclusive benefits, such as:
- FREE copies of ANY of our detailed Theory of Operation and Assembly e-books relating to our projects.
- Random giveaways of bare Printed Circuit Boards (PCB's) developed by The Little Engineers.
- Random giveaways of Kits developed by The Little Engineers.
- Random giveaways of assembled projects developed by The Little Engineers.
- The opportunity to purchase various bare Printed Circuit Boards (PCB's) developed by The Little Engineers at discounts of up to 50% off.
- The opportunity to purchase various Kits developed by The Little Engineers at discounts of up to 50% off.
- The opportunity to purchase various assembled projects developed by The Little Engineers at discounts of up to 50% off.
We will also be publishing detailed Theory of Operation and assembly manuals for all of our open source products in e-book and paperback formats. Purchases of these e-books and/or paperbacks helps to support The Little Engineers and our continued developmental efforts. Donations may also be made in almost any variety of digital currency, including, but not limited to, the following:
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bc1q7m3vmafshmkhz29ec8tayx3704qaa8xxhhadf5 - Ethereum (ETH), Ethereum Classic (ETC), Callisto (CLO) or any ETH, ETC or CLO based tokens:
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Should you wish to use digital currency, I highly recommend checking out this referral link: Digital Currency. Signing up from that link also helps The Little Engineers in the long run. If you would like to make a donation by some other means, feel free to contact me by e-mail or FaceBook Messenger. Please note, however, that donations are completely optional, but they do help to further product development. All products developed by The Little Engineers are completely free to use under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License, even for commercial purposes.
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Github.
Thank You for your time. I hope that you enjoy using these products as much as I enjoyed developing them (or debugging them in the case of the designs produced by my nephew and his father). - Robert "The R.A.T." Allen Turner
*You may have noticed the asterisk (*) in the preceding text in reference to my not having seen my son for quite some time. Events to occur the week of August 5, 2019 would rectify that situation but at no small cost to me. Suffice it to say that my health took a bit of a downward turn resulting from no less than nine sets of symptoms/conditions which culminated in open heart surgery eight weeks ago (as of December 7, 2019). My son drove for many hours and stayed with me up until the day of the surgery at which time he had to return to work. Below, I have listed my discharge diagnosis which lists all nine of these in roughly the order of their occurence, keeping in mind that this all happened to me between August 2019 and November 2019.
Discharge Diagnosis:
- CHF:Congestive Heart Failure
- RG:Reflux Gastritis including a near fatal infection resulting in colitis
- CDD:C5/C6 Degenerative Disease
- HTN:Hypertension
- HLD:Hyperlipidemia
- HM:Hypomagnasemia
- HC:Hypocalcemia
- CAD:Coronary Artery Disease
- ABLA:Acute Blood Loss Anemia
Now, with that being said, I am doing just fine and have recovered nicely. However, our family was struck with yet more bad news.
Cousin William Lee
Almost two weeks into the the "New Year of 2020", on the date of January 12, 2020, the family received even more bad news. My cousin William, the son of my mothers sister, was diagnosed with blood cancer, specifically multiple myeloma. His condition is terminal, although the physicians are optimistic that, with treatment, He can expect somewhere between five and ten years. This was yet another crushing blow to the family.
I suppose that my life has reached a point to where I dread the coming of each new day for the news that it may bring. However, I shall endevor to persevere whilst immersing myself into the day to day operations of "Retro-ATX" and "The Little Engineers Project". I hereby extend my gratitude to one and all for your continued support and encouragement. May God Bless You and Yours. I remain sincerely yours, Robert "The R.A.T." Turner.