When you make the panel for the front, look at an option for us who may want to 
install an SMB front panel board 

Thanks


~~ _/) ~~~~ _/) ~~~~ _/) ~~~~ _/) ~~
Sent from my Phone


> On Jun 7, 2014, at 3:07 PM, Fabio Battaglia <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> This is great!
> I'll definitely be interested in the chassis, multiple fpmini boards and if 
> someone does a group buy of paddles, those too.
> 
> Fabio
> 
>> On Jun 7, 2014 6:53 AM, "Don Caprio" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Josh, Rich, and S-100 gang,
>> 
>> The Imsai front panel S-100 (aka fp-mini) was stalled for quite some time. 
>> Family, work and
>> remodel project left no spare time. 
>> 
>> Looks like we have new life on the project. Many, many thanks to Josh who 
>> got one of prototype
>> boards and worked out the final bugs. Looks like The next prototype should 
>> be our last before
>> production run.
>> 
>> This board is a bit pricey due to the cost of the mini paddle switches. A 
>> completed set of paddle
>> switches goes for ~ $125.00. My source for the toggles left the company so 
>> I'm finding a new 
>> contact and pricing.
>> 
>> The FP-Mini and Josh's new 8080 board is going to make a fantastic, two 
>> board complete system.
>> 
>> I'm working with a local sheet metal fabricator on a mini-chassis based 
>> around the fp-mini and the
>> S-100 8 slot mother board. I needed a chassis design for the next board 
>> layout. We'll need to move
>> switches around and provide mounting holes on the PCB. Anyone who has ideas 
>> or experience 
>> creating a photo mask for the Plexiglas section drop me a line. It may be as 
>> simple as printing a 
>> transparency on a laser printer.
>>  
>> Once I get a final price on the chassis I'll send out a notice to see who's
>> interested. The more we order the cheaper they are. I've mocked up a 
>> prototype of the chassis
>> for your review and comments.
>> 
>> Thanks.
>> 
>> <mini-fp-chassis-small.jpg>
>> 
>> <mini-fp-chassis-top-small.jpg>
>> 
>> 
>>> On 06/ 6/14 07:55 AM, Crusty OMO wrote:
>>> Thanks John,
>>> 
>>> Andrew, 
>>> 
>>> That would be great if you could do a fill on the area around the 
>>> regulator, or perhaps walk me through it?  The other error about pads being 
>>> next to each other doesn't matter, I just over rule the computer's 
>>> objection.  
>>> 
>>> Cheers,
>>> Josh
>>> 
>>> 
>>> From: [email protected]
>>> To: [email protected]
>>> Subject: RE: [N8VEM-S100:3991] ALTAIR/IMSAI 8080 CPU replacement board
>>> Date: Thu, 5 Jun 2014 21:26:15 -0700
>>> 
>>> Josh, Andrew may be able to brush it up. He is a marvel at that these things
>>> 
>>> John
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On 
>>> Behalf Of Crusty OMO
>>> Sent: Thursday, June 5, 2014 8:29 PM
>>> To: [email protected]
>>> Subject: RE: [N8VEM-S100:3990] ALTAIR/IMSAI 8080 CPU replacement board
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Hi John,
>>> 
>>> I uploaded the board, schematic(s), gerber files and firmware file to the 
>>> Wiki site.
>>> Look in 
>>> Board Information, S-100 boards, S-100 ALTAIR-IMSAI 8080 CPU Board
>>> 
>>> The DRC produces 2 errors which I don't know how to suppress.  
>>> 1 error is a drill pad next to a mounting pad for the SD card,  I oversized 
>>> the pads and they overlap.  Neither pad is an active pin or conductor, the 
>>> drill is just a pilot hole to position the SD card socket, the pad is just 
>>> to solder the body of the socket.
>>> The other error(s) are from a bunch of traces I dumped around the voltage 
>>> regulator to act as some extra heat sink.  I should really do a "fill" in 
>>> that area, but I don't know how and it's just easier for me to zig zag some 
>>> wide traces to do the job.  I ignore the errors, the gerber files look good.
>>> 
>>> The firmware file is just a modification of my 8080 monitor program.  It's 
>>> been modified to use the 8250 UART's, and it also has the start of the 
>>> SPI/SD card interface.  I only got as far as receiving the 0x01 status byte 
>>> from the SD card, which means it initialized successfully and I am able to 
>>> talk to it.  In the weeks to come, I'll return to working on the firmware 
>>> to get it to boot CP/M from the SD card.  But first, I must make some 
>>> progress with my ELF projects.
>>> 
>>> Cheers,
>>> Josh Bensadon
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> From: [email protected]
>>> To: [email protected]
>>> Subject: RE: [N8VEM-S100:3982] ALTAIR/IMSAI 8080 CPU replacement board
>>> Date: Thu, 5 Jun 2014 09:20:20 -0700
>>> 
>>> Josh, great work – you must have a lot of time on your hands!
>>> 
>>> Could you put me down for 2 boards.
>>> 
>>> Also could you point me to the most current schematic/board diagram
>>> 
>>> Thanks
>>> 
>>> John
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On 
>>> Behalf Of Crusty OMO
>>> Sent: Wednesday, June 4, 2014 7:20 PM
>>> To: [email protected]
>>> Subject: RE: [N8VEM-S100:3964] ALTAIR/IMSAI 8080 CPU replacement board
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Hi Guys,
>>> 
>>> Well I'm finally done laying out this board.  The autorouter only produced 
>>> swiss cheese with over 900 via's.  It looked terrible!
>>> Anyway, I scrapped everything the autorouter did initially, and proceeded 
>>> to layout the traces manually.  Once I got what I thought was all the hard 
>>> parts done, I let the autorouter have another go at it.  Again it did not 
>>> work out so well and it was unable to complete the board, so                
>>>          I proceeded to undo it's changes and/or improve it's routing 
>>> manually.  I squeezed those traces in there tight, any tighter and they'll 
>>> be popping off the board.  Anyway, I'm working on the silkscreen layer and 
>>> ready to do a run.
>>> Here's a picture of the board layout....
>>> You can see the serial port connections on the top left, SD card to the 
>>> right of the 27C256 EPROM, parallel ports next to that and the ALTAIR and 
>>> IMSAI front panel connectors.  There are also a few jumpers around the 
>>> board to configure for CPU or Peripheral board only and ALTAIR/IMSAI mode.  
>>> Firmware for the board will be my next project, but I have to make 
>>> preparations for VCF-MW my priority.  Dave Ruske and I will be doing a 
>>> COSMAC 1802 exhibit there in September.  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> <mime-attachment.jpg>
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Cheers,
>>> Josh Bensadon
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> From: [email protected]
>>> To: [email protected]
>>> Subject: RE: [N8VEM-S100:3711] ALTAIR/IMSAI 8080 CPU replacement board
>>> Date: Sun, 18 May 2014 00:57:20 +0000
>>> 
>>> Hi Guys,
>>> 
>>> Well, this project has just reached a milestone.  The hardware is tested 
>>> and working.  I had some rewiring to do to make it work for the ALTAIR, I 
>>> thought the ALTAIR and IMSAI front panels were (near) identical, but they 
>>> are not.
>>> There are some jumpers on the board to configure between ALTAIR and IMSAI.
>>> 
>>> Here's a picture of my debugging and testing setup.  The board is being 
>>> tested in the ALTAIR.
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> <mime-attachment.jpg>
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Now entering Phase 2... building a PCB.
>>> 
>>> Cheers,
>>> Josh Bensadon
>>> 
>>> From: [email protected]
>>> To: [email protected]
>>> Subject: RE: [N8VEM-S100:3666] ALTAIR/IMSAI 8080 CPU replacement board
>>> Date: Tue, 13 May 2014 13:56:05 -0700
>>> 
>>> Very nice Josh!
>>> 
>>> John
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On 
>>> Behalf Of Crusty OMO
>>> Sent: Tuesday, May 13, 2014 1:19 PM
>>> To: [email protected]
>>> Subject: RE: [N8VEM-S100:3664] ALTAIR/IMSAI 8080 CPU replacement board
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
>>> Hi Group,
>>>  
>>> Well, I'm cooking up this board at the moment.  I have all the hardware 
>>> figured out to run like the original CPU boards.
>>> I need to do a little more testing of the hardware, then I'll proceed to 
>>> building the boards.  
>>> The Memory, I/O, UARTs and SPI                                   interface 
>>> to the SD card appear to all be working.
>>> 8K chunks of memory can become either ROM, RAM or mapped off the board.
>>>  
>>> CPU: 8080A
>>> UARTS: 2x 8250
>>> RAM: 2x 32K
>>> ROM: 32K
>>> I/O: 8 input, 6 output pins
>>> SPI to SD Card interface
>>> ALTAIR & IMSAI Front Panel Connectors.
>>>  
>>> Where ROM is selected in a block it overlaps the RAM on reads, but writes 
>>> go through to RAM.
>>> The ROM can then be disabled and reads will come from the RAM at that 
>>> location.
>>> The firmware is copying itself to RAM then switching off the ROM.
>>> The CPU can be deselected with jumpers and the board will work as RAM/ROM 
>>> and I/O for another CPU on the bus.
>>>  
>>> Pictures attached.  Yellow-Data, Brown-Address, Blue-I/O, 
>>> Green-Control/Status & everything else.
>>>  
>>> Regards,
>>> Josh Bensadon
>>>  
>>> 
>>>  
>>> 
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>> 
>> -- 
>> Don Caprio
>> [email protected]
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