New Personality Board for the A800

[santosp]

Of course we must not forget and some errors who did the Atari on its service manuals. I found one between others on service manual on Atari 800.

 

Below follows the corrected text by me.

 

4.3.3.1 Bidirectional Data Buffer

The Bidirectional Data Buffers (Z105 and Z106) are 74LS243 quad transceivers, commonly referred to as tristate buffers. Tristate

refers to the three states that can occur in the device.

 

The first state, with pin 1 and pin 13 both staying high, allows data to flow through the data buffer in the direction of the CPU.

 

The second state, with pin 1 and pin 13 both staying low, allows data to flow through the data buffer in the direction of the POKEY chip, the PIA chip and the Personality pcb.

 

The third state, pin 1 going high and pin 13 staying low, creates a high impedance condition in the data buffers and allows other devices to transmit data on the Data Bus lines. This high impedance state also isolates the CPU and the RAM pcbs from noise generated from a device using the Data Bus lines.

[reifsnyderb]

8 minutes ago, santosp said:

Of course we must not forget and some errors who did the Atari on its service manuals. I found one between others on service manual on Atari 800.

 

Below follows the corrected text by me.

 

4.3.3.1 Bidirectional Data Buffer

The Bidirectional Data Buffers (Z105 and Z106) are 74LS243 quad transceivers, commonly referred to as tristate buffers. Tristate

refers to the three states that can occur in the device.

 

The first state, with pin 1 and pin 13 both staying high, allows data to flow through the data buffer in the direction of the CPU.

 

The second state, with pin 1 and pin 13 both staying low, allows data to flow through the data buffer in the direction of the POKEY chip, the PIA chip and the Personality pcb.

 

The third state, pin 1 going high and pin 13 staying low, creates a high impedance condition in the data buffers and allows other devices to transmit data on the Data Bus lines. This high impedance state also isolates the CPU and the RAM pcbs from noise generated from a device using the Data Bus lines.

Good catch.  I never read the text.  lol

[+Larry]

I'm aware that MyIDE-II is not compatible with the 800, but is the original MyIDE+Flash compatible (or could it be)?  The MyIDE boot menu comes up, but the then it goes to a black screen when a selection is made.  But there is no rom to support it.  It also doesn't fit due to the extra height, but that is an old problem.

[Sleepy]

On 7/10/2022 at 12:36 PM, santosp said:

Q. Can I bought one?

 

A. I have only some few pcb's here available. If we come to an agree between us I can assemble one for you.

Why not more from that? Because with the other beast (Incognito) out there I am sure that not many interestsed on this.

If there was to be a new lot, I would consider myself lucky to get one. 🙂

 

I like that nothing needs to be modded on the 800.

[Dinadan67]

I got my board from Panos on Saturday, it is very impressive! The installation took under five minutes, my 800 has 52+496KB now, plus eight switchable OS versions. Yesterday i managed to put three 16MB partitions on a CF card and installed MyDOS 4.53 on one partition. The computer boots very fast from the CF card. The incognito board does much more, but you have to modify the machine. I have a incognito board in my drawer for months, but i hesitated to do all the soldering and drilling to a pristine machine of this age.

[Beeblebrox]

For the incognito install you can do it with no modifications or drilling needed to the casing or motherboard.  (Eg if you don't do any atr swap button). Then it is totally reversable. The benefits of incognito for me in being able to use your 800 fully for more memory demanding games/demos and run most things from the Loader (car and rom the acceptions). 

 

Even if you do the atr led light emitter button mod it is just one 3mm hole in the power board,  a cut trace and tiny mods to the light emitter plastic widget. Plus a lil glue to stick the tiny microswitch on the board. The rest is wiring,  some replacement passive components. Again all reversable. I've never seen the point in doing a separate atr button,  drill a hole in the case,  etc.  The light emitter mod is descreet and looks and works very well. 

 

I use my incognito's 800 regularly and love having many demos games,  images, and music that load incredibly fast off the compact flash based PBI hdd. Watching the Rewind demo running on an 800 is particularly amazing. 

 

See my sig for the incognito install blog guide I did which links to and compliments FJC's incognito install vids. 

Edited September 19, 2022 by Beeblebrox

[Mark2008]

12 hours ago, Dinadan67 said:

I got my board from Panos on Saturday, it is very impressive! The installation took under five minutes, my 800 has 52+496KB now, plus eight switchable OS versions. Yesterday i managed to put three 16MB partitions on a CF card and installed MyDOS 4.53 on one partition. The computer boots very fast from the CF card. The incognito board does much more, but you have to modify the machine. I have a incognito board in my drawer for months, but i hesitated to do all the soldering and drilling to a pristine machine of this age.

Years ago, I attempted to install an incognito. 

 

And I'm infamously bad at electronics.  In fact, just the other day, this should be hilarious - but unfortunately it isn't a joke to some folks here - so I should put up a disclaimer, before I finish this story. I'll do that now.

 

Warning - this post contains violence to Atari - it may not be suitable for all viewers.

 

OK - this should be hilarious but someone sold me a SIO device not important which one - a dealer, a big dealer - not Brewing Academy, a different one.  I plugged this thing in, and all of sudden I was getting a real washed out look on the atari. So I quickly react by turning off the Atari -and to my surprise, the screen still had a washed out look - instead of, you know, being off, like normally you turn off the atari and the screen goes blank.  So then I unplug the Atari.  No change.  Screen still showing a washed out look.  At this point, I'm thinking maybe the retrotink is ghosting an image on the screen?  But then I type on the keyboard, and...the Atari is still running.  Now unplugged.

WOW - turns out that my Atari was being powered by this new device -  through the SIO port. I didn't even know that was possible - this is my luck.

 

anyway that's a completely unrelated story.

 

Back to the incognito story, back in 2013, I bought around when it first came out.  Full of hope.  Tried to install it myself.  Complete failure, that takes a little soldering skill...

 

Now flash forward to 2022, I have managed to do a PBI 5v mode, an s-video mod and a U1MB install - some minor soldering jobs are coming into success....yeah, but do I dare install an incognito?  Nah....enough Atari's have suffered.

 

having a solderless device to install, is always a benefit.   It's amazing how far things have come in this community.

 

 

 

 

 

[flashjazzcat]

11 hours ago, Beeblebrox said:

Even if you do the atr led light emitter button mod it is just one 3mm hole in the power board,

I've stopped even doing that. The wire can run round the edge of the board. So the ATR swap button and HDD LED are more unintrusive than ever.

Edited September 19, 2022 by flashjazzcat

[adam242]

2 hours ago, flashjazzcat said:

I've stopped even doing that. The wire can run round the edge of the board. So the ATR swap button and HDD LED are more unintrusive than ever.

 

I liked the ATR swap button you wired to the light switch in the wall downstairs... damned if I can find that video now.

[+x=usr(1536)]

24 minutes ago, adam242 said:

I liked the ATR swap button you wired to the light switch in the wall downstairs... damned if I can find that video now.

 

I love that video.  It sums up certain things that are, let's say, unique about this hobby very nicely.

[+Larry]

I love the idea of an upgrade board that is like Atari originally intended for the 800 -- "pop the top" and swap the boards. 

 

And I love the idea that my 800 upgrade is still all 800.  Not to say that the Incognito isn't also a superb upgrade, but I have lots of XL's and XE's.

[Beeblebrox]

42 minutes ago, Larry said:

I love the idea of an upgrade board that is like Atari originally intended for the 800 -- "pop the top" and swap the boards. 

 

And I love the idea that my 800 upgrade is still all 800.  Not to say that the Incognito isn't also a superb upgrade, but I have lots of XL's and XE's.

Yup it is a great pop in upgrade. Great to have it for those who wish to upgrade and benefit from it. I'd get one myself if I didn't have the Incognito already installed or wanted the extra functionality it brings to the party. 

 

Not wishing to start a debate here or hijack the thread but interestingly I still consider my Incognito'd 800 an 800. Installing Incognito, or indeed another other upgrade that gives it a RAM upgrade, hasn't changed it for me in the slightest. It still has the same ANTIC, CPU, GTIA, POKEY and PIA after all and the same CPU Mhz speed and graphics limitations/quirks. 

 

So Incognito does provide the XL/XE OS but it can also run Colleen OS by enabling it in the BIOS and be retricted to the lower RAM options including the 48k. So it can run like a stock 800 if you want to at times.

 

It still looks and feels like an 800. Difference is it loads all my games, etc at super fast speeds, the PBI HDD CF card stores all the games I load on it in one place with a great loader interface, (so no need to plug anything else in to load em up). Plus I get the ATR swap functionality so I can run multi image demos like Numen or games like the Brundles. I can load the 3 x image game Brundles into memory in 15-20 seconds.

 

I see it as enabling me to use the 800 reguarly with it's fantastic display output and gorgeous retro look without needing to hook up to an SDrive max, SIO2PC, SIO2SD, or a 1050 drive and the bonus is I can run the latest demos and games. (With the acception of CAR/ROM based games). Incidentally of course I know there is Fujinet.

 

For me the general goal is to still feel I can use my A8s where they are working off the same CPU and graphics chipsets because IMHO I get more satisfaction seeing the original chipsets being pushed. However given A8 owners have been upgrading RAM since the 80s, I have no issues with upgrading RAM, storage mediums or even Pokey stereo sound upgrades.  (With storage mediums users were also upgrading 1050 drives to US doublers and Happy/Laser mods in the 80s).

 

Incidentally I have no issue with modern upgrades like Rapidus or VBXE. I find them intriguing but I'll always prefer to see the original CPU and graphics chips being pushed. I love the fact RAM has always been seen as the first aspect of computers to upgrade. 

Edited September 20, 2022 by Beeblebrox

[Bee]

I'm still exploring my Incognito.  I plan to add a blue HD led so I will get a "pinky" HD LED light, a throwback to 50's hotrodders.

 

 

[Beeblebrox]

@Beeone thing to note with regards to adding the blue led. You probably know already but just in case I thought I'd mention it. Modern Led's tend to be very bright. Avoid buying the ultrabright ones if you can.

 

Again you probably know this but for the benefit of others too looking at the board as the computer would sit normally in front of you, the hdd activity light is on the left, power led on the right. There is a resistor to the left (r202 or 201 - I forget which), which IIRC the incognito's install instructions was replaced with an 820ohm one. You can go higher to a degree to drop the led power light brightness down even more.  It's in FJC's vids and also I think in my own blog guide. (see my signature).

 

The power light brightness can totally obliterate the hdd light to the point you can't see it. 

[Dinadan67]

Can we get back to Panos board?

[santosp]

11 minutes ago, Dinadan67 said:

Can we get back to Panos board?

Panos board...Panos board....

I can not remember where exact I saw this in this thread!😁

[+scorpio_ny]

This is  another nice upgrade option for the Atari 800! Are there any available for purchase? If so, does one have to assemble it?

 

Thanks!

 

[santosp]

31 minutes ago, scorpio_ny said:

This is  another nice upgrade option for the Atari 800! Are there any available for purchase? If so, does one have to assemble it?

 

Thanks!

 

Hi,

I have one last available (are ten out there worldwide and one for me!) and it not need assembly. It ready to work "out of the box".

If you want it please pm me.

[+scorpio_ny]

PM sent!

[Panther]

Here's a video of using the MyIDE interface of the GPB (Grecian Personality Board, as this board ended up being called).  The artifacting and distortion in the video is caused by the camera, not the Atari, and I know it's a bit shaky, I was holding a phone recording this while operating the Atari.  It demonstrations booting MyPicoDOS from one partition of the MyIDE and launching a game, then rebooting and swapping drive numbers with another partition and then booting MyDOS from the other partition.  No frames were removed from the video.

 

[santosp]

Wow Patrick excellent work! And what speed among the changes! 

😀

[santosp]

I bet that if Mr.Atari  share his MyBIOS source and notes, you would take it to another level! 🙂

 

 

[+Larry]

Hi Panos and Patrick-

 

Just curious -- Panos, would you be willing to make another small run of these boards if there are takers?  If so, what would the number of purchasers need to be?

 

Also -- is there a way to add (MyDos) Romdos in the same way that the GPB has incorporated Omnimon and Omniview?  Same address space of $C000 - $CFFF.  Perhaps one could just copy the 16K space of Omnimon OS and then patch in Romdos code using a hex editor?  I would use another eprom and insert the "Romdos OS" in place of the PAL OS.

 

BTW, I love the menu program to change OS on this board. 

[santosp]

Hi Larry,

1. At this time I work on another project complementary to this one. I have already design the pcb and prepare the logic but  I still have a way to go.. 

But if for example 10 more interested members would be found, I think I could arrange one more batch.

 

2. Why I think that this must be answered by Patrick?

 

3. Yes this menu is an excellent work from Patrick. I like it also very much!

[santosp]

Ok lets say some things about it. Is a board for the third memory slot of A800.

My intention and its main operation, is to run  SDX with RTC and to handle an external cartridge above of this like the standalone SDX cartridge. As usuall, without the need to modify your computer.
At the same time it must  provide the lost 16K memory of the third memory slot.

This memory will be needed for the users that have only a simple Axlon memory board (for example 512k)  in the middle slot. Will not needed for the owners of GPB, or those with some Axlon boards who provide also the rest of main memory.
The setup of this board will be available from a menu, like this in the GPB.

I'm also thinking about what I could do with the remaining 256KB of the flash rom, like putting some OSS tools in there, selectable via Patrick's menu.
We'll see..

 

Now as for the external cartridge, it will be work via an small adapter which  will snap into the left cartridge slot of the A800. In this someone will be able to clip the external cartridge.

For the most skilled user who can disassemble his Atari, and place a small adapter on it without naturally solder cables etc., the profit will be to be able to use naturally, without adapters, the left cartridge of his Atari as is.

 

As I said these are my intentions, but I will know better after the sample pcbs arrive here and work with these.