Lpc2000

--- In lpc2000@yahoogroups.com, "Eric Engler" <englere.geo@y...> 
wrote:
>
> --- In lpc2000@yahoogroups.com, "rtstofer" <rstofer@p...> wrote:
> 
> > I have used the Spartan 3 Starter board quite a bit as well as 
the 
> > B5X300 from www.burched.com.  My largest project was to 
implement the 
> > T80 core (Z80) in the B5X300, add a couple of CF drives and run 
CP/M 
> > 2.2.  PS/2 keyboard input and 25x80 text mode for VGA output.
> 
> This sounds cool! Is this something you might be willing to open 
source?

The T80 core is available at www.opencores.com.  If you get that 
running, I can provide the rest of the stuff including an 8 bit HDD 
interface block, a PS/2 to TV950 keyboard translation (PS/2 doesn't 
make much sense to CP/M) and the video that came from John Kent's 
SYS09 project, also at www.opencores.com.

All of the CP/M stuff is currently in the public domain and the 
entire project is built from source.

Like most projects, this one has warts.  I didn't want to implement 
a full width HDD bus so I only read/write the lower 8 bits.  Thus I 
only get 256 bytes per sector.  No big deal, just full disclosure.

Now that I have settled on CF versus a real hard drive, there is a 
standard 8 bit interface that would work even better.  But, alas, I 
don't have the interest to go back and rework the project.

The B5 X300 is the high price spread for development boards.  It 
makes the project pricey compared to, say, the Spartan 3 Starter 
Board.  But, at the time, I wanted the 5V tolerant I/O of the 
Spartan IIE because I was using a real hard drive with a 5V 
interface.  That is not an issue with a CF but that came later.

Richard

 
> 
> I've been thinking about doing this kind of thing to emulate an 
Apple
> II using modern chips, but I don't have the expertise to pull it 
off :-(
> 
> Eric
>