[sebhc] Trying to get NetPC 3.4 running ...

[Scott LaBombard]

Too many mailing lists ... too little time ... sorry folks. I posted
this to the wrong list ... Jack asked me to leave it for a couple
of reasons ...read on:

I've been giving some thought as to the possibility of having
an equivalent to NetPC for the H8. For those of you who may
not know what NetPC is ... it essentially allows access from
a Swtp system to disk images that reside on a PC. The access
is done in such a way so as to make the images appear as real
disks to the Swtp (running Flex as the operating system). The
approach is implemented over a serial port ...a piece of code
runs on both ends of the connection.

It would seem that there would be a way to take advantage of
the H8 simulation work that has been available for some time
to implement a NetPC capability for H8. Specifically, we should
be able to use a stripped down iteration of the simulator to handle
the disk image IO. Instead of having a full simulator that accepts
disk related commands from the console (and that has a full GUI),
it would accept disk related commands via the serial port (sent
from the H8 while booted in HDOS, or perhaps even CP/M).

I know that Dwight and others have done some work in this
area ... any comments?


Scott

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Scott LaBombard" <labomb at rochester.rr.com>
To: <sebhc at sebhc.org>
Sent: Sunday, May 02, 2004 12:01 PM
Subject: [sebhc] Trying to get NetPC 3.4 running ...


> Hi folks,
> 
> As the subject indicates ... I've been attempting to get NetPC 3.4 up
> and running on a recently restored Swtp S/09 system. NetPC starts
> up and displays the 'NetPC driver version 3.4' banner ... and then it
> sits for a minute or so (presumably trying to connect) and then times
> out with 'Can't sync serial transfer!'.
> 
> Here are the system specifics (intentionally verbose):
> 
> * The S/09 has an MP-09A that is configured for extended addressing
> and SBUG 1.8. The system is currently configured to run at 1mhz.
> 
> * Installed boards include the MP-ID board, an MP-S2 with only a
> single port installed on IO port 0 (console), an MP-S2 with both ports
> installed on IO port 1, and two MP-L2 dual port parallel boards
> installed on IO ports 2 and 3. In addition, there is a DMAF2 disk
> controller, connected to the Swtp dual 8" drive cabinet. For memory,
> it has the Swtp SMS3509 memory system (with the SMS3509C
> controller card, and one SMS3509A 128k memory array card).
> 
> * The operating system is Swtp's flavor of Flex, version 2.7:3.
> 
> * The PC side is a Thinkpad laptop with DOS 6.3 installed. I use
> this system as a 'console' (running term emulation) for most all of
> my vintage systems. I'm using a standard DB9-DB25 serial cable.
> 
> I'm connecting the PC to the dual MP-S2 at IO port 1. I've
> modified acia.txt to use port A on the MP-S2:
> 
> aciac equ $E010
> aciad equ $E011
> 
> I've also tried $E014,$E015 with the PC connected to port B. I've
> also tried adding the 6850 uart initialization code to acia.txt (even
> though it is in netdrv.txt already). Last, I also tried just using a three
> wire connection (pins 2,3, and 7) ...all with no luck.
> 
> The dual MP-S2 has been verified functional installed at IO slot 0
> and connected to a console.
> 
> The config.txt file on the PC side is set for 9600 baud, the MP-S2
> is configured for 9600 baud (strapped). Debug is on in config.txt...
> no messages are generated when I run netdrv.bin on the S/09. I've
> tried both 'slow' and 'fast' configurations. NetPC initializes just fine
> on the PC.
> 
> Also, netdrv.txt was assembled on the S/09 itself using asmb.cmd.
> No assembly errors were generated.
> 
> I imagine that I'm missing something simple here ... any suggestions
> would be most welcome. Thanks ...
> 
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Scott
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