bjt wrote:

For an activity LED you can also just wire it direct between IDE pin 39 and VCC (with a suitable current limiting resistor).
I guess it's best practice to have a buffer but for a small LED it should be fine. I did that for my XT build.

I knew about doing it directly but i didn't know what kind of resistors i had to use. My electronics knowledge is very limited. 🤣

I also had the choice of using a CF card adapter that has a IDE LED pin.

I usually use either a 270 or 330 ohm resistor at TTL signal levels (5V). If you want to know how bright (max continuous current) your led can operate, double check your data sheet. Max current handling varies most particularly depending on the led packaging (therefore heat dissipation).

Got the XT-IDE working at CC00h and EMS working with the the Dxxx page frame.

Also tried out my EGA card, works fine. I was hoping to be able to switch between TGA and EGA on the fly by switching the EGA card into MDA mode using the dip switches on the back, but it doesn't seem to work. I guess the Tandy always disables TGA if another video BIOS is present.

Also tried out the YMF card but I couldn't get it to initialise. SETUPSA hangs on execution. Might try the YMF card in another machine to check.

You can switch between a VGA card and the TGA using the VSWITCH utility, but not an EGA card. Of course, I'm sure you know this. 😀

bjt wrote:

Also tried out the YMF card but I couldn't get it to initialise. SETUPSA hangs on execution. Might try the YMF card in another machine to check.

I think i've said it before, but this won't work on an 8bit slot. It might be that either the chipset needs to get WSS activated to get the other stuff as well or it could be that maybe SETUPSA.EXE always tries to activate WSS and it won't go any further if it can't activate it.

SETUPSA.EXE might need a disassemble and try to figure out if the rest can be activated without WSS. It would IMHO be very convenient to be able to use the card without WSS.

Maybe ripsaw8080 can help us with that.

Hi Carlos, what happened when you tried it? Did you get a straight hang on SETUPSA, no output?
I was under the impression Cloudschatze got one to work in a TL/2, but I may have misunderstood.

bjt wrote:

Hi Carlos, what happened when you tried it? Did you get a straight hang on SETUPSA, no output?
I was under the impression Cloudschatze got one to work in a TL/2, but I may have misunderstood.

Yes YMF cards never worked for me on an 8bit slot. And yes SETUPSA hangs, or stays in an endless loop trying to initialize WSS. But if Cloudschatze got one to work on a TL/2 then i have no reason to doubt it can work.

I apologize. My specific mention of the YMF cards was in relation to their ability to co-exist with the PSSJ, based on my experience using one in the Tandy 1000 RSX, which, of course, has 16-bit ISA slots.

That said, and as relates to the YMF cards that I've seen, the only use of the 16-bit ISA extension pertinent to audio functions is the optional use of IRQ10, IRQ11, and DMA0. The larger concern is a possible reliance on +5V and GND lines in the 16-bit portion of the header. When appropriately configured, I'm not aware of any reason that these cards shouldn't work in 8-bit slots otherwise (even concerning 16-bit sample playback), outside of the IDE functionality, which does rely on the 16-bit data lines.

I'll test this out with my own Audiotrix 3D-XG card tonight - it being such a design where I'll need to rig the 16-bit portion of the card edge with +5V and GND.

I was always lazy enough not to take a look at the 16 bit connector on YMF cards and to the ISA BUS pinout. By roughly looking at pictures ISA D02,03,04 fingers are present then D08 and 09 and D16, D18. I/O CS, IRQ 10 and 11 for the first 3 fingers, D08 and D09 for DMA 0 (DACK, DRQ) and then D16 for +5V and D18 for GND.

For the front the fingers present are C11 up to C18, which are just the data lines.

So Cloudschatze's post is pretty much spot on. The card uses all +5V lines available on the bus, and it could be that any vital part might be exclusively taking power and grounding on the 16bit portion, D16 and D18 to be exact, so Cloudschatze's concern is valid.

You could try soldering a wire from the 16-bit 5V and GND lines and connecting it to any exposed 5V and GND pads that draw from the 8-bit ISA lines (the waveblaster connector, maybe?).

Cloudschatze - no worries, thanks for the info!

I tested my YMF card with a multimeter, the 5V and GND pins on the 16-bit part of the edge connector are connected to the 5V and GND on the 8-bit part. So I guess SETUPSA is hanging for another reason, perhaps testing high DMA or looking for a second interrupt controller.

I did try a early SB16 (CT1770) last night on DMA 3 and that worked no problem.

bjt wrote:

So I guess SETUPSA is hanging for another reason, perhaps testing high DMA or looking for a second interrupt controller.

It would be nice to reverse engineer SETUPSA or maybe even write better drivers for these YMF cards. I never seen any programming manual for the chipset though.

On the YMF715 I have a 59-page datasheet, on the YMF715E I have a 54-page preliminary datasheet, a 53-page release datasheet, 34-page register description document, and a 104-page document on implementing suspend/resume of YMF715E without Advanced Power Management. I haven't found anything further yet.

bjt wrote:

I tested my YMF card with a multimeter, the 5V and GND pins on the 16-bit part of the edge connector are connected to the 5V and GND on the 8-bit part.

Turns out the +5V and GND on the 16-bit ISA portion of the Audiotrix 3D-XG are likewise ganged with the 8-bit section. Yay. 😀

I installed the card in the 1000 SL last night - it being the more accessible system at the moment. I wasn't met with the hanging behavior you guys have noticed, but instead, SETUPSA would simply error-out, complaining about an inability to write to the control registers.

I installed the card in the TL/2 tonight, and...

I suspect that SETUPSA uses 80386 opcodes, which would explain why it works in my 486-accelerated TL/2.

bjt wrote:

OK, now we're getting somewhere! I had swapped round the 74HCT245 and one of the 74HCT688 chips by mistake 😵 Thankfully they have VCC on the same pin and everything worked fine once they were swapped back 🤣
The XT-IDE BIOS seems to conflict with the Tandy's built-in IDE if it's at C800h, so I switched it to D800h for testing. Would still like to run it in the Cxxx range because I need Dxxx for an EMS page frame. Will try padding the XT-IDE BIOS to put it at CC00h, thankfully it's only 8KB.
The memory map on the Tandy is very congested, E000 upwards is off limits due to the DOS ROM & BIOS.

- Is it a UK Model or an US one ?
- Does the Tandy-Monitor display EGA/VGA ?
- How fast is the TL/2 according to my T1000 RL/HD https://www.flickr.com/photos/94839221@N05/21 … 57659228835886/
- The 720KB floppy of my T1000RL/HD has Issues, the motor stops while copying if the machine is running some time, any idea how this could be fixed?

Thx
Doc

Cloudschatze wrote:

I suspect that SETUPSA uses 80386 opcodes, which would explain why it works in my 486-accelerated TL/2.

Interesting. I'm tempted to run SETUPSA through a debugger now and work out exactly what's causing the hang. Thanks for testing this out.

dr.zeissler wrote:

- Is it a UK Model or an US one ? - Does the Tandy-Monitor display EGA/VGA ? - How fast is the TL/2 according to my T1000 RL/HD […]
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- Is it a UK Model or an US one ?
- Does the Tandy-Monitor display EGA/VGA ?
- How fast is the TL/2 according to my T1000 RL/HD https://www.flickr.com/photos/94839221@N05/21 … 57659228835886/
- The 720KB floppy of my T1000RL/HD has Issues, the motor stops while copying if the machine is running some time, any idea how this could be fixed?

UK model. The monitor will only do low-res EGA (rebadged Philips CM8833).
I can try Landmark speed test when I get a chance. Not sure about your floppy, possible overheating issue?

Another question for the Tandy experts 😎 Can the line in/mic input act as a passthrough to audio output, or is it strictly for recording only?

UK-Model = 220 Volts 😀 => No Tandy-Market in Germany, but a (perhaps) small one in the UK.
The Tandy Monitor is a CM8833, did not knew that! so it can display EGA Lowres? that's cool.

A TL/2/3 could possible be a really good alternative for low-end PC-Gaming.

Decided to stick with the SB16 for now, as it's not needed elsewhere.
I was trying to figure out a way to have Adlib from the internal speaker and retain the front mounted volume control, but it seems that it'd require some modifications to the audio board. I'll just use a small set of speakers for the SB16.

Yep it's 220V - these were sold for a while in UK Tandy stores. Don't imagine they sold many though.
This particular monitor is a rebadged Philips CM8833, I'm not clear whether this was what Tandy sold with the TL/2 in the UK originally or whether it was purchased later. Maybe the CM-5/CM-11 that people in the States use is 110V only, so Tandy had to source a 220V monitor for the UK and Australia? Anyway it has SCART and TTL input.

Final push last night to get this system finished. Mounted the XT-IDE and installed an activity LED in the spare drive bay's blanking plate. Looks OK I think.

EGA card installed, I have some plans to modify VSWITCH to allow switching between Tandy and EGA. May even be able to use the EGA feature connector so both signals come out of the EGA card.

The little dot on the left is the activity LED, I did a similar thing on my XT.

The system itself is very compact, shame about the Tandy keyboard 🤣

bjt wrote:

The system itself is very compact, shame about the Tandy keyboard :lol: http://i.imgur.com/4Kq9eyXl.jpg […]
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The system itself is very compact, shame about the Tandy keyboard 🤣

What's wrong about the Tandy keyboard?