VOGONS


Data Delivery Board

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First post, by raymv1987

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All,

I'm currently trying to bring this old EISA data delivery board back to life. I am curious if anyone recognizes what drivers/.cfgs it may need based on
Segachanneldatadelivery_3094_front.JPG
Segachanneldatadelivery_3094_back.JPG

Last edited by raymv1987 on 2025-01-02, 05:53. Edited 1 time in total.

Reply 2 of 91, by raymv1987

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wierd_w wrote on 2024-12-22, 02:41:

Eisa has a digita board ID, like pci or mca does.

See what the bios says that ID is, and I'll look for you.

I'm newer to EISA. Just connecting the board and checking the BIOS should tell me?

Reply 3 of 91, by wierd_w

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You will need an eisa config utility, and a .cfg for that card.

This setup program may or may not work...
http://www.vogonsdrivers.com/getfile.php?fileid=746

You'll find a large collection of .cfg files here
https://web.archive.org/web/20190521043143/ht … /~mR_Slug/EISA/

Reply 5 of 91, by raymv1987

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Will give the scanner a good look. I've got the utility and configs for the motherboard in my machine. Hopefully they point me to a board ID for this board and I can find out what files it needs. I do not have a .cfg for this specific card.

Reply 6 of 91, by PC Hoarder Patrol

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raymv1987 wrote on 2024-12-22, 05:36:

Will give the scanner a good look. I've got the utility and configs for the motherboard in my machine. Hopefully they point me to a board ID for this board and I can find out what files it needs. I do not have a .cfg for this specific card.

Try running the Board ID app (boardid.exe) in this Micronics EISA package... http://66.113.161.23/~mR_Slug/pub/EISA/source … ICS/MICRECU.ZIP

Reply 7 of 91, by raymv1987

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Tried both of the suggested utilities. Neither detected anything. However, there are lights on the board that come on when the machine powers on and I'm able to plug in another pc via serial to that 3rd serial port that has the cable connector and get a program to communicate with it.

Reply 8 of 91, by the3dfxdude

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That's likely a data acquisition card. You'll need drivers to use it. So you'll need to identify the card and figure out if it required proprietary modules to get any use anyway. I would not treat those as typical rs232 ports.

Reply 9 of 91, by Horun

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Exactly ! Will need the drivers/interface software too.
Being made of three very large scale field programmable gate arrays and with two bios chips (most likely one for the 80188 cpu, the other to program the fpga's) it will be near impossible to figure out.
Do you have a eeprom reader ? The bios chips may give a hint as to who made the adapter or who used it.
Eisa .cfg's for Xilinx and Altera products are very hard to find as they are somewhat specific to each special adapter and their bios's...

Hate posting a reply and then have to edit it because it made no sense 😁 First computer was an IBM 3270 workstation with CGA monitor. Stuff: https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 10 of 91, by BitWrangler

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the3dfxdude wrote on 2024-12-23, 03:44:

That's likely a data acquisition card. You'll need drivers to use it. So you'll need to identify the card and figure out if it required proprietary modules to get any use anyway. I would not treat those as typical rs232 ports.

Aquisition cards tended to favor the bus type serial protocols, like RS-485 or something. Or they went for distance/speed with RS-422... RS-232 still possible though.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 11 of 91, by raymv1987

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So the serial port connected to the cable can connect via rs232. The 2 fastened to the board are rs422.

I have had the chips dumped and just need to find a hosting spot for the .bin files. This board was made by Scientific Atlanta and used to broadcast data for the Sega Channel game service.

Reply 12 of 91, by raymv1987

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I'm actually working on a project to revive the service at least at a kiosk level. I've got all the appropriate gear and most of the software. The general flow is that the end user inserts a cd containing that month's games into the game server. A series of .exes run that copy the data from the CD to the hard drive, set a run schedule, and then push the data to the board. Board then pushes to some RF modulators via rs422 and then to a combiner and to the Sega. This .cfg conundrum I believe is the only prospective blocker.

Reply 13 of 91, by Disruptor

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During bootstrap your EISA BIOS will complain about changed or incorrect hardware.
The next step is to run an ECU:
When you (re)configure your system with an ECU (Eisa Configuration Utility) it will ask for the driver. It will say which !XXXYYYY.CFG file it needs. XXX = Manufacturer YYYY = Device

Reply 14 of 91, by raymv1987

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So when booting my system, I'm not seeing any missing hardware complaints. When running my machine's ECU, it doesn't even show a board detected in that slot.

If anyone wants to see if you can make heads or tails of this, I've dropped them here:
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/lq69dfogtld3sv … t=igczl9az&dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/4u3tos4fn6qhx1 … t=v2a2vw7k&dl=0

Reply 15 of 91, by BitWrangler

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Sounds like you're talking about something more like a primitive cable modem rather than a normal RF modulator as we know them for hooking up TVs, though modem of course means modulator and demodulator.

Edit: So that makes me think you might need something more like a network card driver, than a port driver. Where earlier OS tended to ignore network cards until you told them they were there.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 16 of 91, by raymv1987

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Interesting note. The rough setup worked like this

300px-SegaChannel_US_Diagram.png

However, the data board in question can connect directly to the 2 RF modulators. This was allowed for localized demos. I've got the specific models outlined in the documentation along with frequency instructions. If I can get to a point where my server picks up this board and the .exe says the broadcast is good rather than timing out I should be able to get this rebuilt at a local level.

Reply 17 of 91, by weedeewee

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an EISA card with jumpers to set IRQ & DMA.

How odd.

raymv1987, Do you have the software that supports this card ?

Right to repair is fundamental. You own it, you're allowed to fix it.
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
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https://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/Serial_port

Reply 18 of 91, by raymv1987

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weedeewee wrote on 2024-12-23, 18:15:

an EISA card with jumpers to set IRQ & DMA.

How odd.

raymv1987, Do you have the software that supports this card ?

That was my thought. I've never seen anything like it. This is the exe that pushes data to the board itself.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/o5k9pcoim7rkax … t=uijsoydz&dl=0

Reply 19 of 91, by weedeewee

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raymv1987 wrote on 2024-12-23, 19:20:
weedeewee wrote on 2024-12-23, 18:15:

an EISA card with jumpers to set IRQ & DMA.

How odd.

raymv1987, Do you have the software that supports this card ?

That was my thought. I've never seen anything like it. This is the exe that pushes data to the board itself.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/o5k9pcoim7rkax … t=uijsoydz&dl=0

Is that all the software you have, a 32Kb executable?

Also, do you have more hardware for the transmission and reception parts ?

Right to repair is fundamental. You own it, you're allowed to fix it.
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
Do not ask Why !
https://www.vogonswiki.com/index.php/Serial_port