[N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need first steps

Discussion:

Marcelo Dantas

2014-12-07 15:16:08 UTC

Hi there,

I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my lab,
after working for some time on my emulator (http://runcpm.blogspot.com/).
After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project, which
looks very interesting to me.

What I have in mind is:
. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor
. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD card
would be the CP/M disk)
. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA monitor
or keyboard
. 64K ram

This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more complicated
part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat filesystem) SD card.
I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure
showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone
already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have
a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).

Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an
emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.

Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.

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John Coffman

2014-12-07 16:10:21 UTC

Permalink

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
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<head>
<meta content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"
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Marcelo,<br>
<br>
Take a look at the SBC Z180 Mark IV board:<br>
     1.  Serial I/O<br>
     2.  SD card socket<br>
     3.  IDE connector for a CF card adapter<br>
<br>
The UNA BIOS for the card can boot CP/M from ROM, or from media, and
can load standalone programs from FAT filesystems.<br>
<br>
The board interfaces to the N8VEM bus, if you wish to add additional
I/O options.<br>
<br>
--John<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
On 12/07/2014 07:16 AM, Marcelo Dantas wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:5702278e-f604-42e4-a346-***@googlegroups.com"
type="cite">
<div dir="ltr">Hi there,
<div><br>
</div>
<div>I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run
CP/M on my lab, after working for some time on my emulator
(<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://runcpm.blogspot.com/">http://runcpm.blogspot.com/</a>).</div>
<div>After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM
project, which looks very interesting to me.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>What I have in mind is:</div>
<div>  . Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor</div>
<div>  . Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card
(the SD card would be the CP/M disk)</div>
<div>  . Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need
of VGA monitor or keyboard</div>
<div>  . 64K ram</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more
complicated part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a
(fat filesystem) SD card.</div>
<div>I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step
procedure showing which are the boards I need to buy
(populated or not), if someone already did this before and if
the SD card part is even possible (I do have a 3-1/2 floppy
disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE,
but it is an emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome
real hardware.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Thanks a lot,</div>
<div>Marcelo.</div>
<div><br>
</div>
</div>
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Kip Koon

2014-12-07 21:40:09 UTC

Permalink

Hi Marcelo!

Have you heard of Grant Searleâs Multicomp Microcomputer yet? It uses an inexpensive FPGA Mini-Development PCB and James Moxhamâs PCB implementation of Grantâs Multicomp design to fully implement and run from an SD Card CP/M 2.2, CP/M 3.0 AND MP/M II v2.1 all from the same SD Card! It is awesome to behold! Max Scane also contributed a bunch to the project adapting CP/M 3.0 and MP/M to run on the Multicomp platform combining them with CP/M 2.2. He also probably helped with adapting Grantâs VHDL code to the larger ram chip as well.

From what little you have said, this might just be right up your alley. Take a look at my Cocopedia Wiki page below for some of my experiences with the Multicomp project. So far, I have ended up building 6 of these babies! Wow! When I first started this Multicomp project, I never dreamed Iâd get this far with it, but James kept updating his Multicomp PCB so I kept getting the latest version. Now I have little Multicomps running around everywhere! :P

There are a bunch of people on the N8VEM list who are involved in the Multicomp project as well. The 2 PCB combo is so small I can hold it in my hand! I have 16 â 8MB drives available to CP/M 2.2 each with 16 users! Wow! Now I can finally study C programming like they used to do way back when microcomputers were young and costly without having to layout thousands of dollars for a full S-100 system! I really love this stuff! Feel free to ask questions. If you are interested, James has a finished PCB available for $12 + shipping I think. Itâs been a little while since I purchased one.

Iâve got to get ready to perform our Christmas Cantata tonight at church so Iâll have to send you some links later on tonight. In the meantime search for âGrant Searle Multicompâ to begin to see what the whole system is like. One individual put the whole system together using various readymade PCBs from ebay and jumper wires. It was pretty cool! Ah shucks, I had to get you at least one link to wet you appetite good!

http://searle.hostei.com/grant/Multicomp/

Here is the link to purchase James PCB.

http://www.smarthome.jigsy.com/fpga

And finally here is a link on ebay to get the FPGA PCB along with the programmer required to bring it up and running!

http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40 <http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15> &_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15

If the lines get split up, just highlight the whole thing in the email message, copy it and paste it into your browser or just click on it. I hope you have as much fun as I have! Take care my friend and Welcome to the N8VEM Project!

Kip Koon

***@sc.rr.com

http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Kip_Koon

From: ***@googlegroups.com [mailto:***@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Marcelo Dantas
Sent: Sunday, December 07, 2014 10:16 AM
To: ***@googlegroups.com
Subject: [N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need first steps

Hi there,

I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my lab, after working for some time on my emulator (http://runcpm.blogspot.com/).

After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project, which looks very interesting to me.

What I have in mind is:

. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor

. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD card would be the CP/M disk)

. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA monitor or keyboard

. 64K ram

This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more complicated part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat filesystem) SD card.

I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).

Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.

Thanks a lot,

Marcelo.
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Marcelo Dantas

2014-12-08 17:41:26 UTC

Permalink

Wow!!! You guys just killed my free time for the next few days ... :)
Thanks a lot for the guidance, I believe I can go from here.

Happy holidays,
Marcelo.

Post by Kip Koon
Hi Marcelo!
Have you heard of Grant Searleâs Multicomp Microcomputer yet? It uses an
inexpensive FPGA Mini-Development PCB and James Moxhamâs PCB implementation
of Grantâs Multicomp design to fully implement and run from an SD Card CP/M
2.2, CP/M 3.0 AND MP/M II v2.1 all from the same SD Card! It is awesome to
behold! Max Scane also contributed a bunch to the project adapting CP/M
3.0 and MP/M to run on the Multicomp platform combining them with CP/M
2.2. He also probably helped with adapting Grantâs VHDL code to the
larger ram chip as well.
From what little you have said, this might just be right up your alley.
Take a look at my Cocopedia Wiki page below for some of my experiences with
the Multicomp project. So far, I have ended up building 6 of these
babies! Wow! When I first started this Multicomp project, I never dreamed
Iâd get this far with it, but James kept updating his Multicomp PCB so I
kept getting the latest version. Now I have little Multicomps running
around everywhere! :P
There are a bunch of people on the N8VEM list who are involved in the
Multicomp project as well. The 2 PCB combo is so small I can hold it in my
hand! I have 16 â 8MB drives available to CP/M 2.2 each with 16 users!
Wow! Now I can finally study C programming like they used to do way back
when microcomputers were young and costly without having to layout
thousands of dollars for a full S-100 system! I really love this stuff!
Feel free to ask questions. If you are interested, James has a finished
PCB available for $12 + shipping I think. Itâs been a little while since I
purchased one.
Iâve got to get ready to perform our Christmas Cantata tonight at church
so Iâll have to send you some links later on tonight. In the meantime
search for âGrant Searle Multicompâ to begin to see what the whole system
is like. One individual put the whole system together using various
readymade PCBs from ebay and jumper wires. It was pretty cool! Ah shucks,
I had to get you at least one link to wet you appetite good!
http://searle.hostei.com/grant/Multicomp/
Here is the link to purchase James PCB.
http://www.smarthome.jigsy.com/fpga
And finally here is a link on ebay to get the FPGA PCB along with the
programmer required to bring it up and running!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15
If the lines get split up, just highlight the whole thing in the email
message, copy it and paste it into your browser or just click on it. I
hope you have as much fun as I have! Take care my friend and Welcome to
the N8VEM Project!
Kip Koon
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Kip_Koon
*Sent:* Sunday, December 07, 2014 10:16 AM
*Subject:* [N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need first
steps
Hi there,
I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my lab,
after working for some time on my emulator (http://runcpm.blogspot.com/).
After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project, which
looks very interesting to me.
. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor
. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD card
would be the CP/M disk)
. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA monitor or keyboard
. 64K ram
This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more complicated
part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat filesystem) SD card.
I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure
showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone
already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have
a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).
Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an
emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.
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Sergey

2014-12-09 00:38:22 UTC

Permalink

Marcelo,

Since you've asked about "a real Z80 processor" you can give N8VEM SBC V2
or Zeta SBC a try; or SBC Z180 Mark IV if you don't mind using Z8S180
instead if Z80 (they are software-compatible).

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Wow!!! You guys just killed my free time for the next few days ... :)
Thanks a lot for the guidance, I believe I can go from here.
Happy holidays,
Marcelo.

Post by Kip Koon
Hi Marcelo!
Have you heard of Grant Searleâs Multicomp Microcomputer yet? It uses an
inexpensive FPGA Mini-Development PCB and James Moxhamâs PCB implementation
of Grantâs Multicomp design to fully implement and run from an SD Card CP/M
2.2, CP/M 3.0 AND MP/M II v2.1 all from the same SD Card! It is awesome to
behold! Max Scane also contributed a bunch to the project adapting CP/M
3.0 and MP/M to run on the Multicomp platform combining them with CP/M
2.2. He also probably helped with adapting Grantâs VHDL code to the
larger ram chip as well.
From what little you have said, this might just be right up your alley.
Take a look at my Cocopedia Wiki page below for some of my experiences with
the Multicomp project. So far, I have ended up building 6 of these
babies! Wow! When I first started this Multicomp project, I never dreamed
Iâd get this far with it, but James kept updating his Multicomp PCB so I
kept getting the latest version. Now I have little Multicomps running
around everywhere! :P
There are a bunch of people on the N8VEM list who are involved in the
Multicomp project as well. The 2 PCB combo is so small I can hold it in my
hand! I have 16 â 8MB drives available to CP/M 2.2 each with 16 users!
Wow! Now I can finally study C programming like they used to do way back
when microcomputers were young and costly without having to layout
thousands of dollars for a full S-100 system! I really love this stuff!
Feel free to ask questions. If you are interested, James has a finished
PCB available for $12 + shipping I think. Itâs been a little while since I
purchased one.
Iâve got to get ready to perform our Christmas Cantata tonight at church
so Iâll have to send you some links later on tonight. In the meantime
search for âGrant Searle Multicompâ to begin to see what the whole system
is like. One individual put the whole system together using various
readymade PCBs from ebay and jumper wires. It was pretty cool! Ah shucks,
I had to get you at least one link to wet you appetite good!
http://searle.hostei.com/grant/Multicomp/
Here is the link to purchase James PCB.
http://www.smarthome.jigsy.com/fpga
And finally here is a link on ebay to get the FPGA PCB along with the
programmer required to bring it up and running!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15
If the lines get split up, just highlight the whole thing in the email
message, copy it and paste it into your browser or just click on it. I
hope you have as much fun as I have! Take care my friend and Welcome to
the N8VEM Project!
Kip Koon
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Kip_Koon
Behalf Of *Marcelo Dantas
*Sent:* Sunday, December 07, 2014 10:16 AM
*Subject:* [N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need first
steps
Hi there,
I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my lab,
after working for some time on my emulator (http://runcpm.blogspot.com/).
After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project,
which looks very interesting to me.
. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor
. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD card
would be the CP/M disk)
. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA monitor or keyboard
. 64K ram
This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more complicated
part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat filesystem) SD card.
I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure
showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone
already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have
a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).
Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an
emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.
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Marcelo Dantas

2014-12-09 14:40:49 UTC

Permalink

Hi Sergey,

Indeed, the FPGA approach looks like an awesome practical environment for
playing with emulation, but is still an emulation. I already got it running
on a Cyclone IV I have in my lab.
The Z180 is not a "real" Z80 per se, but is still interesting for seeing
performance and lots of memory.

From your suggestions the Zeta with the daughterboard definitely catched my
eye. I could use the 3-1/2 floppy drive I have here (not sure where I would
find floppies though, lol).
How does it deal with the SD card? Does it use it as a CP/M filesystem, or
is it FAT?
Can it boot straight from the SD and eliminate the need for the floppy?

Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.

Post by John Coffman
Marcelo,
Since you've asked about "a real Z80 processor" you can give N8VEM SBC V2
or Zeta SBC a try; or SBC Z180 Mark IV if you don't mind using Z8S180
instead if Z80 (they are software-compatible).

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Wow!!! You guys just killed my free time for the next few days ... :)
Thanks a lot for the guidance, I believe I can go from here.
Happy holidays,
Marcelo.

Post by Kip Koon
Hi Marcelo!
Have you heard of Grant Searleâs Multicomp Microcomputer yet? It uses
an inexpensive FPGA Mini-Development PCB and James Moxhamâs PCB
implementation of Grantâs Multicomp design to fully implement and run from
an SD Card CP/M 2.2, CP/M 3.0 AND MP/M II v2.1 all from the same SD Card!
It is awesome to behold! Max Scane also contributed a bunch to the project
adapting CP/M 3.0 and MP/M to run on the Multicomp platform combining them
with CP/M 2.2. He also probably helped with adapting Grantâs VHDL code to
the larger ram chip as well.
From what little you have said, this might just be right up your alley.
Take a look at my Cocopedia Wiki page below for some of my experiences with
the Multicomp project. So far, I have ended up building 6 of these
babies! Wow! When I first started this Multicomp project, I never dreamed
Iâd get this far with it, but James kept updating his Multicomp PCB so I
kept getting the latest version. Now I have little Multicomps running
around everywhere! :P
There are a bunch of people on the N8VEM list who are involved in the
Multicomp project as well. The 2 PCB combo is so small I can hold it in my
hand! I have 16 â 8MB drives available to CP/M 2.2 each with 16 users!
Wow! Now I can finally study C programming like they used to do way back
when microcomputers were young and costly without having to layout
thousands of dollars for a full S-100 system! I really love this stuff!
Feel free to ask questions. If you are interested, James has a finished
PCB available for $12 + shipping I think. Itâs been a little while since I
purchased one.
Iâve got to get ready to perform our Christmas Cantata tonight at church
so Iâll have to send you some links later on tonight. In the meantime
search for âGrant Searle Multicompâ to begin to see what the whole system
is like. One individual put the whole system together using various
readymade PCBs from ebay and jumper wires. It was pretty cool! Ah shucks,
I had to get you at least one link to wet you appetite good!
http://searle.hostei.com/grant/Multicomp/
Here is the link to purchase James PCB.
http://www.smarthome.jigsy.com/fpga
And finally here is a link on ebay to get the FPGA PCB along with the
programmer required to bring it up and running!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15
If the lines get split up, just highlight the whole thing in the email
message, copy it and paste it into your browser or just click on it. I
hope you have as much fun as I have! Take care my friend and Welcome to
the N8VEM Project!
Kip Koon
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Kip_Koon
Behalf Of *Marcelo Dantas
*Sent:* Sunday, December 07, 2014 10:16 AM
*Subject:* [N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need first
steps
Hi there,
I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my lab,
after working for some time on my emulator (http://runcpm.blogspot.com/
).
After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project,
which looks very interesting to me.
. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor
. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD card
would be the CP/M disk)
. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA monitor or keyboard
. 64K ram
This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more complicated
part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat filesystem) SD card.
I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure
showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone
already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have
a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).
Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an
emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.
--
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Sergey

2014-12-09 22:56:23 UTC

Permalink

Hi Marcelo,

You'll be surprised, but 3.5" floppies are still being sold (at Amazon for
example). :-)

It uses CP/M filesystem. If I recall correctly the default RomWBW divides
SD card into 4 partitions 2 GB each. It doesn't use a partition table. It
just uses first 2 GB for the first partition, next 2 GB for the second
partition, and so on.

Yes, it can boot from an SD card. It can also boot from flash ROM, and it
is quite possible to have a diskless system using a ROM disk for CP/M and
some utilities and a RAM disk.

Thanks,
Sergey

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Hi Sergey,
Indeed, the FPGA approach looks like an awesome practical environment for
playing with emulation, but is still an emulation. I already got it running
on a Cyclone IV I have in my lab.
The Z180 is not a "real" Z80 per se, but is still interesting for seeing
performance and lots of memory.
From your suggestions the Zeta with the daughterboard definitely catched
my eye. I could use the 3-1/2 floppy drive I have here (not sure where I
would find floppies though, lol).
How does it deal with the SD card? Does it use it as a CP/M filesystem, or
is it FAT?
Can it boot straight from the SD and eliminate the need for the floppy?
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Wow!!! You guys just killed my free time for the next few days ... :)
Thanks a lot for the guidance, I believe I can go from here.
Happy holidays,
Marcelo.

Post by Kip Koon
Hi Marcelo!
Have you heard of Grant Searleâs Multicomp Microcomputer yet? It uses
an inexpensive FPGA Mini-Development PCB and James Moxhamâs PCB
implementation of Grantâs Multicomp design to fully implement and run from
an SD Card CP/M 2.2, CP/M 3.0 AND MP/M II v2.1 all from the same SD Card!
It is awesome to behold! Max Scane also contributed a bunch to the project
adapting CP/M 3.0 and MP/M to run on the Multicomp platform combining them
with CP/M 2.2. He also probably helped with adapting Grantâs VHDL code to
the larger ram chip as well.
From what little you have said, this might just be right up your
alley. Take a look at my Cocopedia Wiki page below for some of my
experiences with the Multicomp project. So far, I have ended up building 6
of these babies! Wow! When I first started this Multicomp project, I
never dreamed Iâd get this far with it, but James kept updating his
Multicomp PCB so I kept getting the latest version. Now I have little
Multicomps running around everywhere! :P
There are a bunch of people on the N8VEM list who are involved in the
Multicomp project as well. The 2 PCB combo is so small I can hold it in my
hand! I have 16 â 8MB drives available to CP/M 2.2 each with 16 users!
Wow! Now I can finally study C programming like they used to do way back
when microcomputers were young and costly without having to layout
thousands of dollars for a full S-100 system! I really love this stuff!
Feel free to ask questions. If you are interested, James has a finished
PCB available for $12 + shipping I think. Itâs been a little while since I
purchased one.
Iâve got to get ready to perform our Christmas Cantata tonight at
church so Iâll have to send you some links later on tonight. In the
meantime search for âGrant Searle Multicompâ to begin to see what the whole
system is like. One individual put the whole system together using various
readymade PCBs from ebay and jumper wires. It was pretty cool! Ah shucks,
I had to get you at least one link to wet you appetite good!
http://searle.hostei.com/grant/Multicomp/
Here is the link to purchase James PCB.
http://www.smarthome.jigsy.com/fpga
And finally here is a link on ebay to get the FPGA PCB along with the
programmer required to bring it up and running!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15
If the lines get split up, just highlight the whole thing in the email
message, copy it and paste it into your browser or just click on it. I
hope you have as much fun as I have! Take care my friend and Welcome to
the N8VEM Project!
Kip Koon
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Kip_Koon
Behalf Of *Marcelo Dantas
*Sent:* Sunday, December 07, 2014 10:16 AM
*Subject:* [N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need
first steps
Hi there,
I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my lab,
after working for some time on my emulator (http://runcpm.blogspot.com/
).
After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project,
which looks very interesting to me.
. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor
. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD
card would be the CP/M disk)
. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA monitor or keyboard
. 64K ram
This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more complicated
part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat filesystem) SD card.
I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure
showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone
already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have
a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).
Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an
emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.
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Marcelo Dantas

2014-12-15 03:01:56 UTC

Permalink

Hi Sergey,

Couple quick questions:

. Can I buy the boards already populated/tested/working? (or boards+parts
for me to put together?)
. What about pricing, I want to know if it would fit my budget.

(PM me if needed)

Cheers,
Marcelo.

Post by Sergey
Hi Marcelo,
You'll be surprised, but 3.5" floppies are still being sold (at Amazon for
example). :-)
It uses CP/M filesystem. If I recall correctly the default RomWBW divides
SD card into 4 partitions 2 GB each. It doesn't use a partition table. It
just uses first 2 GB for the first partition, next 2 GB for the second
partition, and so on.
Yes, it can boot from an SD card. It can also boot from flash ROM, and it
is quite possible to have a diskless system using a ROM disk for CP/M and
some utilities and a RAM disk.
Thanks,
Sergey

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Hi Sergey,
Indeed, the FPGA approach looks like an awesome practical environment for
playing with emulation, but is still an emulation. I already got it running
on a Cyclone IV I have in my lab.
The Z180 is not a "real" Z80 per se, but is still interesting for seeing
performance and lots of memory.
From your suggestions the Zeta with the daughterboard definitely catched
my eye. I could use the 3-1/2 floppy drive I have here (not sure where I
would find floppies though, lol).
How does it deal with the SD card? Does it use it as a CP/M filesystem,
or is it FAT?
Can it boot straight from the SD and eliminate the need for the floppy?
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.

Post by John Coffman
Marcelo,
Since you've asked about "a real Z80 processor" you can give N8VEM SBC
V2 or Zeta SBC a try; or SBC Z180 Mark IV if you don't mind using Z8S180
instead if Z80 (they are software-compatible).

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Wow!!! You guys just killed my free time for the next few days ... :)
Thanks a lot for the guidance, I believe I can go from here.
Happy holidays,
Marcelo.

Post by Kip Koon
Hi Marcelo!
Have you heard of Grant Searleâs Multicomp Microcomputer yet? It uses
an inexpensive FPGA Mini-Development PCB and James Moxhamâs PCB
implementation of Grantâs Multicomp design to fully implement and run from
an SD Card CP/M 2.2, CP/M 3.0 AND MP/M II v2.1 all from the same SD Card!
It is awesome to behold! Max Scane also contributed a bunch to the project
adapting CP/M 3.0 and MP/M to run on the Multicomp platform combining them
with CP/M 2.2. He also probably helped with adapting Grantâs VHDL code to
the larger ram chip as well.
From what little you have said, this might just be right up your
alley. Take a look at my Cocopedia Wiki page below for some of my
experiences with the Multicomp project. So far, I have ended up building 6
of these babies! Wow! When I first started this Multicomp project, I
never dreamed Iâd get this far with it, but James kept updating his
Multicomp PCB so I kept getting the latest version. Now I have little
Multicomps running around everywhere! :P
There are a bunch of people on the N8VEM list who are involved in the
Multicomp project as well. The 2 PCB combo is so small I can hold it in my
hand! I have 16 â 8MB drives available to CP/M 2.2 each with 16 users!
Wow! Now I can finally study C programming like they used to do way back
when microcomputers were young and costly without having to layout
thousands of dollars for a full S-100 system! I really love this stuff!
Feel free to ask questions. If you are interested, James has a finished
PCB available for $12 + shipping I think. Itâs been a little while since I
purchased one.
Iâve got to get ready to perform our Christmas Cantata tonight at
church so Iâll have to send you some links later on tonight. In the
meantime search for âGrant Searle Multicompâ to begin to see what the whole
system is like. One individual put the whole system together using various
readymade PCBs from ebay and jumper wires. It was pretty cool! Ah shucks,
I had to get you at least one link to wet you appetite good!
http://searle.hostei.com/grant/Multicomp/
Here is the link to purchase James PCB.
http://www.smarthome.jigsy.com/fpga
And finally here is a link on ebay to get the FPGA PCB along with the
programmer required to bring it up and running!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15
If the lines get split up, just highlight the whole thing in the email
message, copy it and paste it into your browser or just click on it. I
hope you have as much fun as I have! Take care my friend and Welcome to
the N8VEM Project!
Kip Koon
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Kip_Koon
Behalf Of *Marcelo Dantas
*Sent:* Sunday, December 07, 2014 10:16 AM
*Subject:* [N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need
first steps
Hi there,
I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my
lab, after working for some time on my emulator (
http://runcpm.blogspot.com/).
After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project,
which looks very interesting to me.
. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor
. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD
card would be the CP/M disk)
. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA
monitor or keyboard
. 64K ram
This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more
complicated part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat
filesystem) SD card.
I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure
showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone
already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have
a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).
Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an
emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
Groups "N8VEM" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
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Tom Lafleur

2014-12-15 03:19:04 UTC

Permalink

As a guide line, depending on your junk box, on average the board cost $50 to $125 each to build.

~~ _/) ~~~~ _/) ~~~~ _/) ~~~~ _/) ~~

On Dec 14, 2014, at 7:01 PM, Marcelo Dantas <***@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Sergey,

Couple quick questions:

. Can I buy the boards already populated/tested/working? (or boards+parts for me to put together?)
. What about pricing, I want to know if it would fit my budget.

(PM me if needed)

Cheers,
Marcelo.

Post by Sergey
Hi Marcelo,
You'll be surprised, but 3.5" floppies are still being sold (at Amazon for example). :-)
It uses CP/M filesystem. If I recall correctly the default RomWBW divides SD card into 4 partitions 2 GB each. It doesn't use a partition table. It just uses first 2 GB for the first partition, next 2 GB for the second partition, and so on.
Yes, it can boot from an SD card. It can also boot from flash ROM, and it is quite possible to have a diskless system using a ROM disk for CP/M and some utilities and a RAM disk.
Thanks,
Sergey

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Hi Sergey,
Indeed, the FPGA approach looks like an awesome practical environment for playing with emulation, but is still an emulation. I already got it running on a Cyclone IV I have in my lab.
The Z180 is not a "real" Z80 per se, but is still interesting for seeing performance and lots of memory.
From your suggestions the Zeta with the daughterboard definitely catched my eye. I could use the 3-1/2 floppy drive I have here (not sure where I would find floppies though, lol).
How does it deal with the SD card? Does it use it as a CP/M filesystem, or is it FAT?
Can it boot straight from the SD and eliminate the need for the floppy?
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.

Post by John Coffman
Marcelo,
Since you've asked about "a real Z80 processor" you can give N8VEM SBC V2 or Zeta SBC a try; or SBC Z180 Mark IV if you don't mind using Z8S180 instead if Z80 (they are software-compatible).

Post by Marcelo Dantas
Wow!!! You guys just killed my free time for the next few days ... :)
Thanks a lot for the guidance, I believe I can go from here.
Happy holidays,
Marcelo.

Post by Kip Koon
Hi Marcelo!
Have you heard of Grant Searleâs Multicomp Microcomputer yet? It uses an inexpensive FPGA Mini-Development PCB and James Moxhamâs PCB implementation of Grantâs Multicomp design to fully implement and run from an SD Card CP/M 2.2, CP/M 3.0 AND MP/M II v2.1 all from the same SD Card! It is awesome to behold! Max Scane also contributed a bunch to the project adapting CP/M 3.0 and MP/M to run on the Multicomp platform combining them with CP/M 2.2. He also probably helped with adapting Grantâs VHDL code to the larger ram chip as well.
From what little you have said, this might just be right up your alley. Take a look at my Cocopedia Wiki page below for some of my experiences with the Multicomp project. So far, I have ended up building 6 of these babies! Wow! When I first started this Multicomp project, I never dreamed Iâd get this far with it, but James kept updating his Multicomp PCB so I kept getting the latest version. Now I have little Multicomps running around everywhere! :P
There are a bunch of people on the N8VEM list who are involved in the Multicomp project as well. The 2 PCB combo is so small I can hold it in my hand! I have 16 â 8MB drives available to CP/M 2.2 each with 16 users! Wow! Now I can finally study C programming like they used to do way back when microcomputers were young and costly without having to layout thousands of dollars for a full S-100 system! I really love this stuff! Feel free to ask questions. If you are interested, James has a finished PCB available for $12 + shipping I think. Itâs been a little while since I purchased one.
Iâve got to get ready to perform our Christmas Cantata tonight at church so Iâll have to send you some links later on tonight. In the meantime search for âGrant Searle Multicompâ to begin to see what the whole system is like. One individual put the whole system together using various readymade PCBs from ebay and jumper wires. It was pretty cool! Ah shucks, I had to get you at least one link to wet you appetite good!
http://searle.hostei.com/grant/Multicomp/
Here is the link to purchase James PCB.
http://www.smarthome.jigsy.com/fpga
And finally here is a link on ebay to get the FPGA PCB along with the programmer required to bring it up and running!
http://www.ebay.com/sch/Computers-Tablets-Networking-/58058/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=ep2c5t144+fpga&_sop=15
If the lines get split up, just highlight the whole thing in the email message, copy it and paste it into your browser or just click on it. I hope you have as much fun as I have! Take care my friend and Welcome to the N8VEM Project!
Kip Koon
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Kip_Koon
Sent: Sunday, December 07, 2014 10:16 AM
Subject: [N8VEM: 19031] Long time CP/M user, N8VEM newbie, need first steps
Hi there,
I have finally decided to pursue a physical mean to run CP/M on my lab, after working for some time on my emulator (http://runcpm.blogspot.com/).
After doing some quick google search I have found the N8VEM project, which looks very interesting to me.
. Run CP/M on a real Z80 processor
. Have the programs (not disk images) loaded on a SD card (the SD card would be the CP/M disk)
. Serial port to my laptop would be the console, no need of VGA monitor or keyboard
. 64K ram
This is a very minimalistic project I guess. Maybe the more complicated part would be to have the CP/M apps loaded from a (fat filesystem) SD card.
I am wondering if someone could point me to a step-by-step procedure showing which are the boards I need to buy (populated or not), if someone already did this before and if the SD card part is even possible (I do have a 3-1/2 floppy disk somewhere, but a SD card would be a plus).
Right now I am working on doing this from an Arduino DUE, but it is an emulation of the Z80, I want to do it with dome real hardware.
Thanks a lot,
Marcelo.
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "N8VEM" group.
Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/n8vem.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

Sergey

2014-12-16 16:21:25 UTC

Permalink

Marcelo,

PCBs normally cost $20 each + shipping. Todd Goodman distributes these
PCBs. Parts cost for Zeta SBC is about $80 for new parts. It might be
cheaper if you already have some parts or get older parts (eBay, some
on-line stores). Parts cost for ParPortProp is about $20.

I haven't seen anyone selling complete Zeta systems. They are not difficult
to build (all through hole parts, with exception of SD card socket on
ParPortProp). Or maybe someone on this list can help you with building it.

Thanks,
Sergey