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486 PC In 5 Cubic Inches?
[Dilbert] writes "I saw this first on ArsTechnica. The machine is a 486SX, fully SVGA compatible, 16 meg of ram, 2 16550A serial ports, hda = 16 meg flash, hdb = 340 meg IBM microdrive. Oh yeah, also built-in 10T ethernet, a floppy header, and parallel port. Granted, most of the ports are brought off the main unit via a 68-pin scsi-style cable to a little port board, but the meat of the machine is still tiny.
The manufacturer is Tiqit Computers." Don't lose it in your couch ;)
A quick flip thru a mag like Circuit Cellar reveals several embedded pc's like this one or, hey, this one is sporting a Penguin logo - what's sweet (and expensive) about the unit here is is the 340Mb microdrive.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Depends entirely on the application. Any project where space, power and weight are heavily constrained are potential targets. I thought of a couple: including one of those experimental electric car projects that you find at universities. Data collection and control would be good uses. A 486 is plenty fast enough if you're not running Windows, but finding that much processor horsepower that runs on a total of 7.5 watts is difficult.
How much power does your Athlon chip dissapate?
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
The problem with it is that it isn't really that much smaller than the much more powerful SaintSong Expresso. The Expresso is packaged into a nice little walkman-sized box, uses Socket 370 so you can put in Celerons or PIII's at 466 or 500MHz, standard SO-DIMMs so you can put up to 256M into it, and laptop style IDE drives so you can get it with up to an 18G drive. It uses the Intel i810 chipset with included SVGA video (including S-Video outs), integrated sound, UDB and PS2 style keyboard and mouse ports. I've seen one running Linux, and it works pretty well. One of the few bad things about it I can think of is that it doesn't include on-board Ethernet, so you have to use a UDB->Ethernet adapter. You can get a little 'docking station' for it that includes a floppy drive and either a CD-ROM drive or a DVD-ROM. Using the S-Video out, you can use it as a very compact DVD player.
All that, and it isn't significantly more expensive than the little 486SX machine. If memory serves, we paid around $2000 for an Expresso with 500MHz Celeron, 128M RAM, 18G hard drive and the CD-ROM docking station.
Yes, I've seen one running Linux no less. Its a nice little box. You can find the manufacturer's page at:
http://www.saintsong.com.tw
Looks like the prices have come down a little since the one I've seen was purchased as well.
There are lots of better and cheaper alternatives out there, depending on your needs. You can get yourself a laptop. Or you can build something around a PC-104 or SBC system. Or you can buy a WinCE machine (e.g., the Compaq iPAQ) and install Linux on it.
Don't forget the Dragonball processor used in Palm compatibles is a modified 68K.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
The problem is it is more expensive than, and significantly less powerful than, but only slightly smaller than the SaintSong Expresso. The Expresso has also been around for at least a couple of months. I've seen both products, and the Expresso is much more of a polished product, as it comes in a nice walkman-ish package whereas the 486SX based box mentioned in this article is basically a bare board.
http://www.saintsong.com.tw
Bigger and faster isn't always better. While I'm not necessarily lining up to go buy one of these 486s, I have to point out that there's a niche for small, reasonably powerful and LOW ENERGY CONSUMPTION machines. What you describe is small and quite powerful, but it WILL NOT RUN on 7.5 watts.
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
There are still plenty of embedded systems computers that use 8088, 286, 386, 486, and Pentium Processors.
BTW, I think this is damn cool. I just wish things like this were cheaper.
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I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
Repeat story....we've already seen it, i believe the story was last titled something about matchbox size computers.
Isn't that a bit personal?
Yes, for a mere US$1,495.00 you too can own a slow, limited computer that you're likely to sit on, lose in your briefcase, or have your dog eat. Spiffy.
I do have to admit that it's a great design, with lots of potential. PDA's will never be the same - nor will beepers, cell phones, etc. Just put a small projector or LCD screen on the thing, and you've got yourself a backpack (or belt-clip) computer. WONDERFUL. I LOVE it.
But COME ON... for US$1,495.00?!? I'd rather pay an extra $200 and get the OTHER really small computer.
Mr. Ska
It's not an Intel 486 - they seem to be using the AMD Elan, a very neat piece of hardware that integrates just about everything onto the CPU. (I believe it's also used on the Morphy One.
There are gobs of stories here in slashdot about open designs like these. Problem is that 99.9% of all slashdot readers cannot manufacture the devices (6-8 level circut boards, SMT soldering station/rework station, SMT skills.... etc...
It could be done at home if you had about $1.2 million (US)dollars worth of tools. (This is new price, you might be able to find used tools for around $400,000 to $600,000 (again USD) A friend of mine has a basic rework iron (Tweezers for resistors/caps/coils) that cost him $650.00 the IR rework station he uses at work costs $5000.00 and that is without the special concetrator/iris to keep from frying the other components.
No, you will not build one of these. Hell I have access to the special tools and I cant. (The multi layer board is impossible at "home")
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I am not sure how much power it consumes, however, the AC adapter (the unit uses 15V DC input) is rated at 45VA max, which would be approximately 35 watts. Since that also powers the docking station (floppy and CD-ROM) when that is plugged in, I would expect the main unit to draw considerably less than that, but I have no idea what that amount would actually be.
While I won't dispute that there might be a niche for the 486 machines where power consumption is extremely critical, I would think it is pretty small, especially when the price and performance of the Expresso is so much better.
My personal favorite for embedded computers is Advantech. For instance, the PCM-5820 is a 3.5" SBC (It takes up about as much X and Z space (laid flat) as a floppy drive, and it's about half as thick.) I know, Cyrix sucks, but it is a fairly low power pentium-class chip. A cabling kit will cost you another $100 or so, and it has ethernet and (AC97) audio.
If you want to move up into the big time, then they also have SBCs which are 5.25", IE, same X and Z space as a CDROM or something. It goes all the way up to the PCM-9574 which takes a socket 370 Pentium III, and as it says, "The PCM-9574 is an all-in-one Pentium® III processor single board computer (SBC) with a 2x AGP LCD controller, Audio interface, PCI Fast Ethernet interface and one PCI expansion slot." Using a right-angle PCI riser card, you can add one or two PCI half-length cards sitting just above the motherboard and taking up a very economical amount of space.
By the way, competing in about the same market as the machine this article is about, Their CPC-2245/N is the same size as a 2.5" hard drive. I don't know what advantech's fetish is with making PCs the size of storage devices, but I guess that's not real important.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Unfortunately, a 66MHz 486-equivalent won't play back MP3s without skipping something awful, unless you knock the bitrate way down and use only mono. (Believe me, I've tried it.) :(
Heavens no!! It can't be. It mustn't be. The 486 was the last 'non-disposable' chip Intel made. They didn't really get onto the Microsoft 'upgrade spiral' marketting model until the Pentium - when they put more effort into backwards compatibility than into progress.
Motorola's 68000 is still out there. Not in Macs but in Sega Genesis machines. It's in A/C's and stereos and all sorts of household electronics. The Zilog Z80 (remember that one?) is still produced. In fact, one is probably looking over your ABS and airbag controls right now... Now, I don't know if I'd trust an Intel CPU (non-embedded that is; their embedded chips are fine) with life or limb, but there's plenty of room for it. Consumer electronics. A dedicated compression processor for digital telephony, HDTV, or a dedicated firewall box to go with your cable modem.
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
Get the Dakota Scout 4-port KVM. It's about US$120 or UKP120 though cables are extra.
I have one and it's brilliant; it requires no external power, you can control it easily from the keyboard and you can run your display at 1600x1200 at high refresh rates with no loss of clarity. I could almost swear that mouse response is cleaner and snappier too.
The case of the unit is a little flimsy, but apart from that I have not found any other weak points in this product. It seems just perfect really.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
Nah. Better off just to port a fuel injection system from something more modern onto your vintage car.
I've got a 1974 Plymouth Valiant Brougham with a Slant-6. I've got most of the EFI system from a 1995 Jeep Cherokee with a 4.0L engine, and I'm well along the path towards getting it running.
The only part that I anticipate real trouble with, is actually recalibrating how the computer reads the mass airflow sensor, since at a given engine speed and throttle position, the slightly smaller Slant-6 won't inhale quite as much air... :)
For troubleshooting, just use a diagnostic cable (available from the dealer) and a notebook computer.
Why build it, when it's already done for you?
No, wait, I'm just asking for something else to break down on my car.Heheheheh... You are, after all, talking about British cars. Probably no matter how badly you kludge any additions together, they'll probably still be more robust and reliable than Lucas Electrics.
Here's a thought, if you're handy, your car troubles you, and originality isn't an issue: Rewire it. It's not that tough.
Figure out how to mount a 1980 or so GM alternator onto your engine. They're great, and the American/Canadian GM alternators have built in regulators. Literally, run the positive lead to the battery, and it works. Run another lead to a lightbulb on the dashboard and you'll know when it doesn't work.
GM also had the best distributors at about that time, and I know that there are mounting kits out there that will let you use the GM HEI system on almost all American engines, as well as many imports (VW Beetle, Volvo, etc). Drop the distributor into the engine, connect the spark plug leads, run a wire from the B pin on the bottom of the distributor cap to the positive terminal on the battery, and it will work. (Add an ignition switch in there somewhere for practicality.)
I'd reserve that little 486 for running the large LED sign that you could build right into the trunklid, across the back of your car, telling people to get off your tail when they get too close. I wonder how it would feel to drill holes for a 16 x 160 LED matrix into my trunk...
<grin>
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
Nope, he was right. A Pentium 60 does a work unit in less than half the time of a 486DX4/100. I have one right behind doing nothing but crunching SETI (and occasionally acting as a storage system), and it definitely takes 100-150 hours per unit.
Ok, or I could purchase a PC/104 (486/66) card, a flashdisk (for the kernel), and a ethernet card, hook up a floppy drive to burn a image of the Distro (find a nice tiny linux distro with IP stack that fits on a floppy), immediately mount a partition from another linux box, download and uncompress my target application onto the flashdisk. Unmount the drive, drop TCP/IP support and run my application. Periodically, the system brings itself back onto the network and dumps data to the fileserver and looks for updated scripts and code. Total hardware cost is well under $750 if you buy these in enough bulk.
What would I do with these you ask? Everything from motor control (for an additional $200 bucks) to some small data aquisition and processing (up to $500 bucks if you want something real special), perhaps some RS-485 communications ($200 bucks) to specialized hardware.
Regardless, I can build a whole system which has a lot of functionality for a whole hellova lot cheaper. No I don't get dazzling graphics and/or performance, but if you're purchasing a 486, thats probably not what you're looking for.
Could I do this with Windows CE? Honestly I don't know... I've never used it, I don't know what the code-bloat is like for it.
a system like this is probably 3.5x4x3 (with cabling) excluding a power supply... which you can work around on many apps... I can fit this in a whole lotta places.
For my apps, a G4 would be like using a 50lb sledge hammer when I'm looking for a jewlers hammer.
You say you want a revolution?
People have been talking about putting a web node in every major appliance- vending machine, atm, car, refrigerator. When a full-featured computer becomes small and cheap, this is possible. The web protocol is not the best, but is is standard and cheap.
And this bit of their terms of sale is such bullshit...
Applicable Laws; Not for Resale. You agree to comply with all applicable laws and regulations of the various states and of the United States. You agree and represent that you are buying for your own personal or internal use only, and not for resale.
I thought US law had the 'right of first sale'?
I wonder if this could qualify as a Seti Accelerator? Just hook it up inside your machine and let it go.
;-)
A 486 should be able to finish a unit in about a day right?
Wiwi
Wiwi
"I trust in my abilities,
Wiwi
"I trust in my abilities,
but I want more then they offer"
Cool, I could put this in my primitive Triumph and put in all sorts of neat-o diagnostic equipment. I could type in commands like "tune -l /dev/carburettor" or run top to see how the vital stats of the engine, temprature and other things are doing. No, wait, I'm just asking for something else to break down on my car.
Quite sadly, my school, for all the computers it does have, it doesn't have a single CS AP course. The theory is that not enough students are interested to hire even a part time CS teacher. I'd try to convince them otherwise, but I'll be gone before they will be able to act.
The school gets grants (usually around election time) for the new computers it uses to teach. These grants already pay for new computers and the people required to install them. These systems come configured and customized to fit the school's needs, without bothering with 300 non-standard systems that rarely arrive in working order. The school doesn't get any grants to pull old systems out of storage and try to get them all to work they way we need them to. In the end, it is more expensive for the school to try and implement donated systems than it is to accept government grants for new ones.
Sure, it would be more a efficient use of tax dollars just to take those old ones out, but the school isn't concerned with that. Sure, a 486 could be used for most classroom purposes (and in some cases they are; most of the classrooms without new computers already have old ones), but so can an iMac, so we might as well use the newer option while we have it.
We don't need new computers. We don't need computers at all. But they're here, we've got 'em, and what's wrong with using them? Why should we be forced to use the random 386 you finally decided to dispose of, when the politicians feel like throwing money at kids?
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Fresno Unified School District.
Good luck.
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I do computer work for my local public school, and I can tell you that at least here, we have way too many 386s and 486s. Some company decides it'll be a nice tax write off and our school becomes a giant storage bin for computers no one wants. Occaisionally, we ship as many as we can off to "less fortunate" schools, but frankly the things are too slow and too old to be worth the time and effort required to implement them in a classroom setting. Why bother explaining to the students and teachers how to use an antiquated system that will be gone as soon as the school gets more money?
We got a rather large "Digital Highschool" grant a while back, specifically devoted to buying new computers. With it, the school bought enough computers to fill at least two new computer labs that I can recollect (one group of 300mhz PCs for a computer-literacy/typing class and one set of iMacs for the library), and when I last left they were planning more new purchases. The science department specifically got some sort of grant that paid for two roaming sets of iBooks to share amongst several classes.
All this money and all these new computers, and about 200-300 486 or older PCs sitting around in various storage rooms waiting to be shuffled off to some place else while they just get older. The school can't sell them because no one wants them and it can't throw them away because someone thinks they're more valuable than they really are.
So, when you donate that old clunky 486 and think it's going to be used, think again. The school doesn't have the time or the money to homogenize and install 300 old computers that were sitting in someone's closet. If you really want to help the school out, sell the computer at a garage sale and donate the money.
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No, it's $1500 for a REALLY TINY, REALLY LOW POWER 486. Don't compare it to running down to your local screwdriver shop and buying a $100 motherboard and a $75 Celeron, because you're talking two entirely different critters here.
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
why?
Dallas is giving away their OS, apps, docs, schematics, and source for free from their site.
I'm surprised that the TINI never made it on Slashdot before. Who cares about 486-that-fits-in-my-pants-and-costs-as-much-as-a-P C systems when you can do just about the same for much less? Sure, it's neat-o and geekworthy that it could be done, but is it practical?
Gentle Slashdot authors, there's a "Search" button at the bottom of each Slasdot page. Please use it.
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The way we're SUPPOSED to do things, connecting to the internet with a home system needs 3 more service boxen.
1: A firewall, running nothing else.
2: A box on a DMZ, for any services you want to offer for incoming connections, perhaps SSH for yourself, at the very least.
3: A dedicated logging box.
Plus a fourth box, if you want proxies or the like. I also find mod_roaming and a local IMAP server handy if the desktop is dual boot. Maybe these could be safely be put on Box 2, above, but a purist would probably say not.
This is a lot of boxes, even if old 486's are cheap. It's starting to run into a lot of floor space and electricity. I like the idea of these tiny computers for this role. All 4 desired computers should be able to be packed into the space of one regular sized unit.
Too bad the subject system costs $1500.
Is there anything fairly small, but very cheap? I keep seeing talk of 1U rack mount cases, but those are pretty pricey, themselves.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
I spent some time with these two modules - the JumpTec PC and Ethernet/Video combo. It looks like they spent a lot of time minimizing the board layouts so that they could drop the pins between them and plunk on a microdrive - very slick!
Yes, believe it or not, you CAN install Windows 95 on this thing - a friend of mine (who now works at M$, RIP) loaded it on ours and said it was the "cleanest install I've ever done". Who'd of thought? :)
http://www.tiqit.com/icons/plugged2.jpg is the great picture. The same as above, but enlarged about 2x.
Simple. They're summer re-runs.