Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

1.70 Mhz 8-Bit Ataris Get 10 Mbit Ethernet

Posted by simoniker on from the next-up-firewire dept.

point writes "Thanks to Chris Martin, 8-bit Atari power users can now enjoy 10 Mbit Ethernet, something that the Commodore 64 crowd have been able to do for over a year now... Time to pick up that age-old flamewar? An Ethernet-enabled Atari port of the Contiki operating system has already been completed, and brings the Atari users telnet, e-mail, a web server and a web browser. Pictures and schematics for the Ethernet card, as well as screenshots of the system in action on an Atari 800 are available from the project's webpage."

7 of 208 comments (clear)

  1. Re:C64 die-hard alert by runderwo · · Score: 2, Informative

    Huh? There was a hard drive for 8-bit Atari machines too. Logically enough, it connected to the joystick port.

    --
    LRC, the best-read libertarian site on the web
  2. Re:Yet Contiki for NES still doesn't have com supp by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Yeah, that would be cool. The easiest solution we've been able to come up with for communication would run through the controller port to a host program on the PC. There's posts about it on the nesdev.parodius.com forums. But I'm not sure if that can work with Contiki, maybe it can somehow?

    I'd like to find out. I've got the commucication schematic already, it just needs to be tested. My kingdom for a devcart! heheh.

    If anyone has any ideas, or is just interested, feel free to stop by the NES hardware forum.

    -Memblers

  3. Not perfect yet by Martigan80 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Current Status:
    # Compiling: Contiki, UIP, CS8900A driver, Telnet, Email, Web Browser.
    # The Telnet only version works under SpartaDOS.
    # Pings work, but many packets dropped.
    # Telnet works, but looses connection.

    So there is still a way to go. They have a work in progress but are not fully up.

    --
    This SIG pulled due to lack of funding. (This damn war is costing too much!)
  4. Re:1.70 Mhz?? by Thowllly · · Score: 2, Informative

    No, it was clocked at 1.79Mhz (half the NTSC color carrier frequency). The the 6510 in the C64 was clocked at 1Mhz.

  5. Re:Cool! by spektr · · Score: 2, Informative

    Download the remix here

  6. STOP THINKING INTEL! by SharpFang · · Score: 2, Informative


    Do you know Amiga 1200 with 12MHZ CPU - from user's feel side of view - felt WAY faster than 486/80MHZ with twice as much RAM?

    Why? Better architecture. Not only CPU but whole computer. I can imagine employing the gfx chipset for such a work. It can move data between ports and memory at amazing (comparing to the CPU) speeds, fill large areas of memory with specific values, move memory areas etc. Without taking CPU time and without even the CPU waiting (so CPU may do its own stuff while GFX chipset does its own.

    Let's make a very rough count...

    10Mbps with traffic overhead of Ethernet etc (all that is stripped on hardware) is about 1 Mbyte/s. With 64K of RAM, it's about 0.064s to fill whole RAM. Assume screen frequency of 50HZ, gives 0.02s/frame. Transfer of 20K/frame required. For the CPU - way too much. For ANTIC (the gfx chip) - acceptable amounts I think...

    --
    45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
  7. Re:I'm Sorry, but ... by Jennifer+E.+Elaan · · Score: 2, Informative
    All very good reasons. Those of us who do a lot of embedded development also do it for learning purposes. An old 8-bit machine from the '80s is a lot easier to debug than a modern 8-bit microcontroller (more interactivity, easier to place probes in the hardware, etc), while simultaneously having the same limitations.

    Chances are, if you can cram contiki onto an Atari or C64, you can get a TCP/IP stack into an embedded controller of some sort.

    --

    Hardware, software, and blinking lights!