AZ controller for PDP-11 QBUS verison Опции

[SuperMax]

Us developed a pseudo disk controller on MicroSD

This controller is intended for modern and reliable replacement of KZD (DW) in computers of the DVK-1 series; DVK-2; DVK-3; DVK-4; Electronics-60; Electronics 60M; Slavutich PC-1 and similar PDP-11 compatible.

Photo of the controllers:
from above - for QBUS
from below - for MPI BUS (soviet clone QBUS but of a different size):



Photo of the controller QBUS with a network card



Specifications:

Emulation of 8 disks with a volume of 65534 blocks for the correct operation of RT-11; thus the total usable storage capacity is 262136K;
The controller supports MicroSD- and MicroSDHC; SDXC cards are not supported by our device;
The ability to install 2 controllers with different addresses is supported;

Connecting the controller to the network
AZ series controllers for DVK UKNTs, etc. have the ability to connect an external network adapter via SPI interface based on ENC28J60
This Ethernet network adapter allows the controller to be connected to the network at a speed of up to 10Mbit.

To connect you need:
- 10pin connecting cable with IDC connectors, no longer than 20cm.
- Etherent network adapter based on ENC28J60
- network Ethernet cable
- a router or other device / service that distributes an address via DHCP

Desirable
- presence of an NTP server in the network

A ready-made 10pin module based on ENC28J60 is used as a network card
connected by a 10-core loop with IDC 2x5 connectors


User's manual
The proposed controller emulates up to eight AZ disk devices on one microSD card. Each emulated disk (pseudo-disk) is represented on the card by a file from the PC's point of view, so there are no questions about placing pseudo-disks on a large storage device - just place the card in the card reader, connect it to the PC, copy files of the required size (and with the required content) to the card , move it to the controller, and that's it! Moreover, after working with the card on the DVK, you can remove it from the controller, put it back in the card reader and copy the generated disk image file to a PC, where you can work with them by any means - for example, connect to an emulator, archive it and put it somewhere on storage, send to conference, etc. It is also not difficult to copy some material found on the network to a card, rearrange it into a controller and use this material at PDP-11.

The controller occupies addresses 177220-177226 on the IPI (word, byte access is prohibited). 177220 - command and status register (RKS, CSR), 177222 - data register, 177224 and 177226 - registers (one-word ROM) bootloaders.

The controller supports MicroSD and MicroSDHC cards. We tested SDHC cards from different manufacturers and sizes, the difference was only in the write speed to a pseudo disk. We barely managed to find an ancient micro-SD (not HC) at 512M, yes, it writes slowly, but it works and the reading speed is almost the same as that of SDHC. SDXC cards are not supported by our device.

Transfer the image files AZ0-AZ7 to the MicroSD card. These are AZ000.DSK files - AZ007.DSK. Insert the card into the slot on the controller until it clicks.

Turn on your computer. Most likely, the screen will display 6 octal digits and, in the next line, the "@" icon, the cursor will blink next to it. This is a signal that the processor is in Halt-Mode and is awaiting a remote command from you.

Let's serve it. The command is like this:

177226G

This is an instruction to the processor to start executing the program from address 177226. This address contains the one-word ROM of the OS startup program from the AZ0 disk. RT-11 should start. After that, you can reboot from any other disk with the BO AZx command:
you can also use the full address command:

177777226G

There is an alternative command - start from the address 177224, i.e. 177224G. So far, its action is exactly the same as that of the main launch command, but some changes are planned further, in particular, one of them will simply start the OS from AZ0, and the second will ask which disk to boot from.

The size of each of the disks (files from the PC point of view) must be strictly 32767K (65534 blocks), so the total capacity of the drive will be 262136K. In the next new version of the firmware, a change of disks (file-images) will be added directly from RT-11, with a special program, then on the micro-SD it will be possible to have as many file-images as it will fit, however, only 8 of them will be available at the same time, those. 262136K, this is the RT-11 limitation.

It is possible to install two controllers, for this, an alternative set of controller addresses is provided, switching is performed by DIP switch # 1 on the controller board. The main set of addresses (177220-177226) is effective when this switch is off, the alternative (177200-177206) is effective when this switch is on. The rest of the switches are reserved for further functionality expansion.


Product development prospects
This controller is equipped with a powerful enough STM32F407VET6 microcontroller, which allows you to implement the expansion of the controller's capabilities without changing the hardware platform.

Accordingly, I will designate an approximate set of functionality for development:

1. realize the network connection using an external network card based on ENC28J60 [implemented]
1.1 connection will allow you to remotely access data on the SD card - that will be FTP server WEBDAV server [implemented]
through which it will be possible to change information on the disk remotely [implemented]
1.2 FTP server WEBDAV server will provide access at the level of FS RT11 itself [implemented]
1.3 Firmware update via the Internet
1.4 Managing network settings via ini file

2. Development of the functionality of mounting images through an ini file
2.1 Mounting images via SET AZ command
2.2 Mounting images on SMB / NFS-share
2.3 Expanding Supported Disks for RSX-11 Operation
2.4 Update via SD card image
2.5 External loader, those user code that is downloaded into the machine and launched (convenient for developing your extensions based on AZ - for example, the boot menu)

3. Clock

4. Development of the AZX.SYS driver for the XM monitor [implemented]

5. Development of a driver for RSX

Contacts:
If you have any questions, you can ask them by writing us a letter to radioshop@maxiol.com

[SuperMax]

How do I purchase a controller?
writing us a letter to radioshop@maxiol.com