[Coco] Proto CoCo

[Phill Harvey-Smith]

Mike Pepe wrote:
> What techniques are you guys who do hardware stuff using for
> prototyping?
> 
> There aren't any nice CoCo-cart compatible prototyping boards
> anymore. I've been wire wrapping my projects, which works, but tends
> to get tedious.

Well, I set myself up to make my own PCBs, using the UV transfer method,
desing my board on the PC, print out on tracing paper, expose the board 
to UV (with a UV lightbox) through the image on the paper, then into a 
developer and then into an exch solution in a bubble tank. I have had 
pretty good results this way, even able to do surface mount stuff, 
though it is fiddly :)

This method did require a fair investment of cash, but I waid this 
against the cost of getting boards made by a boardhouse, and decided 
that in the long run doing it myself, was probably going to work out 
cheaper, plus you didn't have to wait for the board to be delivered :)

Plus it's more fun :) :)

> I bought Eagle a while ago and have yet to do anything useful with
> it.

Yes using Eagle here too, have had to make my own libraries for some of 
the old chips, and the CoCo/Dragon cart port etc, but these seem to work 
pretty well. I would reccomend Eagle, it may not be as easy to get into 
as some PCB cad packages but once you get your head round it's way of 
doing things it does seem much more natural.

> Just wondering what techniques and/or products are out there to help.
> I know Cloud9 somehow has nice plastic CoCo cart cases.

They do ? this is something I have been looking for I have made a couple 
of cart port boards, but don't have a case for them :) One of my current 
projects, is a multi-cart using a CPLD, and a large Flash ROM, to enable 
you to burn images of several CoCo/Dragon carts to the flash, and select 
at boot time which one you want (via a menu), I have this on a normal 
game cart sized board, but alas no cases for it at the mo :)

Cheers.

Phill.

-- 
Phill Harvey-Smith, Programmer, Hardware hacker, and general eccentric !

"You can twist perceptions, but reality won't budge" -- Rush.