[Coco] The Definitive Post on the CC-Five ;)

[jdaggett at gate.net]

On 29 Jan 2007 at 2:49, farna at att.net wrote:

> I understand completely! The spec/design document can be used for both
> emulator and FPGA work. I bet there are a lot of CC3 programmers that
> would love to have it for the existing software as well! 
> 
******************

For my personal needs of such a board, it would have to be software compatible 
with the COCO3. First off so that any hardware debugging can be made far easier 
than trying to go off on a tangent. Also where I live I am cramped for space. So 
another PC case and keyboard and monitor is not an ideal situation. Also I want 
some software that I am writing in DECB to work on the new board. 

> No matter what you do, it would be nice to make the emulator and an
> upgraded FPGA machine software compatible. Wouldn't help hardware, but
> would certainly help on the software front! 
> 
> Someone mentioned that having a machine that was distinct from a PC
> was a plus. I agree, but I'm practical enough to know it just may not
> be feasible. But there are ways around that while still taking
> advantage of the ubiquity of PC hardware. There are micro ATX boards
> (9.6" square), mini-ITX (6.7" square), nano-ITX (4.7" square), and
> PC104 (~3.75" square) form factor P-III (or equivalent) based boards.
> Any of these could be packaged to look significantly different. I
> suggest leaving packaging up to the user though -- the packaging is
> usually a major expense! If a board with integrated video is used,
> there's no need for any add-on cards. Since the limitations of the
> machine (virtual or FPGA) will be well below any PC video card
> capabilites with no need to even meet them (programming limitations in
> other areas would also limit video), what need is there for anything
> in an expansion slot? An integrated board will already have all
> necessary I/O. That would make packaging into a "different" case easy!
> I know you've all seen a lot of the custom PC mods now -- you can
> stick a modern PC board in anything! 
************

As I stated before size for me is important. I personally am learning towards the 
EPIC and PC104 combination. Where the main portion of the CPU hardware sits 
on a EPIC size board( ~4.5 x 6.5 inches) with the capability of stacking as many 
PC104 boards on top as needed. Can be either 8 or 16 bit ISA buss or use some 
version of our own.   

james