[Coco] COCO FPGA

[Aaron Wolfe]

On Sat, Dec 24, 2011 at 3:17 PM, Mark McDougall <msmcdoug at iinet.net.au> wrote:
> On 24/12/2011 7:33 PM, Aaron Wolfe wrote:
>>
>> On Sat, Dec 24, 2011 at 3:17 AM, Mark McDougall<msmcdoug at iinet.net.au>
>>  wrote:
>>
>> On the CoCo3FPGA, DriveWire *does* work with software that accesses
>> the hardware directly, because the CoCo doesn't know it's using
>> DriveWire.  The stock DECB rom is running and talking to what it
>> believes is a stock FDC.
>
>
> Oh, I stand corrected then. I'm getting confused then, maybe with the DW ROM
> in Coco3FPGA? I know there's some incompatability there, somewhere?!?
>

No DW ROM in CoCo3FPGA.. you use stock CoCo roms.

>
>> Funny enough, any storage option that did use the SD card would
>> probably not be so compatible, just as any of the hard drive/flash
>> storage options available to a real coco are not so compatible.
>
>
> The idea behind SD is to hang it off the back end of a WD17XX emulation, so
> it would be 100% compatible. Otherwise, yes, IDE isn't exactly stock either,
> but given the long-ago availability of those options (like SuperIDE) I
> personally consider it 'real'. Feel free to differ in opinion though.
>

This is exactly what CoCo3FPGA does with DriveWire now.   It sounds
like Gary will do that somehow to the SD card as well.  I incorrectly
assumed he would implement it in the fashion of all the actual hard
drive controllers available on the CoCo, which all have exactly the
same incompatibility issues on a real CoCo that you ascribe to
DriveWire :)

Some people just don't like hooking up to a PC.  I get that.  But
given that DriveWire on the FPGA is actually *more* compatible with
software than it is on a real coco, and even on a real coco is it
exactly as compatible as any other storage controller except the stock
FDD...  i really don't see the compatibility issue being very
applicable.

>
> Regards,
>
> --
> |              Mark McDougall                | "Electrical Engineers do it
> |  <http://members.iinet.net.au/~msmcdoug>   |   with less resistance!"
>
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