Question about USB on the minimig

[Doobrey]

@little,
 That won't work,those PIC's aren't USB host controllers.

[freqmax]

There got to be free room to store the associated USB driver code aswell. Besides the stuff that has to be there presently.

[techie]

So what can we conclude from all this?

1) That USB for classic gaming (i.e. USB joysticks and Mice in games only) is probably not going to happen without some sort of external adapter (Most likely in the form of USB to 9pin adapter) to do the work.

and 2) USB for a Harddrive/Flashdrive based MiniMig running AmigaOS is possible but impractical :-(

Does that about sum things up :-?

[dammy]

Last I heard the compatibility was for user level code only. Supervisor side is totally different beast.

Plus even the user level side isn't 100% compatible.

What if you took AROS ported it to Coldfire as Minimig-coldfire.  Could the user apps survive with that library for what's missing?

Dammy

[Gilloo]

techie wrote:
Sorry I'm probably just being Thick here but if this is the case then I have to ask; How does the Anaiis USB stack work then???  :-?
Because it claims to be working on a pretty much stock Amiga 2000 with ZorroII Highway USB and 68000 processor (7.14 Mhz).
(http://aminet.net/package/driver/other/anaiis)

Hello. As you see, I'm the author of this *fabulous* stack... ;-)
ANAIIS is nothing without the uhc124 die (TransDimension), and the help of Michael Boehmer (The conceptor of Subway and Highway).
This non-PCI die can easily manage transactions between the 68000 and the usb world. The only limitation of ANAIIS is the lack of isochronous support (can't use audio, video,...) but a simple 68000 can't manage interrupt each millisecond, and for my own usage, I don't use these peripherals on my 'miga: only hub, mouse, keyboard, printer. For games, it's better to use the original gameport. This stack seem to be closed and limited: normal still in dev, and I'have no time to improve it (maybe a Subway version will be available *soon*)!

On Minimig, it will be good to implement this kind of die (like uhc124, non PCI chip...), and map register with a PIC (or other way), to keep compatibility with original hardware.

[little]

The only limitation of ANAIIS is the lack of isochronous support (can't use audio, video,...) but a simple 68000 can't manage interrupt each millisecond,

Very interesting. Do you think that if the 68000 is overclocked to 28mhz (instead of the stock 7 Mhz) it would be feasible to support isochronous mode?

This chip seems pretty marvelous, more info here and here. IMHO is this is added to minimig 2.0 it would allow cd/dvd drives, hard drives, memory sticks, mouse, keyboard, printers, wifi connections, network connections, joysticks and maybe floppy drives (I have no idea if it is feasible to read amiga formatted and copy protected disks), albeit I have no idea if the PIC has enough memory to control the uhc124 and many drivers for amigaos would need to be written.

edit: The uhc124 is only $4.80 retail O_o;

[techie]

Gilloo wrote:

techie wrote:
Sorry I'm probably just being Thick here but if this is the case then I have to ask; How does the Anaiis USB stack work then???  :-?
Because it claims to be working on a pretty much stock Amiga 2000 with ZorroII Highway USB and 68000 processor (7.14 Mhz).
(http://aminet.net/package/driver/other/anaiis)

Hello. As you see, I'm the author of this *fabulous* stack... ;-)
ANAIIS is nothing without the uhc124 die (TransDimension), and the help of Michael Boehmer (The conceptor of Subway and Highway).
This non-PCI die can easily manage transactions between the 68000 and the usb world. The only limitation of ANAIIS is the lack of isochronous support (can't use audio, video,...) but a simple 68000 can't manage interrupt each millisecond, and for my own usage, I don't use these peripherals on my 'miga: only hub, mouse, keyboard, printer. For games, it's better to use the original gameport. This stack seem to be closed and limited: normal still in dev, and I'have no time to improve it (maybe a Subway version will be available *soon*)!

On Minimig, it will be good to implement this kind of die (like uhc124, non PCI chip...), and map register with a PIC (or other way), to keep compatibility with original hardware.

Thank you very much for your input :-)
So I guess the only hope for USB joysticks is if someone out there creates a USB to 9-Pin adapter but on the plus side at least it sound like USB mouse and keyboard support is feasible (if only from within Amiga OS).

[wolfchild]

I was toying with the idea whether it would make sense to put an ARM processor with USB master capability on the board.  

This could run software that is able to control a multitude of devices (USB mass storage, USB HID, USB imaging, etc), then map the device to the Amiga's official PCMCIA memory area.

If I'm not mistaken there were network cards, CD-ROMS, flash memories, serial ports and scanners for the A600/A1200 PCMCIA slot back in the old days, therefore drivers on the Amiga should be doable.

The Philips LPC2468 would seem to be up to the job as it's able to run uCLinux (which means ready made drivers for just about any USB peripheral).  This of course would mean  taking the Minimig to a whole new dimension, also as a very interesting tinkering platform for FPGA and MCU development.

What do you guys think?  Personally, I have a feeling that it would shift focus away from the Amiga in Minimig, but would enable relatively easy implementation of USB.

[little]

I was toying with the idea whether it would make sense to put an ARM processor with USB master capability on the board.

Would it be expensive?

[wolfchild]

Would it be expensive?

Depends on what is expensive to you.  If you look at the hardware alone, the processor by itself is around 15 USD.  It could replace the PIC micro and could also allow use of SDRAM instead of the present SRAM, thus not increasing the cost of the system by much, if at all.  You then need to add costs for connectors, ethernet + USB phy and other stuff.

On the other hand, minimig, as it is, already comes up to around 160 USD in parts alone.

I am not even considering the time frame to implement such a beast.  It would need people with various experiences in different fields (Linux, Amiga driver programming, Amiga hardware experts/hackers).