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So what's in the firmware for this thing? I can guess, based on the operation--and having done one myself, but it'd be nice to get the firmware from the unit itself.

So, there's that header near the power pins that I was talking about. I've identified the connections to the MCU USART and noted from that there's a serial boot utility that's present in the chip. All that's needed is a level converter for 3.3V logic to RS232C and a terminal emulator running on a PC (I really like ...

Okay, time to test this thing and see what's up.

As mentioned earlier, this thing comes with a mini-CD--but don't expect much. You get English and Chinese versions of the somewhat cryptic manual and a couple of software programs in RAR archives.

No installation routines; you have to figure that out all by yourself. No wonder they don't sell many of these.

The format is fixed at 18 512-byte sectors per track on 80 tracks, with sectors numbered from 1 to ...

On a whim, I picked up a GoTek 3.5" 1.44M floppy emulator from eBay for just under USD$29 shipped.

It arrived in a padded mailing envelope with a "China Post" shipping label. Inside, inside of a plastic bag was a "mini" CD and the GoTek unit with a couple of mounting screws.

Here's a top view of the GoTek next to a traditional (NEC) 3.5" 1.44M drive:

Attachment 11542

Here's what the front looks ...

Part 12 of this series is here. The beginning of this series is here.

Cloning the Trantor T130B ROM PAL, continued.

In the preceding entry, we've discovered that simply reading and crunching the original PAL results in impossible garbage. In particular, nothing appears to be happening with the output on pin 13. So, let's pull out the datasheets and continuity tracer and see what gives.

The controller chip on this board is an NCR 53C400. The datasheet ...

Attached Files

• T130B.ZIP (525 Bytes, 575 views)

Part 11 is here. The beginning of this series is here.

This part of this thread is dedicated to the memory of the late Don Maslin, who never did figure out how to get his T130B to boot. We've solved it, Don!

There are probably more Trantor T130B SCSI adapters floating around than any other 8-bit ISA card, save perhaps, for the Seagate ST-01. Most of them were sold with SCSI CD-ROM drives or SCSI tape drives and lack not only the boot ROM, but also U6, a PAL that ...