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Balcones SASI cards Z-80, S-100, WD1002-05, BRAVO-110

bcc

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I stumbled onto this smaller card today that I have been searching for... for years...It's a small slice of my own history at Balcones Computer Corporation.

Z-80 daughter card to SASI-40-pin. (To me it looks like this one had been installed into a Kaypro, (Balcones was also a Kaypro Dealer) but I know for a fact that we used it on Teletek Systemaster-1 S-100 cards as well for internal use.

Some headers, 244, 245 and a PAL, z-80 socket...caps, bare board, driver install? and done. This was the first iteration.

Geared toward the 40-pin WD1002-05 controller interface, (but 50 pins present... cut and splice as needed). (Balcones evaluated the Xebec SASI controller cards as well, but internally, WD was chosen for whatever reason...(price or technical muscle?) as the standard...(this continued into the PC's Ltd and Dell years as well).


The larger Balcones SASI S-100 card:

This is the card that made it possible to integrate an S-100 Single Board Computer system into a "Shoebox" system. It was referred to as the "Bravo-110" and allowed Balcones Computer Corporation to configure the Teletek single user Systemaster 1, Z-80A, 64K CP/M 2.2 and to interface to a WD1002-05 + a 3.5" ST-506 MFM style (Rodime) HD and 5.25" floppy drive.

Power could have been supplied to the S-100 card via a single free buss socket, so no S-100 expansion capability unless transferred to a BUS arrangement.

The goal here was cost reduction and footprint shrinkage pure and simple. Balcones needed a right angle as part of the mechanical solution.

I have also located the Balcones "short S-100 SASI Motherboard" version using the 40-pin alternate SASI interface cards which allow the Systemaster-1 to be plugged into the SASI interface card itself (as well as an additional S-100 card if desired). The interface card has gold fingers for add in use in a regular S-100 bus, as well as (2) S-100 bus socket locations and the SASI card with it's SASI interface IC's becomes a small S-100 BUS. The arrangement of the gold fingers and the S-100 bus sockets creates an S-100 bus with a right angle in the middle.
 

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Balcones SASI Variant with EEPROM for Xerox 820-II Expansion port

Balcones SASI Variant with EEPROM for Xerox 820-II Expansion port

I stumbled onto this smaller card today that I have been searching for... for years...It's a small slice of my own history at Balcones Computer Corporation.

Z-80 daughter card to SASI-40-pin. (To me it looks like this one had been installed into a Kaypro, (Balcones was also a Kaypro Dealer) but I know for a fact that we used it on Teletek Systemaster-1 S-100 cards as well for internal use.

Some headers, 244, 245 and a PAL, z-80 socket...caps, bare board, driver install? and done. This was the first iteration.

Geared toward the 40-pin WD1002-05 controller interface, (but 50 pins present... cut and splice as needed). (Balcones evaluated the Xebec SASI controller cards as well, but internally, WD was chosen for whatever reason...(price or technical muscle?) as the standard...(this continued into the PC's Ltd and Dell years as well).


The larger Balcones SASI S-100 card:

This is the card that made it possible to integrate an S-100 Single Board Computer system into a "Shoebox" system. It was referred to as the "Bravo-110" and allowed Balcones Computer Corporation to configure the Teletek single user Systemaster 1, Z-80A, 64K CP/M 2.2 and to interface to a WD1002-05 + a 3.5" ST-506 MFM style (Rodime) HD and 5.25" floppy drive.

Power could have been supplied to the S-100 card via a single free buss socket, so no S-100 expansion capability unless transferred to a BUS arrangement.

The goal here was cost reduction and footprint shrinkage pure and simple. Balcones needed a right angle as part of the mechanical solution.

I have also located the Balcones "short S-100 SASI Motherboard" version using the 40-pin alternate SASI interface cards which allow the Systemaster-1 to be plugged into the SASI interface card itself (as well as an additional S-100 card if desired). The interface card has gold fingers for add in use in a regular S-100 bus, as well as (2) S-100 bus socket locations and the SASI card with it's SASI interface IC's becomes a small S-100 BUS. The arrangement of the gold fingers and the S-100 bus sockets creates an S-100 bus with a right angle in the middle.

=====================

It escaped my mind that I have another SASI variant running in a Xerox 820-II. The Balcones SASI controller for Xerox 820-II.

This setup is a precurser to the Xerox Expansion chassis Xerox sold for the Xerox 16/8. It too interfaces to a WD-1002-05 and can read and write MSDOS, CP/M-86 and CP/M Xerox 5.25" formats using the 8086 card. This SASI card plugs into the external Drive slot that was normally used to interface to the 8" floppy, floppy/SA1004 HD and 5.25" floppy drive cabinets and uses the built-in Xerox 820-II external drive connector. The expansion slot can accept the 8086 CPU card as well to run the Xerox 16/8.
 

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