[Coco] Thought

[Mark McDougall]

Allen Huffman wrote:

> USB device versus USB host I get.  So the CoCo is a "device" to the PC. 

Exactly.

>  With Drivewire achieving floppy speeds via bitbanger ports, how much 
> faster do you think such a USB interface could work?  What would it 
> connect to on the CoCo side?

Well USB 1.1 (as supported by the chip I'm using) has a theoretical maximum
throughput of 12Mbps. That's more than adequate for floppy speeds. I'm not
sure at this stage exactly how much of this extra throughput, if indeed any
at all, will be realised when connected to the CoCo.

It would connect to the standard floppy controller pak and would appear as
normal floppy drives connected to the CoCo. I guess this would be the big
advantage over the DriveWire as it would not require special drivers and
would not be restricted to 0S-9 - much like Eric's SVD I linked to in my
original post and which actually works on the CoCo now (something I actually
wasn't aware of until yesterday).

IIRC (it has been a *long* time since I relinquished my real CoCo) there was
a drive controller pak that plugged into the CoCo?!? I guess another option
would be to eliminate the pak altogether and emulate the controller on the
USB board as well? Interesting...

Regards,

-- 
|              Mark McDougall                | "Electrical Engineers do it
| <http://members.optushome.com.au/msmcdoug> |   with less resistance!"