[Coco] Somewhat OT - SWTPC 6809 Restoration Project

[Gene Heskett]

On Sunday 12 April 2009, Ron Bihler wrote:
>Joel Ewy wrote:
>> Hey all,
>>
>> I have on loan the remains of two or three SWTPc 6809 computers that
>> had belonged to the late friend of a friend, and I'm going to try to
>> restore them to working condition.  (I can probably only get one
>> working, since there only seems to be one CPU board, unless another
>> one turns up in other boxes...)  My plan is to try to get Flex and
>> OS-9 running, and maybe get it to run some old text adventures and
>> such things.  If I get real ambitious I might hook up one of those
>> serial<->ethernet/telnet thingies and make it play adventure games
>> over the Internet.  First things first though.  I'm cataloging the
>> parts and trying to understand the DAT circuit on the CPU board.
>>
>> If you have an interest in such arcana, you can check out my progress
>> here:  http://8littlebits.wordpress.com/category/swtpc/
>>
>> JCE
>>
>>
>> --
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>> Coco at maltedmedia.com
>> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/coco
>
>Been working on a 6809 SWTPC as well, the machine I have is
>operational.  However it appears the DC-4 floppy controller didn't like
>shipping and I have not been able to get the Flex boot disk to work.
>Still a work in process, but a step at a time.
>
>Let me know how you do, I would like to get os9 running on the machine
>as soon as I get the floppy to work again.  Have you run the everson
>emulation?  Very cool and I am hoping the rom images from the emulation
>will work to load OS9.  The flex disk formats are very odd, but in the
>end the controller is not working right.
>
>Ron Bihler

What FDC chip is in that controller?  I have had several 1773's go toes up 
over the years & ATM have NDI where fresh ones can be had.  I used up all my 
spares in the EDISK workalike (but much much better) at the tv station over 
the years.  Or is someone now making clones?  For the 1793, the MB8877 
(Fujitsu?) works even better, but again, those are false teeth for chickens at 
best.

-- 
Cheers, Gene
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