[Coco] CoCo 3 68000/RAM board project

[jdaggett at gate.net]

Frank

My thoughts to were along that line. Most of the enhancements would be 
best used by OS9. I still have the ability to run DECB in a window and 
using a modern monitor. There are a couple of ways to do this. WIth an SPI 
interface storing and retrieving programs and OS' are rather easy. The 
XC2S250E has 12 2Kbyte block rams that can be configured as ROMs. It 
would be no real problem to write a small bios that can be used to boot 
DECB or NitrOS9/OS9.

james

On 8 May 2009 at 17:35, Frank Swygert wrote:

> This makes the most sense James! While any software written for the
> enhanced machine will only run on it, running older software shouldn't
> be a problem. The dual processor machine would at a minimum need an
> enhanced version of Nitros-9 (or OS-9) just to be able to run at all
> -- zero backwards compatibility, even of the operating system. Even
> the DECB fans like myself realize that it's not conducive to easy
> backwards compatible enhancements, but Nitros is. And I realized a
> long time ago that OS-9 is where all the real activity is, especially
> for new stuff. Not much for DECB. If you just want DECB it's easy
> enough to keep an old CoCo running or use an emulator. 
> 
> -------
> Date: Fri, 08 May 2009 13:24:25 -0400
> From: jdaggett at gate.net
> 
> All are good ideas.
> 
> Considering that the GIME has limited video capabilities, enhancing
> the graphics ability of the GIME chip you eliminate the second 6809 to
> do graphics This can be done by building into the new GIME a graphics
> processor that takes commands and draws the polygon and line shapes
> within the configurable graphics window. 
> 
> I lean to more enhancing the graphics capability of the GIME chip over
> a dual processor 6809. Unless you have OS9 modified to handle dual
> processors, a coprocessor makes better since with enhanced graphics.
> Also consider this, a FPGA based system can be made to run
> considerably faster than the current Coco3. About ten times faster. 
> 
> -- 
> Frank Swygert
> Publisher, "American Motors Cars" 
> Magazine (AMC)
> For all AMC enthusiasts
> http://farna.home.att.net/AMC.html
> (free download available!)
> 
> 
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