Ok
I appologize for taking up additional bandwidth but I cant be the only
dense and ignorant TR user out there who is maxed out on ports and IRQs ,
so i hope the discussion is of interest to more than a few and answereable
but a true computer wizard. In the case of the USB situation, what I'm
hopping is that I can solve the fact that I need to free up one or more IRQ
for an audio card and a 2nd radio control line.
Here is the line up on my current PC a P-233MMX running W98
IRQ 00 System timer
IRQ 01 Key board
IRQ 02 Programmable interrupt (used by the system for ???)
IRQ 03 COM 2 VHF Packet TNC interface
IRQ 04 COM 1 Radio Interface
IRQ 05 LPT 2 CW keyeing and PTT interface from TR LOG etc
IRQ 06 Floppy drive controller
IRQ 07 LPT 1 Printer port
IRQ 08 CMOS real time clock
IRQ 09 COM 4 Modem
IRQ 10 COM 3 HF digital TNC
IRQ 11 PCI steering (video card)
IRQ 12 PS2 mouse port
IRQ 13 Numeric co-processor
IRQ 14 IDE controller primary HD #1 and CD-ROM
IRQ 15 IDE controller Secondary HD #2
My qaundry is that I'd like to add a second radio (COM 5), and an Audio
card. both of which need dedicated IRQ's if they are to operate ALL the
time in parallel with the other ports without conflict. I could free up IRQ
15 but I'd rather not as this is the "backup hard drive" . And I guess I
could put the printer and the Radio keying on the same LPT with a switch
box as that is the one situation where in practice I never use both at the
same time., that would free up IRQ 05. But if I can get the IRQ's freed up
by moving some of the COM traffic to the USB then that would be cleaner.
My understandinng is that the USB is faster as well which would be good for
some radio interfaces as some of the softeware I run does end up waiting on
the polling process for traffic with the radio (all though delays that I
see here may be due to the radio and not the BUS polling speed).
Another solution might be to get a 2nd clunker PC and then move of the
TNC and 2nd radio traffic over there and then network. it back to the main
PC. I could probably move the Printer over there as well. Networking brings
with it another can of worms though that I rather avoid, but I have about
resigned myself to that as a solution.
With true 32 bit technology available in PCI BUS architecture it seems to
me that someone owes us another 16 IRQ's !!!
Help.... thoughts ....other suggestions
Dave
K9NX
At 09:16 AM 7/15/98 +0000, Jeff Tucker wrote:
>
>And that's the whole point. In order to install serial ports, you had
>to set jumpers on your card, open your computer, install the board,
>and change BIOS settings. Yikes! What percentage of computer
>users could do that by themselves?
>
>USB won't be used to add serial ports, it will replace serial ports.
>Once peripherals are on USB, you won't need serial ports.
>
>Basically all new motherboards and all new computers support
>USB, as do the latest versions of the MS operating systems. I
>think you'll see it take off now. The original versions of Win95
>didn't support it, although it has for a year now. But, manufacturers
>can now be confident that any computer with USB and Win98 will
>support the bus. You're starting to see monitors with hubs built
>in and I think the peripherals will take off over the next year.
>
>Intel produces a complicated technical document which details
>their latest reference PC. It specifies the technical details of busses,
>memory, etc. to make sure all the PC's are compatible with the
>latest Intel processors and chipsets. Did you know that Intel now
>no longer requires an ISA bus on a PC? Their plan in the next
>couple years is to obsolete the ISA bus and drop support for it.
>Apparently, PCI will still be around, so any add-in cards will need
>to be PCI.
>
>The motherboards we're buying now have disk controllers and
>a video controller built in, along with the usual serial and
>parallel ports, plus USB. Basically everything that used to be
>on its own add-in card is now standard on the motherboard. We
>can bring up a whole computer with 0 cards installed. (I think
>we still need to add a card for sound. That won't last long,
>though, I'll bet.)
>
>All of the solutions being used by ham radio programs for
>controlling switch boxes, sending CW, etc. have been a
>semi-kludge, manually setting data and control signals high
>and low to achieve the desired effect. (Not to say I haven't
>done that myself in my software.) What would be really neat
>for the future is a standard USB ham radio accessory box.
>This box would connect via USB and have connections for
>paddles in and out, probably a connection to talk to the
>radio(s) and either connections for top-ten type devices
>or the device functionality built-in. We could build this today,
>but I'm not sure what the interest level would be. And, the
>ham radio software would have to support it. This would
>get further into the Windows API stuff than most of the
>current software goes.
>
>For a while, we'll still be able to run the way we are. Maybe
>for years there will be parallel and serial ports on our
>computers. But, there will be a day when a significant number
>do not.
>
>Besides, things like sending CW are really a great application
>for a small embedded processor. The logging program could
>send a command to the external box to send a letter. The
>box would take care of it and the logging program wouldn't
>have to get bogged down in the details. No more timing loops,
>etc. to try to send CW at the same time everything else is
>going on.
>
>73
>Jeff N9HZQ
>ISA, RIP 198? - 2000 (we'll see)
>
>----------
>From: jfeustle
>Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 1998 8:33 AM
>To: Jeff Tucker; trlog@contesting.com
>Subject: [TRLog] USB and cards
>
>
>The only thing I've run across that could be connected to the USB of my now
>aging Compaq was the new Microsoft keyboard that I bought for it. USB has
>been described in terms much like SCSI connections only you are not limited
>to seven or eight that you can daisy chain together. Unless I'm wrong or
>missed something in NinfoWorld, USB will probably be of little help for
>adding serial ports. It's gotten lukewarm real support--as opposed to
>enthusiastic "promised" support--from many vendors. I got my multi-port
>card from Radio Shack and it has worked flawlessly ever since I configured
>and installed it. I also had to make some changes in the BIOS setup for my
>computer as it set COMM 1 and 2 to odd addresses. Now, to get old "fat
>fingers" to perform flawlessly.
>
>73,
>
>Joe, N8JF
>
>
>--
>FAQ on WWW: http://www.contesting.com/trlogfaq.html
>Submissions: trlog@contesting.com
>Administrative requests: trlog-REQUEST@contesting.com
>Problems: owner-trlog@contesting.com
>Feature Wishlist: http://web.jzap.com/n6tr/trwish.html
>
>
><<< ==================== Original Email Header ==================== >>>
>
>Return-Path: <owner-trlog@contesting.com>
>Received: from tetsuo.mspring.net (tetsuo.mspring.net [207.69.231.11])
> by camel5.mindspring.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id IAA07138
> for <wci3@mindspring.com>; Wed, 15 Jul 1998 08:37:08 -0400 (EDT)
>Received: from dayton.akorn.net (dayton.akorn.net [205.217.100.11])
> by tetsuo.mspring.net (8.8.8/8.8.6) with ESMTP id IAA11314
> for <jefft@wciatl.com>; Wed, 15 Jul 1998 08:37:06 -0400 (EDT)
>Received: from dayton.akorn.net (dayton.akorn.net [205.217.100.11])
> by dayton.akorn.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id IAA29860;
> Wed, 15 Jul 1998 08:36:37 -0400 (EDT)
>Received: by dayton.akorn.net (TLB v0.10a (1.23 tibbs 1997/01/09
00:29:32)); Wed, 15 Jul 1998 08:36:29 -0400 (EDT)
>Date: Wed, 15 Jul 1998 08:33:33 -0400
>From: jfeustle <jfeustle@uoft02.utoledo.edu>
>Subject: [TRLog] USB and cards
>X-Sender: jfeustle@131.183.1.4
>To: trlog@contesting.com
>Message-id: <3.0.1.32.19980715083333.0069edf8@131.183.1.4>
>MIME-version: 1.0
>X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 3.0.1 (32)
>Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>Sender: owner-trlog@contesting.com
>Precedence: bulk
>X-Sponsor: W4AN, KM3T, N5KO & AD1C
>
>
>
>
>
>
>--
>FAQ on WWW: http://www.contesting.com/trlogfaq.html
>Submissions: trlog@contesting.com
>Administrative requests: trlog-REQUEST@contesting.com
>Problems: owner-trlog@contesting.com
>Feature Wishlist: http://web.jzap.com/n6tr/trwish.html
>
--
FAQ on WWW: http://www.contesting.com/trlogfaq.html
Submissions: trlog@contesting.com
Administrative requests: trlog-REQUEST@contesting.com
Problems: owner-trlog@contesting.com
Feature Wishlist: http://web.jzap.com/n6tr/trwish.html
|