I/O to the real world
Community Forums/General Help/I/O to the real world
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| I would like to get back into interfacing the PC/Mac to the real world using Blitz Max. Back in the day I has the following options. Use either the serial or parallel ports, which don't exist anymore. If a PC insert a Via Card (a 6522 on port 300 giving bidirectional 8 bit ports and interrupt access), no good for Macs or modern PC's. Pick up a Vellman kit for a USB interface, good for PC only as it needed a DLL (win 98) to access it. As far as I can see the only options appear to be either, get an older PC with older ports/older OS or get a Rasberry PI, which seems to offer IO capability but I'm not sure if it works with PC and Mac USB ports. Does anybody have any ideas other than these ? have fun cps |
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| You can still use USB -> Serial on modern windows, with the proper drivers installed it just shows up as COM port whatever in the OS. e.g. https://www.amazon.com/Plugable-Adapter-Prolific-PL2303HX-Chipset/dp/B00425S1H8 (Compatible with Windows, Mac, Linux) I'm using some of the them to connect ancient hardware GPS units to modern Windows 7/8 laptops, only caveat I've run into is is that some old software itself may have limitations in that may only give you a choice of single-digit COM ports and not be aware of COM11/12/13/14/15/16/whatever, you may need to re-assign the port it got in the Windows device manager to give it a low enough number to work with old software. |
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| i use an esp8266 a wlan to anything interface |
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| Many thanks for the responses, I wasn't aware of these two options so I'll investigate. Have fun cps |
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| Have gone down USB to RS232 route, so that leads to the question; Is it possible to load the wxctb module as a stand alone module and if so where do I find it? Or do I have to load the entire wxmax module to use it. Many thanks again for the pointers, have fun cps. |
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| Not to happy with RS232 route so swerved and purchased an UNO R3 Development Board MEGA328P ATMEGA16U2. This comes with Digital/analogue in/out ports via a USB port. According to the blurb (I haven't got it yet) this can be programed in Java or C++. So my follow on question is .. Can Blitz Max communicate with either a compiled C++/Java programme or a Interpreted bit of Java script ? Have fun cps. P.S. I've just dug a bit deeper and found some examples of Blitz Max communicating with C in the forums so the answer is yes to C, as for Java ? |
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| Just got to rave about the Ardunino UNO Rev 3. Not only analogue/digital I/O but on board cpu. Basicly Its a PIC with I/O that can be programed with a C type syntax via a usb. If any of you are revisiting/starting I/O I can recommend this unit and at about £5 its easy on the pocket. Still got to find out how to get it to communicate with Blitz Max but it's seen as a com port by higher level apps so I have hopes for this as well. Things have certainly moved on from hard wiring VIAs to addr/data bus. Have fun cps |
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| Not only analogue/digital I/O but on board cpu. Basicly Its a PIC with I/O that can be programed with a C type syntax via a usb. Oh man, just when I thought I'd moved on from interfacing my own bespoke data from cassette tape to software something new comes along that gets the cogs whirring again ;) |
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| I know, you turn your back for a second and something wonderful pops up that you just have to fiddle with. I'm loosing sleep busy blowing the dust off my old interface bits and bobs and looking at a common bus to interface them to the UNO. Have fun cps |
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| I'm loosing sleep busy blowing the dust off my old interface bits and bobs and looking at a common bus to interface them to the UNO. Have fun cps You got me thinking about the bespoke schmitt trigger circuitry I built which allowed speed data from a bike ride, on a cassette tape, to be 'sampled' by my Amiga 1200 - mcuh fun and satisfaction there. Now, I just use old GPS data with heart rate and everything for my data analysis, somehow there was more gratification from using my own hardware to interface data to the computer ;) |
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| I think building your own I/O helps you to understand the beast, once you get over being scared of frying the lot computers become just another group of chips (like CMOS/TTL), that can be bent in a direction of your choosing. As for the UNO it seems pretty robust, I've dropped opto isolators on the digital ports out of habit, but I'm not sure I needed too. You've got my imagination going over your interface, I was lucky as my first computer (oric/atmos) gave access to the bus (control/data/addr) so I never had to get data in using the tape input. Though I did once interface to another 8 bit unit using a kaput unit's tape output driven by my VIA (a desk full of wires and bits of circuit board). From memory I think it might have been PPM at about 10K carrier and about 1 K modulation for logic 1. I've not had to visit PPM/PWM for years so thanks for tickling the old grey cells. I've had to put things to one side as the wife expects to see something of me over Christmas, but next year..... Have fun cps PS prosessing.org, cross platform and high level language that can interface to the UNO, comes with its own community and is open source. PPS Ethernet shield with microSD card reader, networking and data storage. Wow another world awaits.. |
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| You've got my imagination going over your interface, I was lucky as my first computer (oric/atmos) gave access to the bus (control/data/addr) so I never had to get data in using the tape input. It was kinda rudimentary design, a 3-pin chip with two 1.5V batteries created a 15 KHz 'beep' every time a reed switch passed a magnet on the bikes forks. Beeps recorded on a cassette tape, replayed via a schmitt trigger using a 74LS4016 I think it was (no wonder my memories rubbish - it seems to be full of junk like that....). The silicon chip relay simply closed, which switched on of the inputs to the mouse/joystick port on my Amiga1200. A (little...) code written in bbasic 2.1 sampled the data and plotted it in a graph. A bit of time spent there I can tell you ;) Who needs sleep anyway.... |
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| Ah I can visualise it now.. Thanks you've stopped my mind wondering. I still tinker with 74's and 4000's but unlike in the days of my youth (Ahhh) it takes so much time. Still I'm sure that the UNO is going to save a lot of iron work, here's hoping. Have fun cps |
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| if you like easy programming so i think mmbasic is recommended. it is different to arduino but it is cool also. most i/o protokolls are in i2c,serial,1wire,port bit and so on . |
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| 'Panno' Many thanks for the input. I did get a similar USB to RS232 lead type thing, but interfacing to Blitz Max needed a Module and I want to avoid that if possible. I will add mmbasic and i2c to the 'To Do List' as soon as I get my head around the UNO. As you can see from the thread my understanding of what is available is somewhat behind the times. I am hoping that I can interface my electronics to a high level language like Blitz Max which the UNO with its cat5 adaptor should offer. Thanks again and Happy New Year. Have fun cps opps! getting my code numbers mixed up, the esp8266 seems to be a similar bit of kit to the UNO must investigate further, thanks for the heads up.. |
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