Hi John,Love the idea! Second the notion that it also makes a very handy 'diagnostic' system, as well. I'm not sure if it's possible (or optimal) to construct the layout such that all the 'optional' configurations were grouped on one part of the board, but it's a neat idea. I think having the serial console as at least an 'optional' configuration is ideal, and while I can certainly understand the notion that plugging in a vga monitor is much simpler, I also counter-argue that if you are soldering together an SBC (s100 or not!) - then the notion of hooking up a serial console is neither foreign nor all that scary - even as a beginner. Having both 'options' on one board would offer the maximum versatility. I also like the idea of the onboard storage, though I am not so sure that is as easy as just 'adding an sd card connector' - I know that the IDE board is, well, an entire board in of itself. But then, that is a different scenario, in this case there may be either processor support, or a single-chip controller solution, that would fill the bill.So, not much help from me, just a lot of enthusiasm and opinion! I am curious though, as a separate comment (and maybe needs it's own thread?) has anyone contemplated creating an ethernet board? I imagine the biggest limiter is finding through-hole controllers, (or maybe having enough memory in an S100 system to handle a full tcp/ip stack - I know there are some pretty tiny ones in use on modern embeded systems with similar resource constraints, but not sure if that makes this idea viable).Just my random thoughts.Ron--On Wed, Sep 9, 2015 at 3:41 PM Max Scane <mjs...@gmail.com> wrote:Hi John,I like the idea of an S100 SBC. It would be good for beginners and could also be useful as a check-out board for reviving older systems.Since it is aimed at beginners and you have plenty of real estate on the board, how about arranging the board into separate sections such that you have a core (required) section that contains CPU,RAM,ROM etc and various optional components, such as serial ports, Propeller VGA, parallel, Bus interface etc. The user can populate the optional parts as/when required. Fully populated it would be a proper SBC capable or running CP/M etc.I think an SBC needs to also have some storage so maybe an optional SD card connector could be added to the top edge.If you put a footprint for DE9 Female connectors ( with a 10 pin connector behind it) for the serial ports then the user could connect a USB-Serial adapter directly to the board without needing to make a serial cable.I haven't seen a Z180 S100 board as yet so maybe this board would be a good candidate for this chip. The on-board peripherals would reduce the chip count and a PLCC socket is not too much of a challenge for a beginner.So my suggested configuration would beRequired ComponentsZ180 CPU512KB RAM (single chip)512KB ROM (flash/eprom) **The Z180 MMU can support 1MB address space, ROM could also be ROM disk.Optional components (requires at least one I/O device)DE9 Female connectors for Z180 serial ports10 pin headers for serial ports82c55 parallel (for keypad/display)Propeller VGA + PS/2 KeyboardSD CardS100 bus interfaceDC Jack for 5V local powerA minimal system for example would be CPU,RAM,ROM and a serial port.If the user wants to use VGA then he adds the propeller chip and connectors. If he then wants run an operating system then add the SD card connector.I'd suggest limiting the number of jumpers so that it is easy to build and configure.With the local DC jack you don't initially need an S100 backplane but it could be added later to access other S100 boards.Cheers!Max--On Thu, Sep 10, 2015 at 5:34 AM, monahanz <mon...@vitasoft.org> wrote:--Guys, I thinking of trying to solve the chicken/egg problem by doing a single Z80 based S100 board that would contain 64K RAM, EEPROM, PS/2 keyboard input as well as a host of indicator LED's and jumpers to deactivate ROM/RAM keyboard etc. one at a time as other boards are added to get new people started on the S100 bus.The only part I'm not sure of is what to do about console output/video. Was thinking of using the basic Propeller Console IO circuitbut this requires programming its two wire serial EEPROM with Parallaxes software and USB adaptor/software. Do you think that is outside the range capability of mostnewcomers. Alternatively we could go with a straight serial output to some dumb terminal IBM PC terminal emulator. Open also to other suggestions.John
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