Acorn hardware DIY upgrade kits

When I see people resurrecting their old hardware or buying old hardware and returning to RISC OS, I do at times wonder why no-one has tapped into this by producing a low cost DIY kit for old Acorn hardware. I know that RISCOSBits have done something for the RISC PC and Ident have their solution, but there doesn’t seem to be anything for the A3000 series or the BBC micro. These self-contained units with their in-built keyboards would seem to be an ideal canditate for a DIY RISC OS 32bit upgrade kit, that included a software deal to upgrade existing titles to 32 bit or an aemulor type solution.

I would have thought something like this might even go someway to preventing some of those units ending up in landfill sites, by giving them a second lease of life.

When I see people resurrecting their old hardware or buying old hardware and returning to RISC OS, I do at times wonder why no-one has tapped into this by producing a low cost DIY kit for old Acorn hardware.

Probably because the whole idea is silly? I really don’t understand the appeal of such things. Maybe if there wasn’t such a size difference between modern machines and old ones it would make sense to re-use an old case, but when you can have a modern RISC OS machine the size of a matchbox it seems pretty ludicrous.

Would you buy a modern smartphone and then fit it inside the shell of an 80’s brick mobile phone?

Would you buy a modern laptop and fit it inside a suitcase-sized 70’s/80’s portable computer?

Would you buy a modern PC and then fit it inside the chassis of an old mainframe that fills half your house?

Also, a DIY solution is already available. It’s called “work out the parts you need, buy them, and fit them yourself”. Have fun adapting all the I/O interfaces (keyboard, mouse, monitor, disc drives, network, etc.), especially if you want both new and old machines to continue to be usable. Or were you just planning on duplicating everything? In which case see my previous answer re: pretty ludicrous putting a new machine in an old case.

There’s nowt so queer as folk. I have a neighbour who has built himself a car from a kit, a sort of biscuit-box on wheels. I have never understood the fashion for retrokit(sch). Perhaps it is a desire to stop the world and get off yesterday?

Maybe if there wasn’t such a size difference between modern machines and old ones it would make sense to re-use an old case, but when you can have a modern RISC OS machine the size of a matchbox it seems pretty ludicrous.

Hmmm, I suppose I should take the old RPC board I have in the old A440 case apart.

With someone who has an A3000 the scope for putting a Pi3 board plus and assortment of other add-ons into one physical object that covers every aspect apart from the mouse and display isn’t to be sniffed at, particularly if you can create a housing on the underside to stow away the mouse when not in use.
It’s a semi-portable…

The cool thing would be the opposite: a modern FPGA board to get a new ARM computer for RISC OS 3… with more speed, better screen modes and recent hardware. Anyway, it’s probably better to bet on good emulation. Archiemu?

but there doesn’t seem to be anything for the A3000 series or the BBC micro. These self-contained units with their in-built keyboards would seem to be an ideal canditate for a DIY RISC OS 32bit upgrade kit,

Mmmm… It’s pretty much a given that they will never ever run RISC OS 5 (the processor simply cannot do the 32 bit mode, and the MEMC… the less said about that, the better).

Which means we’d be gutting the thing with the intention of recycling the keyboard. Okay, it wouldn’t be too hard these days to fit a Pi/Beagle/whatever and use something like a higher end PIC or STM32 to pretend to be a keyboard interface, scanning the existing keyboard matrix and spitting out the applicable USB messages. Ditto the dinky quadrature mouse.

But why?

No, seriously. WHY?

My Pi fits in a box roughly the size of a packet of cigarettes (I don’t smoke so don’t quote me on that). It is attached to my bookshelf by the PC’s monitor. Some wires come out of it, one is to an LED mouse, one is to the keyboard – a generic cheapo keyboard that does the job perfectly. And, of course, one is the video. It goes to my monitor via a VGA adaptor.

The largest item is the keyboard, and when I don’t need it, I tuck it behind the monitor. Because the largest item is the keyboard and it’s a hell of a lot smaller than an A3000.

Additionally, while it might be “nice” to use a BBC keyboard (proper clicky keys, not this modern membrane rubbish), you will need some sort of translation driver either in the USB dohickey, or in the target computer. Why? Because the Beeb is from an era long before all these exciting oddball keys like “Page Up” appeared on the scene. No F11, no F12, and a really eccentric layout. Feast your eyes on this: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/BBC_Micro.jpeg
The BBC Master (Compact) keyboard isn’t much better, and its legacy is why RISC OS in 2017 still cannot differentiate between Page Up and Shift-Up (ditto for Down). :-/

Would you buy a […]

Would you steal a car / grannie / little girl’s lollipop / DVD ? :-)

Perhaps it is a desire to stop the world and get off yesterday?

Can you blame them?

a modern FPGA board to get a new ARM computer for RISC OS 3… with more speed, better screen modes and recent hardware.

Speed – yes.
Screen modes? Modern hardware? Memory? No, no, and no.

Why? RISC OS 3 (as in 3.1x) only knows of the VIDC1. It can do whatever the VIDC1 could do, which was a hell of a lot in 1987 but not so much in 2017.
For a lot of the hardware, it depends upon the IOC. Now we know how the IOC works (datasheets and emulators) so an FPGA clone might be possible, but we’d be looking not at a clone but at an FPGA “lookalike” that presents a quadrature mouse port to RISC OS and a USB mouse port to the outside world. Is that even possible in FPGA, or would a microcontroller be a better bet here?
Memory? It may be possible to bodge together a super-MEMC that is capable of addressing up to 16MB (rather than the insane daisy-chained MEMCs arrangement). But 16MB is your lot. No, really, that’s the absolute limit. The entire addressing is 64MB which is split up as “the ROM part” (when read, or various bits of hardware when written), the physical RAM, and the logical RAM. Because of how things are allocated (like RMA in a specific place, memory translation table, etc), that consumes the 64MB memory map. https://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~theom/riscos/docs/ArcMemMap.txt

Better to stick with emulation, and let the old machines retire gracefully.

Now we know how the IOC works (datasheets and emulators) so an FPGA clone might be possible, but we’d be looking not at a clone but at an FPGA “lookalike” that presents a quadrature mouse port to RISC OS and a USB mouse port to the outside world. Is that even possible in FPGA, or would a microcontroller be a better bet here?

The MiST FPGA board is capable of emulating both Archimedes and Beeb hardware (among many other 80’s machines). Looks like it relies on an ARM core for some of the IO (probably the SD interface and USB stack)

https://github.com/mist-devel/mist-board/wiki/TheBoard
https://github.com/mist-devel/mist-board/wiki/CoreDocArchimedes
https://github.com/mist-devel/mist-binaries/tree/master/cores/bbc

Screen modes?

With ArchiEmu, it’s possible to simulate modes that could not work on an Archie.
The same as Arcem. And perhaps that with some tweaks, it could be even better.
I still dream of a virtual Viewfinder extension for Arcem or ArchiEmu.

Modern hardware?

I mean, to use an USB keyboard.

Memory?

First, it’s possible to get 16MB of RAM (not so easy on an Archie).
Second, it could be possible to map a virtual hard disc in the board’s RAM.

16 MB + 64 MB super RAM disc would be a great enhancement.
Even for ArchiEmu :)

Tests made on ArchiEmu with a disc mapped in RAMdisc are OK.
But I’m sure, it could go faster with a native implementation.
And with features as save on quit / load on start.

There are still ways to get a better Archimedes emulation.

The MiST FPGA board is capable of emulating both Archimedes and Beeb hardware (among many other 80’s machines). Looks like it relies on an ARM core for some of the IO (probably the SD interface and USB stack)

Yep, but it’s slow, and unreliable.
And no HDMI too.

There are still ways to get a better Archimedes emulation.

The almost universal emulator MAME, added support for RISC OS. I admit to not trying it, but it may be worth road testing it and see how good it is.

http://www.mamedev.org/

I briefly tested Archimedes emulation in MAME – it is probably the most user unfriendly solution ever conceived. Quality of emulation was OKish, but rather slow – and of course we lack a recent MAME port for RISC OS which could have made it slightly useful.

ArchiEmu is great, but lacks host OS integration. ArcEm is great, but would benefit from a “proper UI”. Adrian Lees once made a port of RPCEmu, but it seems to have never seen the light of day.

Concerning Archimedes on MIST: unfortunately, progress is non-existing for the past few months (or years), which is a shame because it has a lot of potential. But it already pushes MIST to its limits. There is now the beginning of a MIST sucessor called MISTer based on an off-the-shelf Terasic board with a much more powerful FPGA and HDMI output, maybe this will be a future solution (you have to build everything yourself at the moment) – but most FPGA devs aim for the “masses”, i.e. classic game consoles and 8bit/16bit home computers.

Here is my take on the MISTer if you can read German: http://itblog.huber-net.de/2017/06/vom-mist-zum-mister/

Or Google translate’s effort for the rest of us…

I think the idea of an upgrade kit is a good one, unless it involves destroying a working machine. In the situation where you can’t revive an old computer completely, it’s a great idea to put the parts that still work to use, either by using them as spares for other machines or by replacing the broken bits to create something less authentic but functional. Those old keyboards are pretty robust!

Of course you can buy a single board computer and a load of peripherals to run RISC OS or emulate MOS but that’s arguably just wasteful if you already have a working machine with keyboard and mouse. You might also be sensitive to the keyboard layout, making it annoying to have to adapt to a different one with keys spaced slightly differently.

There are quite a few projects for the 8-bit systems that add previously-unimagined capabilities to them, such as the FPGA and Pi-based second processors for the BBC Micro and the replacement video ULA that provides things like an extended colour palette. For the 32-bit systems there are things like video enhancers. And there are SD and CF adapters for both 8-bit and 32-bit systems.

Many of these projects are done for the technical challenge of seeing what’s possible rather than to keep systems useable – after all, the software has trailed behind the hardware for some years – but there’s scope to create things that do both, keeping an old machine relevant while enhancing it in a way that is in keeping with the original design. At some point we may even see more complex new add-ons for the later 32-bit machines, such as second processors for the RiscPC.

I think the idea of an upgrade kit is a good one, unless it involves destroying a working machine. In the situation where you can’t revive an old computer completely, it’s a great idea to put the parts that still work to use, either by using them as spares for other machines or by replacing the broken bits to create something less authentic but functional. Those old keyboards are pretty robust!

That’s the idea!

CJE came up with a great concept RISC Hearts and Ident , RISCOSbits are giving RISC OS users upgrade options, along with Elesar and R-Comp .

Most of us have become so used to throwing computer kit away (myself included) to upgrade the technology we use. Wouldn’t DIY kits provide us with a more sustainable option? We’d be doing our bit by helping to reduce the amount of toxins that have the potential to end-up in our food chain. If you don’t believe this is a growing problem, just type “bbc plastic waste toxic” into a popular search engine.

Back to those old keyboards (BBC Micro, etc). Here’s a link that demonstrates what’s been done already – providing a BBC Micro keyboard with USB connectivity.

I’m not suggesting people remain locked into the past, but giving them upgrade options in terms of both hardware and software¹ surely benefits everyone.

¹ _{How many RISC OS software developers offer 32bit conversion incentives?}

Wouldn’t DIY kits provide us with a more sustainable option?

I wonder about the efficiency of the old machines versus a Pi or the like. The Pi takes so little power that it can ride out brownouts from the power stored in the PSU’s capacitors. While junking an old machine may not be great for the environment, neither is wasting electricity – the only difference is what you can see versus what is someplace else…

How many RISC OS software developers offer 32bit conversion incentives?

What, like updated software?

Most of us have become so used to throwing computer kit away (myself included) to upgrade the technology we use. Wouldn’t DIY kits provide us with a more sustainable option? We’d be doing our bit by helping to reduce the amount of toxins that have the potential to end-up in our food chain.

Well there’s your problem, you should be taking it to an electronic waste recycling facility, not throwing it in the bin ;-)

Replacing broken/obsolete parts to keep an old system working/usable is definitely a good thing (SD cards to replace old floppy/hard discs, PS/2 or USB keyboard/mouse adapters, video output via modern interfaces, etc.). But when you want an upgrade, there’s a limit after which you’re better off just throwing the system away and starting again. And for me that limit is replacing the CPU/memory with something which is light-years ahead of the original.

What exactly are you after? The impression I got from your first post was that you wanted an upgrade that would replace the old CPU/memory/etc. in a classic system with something more modern, along with some kind of magic software deal to allow your old apps to continue to run. But since you’re citing Ident, RISCOSbits, Elesar, ARMini, etc. as examples I’m a bit confused. Those are entirely new computers to replace your current ones, not upgrades for existing systems.

I wonder about the efficiency of the old machines versus a Pi or the like. The Pi takes so little power that it can ride out brownouts from the power stored in the PSU’s capacitors. While junking an old machine may not be great for the environment, neither is wasting electricity – the only difference is what you can see versus what is someplace else…

On the whole I agree with what you say, but take a broken BBC Micro or A3000 series computer and install a Pi (or something similar), USB keyboard adapter, …

What, like updated software?

Not quite. AFAIK – 1. If I’ve recalled this correctly at some point R-Comp was offering a 32bit version of DataPower for a small fee as an incentive to upgrade.

Back to those old keyboards (BBC Micro, etc). Here’s a link that demonstrates what’s been done already – providing a BBC Micro keyboard with USB connectivity.

I’m fine with people reusing broken machines in this way, though I’m sure that nobody is asking for my approval in any case. It concerns me slightly that random people will buy kits to convert Electrons into USB keyboards because they think that their Electron was crap and fancy a bit of keyboard cosplay to spice up their lifestyle computing experience. I suppose, at least, that selling broken Electrons as £115 USB keyboards is one way of extracting disposable income from people with more money than sense.

It concerns me slightly that random people will buy kits to convert Electrons into USB keyboards because they think that their Electron was crap and fancy a bit of keyboard cosplay to spice up their lifestyle computing experience. I suppose, at least, that selling broken Electrons as £115 USB keyboards is one way of extracting disposable income from people with more money than sense.

I agree! £115 just for an Electron USB keyboard is certainly an interesting proposition! :D

Perhaps if they’d given it a clean and fitted it with a Rasberry Pi it might have been worth it for someone interesed in retro stuff.

keyboard cosplay

That’s a fun way to describe it.

is one way of extracting disposable income from people with more money than sense.

Isn’t that Apple? Or the vinyl revival?

+1 for “keyboard cosplay”. ☺

ArchiEmu is great, but lacks host OS integration. ArcEm is great, but would benefit from a “proper UI”. RPCEmu seems to have never seen the light of day. Archimedes on MIST: unfortunately, progress is non-existing for the past few months.

Perfect summary :)

It concerns me slightly that random people will buy kits to convert Electrons into USB keyboards because they think that their Electron was crap and fancy a bit of keyboard cosplay to spice up their lifestyle computing experience.

I agree! £115 just for an Electron USB keyboard is certainly an interesting proposition! :D

Argh, that’s positively macabre! :( It’s the computing equivalent of people who decorate their homes with taxidermized* animal corpses.

_{*This may not be a real word, but in this context it sounds as if it should be.}

Probably because the whole idea is silly? I really don’t understand the appeal of such things. Maybe if there wasn’t such a size difference between modern machines and old ones it would make sense to re-use an old case, but when you can have a modern RISC OS machine the size of a matchbox it seems pretty ludicrous.

Well the size of, for example, the Risc PC, is of course to hold standard components like hard drives, CD and floppy, power supplies and podules. To this day I still love the slice approach to expansion. If the OS could be persuaded to support more than 8 hard drives, you could build a monster NAS / media centre although granted RAID would be desirable in that case.

I expect some people will say that bulky hard discs and optical media are soon to be rendered completely obsolete, what with ever larger capacity solid state media. I do however think that the large desktop computer will still have its place for many years to come, if only because it’s hard to dissipate heat from a very small power intensive computer. Of course that last part has never really been a concern for ARM based devices!

There are quite a few projects for the 8-bit systems that add previously-unimagined capabilities to them, such as the FPGA and Pi-based second processors for the BBC Micro and the replacement video ULA that provides things like an extended colour palette.

A Pi-based second processor sounds like an impressive achievement. I wonder how hard it would be to knock up a board with a modern ARM chip that could fit in the Risc PC’s second processor slot? Sadly I’m primarily just a software guy (though I have been known to wield a soldering iron from time to time) so that’s well outside my area of expertise.

This may not be a real word

It may not have been before, but it is now. Its meaning is clear, and it’s been used at least once. Good enough for me.

Or Google translate’s effort for the rest of us…

Surprisingly good, unfortunately let down by the fact that it often translates MISTer as MIST, which somehow ruins the point.

Wake me up whenever AI starts to live up to my (actually rather low) expectations.