Vernier Serial Box Help Needed

[I.G. Dev.]

I have been toying off-and-on for years trying to get the Vernier
Serial Box to work with the IIGS. I believed that a solid library
in/for Complete Pascal, along with a simple reader application, would
be a great way to use the IIGS in scientific data acquisition for
kids.

Unfortunately I have never ever been able to devote the right amount
of time to the task. I would like to offer some kind of bounty to
someone to actually do the job, basically paying for someone to
release a PD or MIT-style licensed thing for the community that works
with the Serial Box. My hope is that one of the coding veterans out
there has some free hours to spend over a few weeks.

Please email me at ig...@hotmail.com if you're interested.


Thanks.

[MarkO_]

The ][gs' Serial Port seems to have the Control Lines needed to control the Modes of the Vernier Serial Box, and the Data from the Box is quite simple, according to the Serial Box Interface Toolkit information..
Using the Functions in the Serial Box Interface Toolkit as a Template, an Interface in any language should be quite possible..

Personally I am not a Pascal programmer, no that familiar with the ][gs.. But I think I will play around with this idea..

[MarkO_]

I just won an eBay auction for one of the Vernier Serial boxes, so I should be able to work with an actual Box, rather than program from the Specs..

[MarkO_]

I picked up my Vernier Box yesterday.. The connector on the Vernier Box is an 8-pin Mini DIN, that appears to be pinned like the Apple ][gs and Mac.
The Serial Cable that it came with is an 8-pin mini DIN to DE-9, obviously for a IBM PC type computer.. Is the Mac cable for the Vernier Box a Straight Through 8-pin mini DIN to 8-pin mini DIN, or like a NULL Modem Cable??

I am connecting this box up to an Intel PC with a USB to Serial Interface to see if it works..........

[MarkO_]

The Vernier Box seems to be working fine...
I can see that it does some Averaging of the data, because if I connect the Red Probe to the 5VDC output of the Vernier box regulator, I can see the Data change almost immediately, but when I remove the probe, the Data takes a few seconds to return back to the pre-connection Data stream..

[Michael J. Mahon]

I'm surprised to hear that the bandwidth of the ADC is so severely
restricted.

If the box is "smart", does it accept commands? If so, there must be a
mode to obtain more immediate readings.

Other possibilities are that it uses a DMM-style dual-slope ADC--more
accurate (10-12 bits, possibly 3-1/2 digit BCD) but quite slow, or that the
input impedance is very high, and you need to touch the probe to ground to
drop the voltage quickly.

The Apple II is quite capable of using ADCs at sample rates of many
kilohertz, to, for example, sample audio. It would be a shame if the
Vernier box could not support the maximum rate its serial interface
supports.
--
-michael - NadaNet 3.1 and AppleCrate II: http://home.comcast.net/~mjmahon

[MarkO_]

The "Serial Box Interface Toolkit Manual" gives no indication that the Vernier Serial Box is "smart", it merely provides the Data in a format that can be read by a Serial Port at 2400 bps, 8N2.

According to the Manual, and from what I can verify with the box I bought, there is 4 Data Bytes, repeated indefinitely..


The "Serial Box Interface Toolkit Manual" found in these Links:

http://www2.vernier.com/free/sbi-dev.exe
http://www2.vernier.com/free/sbiss.sea.hqx

That I found on this page:
http://www.vernier.com/forums/do-it-yourself/108-serial-box-interface-protocol-help/

[MarkO_]

| Other possibilities are that it uses a DMM-style dual-slope ADC--more
| accurate (10-12 bits, possibly 3-1/2 digit BCD) but quite slow, or that the
| input impedance is very high, and you need to touch the probe to ground to
| drop the voltage quickly.

I didn't try Grounding it, I just removing it and let it float..

| The Apple II is quite capable of using ADCs at sample rates of many
| kilohertz, to, for example, sample audio. It would be a shame if the
| Vernier box could not support the maximum rate its serial interface
| supports.

I would guess that the Vernier Box is designed for the Lowest Common Denominator.. A Bit Banged Paddle Button Port on just about any 8 Bit PC could get the data..

[MarkO_]

I just received a couple Used 8-pin Mini DIN Cables to connect the Apple ][gs to the Vernier Box. Now to hook it up and load a Terminal Program.. I always like ASCII Express...

A month ago I bought a nicely used version of "How to Build a Better mouse trap and other things", but the experiments in it assume the Vernier Box is the one that connects to the Game Port, ( e.g. Analog and Digital Input ), rather than the Serial Port version.. I have some other Hardware that connects to the Game Port, I can try the experiments with..

[MarkO_]

I just received an Auction I won of a Lot of 8, Vernier Serial Boxes. Time to test them..
MarkO

[I.G. Dev.]

I am embarassed to say that I let this drop, after asking for help,
after so many months.

I have some access to some x86 PC code that came from Vernier (Mr.
Vernier himself was very helping in sharing info with me, especially
considering he had to "dig" for the stuff in his company's archives).
If anyone would like to see that, please email me. I also have some
hard-to-find docs, I think different than what MarkO_ dug up.

I'm still open to supporting anyone that cares enough to make a Serial
Box input into a IIGS into... "something". I apologize to anyone who
took a look at this at all, and then wondered where I went.

Thanks.

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