Program Transfer with Sharp PC-E500
Raymond Claude Stoecklin
A friend of mine has got a Sharp PC-E500 with some scientific software in it.
There is a strange kind of serial port (11 pins) but not a very good documentation.
So has anyone out there ever tried to connect that handheld to a PC for a Program
Transfer ? Thanks in advance for any advice or warnings by e-mail.
Raymond
P.S: sorry, no bottomline yet :-)
twoo...@cc.curtin.edu.au
>A friend of mine has got a Sharp PC-E500 with some scientific software in it.
>There is a strange kind of serial port (11 pins) but not a very good
>documentation.
>So has anyone out there ever tried to connect that handheld to a PC
>for a Program Transfer ? Thanks in advance for any advice or
>warnings by e-mail.
>
> Raymond
I hate to say it but all the relevant info is in the manual...
pages 350,303,327,287.
You just have to be computer literate to understand what it is talking about.
The 11 pin connector is RS-232C compatible.
i.e. the same as the IBM-PC serial port but instead of +/-12 volt levels
the output (and input levels) are +5V and 0V.
The relevant pins are:
pin 7 signal ground
pin 2 send data (ouput from pc-e500)
pin 3 receive data (input to pc-e500)
plus the usual handshaking lines, nice but not necessary.
Hardware: All that is required to connect the PC to the E500 is a level
converter. Sharp sells one (dunno the $$$$) but if you have a bit
of nouse you can build one using a chip such as the Maxim MAX232 which
converts the +/-12V levels to TTL (+5V,0V) levels and vice versa.
Don't try to do it without the converter - you will fry the handheld
or both.
Software: On the IBM-PC you need a terminal emulation program to
read and write the serial port. PC-Talk is a primitive shareware example.
On the PC-E500 no software is required. Firstly configure the
RS-232 transmission parameters with:
OPEN"1200,N,8,1,A,L,&H1A,N,N"
( 1200 BUAD
N=NO PARITY
8 BITS PER CHARACTER
1 STOP BIT
A= ASCII (the only setting)
L= end of line is CR + LF
&H1A = end of file code
N=not using XON,XOFF
N=no switch to SI&SO
The IBM-PC terminal program needs to be set-up with similar parameters.
up to you.
)
CLOSE (close the link just opened)
SAVE or LOAD will save or load a file through the serial port.
The only disadvantage with this form of communication is that you
cannot transfer machine code programs easily.
Hope that helps!
BTW: how many other SHARP PC-E500 owners are there out there???
I also have some really FANTASTIC shoot-em-up games written in Machine code
and about 20K in size from a Japanese handheld magazine. If people
are interested I will post them to the net.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Andrew Woods | School of Electrical & Computer Engineering,
| Curtin University of Technology
_--_|\ | Perth. Western Australia.
/ \ | Internet: TWOO...@cc.curtin.edu.au
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Narihito Kon
> In article <1991Nov5.1...@neptune.inf.ethz.ch>, rcst...@iiic.ethz.ch (Raymond Claude Stoecklin) writes:
> >A friend of mine has got a Sharp PC-E500 with some scientific software in it.
> >There is a strange kind of serial port (11 pins) but not a very good
> >documentation.
> >So has anyone out there ever tried to connect that handheld to a PC
> >for a Program Transfer ? Thanks in advance for any advice or
> >warnings by e-mail.
> >
> > Raymond
>
> I hate to say it but all the relevant info is in the manual...
> pages 350,303,327,287.
> You just have to be computer literate to understand what it is talking about.
>
> The 11 pin connector is RS-232C compatible.
> i.e. the same as the IBM-PC serial port but instead of +/-12 volt levels
> the output (and input levels) are +5V and 0V.
Once I also thought like above. But later, I noticed that I made a mistake.
Raymond said about "11pin connector" not 15pin's one.
(I was puzzled the word "serial port".)
> The relevant pins are:
> pin 7 signal ground
> pin 2 send data (ouput from pc-e500)
> pin 3 receive data (input to pc-e500)
> plus the usual handshaking lines, nice but not necessary.
>
> Hardware: All that is required to connect the PC to the E500 is a level
> converter. Sharp sells one (dunno the $$$$) but if you have a bit
> of nouse you can build one using a chip such as the Maxim MAX232 which
> converts the +/-12V levels to TTL (+5V,0V) levels and vice versa.
> Don't try to do it without the converter - you will fry the handheld
> or both.
>
I'll add some information to above:
(1)Pin assignment:
pin siglnal name direction function
------------------------------------------------------------------
1 Frame_ground --- Protectional ground
2 Send_data to PC Transmit data from PC-E500
3 Received_data to PC-E500 Received data from PC
4 Request_to_send to PC When PC-E500 send a data,
this line turns to high-level.
5 Clear_to_send to PC-E500 while this line hold high-level,
PC-E500 can send a data.
6 ---
7 Signal_ground --- Signal ground
8 Carrier_detect to PC-E500 while this line hold high-level,
PC-E500 receives data.
9 ---
10 VC --- PC-E500's high-level
11 Receive_ready to PC When PC-E500 can receive a data,
this line turns to high-level.
12 ---
13 VC --- PC-E500's high-level
14 Equipment_ready to PC While PC-E500's serial circuit is open,
this line holds high-level.
15 ---
-----------------------------------------------------------------
(2)Pins are designed in 1/20-inch-pitch-rule. So, it's good to divert some
kind of DIP pitch connector (ex. wrapping wire's one) to make
serial port connector.
# Does it available in reference manual? (if it does, I'm sorry...)
Well, I don't have good documentation about 11pin connector either.
But I have circuit chart about PC-E500, so I'll write about 11pin's
function soon.
> Software: On the IBM-PC you need a terminal emulation program to
> read and write the serial port. PC-Talk is a primitive shareware example.
>
> On the PC-E500 no software is required. Firstly configure the
> RS-232 transmission parameters with:
>
> OPEN"1200,N,8,1,A,L,&H1A,N,N"
>
> ( 1200 BUAD
> N=NO PARITY
> 8 BITS PER CHARACTER
> 1 STOP BIT
> A= ASCII (the only setting)
> L= end of line is CR + LF
> &H1A = end of file code
> N=not using XON,XOFF
> N=no switch to SI&SO
>
> The IBM-PC terminal program needs to be set-up with similar parameters.
> up to you.
> )
>
> CLOSE (close the link just opened)
>
> SAVE or LOAD will save or load a file through the serial port.
I don't know that other version (i.e. not sold in japan) of PC-E500
have same BUG, but my PC-E500 can't handle XON-XOFF unless SI&SO
available.
Exsample:
OPEN"9600,N,8,1,A,L,&1A,X,N" <-- PC-E500 ignore XON-XOFF controll
OPEN"9600,N,8,1,A,L,&1A,X,S" <-- PC-E500 handle XON-XOFF controll
If you have trouble with XON-XOFF, it would be helpful to doubt SI&SO
parameter.
> The only disadvantage with this form of communication is that you
> cannot transfer machine code programs easily.
I have also wanted to transfer machine code programs through serial
port for a long time, but none made efficient transfer program.
So, I made a DEVICE-DRIVER for PC-E500 which provide a environment
like MAXLINK. If you use this, you can have "L:"
drive on PC's FDD or HDD, and operate it from PC-E500. It works same
as "E:" or "F:" wholly.
If anyone want it, I'll make ready for post (Documents are written
in Japanese, so I must translate it to English! If you read japanese
, I can post it right away.)
PS. Sorry for very BAD english...
--
Narihito Kon
Dept. of Computer Science, Tokyo Institute of Tech., Japan
E-Mail : k...@cs.titech.ac.jp
HAM : JK1OSG @ JR1YTD
Kenneth B Streeter
>BTW: how many other SHARP PC-E500 owners are there out there???
I have a Sharp PC-1500, which, I presume is similar, but probably
totally different!
--
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MIT LCS, Room NE43-350 | UUCP: ...!uunet!im.lcs.mit.edu!streeter
545 Technology Square | (617) 253-2614 (work)
Cambridge, MA 02139 | (617) 394-0723 (home)
Narihito Kon
11pin connector is used to link to peripherals such as PRINTER, FDD,
and so on. (I think someone pointed out that already on this newsgroup.)
As compared with 15pins, 11pins have a lot of unknowns. Functions
are not opened officially. All that we can do is to conjecture its
functions from circuit chart. The following is obtained from my own
investigation of circuit chart. Errors would be contained.
11pins' function:
-----------------
pin name(from circut chart) direction function
---------------------------------------------------------
1 MT2(Magnetic Tape 2) to E500 Conneted to internal
buzzer
2 VCC --- None to say(+5 to 6V)
3 GND --- None to say(0V)
4 BUSY from E500 PC-E500 is busy,
can't receive data(?)
5 DOUT from E500 Data out to peripherals
6 Xin to E500 Data in from MT.
7 Xout from R500 Data out to MT.
8 Din to E500 Data in from peripherals
9 Ack to E500 Acknowledge signal
to E500(?)
10 IO2 ??? ???
11 IO1 ??? ???
In addition, I'll show functions of INTERNAL RAM(these are like
registers) below:
Important part of INTERNAL RAM:
-------------------------------
Address Name function
-------------------------------------------------------------
0xec BP RAM BASE POINTER (*1)
0xed PX RAM PX POINTER (*1)
0xee PY RAM PY POINTER (*1)
0xef AMC ADR. MODIFY CONTROL (*1)
0xf0 KOL KEY OUTPUT BUFFER (Strobe to key matrix)
0xf1 KOH KEY OUTPUT BUFFER (Strobe to key matrix)
0xf2 KI KEY INPUT BUFFER (From key matrix)
0xf3 EOL E PORT OUTPUT BUFFER
0xf4 EOH E PORT OUTPUT BUFFER
0xf5 EIL E PORT INPUT BUFFER
0xf6 EIH E PORT INPUT BUFFER
0xf7 UCR UART CONTROL REGISTER
0xf8 USR UART STATUS REGISTER
0xf9 RXD UART RECEIVE BUFFER
0xfa TXD UART TRANSMIT BUFFER
0xfb IMR INTERRUPT MASK REGISTER (*1)
0xfc ISR INTERRUPT STATUS REGISTER
0xfd SCR SYSTEM CONTROL REGISTER (*1)(*2)
0xfe LCC LCD CONTROL REGISTER
0xff SSR SYSTEM STATUS REGISTER
(*1) You should not touch this register if you don't have enough
information about machine language and system of PC-E500. This is
very critical.
(*2)Contents of this register is:
---------------------------------
|MSB| | | | | | |LSB|
---------------------------------
| | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | +--- ???
| | | | | | +------- Interval Timer Control 1
| | | | | +----------- Interval Timer COntrol 2
| | | | +--------------- 1: POWER-OFF
| +---+---+------------------- 000 None
Unknown 001 Buzzer on
010 Beeps at 2KHz
011 Beeps at 4KHz
100 None (Xin sense amp. active)
11x Xin -> Xout(Xin sense amp. active)
Noisy sound will occur!
- figure 1 -
Xout and Xin are connected to SCR and SSR. So if you read/write
these register, the result will appear at these pins and registers.
But in SCR, there are some ciritical function (like POWER-OFF bit).
Please be careful when you write data at this register.
Other pins are connected to mainly E-PORT but indirectly. There exist
some diodes and transisters between pins and CPU ports. These
relations are complicated.
You can read/write these registers even from BASIC. For example, if
you want to write data (ex. 0xff) at EOL, you only type
POKE &F3,&FF
And if you want to read data from RXD, you only type
PEEK &F9
BASIC interpreter redirects data destination from EXTERNAL RAM to
INTERNAL RAM automatically when address of POKE/PEEK is pointing
between 0x00 and 0xff.
But please don't forget that BASIC interpreter is also using these
registers, so data would be often changed or intercepted by it.
Narihito Kon
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Kenneth B Streeter
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Narihito Kon
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