Looking for a 16Bit ISA capable small PC

[Manoel Trapier]

Hello everyone, for a future project I'm searching for a small sized computer with 1 or 2 16bits ISA connector.

A CPU as low as a 486 would be enough for my project. For the size something about the size of the "MSI MegaPC" in the main room would be really welcome as I already have plenty of large PC.

Something like this would be perfect: http://www.casimages.com/i/160221114159415746.jpg.html

If any of you have something like this that take some space, it may make an happy person!

For those who are interested, my project would be to make an FPGA based board connected to the ISA port, so with full access to the CPU memory & IO bus, to make a hardware emulator  of an existing portable device that used a NEC V30MZ CPU (a 80186 clone) and the hardware is completely different from the PC platform, and the project would use the V86 mode for running the software to debugging, and the FPGA board would provide all of the original hardware IOs & memory.

Cheers,

Manoel

[daprigoo]

That sounds a very interesting project, do you intend to share the design etc?

I don't have a motherboard with ISA but I do have a mini-ITX Morex Venus 669 case (33 x 23 x 20) if that helps.

 
Also an Atom 330 motherboard (Intel D945 GCLF2) but no ISA only a single PCI. 

David

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[bar...@iware.co.uk]

Have you considered PCMCIA?

[Bob Dunlop]

On Tue, Mar 01 at 02:01, Manoel Trapier wrote:
> Hello everyone, for a future project I'm searching for a small sized
> computer with 1 or 2 16bits ISA connector.
>
> A CPU as low as a 486 would be enough for my project. For the size
> something about the size of the "MSI MegaPC" in the main room would be
> really welcome as I already have plenty of large PC.

I may have a PC that is suitable. Pretty sure it's ISA + PCI but need
to crack the case tonight to check. Pentium II processor. Might be a
bit bigger than wanted, a mini-tower varient.

> For those who are interested, my project would be to make an FPGA based
> board connected to the ISA port, so with full access to the CPU memory & IO
> bus, to make a hardware emulator of an existing portable device that used
> a NEC V30MZ CPU (a 80186 clone) and the hardware is completely different
> from the PC platform, and the project would use the V86 mode for running
> the software to debugging, and the FPGA board would provide all of the
> original hardware IOs & memory.

Intel 80186, that takes me back to the 80s. Used to build bus master ISA
cards with 80186 processors on them to offload the PC's serial I/O loads.

If your card is expecting to be able to DMA access memory on the main
PC motherboard be aware that not all ISA PCs were capable of this. An
area of the IBM spec such as it was that often got missed.

--
Bob Dunlop

[Alex Gibson]

How about this?

http://arstech.com/install/ecom-prodshow/usb2isar.html

Tapped on my mobile phone.

--

[Mark Robson]

Funny story... a company I once worked with, were building some ISA cards for PCs (a long time ago). These were hand-made boards and occasionally contained faults, so they were all tested before shipping.

Sometimes the faults made them non-functional, occasionally they broke the motherboard.

We learned that it was possible to buy a "isa bus protector", for some crazy price like £5k.

But the real solution was just to use old 386 motherboards for testing instead. The typical rate that they were destroyed was about 1 motherboard for 200 cards, or something - not bad.

Mark

[Bob Dunlop]

On Wed, Mar 02 at 09:38, Mark Robson wrote:
> Funny story... a company I once worked with, were building some ISA cards
> for PCs (a long time ago). These were hand-made boards and occasionally
> contained faults, so they were all tested before shipping.
>
> Sometimes the faults made them non-functional, occasionally they broke the
> motherboard.
>
> We learned that it was possible to buy a "isa bus protector", for some

> crazy price like ??5k.

>
> But the real solution was just to use old 386 motherboards for testing
> instead. The typical rate that they were destroyed was about 1 motherboard
> for 200 cards, or something - not bad.

We brought a good brand of PC I think it was Compaq but can't be 100%
after this time. Nothing in the warrantee says you can't install a card
and reboot 50 times a day.

Service guy never had an issue replacing motherboards every 8 weeks or so
of the 2 year guarantee. He did eventually leave us with four mother
boards so we could change them ourselves and he'd call by every couple
of months and swap the duds for new.

--
Bob Dunlop

[Manoel Trapier]

PCMCIA? That's an idea, but I will need more space than what a PCMCIA card could provide, and it's much easier to make an ISA PCB dans a PCMCIA one..

PCI is not an option because I need direct access from the CPU to the ISA card. Same problem with the (really expensibe) USB to ISA.. 

I had never imagined that someone ever made something like this, I don't really see the point as all of the ISA board expect to be on the CPU bus o_o

David: thanks for the proposal, but I don't think there are any mother board with ISA in the mini ITX form factor :(

Bob: Tell me, about the PC you have, but I fear that a mini tower may be a big bigger than my real need, the smaller the form-factor the better)

The fact it's a P2 is not a problem per-se as I'm planning to run the main OS with something like Linux, and having a process running in V86 mode, with a supervisor to debug and manage access to the ISA hardware.

And for DMA no, the V86 process will only do "direct access" to the board, and no DMA, at least not on the CPU side.

Manoel

[Bob Dunlop]

On Wed, Mar 02 at 11:18, Manoel Trapier wrote:
...

> Bob: Tell me, about the PC you have, but I fear that a mini tower may be a
> big bigger than my real need, the smaller the form-factor the better)
> The fact it's a P2 is not a problem per-se as I'm planning to run the main
> OS with something like Linux, and having a process running in V86 mode,
> with a supervisor to debug and manage access to the ISA hardware.

Long story short, plugged it in last night, blink of LEDs, buzz, crack.
It is an ex PC. I suspect something impossible has died in the P-II
module, had a couple of others go that way many years back.

If it's any consolation it would have been too big anyway. 42x21x41cm.
Much bigger than I remembered.

1998 ASUS P2B AGP motherboard. 3x ISA 16 slots, 4x PCI, AGP.

There's an ASUS PCI-SC875 Ultra-Fast/Wide SCSI card and 2G SCSI drive
in there is anyone is looking for historic parts.

--
Bob Dunlop

[mikethebee]

Manoel, I have left a old PC Motherboard with ISA slots on the old 3week shelves, marked for your attention. Maybe it will be of use. -MTB

[Manoel Trapier]

Thanks Mike, I will look if something could be done with!

[Manoel Trapier]

But if anyone have or know somewhere to find something like the one I show earlier in this thread or something the size of the Amstrad PC 5086/5286. I might be able to make it work with the P2 but a simpler Intel CPU from a 386 to 1st gen pentium would be nice. (I need at least a CPU with the V80 mode which is like the real mode but under an hypervisor.

Thanks again Mike I will try to make shine that mainboard for prototyping :)

[Manoël Trapier]

Ok I've started to make some test, but I don't have a working ATX PSU, the non dell one on the 3week shelves seems to not work, I haven't tested the Dell as it's pin out is not ATX, so be careful to not use it directly on a non compatible DELL PC!

Does someone have an 20-pins ATX power supply that he could lend in the space for a couple of day? (or something to convert from 24-pins to 20-pins as there is a one with a 24-pins downstairs, but the connector of course does not fit a 20-pins one...

Thanks,
Manoel

> Le 11 mars 2016 à 15:06, Manoel Trapier <godz...@gmail.com> a écrit :
>
> But if anyone have or know somewhere to find something like the one I show earlier in this thread or something the size of the Amstrad PC 5086/5286. I might be able to make it work with the P2 but a simpler Intel CPU from a 386 to 1st gen pentium would be nice. (I need at least a CPU with the V80 mode which is like the real mode but under an hypervisor.
>
> Thanks again Mike I will try to make shine that mainboard for prototyping :)
>

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[Matthew Daubney]

Check in the grey boxes in the room with the three week shelves. There used to be a box of them