Albireo - USB/SD interface for CPC (new version without serial)

[hlide]

Interested by one too.

[Zik]

Hi everyone,

After a long time, here are good news. I finally got enough orders to build a new batch for a reasonable price (so that the unitary price will not change for you). I received them and they are working fine (Albireo+SD card)!
In the coming days I will PM everyone who placed an order to confirm order, arrange payment and get your email address if I do not have it already.
I will try to do that real soon but my time is limited, so please forgive me.

I ordered some spares. So, if you finally want one, please send me a PM.

[Audronic]

@Zik
Yes please, one for me!

Pm sent to you

Thanks

Keep Safe

Ray

[norecess464]

Yep @Zik , me too please. (PM already sent !). Thanks!

[HAL6128]

@Zik. PM sent.

[Fran123]

Hello

Does it implement a ROM?  Does it is compatible with a ROMBOX?

Thanks

[Zik]

Does it implement a ROM?  Does it is compatible with a ROMBOX?

Hello. In addition to this card you need a ROM expansion interface (any should work) to use the Albireo properly.
See the first post of this thread for more details.

[Zik]

Hi,
Everyone who ordered for this second batch should now have the card in their hand (or it is on the way). I have a few spares left if anyone else is interested.

[dodogildo]

@Zik I'm also interested in one of the remaining ones. Will message for the details.

[GUNHED]

How much units of the Albireo (taken all together) have been sold by now?
Is it 100 units already?

[Zik]

How much units of the Albireo (taken all together) have been sold by now?
Is it 100 units already?

I have now sent a little more than 50 units as of now. But I do not know how many @PulkoMandy did send previously, I assume at least about the same amount?

[PulkoMandy]

Hello,
I think a bit less than that, something like 35, of which the 5 first prototypes with a lot of patch wires all died for some reason and had to be replaced with the final board.

So that makes it close to the FlashGordon, about 70

[GUNHED]

Very nice! For CPC this is done well. Hope to see the 100 mark cracked soon.
And good to know for us programmers too. 

[zhulien]

If usb devices with fat32 are supported does that mean usb hard disks should work? Has anybody tried?

[rpalmer]

If usb devices with fat32 are supported does that mean usb hard disks should work? Has anybody tried?

I doubt the USB hard drives are likely to work, since the USB interface is just a parallel to serial communication interface and that many USB hard drives require fast USB in order to work. A slow USB like 1.1/1.2 and maybe 2.0 standard may be unusable. It is worth testing to see if a low capacity drive works.

[HAL6128]

Yes, it works! I didn't test it on the Albireo device but on the new UlifAC v5 (but I think it will also work on the albireo... maybe check this later).

I have an old 500GB Seagate HDD, created a "small" partition with 2GB FAT32, stored the SymbOS files on it, plugged it via an IDE2USB adapter on the UlifAC (recognized without any problems) and started the OS.

Interesting is, that it doesn't work with my (similar) Wester Digital 500 GB drive.

[Prodatron]

Thanks for testing! Now I wonder if 3,5" USB disc drives with 1,44MB FAT12 discs are working as well

[HAL6128]

No, the USB Floppy drive didn't start. I assume that power supply is not sufficient enough.
I don't know if there will be a possibility to power it externally?

[Prodatron]

No, the USB Floppy drive didn't start. I assume that power supply is not sufficient enough.
I don't know if there will be a possibility to power it externally?

There are Y cables for adding a power supply, but these usually have a USB micro/mini connector for the device.

https://www.amazon.de/USB-Mini-Y-Kabel-Stecker-Mini-B-5pol/dp/B000TG3H2S/ref=pd_sim_computers_1?tag=comput0d-21

I guess your 3,5" disc drive has a fixed cable with male USB A? Not sure if there are Adapters from female mini/micro to female A.

[HAL6128]

Yes, it's a fixed, male USB A cable.

[zhulien]

interesting, i just got a 250mb zip ide zip drive, so i just need to find a suitable PSU for it and I will also give this a try 

[zhulien]

Interesting there is a youtube video 'can the ps2 burn a dvd' - since dvdram can be formatted as fat32 or fat16, the ps2 can just write to the fat16 as it does any usb memory stick.  I wonder then if albiero will just work with a fat32 dvdram drive also... i'll have to check if any of my external drives are dvdram and give it a go.

[PulkoMandy]

On Albireo, USB mass storage (as used by hard disks and USB keys) will work using the built-in driver in the CH376 chip. Speed isn't a problem, it will be slow (compared to modern machines) but still plenty fast for the z80. So, for USB drives of that type, no changes are needed. Yes, for hard disks it may be a good idea to not overwork your CPC 5V power supply and use external power on the USB port (typically, had drives will have an external supply anyways).

Other hardware such as floppy drives would need a specific driver written on the z80 side, because they use a slightly different protocol.

I think CD drives are different enough that they would also need a separate driver, at least because of using a different sector size (sectors on a CD are 2KB instead of 512 bytes).

[Raven]

Hi everybody,

I am interested in an Albireo card.
How to get one ?

Regards

[Zik]

Hello everyone,

I am sorry, the second batch is sold out. To build a third one and maintain the same price of 25€ (µSD card and shipping costs included), I need to reach 25 orders (maybe 20 could be enough). For now, I have 2 pre-orders (including Raven).

As a reminder, it is possible to plug 2 Albireo boards at the same time as this Albireo v2.0 version can be reworked to shift I/O address.