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(TODO!) + ROMs, Good Disk, First Samples

A project log for OMNI 4 - a Kaypro 2x Logic Analyzer

A while back I acquired a rare logic-analyzer, whose lone system-diskette needed backing-up. Now this page is all things OMNI 4

eric-hertzEric Hertz 09/13/2017 at 06:552 Comments

(TODO: Apparently I set the logic-analyzer board on a scanner way-back when... 350MB files my computer can't handle right now. But maybe they show some now-unreadable chip-markings. I do remember, now... my scanners weren't too happy with the three-dimensionality of the thing. But who knows... Next time I free up a couple gigs for temporary files, I'll try to remember to look at 'em, and maybe upload. And now I recall why I was so excited to spend $300 on a student's wage to buy a SCSI scanner I did a lot of researching for, way back when.)

Two EPROMs exist on the KayPro motherboard (none seen on the Logic Analyzer board). U9 and U34, different sizes.

U9 seems to be the character-generator ROM (likely once labelled "K2xCHAR", though the sticker has been floating in the case).


U34 seems to be the boot-ROM/BIOS...


Funny it mentions CP/M in the ROM... because that message doesn't come up until the disk loads.

The ROM images are now in the "Files" section.

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"Burnt" new disks (several, infact). Turns out the first diskette was corrupt. The image burnt without errors numerous times thereafter.

Now I can run D.COM:


yeahp... I ran that once before and forgot... basically just a little more sophisticated than "dir"

STARDNLD.COM still just freezes... anyone know what it might be?

I think the majority of the rest of the files are actual logic-analyzer samples and/or configurations... but I have yet to look into them.

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On to sampling!

Only one probe is labelled... and the other seems to have different heatshrink...

I had to look inside... (I'm guessing someone else did before, as well).


Huh... This thing supposedly does waveform generation, but I don't see that happening with 7400's at the probes. Maybe they require different probes.


I set up the logic analyzer pods to read from a few pins on what I think to be the video-controller and discovered an interesting error message:


"External clock does not generate waveform"

This message occurs when the cables are near other circuitry... or when the cables overlap themselves. Lotsa testing happened... Apparently we've got some antennas.

Re-ran the cables away from other circuitry, and now we have waveforms!


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Gotta cut my laptop-usage short... thing eats through the battery, gotta leave the engine on to use it longer than an hour-ish, else I'll need a jump-start tomorrow.

Discussions

Dr. Cockroach wrote 09/13/2017 at 08:21 point

Damn, that looks great :-) If you were over here I could set you up with a solar panel and inverter system...

  Are you sure? yes | no

Eric Hertz wrote 09/13/2017 at 21:59 point

nice! Solar is a great idea...

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