MPC60 SCSI card with internal SD card reader.

Greetings!

I just finished up a project that took me near 2 years and figured I'd show it off a little.

The only reason it took 2 years is I managed to crack the glass on my LCD and it took me that long to find a replacement LCD.

[[removed google+ link that didn't work and I don't feel like fighting with]]

http://www.sdiy.org/xyzzy/MPC60/

I've created a slightly different version of the original Marion SCSI card for the MPC60. The size is the same but you might notice it has 4 power connectors on the right side and the onboard connectors are 50pin and there are two of them. One is a standard male and one is a right-angle female at the edge. In those, fairly crappy, photos you can just make out the I/O Data SCSI/IDE bridge plugs right in the front of the SCSI card. The ribbon cable running to the back of the unit is just IDE to the SD card bridge.

It all fits internally. Power supply seems to be holding up just fine although if I see any issues it'd be easy enough to add a separate 5v supply just for the SD card and IDE bridge.

One big advantage to using SD over CF cards is that SD cards don't report themselves as Removable. Thats up to the SD controller, and the ones I've tried sofar all report themselves as Fixed Disks.

Anyhow, its done. My MPC60 lives and I am a happy camper!

-Tom

That link doesn't appear to work. It asks you to log in and then tells me I do not have access to the document. May be worth trying to upload it to an image hosting site like photobucket etc.

So when you say you've created a slightly different version of the marion scsi board, do you mean you have built from scratch an aftermarket scsi setup, or you have modified an existing marion board??

Damn Google+.

I put the 3 pictures here : http://www.sdiy.org/xyzzy/MPC60/

I made a new SCSI board. Got tired of seeing people trying to sell the Marion ones for $600.

I'm also laying out a new memory board. Nothing special about it, I just want one. Currently you can see how it has the piggybacked RAM chips in there. Works, but while I'm in an MPC60 frame of mind I figure I'll do it right.

The extra hole next to the LED on the SD card slot is from the previous version SD card board I got that had an activity LED. I managed to zorch it and had to use another that only has a Card Inserted LED. Once I get a replacement I'll go back to the other model with more blinky lights.

Very impressive, Tom !!
Welcome to the forum

Cool Could you share the layout and a list of parts? Is it hard to get those DP5380N SCSI controller ICs ? If I remember correctly the original SCSI boards are equipped with a different IC. Are those ICs standardized?

The SCSI chip you see in the picture does *not* work. A little history. The 5380 chip was very popular in the late 80s early 90s. Several companies cloned it. LOGIC cloned it and "fixed some bugs" and sure enough one of the problems I ran into was incompatibilities. Turned out that finding the right chip was almost easy compared to finding SCSI terminator resistors these days...

I have a few extra boards that I've sent over to synthparts.com. As it was a group effort over here to make it, I can't really give out the gerbers.

I haven't updated this thread in what seems like forever.

The good bits:
SCSI card works fine, no issues.
SD works fine with the I-O Data IDE bridge.
CF also works fine.

The annoying bits:
I-O Data cards of the right model are scarce as heck.
ACard SCSI cards seem to work fine with CF, but have data corruption with the SD card bridges that I've tested which have so far all had the same chip on them despite replies from the far east to the contrary.

I'm trying to set aside a weekend to fight with this but time has been a rare commodity last few months but hopefully I'll get to it...

Dont give up, you will reap the rewards.

There are threads here which identify the ACARD's that work.

Are you still making the memory upgrades and the scsi cards?

viacom wrote:Are you still making the memory upgrades and the scsi cards?

Forum member Flub also made some MPC60 SCSI boards and put them up for sale. So it is clearly possible for these ancient parts to be produced in small quantities, by the right people.

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=158637

There is also a SCSI board on ebay right now, from France €350 OBO

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/120993865041? ... 1423.l2649

The SCSI card itself is not the issue. I've made several and they work and are solid. I've been trying to work the kinks out of reliably putting solid state storage on them inexpensively.

CF seems to be 100% reliable with the Data IO and Acard IDE/SCSI bridges. SD is much more problematic.

I need to spend some quality time on this project and work the kinks out, I've just had too much Real Work and Project Work to maintain focus.

The memory cards were a no-brainer, the hardest part being finding the chips at a reasonable price. If I'd been smart I'd have done the board for the ZIP format chips which are readily available, but that was my bad...

viacom wrote:Are you still making the memory upgrades and the scsi cards?

More importantly, are you making any of these available for sale?

Having a solid state storage solution attached to the SCSI board is cool, but just to have the option to use SCSI storage is a good place to start for many people.

I promise I'll get off my butt soon and get some assembled...