Twin PCI Riser Project for TAM, 6360, 5x00 Single Slot PowerMacs.

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Fabulous! Thank you very much, you've answered so many of my questions. I had a nagging suspicion about the notch I'll need to make for PRAM battery clearance. I pulled the bats from my boards, but still have them, so that's one big one down!

This shot is amazing:

View attachment 24253

The "sideplane"  popped up in my window close enough to life size that holding the cardboard template I cobbled together about an inch and a quarter off the screen matches up almost perfectly. Even the CS2 cutout appears to be pretty close, I threw that on there roughly, expecting to be more than this little bit off!

View attachment 24182

Your pic of the solder side is probably good enough for a rough fit test with my mockup. There's just enough perspective distortion (leaning in building/keyhole type) in your shot to induce fudge factoring. An actual scan of the solder side of the PCI riser as I've illustrated above with the 6400 riser would give me hard numbers for the PCB design. As is, I can file the mockup down to a near perfect match for rough testing. Put the CS2 riser on the scanner at the same time and that will be another good reference for my workup.

Your top view pics cut off at the edges enough that I can't estimate the maximum PCI card length for the TAM. Could you measure the distance between the cover plate's metal shield and the sidewall/backside of the card area at the real of the slot? Looks to be at least a bit longer than a 7 inch card?

Thanks so much!

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

View attachment Printout-X.PDF

 

[EvilCapitalist]

Managed to find a buddy who has a multifunction machine and got some scans:

CSII





PCI (TAM)





PCI (5500)

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

OOH BABY!!!!!  []   Many thanks.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Time to start making a BETA version of the Dummy Two Slot Riser. The red outlines define the CS2 slot. Don't know why, but Apple spaced the CS2 PCB much farther from the PCI card's PCB than standard 2cm spacing. I thought the CS2 riser looked awfully tall for its purpose? It may have something to do with the curvature of the back a/o ventilation out the top of the fat back requiring more surface area or specific placement? Doesn't matter, good news is that the second slot might be added at standard spacing.

I plugged a standard USB cable into the connector protruding from a card's cover plate and measured a tad under 2cm as enough setback to bend the cable around 180 degrees without strain. So the second slot is the standard 2cm higher at a 2cm setback in reference to the standard TAM Slot in the light gray area representing the TAM's PCI riser.



Views are from solder side of the cards, matching scans above.

If the curve of the back is too tight toward the bottom (TOP of the upside down second card) inside the Fat Back, then I'll need to tighten up the slot spacing a bit to fit a higher profile card in the top slot, limiting the maximum height of components on the main card. But we're looking good so far! []

Thanks again for the scans, evil one.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

The more difficult TAM exercise for the rare and wildly expensive few is coming along nicely. o here's background info developed in the past on modding the multitude of slot deprived Macs in the 6360/5400/5500 form factors:

rsolberg"s pics from his Performa 6360 dual PCI slot mod thread.

Dana's comparison pic of the risers:

Found pics searching through my attachments. Neanderthaler approach to TwinSlotting a 6xxx/6500 hybrid.Custom riser with setback slot is a tad more elegant approach to the exercise than transplanting the the two slot drawer. The 6360/5400/5500 the single slot is spaced far closer to the logic board than the lower slot on a 6400/6500 riser. So fitting a second card and card within the drawer cubic on a custom riser is a simple exercise as compared to the TAM mod.

These shots illustrate the need to set the second slot back an inch or so from the backplane:

View attachment 11909

View attachment 11907

PCI bridge research for TAM compatibility turned up info that appears to limit my build to the original 6360 board and PSU.  Doing so will maintain compatibility with the Sonnet TEMPOtrio, which doesn't play nicely at all with the TAM/6500/5500 architecture. Its ATA133 connections to 2.5" SSD/Hybrids while its USB and FireWire connections will be jumpered to a breakout kluge at the vestigial PDS card opening. The full length VidCard hack I did when the fefurb 6360 was my new graphics workstation and is slated to be tidied up.

That's the low hanging fruit I first mentioned that many of you might find interesting for upgrading your more common machines. But for now it's back to the few, the pampered, the TAMs.

 View attachment PDF-conversion.pdf

 

[360alaska]

Here's a suggestion, Why not do two full pci slots and one mini-pci on the back for a wifi card?

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Now you're talking my language.  [] I've got all the stuff laying on the printout I did of the PDF from my last post and checking clearances for doing just that right now! I'll post a pic later. It's tight, but it'll work on a daughtercard. No place to put the SMT Mini PCI socket on the riser due to interference with the thruhole PCI connectors and it needs standoffs to clear the PCI connector on the logic board. It's T-I-G-H-T!

Bad news so far on the three slot riser testing, I'll post a pic of the tables printed on the side of the card. Looks like it might need to be installed in Slot D for the three slots to be addressed as A/B/C, so reverse engineering the slot assignment method will be necessary.

At lunch right now, back to work, more later.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Last week a half dozen of these arrived:

View attachment 24146

The 352 was reported as working fine in the B&W G3 over at OS9lives and on Friday this arrived:



Which I am hoping will run in the B&W G3 as well.



If these cards can be coaxed into working way back in the ancient Gazelle/Alchemy Architectures it would be really amazing. Then a kluge like this might be a possibility:



Mini PCI is a very tight fit. Luckily the traces flow nicely for inverted installation. The header/socket connection's standoff distance clears the motherboard connector, placing the Mini PCI card between the PCI host slot and CS2 slot connectors on the logic board. The antenna connections are clear of the CS2 Slot.

My tiny Aironet's used, I've got a brand new BroadCom Mini PCI wireless card coming on the slow boat from China. If any Mini PCI card might work at all in the TAM or my 6360 it's worth exploring.

Mythical third slot search is on hold. I'll post a pic of the info on the three slot rackmount riser tomorrow.

This is all waaaaay over the top! USB->10bT->WiFi doesn't require the mythical third slot, but a Mini PCI wireless card might be a better choice in terms of staying within the power budget of the TAM?

I'll be happy just getting a second slot in the original drawer of my 6360 some day.

 

[EvilCapitalist]

This is all waaaaay over the top! USB->10bT->WiFi doesn't require the mythical third slot, but a Mini PCI wireless card might be a better choice in terms of staying within the power budget of the TAM?

I get the impression that the power available on the TAM is pretty low.  I have to assume that was what was causing my Farallon 10/100 CSII ethernet card to not work when I used it in conjunction with my Tango and 500MHz Crescendo.  My testing, which was admittedly unscientific, showed that I could only have 2 of the 3 in the system and get everything to work...which is why I gave up trying to get the 10/100 card to play nicely and just went back to using the standard Apple 10Base-T version.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

That sounds strange, IIRC reading that in the 6500 riser tests (with HDD contraption removed for clearance) two video cards worked fine. in the TAM.

ISTR the CS2 Slot budget is .25A at 5v? If that's a hardwired (resistance?) limitation of the TAM's hacked 6500 board that may have been your problem with the Farallon card? When you had them, did you test the 10/100 card for function in your 6360/6400 and especially the 6500?

I've been wondering about power budget and the possibilities of connecting a TAM's USB card in my upper Slot B to an external powered USB hub. Would a hub power the bus to which it's connected? Guessing not, but a double-back hacked on an 8-wire cable build could break out to two connectors at each end. TAM to hub input on one "line" and a powered connection on the hub out and back to the TAM on the other "line" for running USB to 10bT adapter and Vonets type wireless setup withoud the need to tap the TAM's available power at all.

Such a setup could be more elegant, precluding the necessity for (and testing of) the Mini PCI kluge illustrated above. USB 1.0 is considerably faster than 10bT, but that connection is bottlenecked at the OS9/8.6 802.11b top end. So throughput limited to about 110% of 10bT would be an improvement (on top of being wireless) and your Farallon 10/100 card would share that same OS induced wireless bottleneck, so it wouldn't be necessary and its replacement would be power budget neutral.

Dunno, typing out loud here while caffeine deprived after a very restless night. :blink:

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

From another of my crazy threads:

View attachment 14632

A quartet of these adapters coupled with a length of my olde schoole 4 pair twisted copper would have power and ground on the return leg with D+ and D-  on the other pairs? What the heck is ID/IO on that board, USB ground and GND is chassis ground? At any rate that'd be the test setup in my 6500 in 6XXX case doppleganger TAM. A more elegant (could anything be less so?) cable build would be in order for this hack.

Does that circuit sound workable or would ten lines be required for discrete power and ground lines in both directions? I'm thinking not? I

 

[EvilCapitalist]

ISTR the CS2 Slot budget is .25A at 5v? If that's a hardwired (resistance?) limitation of the TAM's hacked 6500 board that may have been your problem with the Farallon card? When you had them, did you test the 10/100 card for function in your 6360/6400 and especially the 6500?

Not sure how much power the Farallon 100Base-TX CSII card draws as compared to the regular Apple 10Base-T version but I know if I took out the Crescendo, the Farallon card and USB/Firewire card got along fine.  Then if I took out the USB/Firewire card and put the Crescendo back in, it and the Farallon card played nicely.  I just couldn't get all three of them to play nicely all at the same time.  The TAM became very unstable, if it booted at all.  More often than not it would just bomb on startup and that was it.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

It's tangential, but and interesting situation. I'll have to check the threads that led up to this one for the 6500 riser test. Methinks there was no Crescendo/L2 G3 processor upgrade involved, which is why two VidCards functioned fine hanging inboard & outboard of the standard TAM riser zone.

The Crescendo G3 L2 I got for the brand new to me 6360 refurb I got through the User Group Connection, IIRC. That was probably early 1997, not long after it was introduced. Got the G3 card a bit later.

Meanwhile, for the PowerBook 1400 Sonnet moved to a "low power copper technology" G3 for the Crescendo/PB which drew significantly less power than the stock Apple CPU cards that "extends battery life up to 30%."

6360, TAM and 1400 all used different flavors of the 603e, so why is the L2 version such a power hog in the TAM?

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Belay that drivel I posted about looping powered USB back to the TAM when I was out of it. That was an unfortunate train of though derailment. :

If you're running anything at all off a USB card in a TAM it had better darn well be a Powered Hub! That's where you'd make your USB to 10/100 conversion or go straight from a powered USB port to a USB/WiFi dongle/antenna combo or summat. Antenna/Hub location flexibility is a good thing.  CS2 is a friggin' DINOSAUR that should be put down at earliest opportunity. It's a waste of power any way you look at it with USB in the picture.

Do we have a USB ONLY thread anywhere about cards for the Gazelle machines? USB is turning out to be a lot more useful all around than the FireWire bridge thing for combo cards. Hap told me those things are so scarce he had to trade a real collectible for a friggin' I/O card!

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Finally found where you'd linked the MacGurus Thread: Multiple-PCI-cards-in-1-slot-TAM

As expected, no mention of a G3 card. Researching the power draw of the two VidCards he ran might be interesting.

 

[wolleg]

Hello, I am new to this forum and just try to learn as lot as I can from all of you.  I grew up as a computer/e-tech nerd long time ago and are right now in the situation of building my all-time-dream of my personal „tech-album“ - a collection of computers, which where important for my life till now. All of them sitting in working condition well presented in my working room. As I just put my hands on a Classic II for recapping I was „disturbed“ by getting the chance to buy a working TAM in really good condition, with German keyboard (I am from Germany). I couldn't resist - now being a proud owner of one of them.  Although the machine itself is in great condition - no broken plastic anywhere - the keyboard (everything including the leather looks very clean) has a always-pressed ctrl-key, also if it isn't pressed. So my first work was a complete disassemble of the keyboard - and I found that it has a marriage with some sugar-fluid in the past. :-(  After carefully disassembling every passible part and cleaning over 2 complete days its now working again as smooth as new.  I had the luck to get a Sonnet G3/L2-400- and a Sonnet Tango 2.0 USB/Firewire-card and now I wait for an IDE-to-Compactflash-adapter to replace the (working) IDE-HD.

Long story - sorry - now for my reason of writing here:

My TAM is missing only three things: the leather-replacement for the touchpad, the plastic-port-cover(s) of the right-back-side over the „cable-sorter“ - and finally the Comm Slott II riser card! The PCI-riser is there, but the Comm slots II riser is missing! As for now I bought an SMC USB to Ethernet adapter with OS 9 drivers but for a „complete“ TAM a cCS II riser and a Apple Ethernet CS II card would be nice.

Than I read here for the possibility to build a two-PCI-slot riser for the TAM - heureka, what a great idea IMHO! I have some 10/100 Mbit-PCI-Ethernet-cards for Mac OS 9 here so for me that would be the perfect completion for the system! I would get USB, Firewire and 100Mbit Ethernet! In one USB-Port sits a Mac OS 9 ready D-Link DBT120 Bluetooth adapter for BT trackpad, mice or keyboard as an option and the TAM will become a special place on my personal tech-diary-board.

So my question: Will there be any plan to continue the build of a two-PCI-riser card for the TAM? I will do as much help for this as I can - if someone tells me what to do. ;-) Also I am willing to spend money for this project as I am shure it will be of interest for some more guys/TAMs out there. The time of doing my own PCB-stuff and chemically etching things is far away in the past with my first 8 MHz ATARI-ST - decades from now. ;-)  But this card with no active elements seems to be realizable - especially with the work and planning you all put into it till now! So if I can convince someone here to go forward for a first version of such a two-PCI-riser-card I will be happy. Please!  

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Hi, welcome aboard! Project isn't dead. I've just been doing other things around here that have kept the bench piled high. I've got the cable type PCI risers here to splice together a Slot B riser. If I can get that straightened out I'll graft Slot A onto it. If that work,, I'll have the traces done in bits of IDC cable and documented.

Was supposed to send a physical prototype for fitment testing to someone, but decided to hold off on that until I figured out exactly how the 6400/6500 riser works, how to make a sturdier mockup or if my cardboard mockups might work out well enough for basic fitment testing.

Right now I'm doing off the wall, theoretical project playtime as time permits. February sounds good to take another look at the riser project, If you want me to send you cardboard mockups for test fitment, shoot me a PM.

If you've had etchant stains on your hands and the drill list was accomplished on a drill press, we're probably of an age, or you were doing that stuff very young.  []

 

[Byrd]

Hey Trash,

For some reason I never delved any further in this thread to see all your experiments with dual PCI risers and fitment - well done!  During the Christmas break I've spent a bit of time on my TAM, the issue with dual PCI slots if that it'd likely need to be a custom part - there is a large offset of space required before a PCI slot can begin.  Power issues are ongoing and stabilising two cards without chopping into the case would be very difficult.

I was toying with adding a 3DFX card in my TAM for giggles, however heat output is a concern - the fans are poorly placed and while temperature controlled don't appear to do much.  I did get one successful mod done though, adding an external monitor port (an Apple adapter exists for 5x00 and 6x00 Macs, cloned display), cut into a port in my USB card.

The CSII riser though I'd be dead keen for if someone made a duplicate ...

JB

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Thanks, mate. It's definitely a custom riser, but as the cards hang straight down, there's not much stabilization required.

View attachment 24139

This shot EvilCapitalist posted shows just how much room there is for a second card above the first.

View attachment 24248

CSII port would be the breakout avenue for anything like USB or Ethernet or a WiFi antenna coming from the second card. A Video cable could be snaked out that port as well. That Illustration shows less of a setback than now planned.

View attachment 24211

As I said before: If someone could print this file at 50%, cut it out, test fit and let me know if it needs to be trimmed and by how much it would be a big help.

View attachment 24212

I'll add that rubber cementing or taping the print to a thin bit of cardboard would be good, just stick it in the slot and takes some pics.

edit: dunno if the bobbed CSII connector is available for a "pretty" riser, but a full length PCI connector would work on a bit wider card. The keying is fine, there'd just be some unused contacts.