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DO-ABLE? --> Ram Drive in the JP1 USB interface ?
Posted: Tue Feb 24, 2004 6:03 am
by TimH
It occurs to me that a very cool feature would be to have a ram drive built into the JP1 USB interface. Any of you hardware gurus know if that is even remotely feasible?
Posted: Sun Mar 14, 2004 5:32 pm
by classicsat
Remotely, but why? Any capacity you could accomplish would be miniscule and slow.
Posted: Sun Mar 14, 2004 7:08 pm
by TimH
Why?
To hold the Delcom drivers of course
Posted: Sun Mar 14, 2004 8:34 pm
by Mark Pierson
Assuming that having the Delcom drivers on a ram drive would even work to begin with, I seriously doubt the added expense and construction difficulty could be justified. I'm no hardware expert, but we're certainly talking about more than just adding a memory chip. Then of course, you'd still need drivers for the ram drive hardware, and that would probably negate the whole reason for doing it in the first place.
Posted: Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:49 pm
by TimH
If you cared about supporting the range of o/s, which I don't (but I know you do look at it from that perspective Mark), ram-drive drivers would be an issue. I use Lexmark usb drives at work, and on xp I've never needed drivers, just plug em in and go, so I know that at least on xp it's possible to do usb ram drives without external drivers.
Generally speaking, I still think it would be way cool, though granted a corner case. If you could add a small ram drive, say big enough to hold the tools, rdf's, and a few IR saves... well what would be better than that?
I seem to always find myself in the position of IT specialist for my family, extended family, and friends. I make my living, and most of my life, by being able to put my hands on tools, of one form or another.
I have a complete set of parts for another usb interface on hand. If any of you hardware guru's decide it might be fun to take a whack at a design, I'd be more than happy to take the time, and potentially trash the parts, to take a stab a putting it together.
Don't know if anyone else would be interested in being able to tote thier jp1 kit around, in thier interface, but I would
Posted: Wed Mar 17, 2004 6:29 am
by daveoram
Simple (?) answer could be:
Buy a cheap (8Mb) USB Drive, and one of them small USB hubs about the size of a telephone adaptor. Plug your USB interface and Drive into the hub. Bind the whole lot together with some heatshrink tubing.
Voila! your all in one portable interface/toolkit - It may not look nice, but for the number of people who would probably need it, it would be the most cost-effective method