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Re: prototype board options

I've made my own Apple II cards from ordinary double sided PCB stock. It was easier than I first thought it might be. I haven't bothered with a bread or proto boards since learning to etch my own PCBs. 

http://www.willegal.net/photo/repair/besttester.htm (bottom of page)
http://www.willegal.net/appleii/appleii-fwboard.htm
You might want to put a second AVR on the board and use some sort of serial protocol (I2C or RS232) to communicate rather than running ribbon cables around. One AVR handles the user interface and the other handles the bus interface. Communication between them is via the serial link. 

Regards,
Mike Willegal

jonnosan wrote:

I've been toying with the idea of building a "front panel" for my iie,
mostly inspired by the one shown in "Understanding the Apple ][",
except using an atmega16 + an LCD display + a 16 button key matrix for
input.

I don't expect to have either the time or the technical chops to
actualy finish this, but it's been fun playing with interfacing the
atmega16 to the LCD and the keyboard. Now the time has come to try to
connect to the apple ii bus.

What are the best options for connecting my circuits to the bus?

Since the LCD and keyboard will need to be mounted outside the apple's
case, I've been imagining making a card that connects the relevant
lines to some IDC headers, and then some ribbon cable coming from the
card to an external box.

I've been considering the "Little Proto II" but have held off because
of the cost (will be about $100USD once postage to Australia is
included), also because if this thing is ever finished, I don't want
to be worried about jumpers falling out of the bread board.

I'm also aware of the '8 bit baby', but it doesn't seem to be
available anymore.

So my current plan is to cut the edge connector off a surplus card (I
acquired some clone RGB cards that I don't think will ever serve a
useful purpose to anyone), and then solder some ribbon cable straight
on to the gold plating.

Can anyone suggest something more elegant?

Regards

Jonno