Re: apple 2 usb

[Mark McDougall <msmcdoug@no.spam.iinet>]

rg.jones@rogers.com wrote:

> The question boils down to your expections for such a device ...?
	(snip)
> .... or something in between .....

What may indeed be possible would be to create an 'emulation' card for 
specific devices that look like standard Apple II peripherals to the apple 
but use standard USB devices.

An example would be a mouse or USB flash device or printer as someone suggested.

The big advantage would be that there is no need to create drivers on the 
Apple side (or at least minimise the work required, depending on the 
peripheral). For example, you'd be able to make a USB HID mouse look exactly 
like an apple mouse, or flash stick look like an apple HDD, but you wouldn't 
attempt to make a HP LaserJet 6 look like an Epson MX-80.

The big disadvantage is that the hardware would definitely not be a 'Generic 
USB Adapter'. The hardware would have to (at least) emulate the hardware 
interface of each supported device.

This could be alleviated somewhat with the use of some programmable logic on 
the board - for example CPLD/FPGA, and/or use of a USB microcontroller such 
as a Cypress or PIC part. That may make it possible to re-configure the 
hardware for more than one device, allowing either 'chop and change' with 
different devices, or multiple cards (each configured differently) to 
support multiple USB devices.

Certainly an interesting idea...

Regards,

--
|              Mark McDougall                | "Electrical Engineers do it
|  <http://members.iinet.net.au/~msmcdoug>   |   with less resistance!"