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  • Preserving hardware designs

    From scott@scott@alfter.diespammersdie.us (Scott Alfter) to comp.sys.apple2 on Friday, July 11, 2025 21:48:58
    From Newsgroup: comp.sys.apple2

    I've been on a bit of a kick lately to document old hardware in KiCad.
    Think of it as a smaller-scale version of bit-preserve, which tends to have schematics but not PCBs:

    https://github.com/baldengineer/bit-preserve/

    (FWIW, I've contributed the EZCGI to bit-preserve:
    https://github.com/baldengineer/bit-preserve/tree/main/Apple/Peripherals/ezcgi)

    Here's what I have so far:

    EZCGI (from a Byte article):
    https://gitlab.alfter.us/salfter/a2-9918

    ALF MC16 and MC1 (from PDFs in the Internet Archive, IIRC):
    https://gitlab.alfter.us/salfter/ALF_sound_cards
    (the MC1 PCB was based on the original layout in the documentation)

    Microsoft Softcard (also from a PDF in the Internet Archive):
    https://gitlab.alfter.us/salfter/Microsoft_Softcard

    Willegal Brain Board (from the original website):
    https://gitlab.alfter.us/salfter/brainboard
    (PCB based on the published gerbers)

    Each repo provides at least a schematic and PCB layout that'll open in KiCad
    9 (the older ones might open in KiCad 7). A PDF copy of the schematic, a
    STEP rendering of the PCB, and gerbers are also included. Software (source and/or binaries) has been gathered up for some, but not all.
    --
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  • From scott@scott@alfter.diespammersdie.us (Scott Alfter) to comp.sys.apple2 on Friday, July 11, 2025 21:52:30
    From Newsgroup: comp.sys.apple2

    In article <eFfcQ.826029$Ra5f.541406@fx13.iad>,
    Scott Alfter <scott@alfter.diespammersdie.us> wrote:
    ALF MC16 and MC1 (from PDFs in the Internet Archive, IIRC):
    https://gitlab.alfter.us/salfter/ALF_sound_cards
    (the MC1 PCB was based on the original layout in the documentation)

    Now that I think about it, the MC16 PCB was produced from someone else's reconstructed gerbers as well. The EZCGI and Softcard PCBs, by comparison,
    are my own work, with the Softcard only sharing component layout with the original.
    --
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    / v \ Scott Alfter (remove the obvious to send mail)
    (IIGS( https://alfter.us/ Top-posting!
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  • From scott@scott@alfter.diespammersdie.us (Scott Alfter) to comp.sys.apple2 on Thursday, July 24, 2025 23:59:47
    From Newsgroup: comp.sys.apple2

    A work in progress, but the schematic is complete and the PCB is based on a known-working layout:

    https://gitlab.alfter.us/salfter/Apple_II_Rev0

    The schematic was created from the Red Book. The PCB started out as an
    import of Mike Willegal's gerbers, which provides most of the traces.
    Errors in the Red Book schematic (and, in a few places, errors in my capture
    of the schematic) were fixed by seeing what connected to what in the PCB
    until DRC no longer complained of shorted nets or unconnected pins.
    --
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    / v \ Scott Alfter (remove the obvious to send mail)
    (IIGS( https://alfter.us/ Top-posting!
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