Re: PC Vector Generator Card...

>if you would use PCI instead of ISA, mac folks could
>use it too.. I came across an interesting part yesterday
> from anchorchips called the an3041 which has an 8k I
>and 8k D cache between the PCI bus and the local bus

That chip sounds interesting... We did a pretty in-depth evaluation of PCI
interface chips a little while back and found some that would work pretty
well too. (PLX makes one that looks the "easiest" to use to me at least.)

I have a few issues with PCI:

1) Hard(er) to layout in 2 layers and have it work. (and the PCI bridge
chips are usually fine pitch parts which makes hand assembly kinda painful
and might be too close together for AP Circuits to fab) I definately
wouldn't pass FCC part 15. ;-)

2) Tougher to debug. ISA is a pretty simple bus that my logic analyzer
wouldn't have a problem with (non muxed, etc.) PCI gets pretty scary. We
don't have a PCI buis analyzer here yet.

3) Software (drivers) are a lot harder to write. :-( Something like the
PLX gets a headstart on the PC side, but the Mac side would still need some
work. (Ward at LoneWolf migth have Mac PCI drivers already for sale
already though...)

4) It's something else to learn. :-/

I think I'll try ISA as a "realistic" sized project, then after we do our
first few PCI modems at work maybe try PCI...

USB would actually be a good candidate, but I don't feel like dealing with
the USB drivers and Win95 on the PC side.

-Clay

Clayton N. Cowgill Engineering Manager
_______________________________________________________________________
/\ Diamond Multimedia Systems, Inc. clay@supra.com
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Received on Fri Dec 5 17:33:25 1997