Re: LZ: RAM I/O Expander


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Re: LZ: RAM I/O Expander



Here's just another idea.  You might want to send large numbers of bytes 
for xfering, and while 5 at a time is good, more would be better.  So why 
not just have those 2 digits instead of adding anohther byte to be 
xfered, instead set a multiple of a constant.  i.e. 00 is 1 byte, 01 is 8 
bytes, 10 is 10 bytes, etc...    Just a thought.


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On Thu, 12 Sep 1996, Ed Plese, Jr. wrote:


> I was just looking over the plans for the RAM IO Expander and it 
> looks pretty good.  The only thing is that it may be slow.  The 
> reason for this is that for every byte that the TI-85 wants to read 
> or write, it has to transfer four (send 3, get 1 for read and send 4 
> for write).  What would greatly speed this up would be to have page 
> writes or just have the TI-85 send three config bytes and in them say 
> how many bytes to write or read and then just write or read that many 
> without the three bytes.  A couple ways to do this would be to add 
> the ability to write up to 5 bytes at a time using the two leftover 
> bits in the address, or increase the number of data bytes to 4 and 
> have the last be the number of bytes.  Either way would work fairly 
> well.  It may require a lot more work on the plans, but it would 
> greatly speed up the transfer.  Actually, the first way would 
> probably work sufficiently and be easier to implement, but the second 
> way would speed things up even more, but would require a lot more 
> work.  
> 
> As an example, if the link port transfers at 9600 bps (BITS per 
> second), then it can transfer a maximum of 1200 BYTES per second.  
> Now, if you were to use the current plans, which require 4 bytes 
> transfered for every 1 data bytes, then a maximum of 300 bytes per 
> second can be transferred.  If you were to use the first way 
> mentioned, then can transfer 8 bytes for every 5 data bytes.  This 
> will speed up the transfer to a max of 750 bytes per second, which is 
> 150% faster than the current way (2.5 times as fast).  This way is 
> definately worth the extra work.  The second way could transfer up to 
> 256 data bytes for every 4 config bytes.  This would result in 
> transfer rates up to about 1181 bytes per second.  This is an 
> increase of 294% (3.9 times) over the current plans and a 50% 
> increase (1.5 times) over the first method suggested.  If you are 
> looking for the maximum transfer rates, then the second way is 
> definately the way to go.  And for those of you who are wondering how 
> you can get 5 out of two bits, you are always going to send or 
> recieve at least 1 byte so just add one to the value that is sent in 
> the config byte. (00=1,  01=2, and so on.)
> 
> I don't know what you think of this, but I think Mel Tsai would be 
> willing to think about one (if not both) of my suggestions.
> 
> -Ed
> 
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