The Sinclair QL Forum

RWAP wrote:The buttons are more problematic.

Nah

Just buy three round, panel mount momentary switches, and solder them across the PCBs switches. Then drill holes somewhere you like (under the right side lip seems good) and mount the switches in the round drilled holes.

Voila!

Dave wrote:

RWAP wrote:The buttons are more problematic.

Nah

Just buy three round, panel mount momentary switches, and solder them across the PCBs switches. Then drill holes somewhere you like (under the right side lip seems good) and mount the switches in the round drilled holes.

Voila!

Yes, but if want square buttons, you can use panel mount momentary switches (that mount in round holes) with square buttons

Or you buy a different version that has a front panel...

Mark

When I said round I was referring only to the fitment type. The style of the buttons is the choice of the buyer. I would not want to be so dictatorial.

I think three small black, square buttons with the same finish as the rougher ABS finish on the QL case would be a pleasing look.

You could always buy a square drill bit

At least they're easier to get hold of than QL serial connectors.

vanpeebles wrote:You could always buy a square drill bit

You can get square drill bits ---- but only for making square holes using SDS drills for electrical outlets (more of a chisel than a drill bit really )

Mark

First order of business: believe it or not, there are square hole drill bits. Check this out:


But for us who don't have access to industrial gear, a dremmel, a plain drill and some files are all that's needed. Oh, yeah, and a triangle and a pencil and lots of patience.

About the HxC, I've got one of these and it's working. Not always perfectly, but I've tried it on different computers. The BBC B and Master are weird, some disk images work, some don't. You have to know if the image you're copying is single or double side, double or high density, etc. The HxC can't use disk images just like that, you need to convert them from a PC to its native format and as such, you usually need to provide information as to what kind of disk you've got an image of. If we're talking about Amigas or Atari STs, where the drive was integrated, there's no problem, as all disks are the same. But for computers that came with no in-built drive or controller... it's an issue.
But apart from that, its working.

The switches and LEDs and LCD can be relocated or even replaced, quite easily. I've settled for nice round soft-touch momentary switches and LEDs that won't burn your retinas in an external case.
As the guys before said, someone could write a programme to change disks and retrieve information from the HxC, or even change disks and display lists with commands, but I find that overkill. A couple of button presses aren't too hard to do.
The only regret that I have is the 2x16 LCD. I'd like something bigger. Maybe even a graphic one in portrait mode.

vanpeebles wrote:Was it a difference between flash cards causing the bother?

I'm not 100% sure, I had only three CF cards to test it all, two of them 4GB and one 16MB (yes, MB, not GB). On some interfaces, any combination of the three would work fine, one interface would only allow the first 2GB to be accessed no matter how I tried to partition it - it was a cheap CF card interface bought for about £2 after all

I suspect one of the six interfaces tried is faulty, as it seems to work sometimes, not other times, so I have scrapped that as it also only cost a couple of pounds.

The best of the lot has been that dual master/slave device that is the same size and shape as a 2.5inch hard disk drive. It obviously needs a 44-pin to 40 pin and power adaptor to work with Qubide, but as this was already present anyway when I removed the original drive, no problem (you can buy them cheaply on Amazon if needed).

Anybody wanting to buy these flash memory card adaptors for use with Qubide will need to note that they need a power connection - most have a floppy disk style small power connector, not the larger (Molex?) types you usually find in PCs. As most Qubides end up being built into re-cased QL or Aurora systems anyway, shouldn't be an issue if there's a spare power connector.

Remember that most of these flash memory card IDE adaptors are NOT hot-swappable, you can't exchange cards on the fly.

It was interesting when I stumbled across the SD card IDE adaptor and got that working too. I hadn't realised they existed for SD cards. Peter Graf's QL-SD uses Qubide format as well (well, strictly, SER-USB format based on Qubide using Adrian's drivers), in which case my method and Peter's cards might be compatible. Happy to send Peter a Qubide formatted SD card to test this if he wishes (if there's doubt).

Mr_Navigator wrote:Compact Flash to IDE if you have an IDE interface for you QL looks like a promising way to go.
Never had a Qubide system so unlikely now, nor the Aurora and the Thor also,
SD card is possibly in the mix and another alternative, but not here yet so...
I have a floppy disk interface for standard QL one with memory expansion, one without
Has anyone tried a Compact Flash/SD Card interface that could plug straight in to a Floppy Disk interface?
Hmmm

My CF and SD card solution is of course only for those with Qubide.

If such an adaptor was available which allowed SD and/or CF cards to be plugged into a floppy disk interface and transparently work like a (very large!) floppy disk, that would be a pretty mind blowing device which I'd certainly buy.

I'm still looking forward to QL-SD if and when that goes into production. So is my QL...

Another device I bought at the same time as the IDE SD card adaptor is a USB to 9-pin COM adaptor. I haven't tried it yet to know and how it works. As my PC has no COM port connector, this gadget will hopefully let me set up SERNET link to transfer files between PC and Minis-QL and hopefully even my spare QL (only two at a time with standard SERNET software sadly).

Next thing I need now is background file copying so that the Minis-QL can backup files automatically in the background between the two compact flash cards. I have thought of writing a little backup program which in essence works like a screen saver - if no keyboard or mouse use detected, copy a file and hope that copying completes before the computer is used again, I would have thought flash memory cards might be fast enough, perhaps.

I've already written a little 'sync' program which lets you synchronise (i.e. keep up to date) latest files between drives, it's a BASIC program which should appear in the next issue of Quanta mag (plug plug!) unless Mr Navigator gets snowed under with copy again

dilwyn wrote:
I've already written a little 'sync' program which lets you synchronise (i.e. keep up to date) latest files between drives, it's a BASIC program which should appear in the next issue of Quanta mag (plug plug!) unless Mr Navigator gets snowed under with copy again

It's in there