> On Thu, 17 May 2001, Hans Franke wrote:
> > Well, if we are talking about modern day I/O interface for a
> > home brew system, I'd strongly recomend USB. Single chip USB
> > controlers offer a great deal of flexibility with a simple
> > interface, ready for 8 or 16 bit systems. And you may get
> > almost any peripherals for USB, including _any_ kind of mass
> > storage.
> The simple single chip non-PCI USB devices are pretty much all client
> controllers, not master controllers. That means that they can act as a
> peripheral themselves, but not interface to other peripherals.
Well, high sophisticated stuff like an Atmel 43USB320 will work
fine as host controllers ... and you even can put 'dynamic'
hardware in your design (as little programms for the integrated
8 Bit CPU.
Or take the Infineon SAB C161U, a nice 16 Bit CPU (or SAB-C541U
if you prefer 8051 CPU style - there are similar x51 CPUs from
Texas and Intel of course).
For all of these some serious twiddeling is required of course.
Then there is at least one PowerPC Chip capable of USB Host
functions from Motorola: MPC 850
Anf if I remember correctly Cypress offers also a nice uP with
USB on board, capable of acting as host ... at least I remember
some application note.
Of course, there ae simple USB host controllers without a (visible)
CPU, like one from Scanlogic with several version, capable to act as
root hub or controller and a very fine and universal 8 or 16 Bit
interface - my personal favorite - and there is the Transdimension
UHC124 - very similar, but additional features.
Next there are FPGAs (like the Kawasaki USBx, with or without
on chip uP)
And last but not least, some companies offer USB Controllers as
IP for standard FPGAs (LSI Lucent or Sand)
Or, after all take just a serial interface and a USB Transciever :)
Gruss
H.
--
VCF Europa 3.0 am 27./28. April 2002 in Muenchen
http://www.vcfe.org/
Received on Thu May 17 2001 - 12:24:39 BST