Most liked posts in thread: I'm going to build a WEFAX interface

Nice to see you've joined our little photo club here too, @Graham! Looking spiffy!
Now we have current faces to put too regulars in our little club! Though I know some of you do the video chat thing so you already knew what some others looked like. looks like we all have lack of full head of hair issues! Maybe I'll get up the courage now to show myself without a hat on...maybe...

 

Yeah, I'll get around to figuring out the microphone and webcam soon, or else just buy new ones that just work.

Right now I'm busy continuing work on my house's interior. I just bought a new $1000 kitchen oven range this morning with induction heat stove-top. I got it on sale for $670 because it has a couple of damage dents on it, but they are on the sides which are now hidden anyway, between counter tops on both sides! Nice brushed metal trim one that matches my brushed metal refrigerator, sink, microwave, Nescafe coffee machine, toaster and other odds and ends. The kitchen is starting to look sharp! I still have to paint the walls and put in tongue and groove wood flooring though.

 

That sounds great Matt, Money off and no damage to be seen a win win ..

 

Thanks Graham. I was trying to match the laundry room appliances with the kitchen too, but I found deals on a washer-dryer set and a chest freezer that are white, a year or two ago, I couldn't pass up, so the laundry room appliances are all white. I'd had the brushed metal refrigerator already as well as one of those convection/toaster ovens the size of a full-size microwave and a full-size microwave the same style too before I purchased the laundry machines.

 

The thing I don't like about brushed metal appliances in the kitchen and white for the laundry is that my "laundry room" is really a laundry nook, that was once a laundry room, but I opened it up to expand the kitchen and open up the whole house through the kitchen and living room, and so the kitchen flows into a hallway that has a laundry nook just deep enough for the machines and just long enough for the pair and the chest freezer.

There's no divider, there was, before I tore it out along with the wall on the opposite side, which I am now seriously thinking about installing at the end of the freezer, about two feet further into the kitchen area than the original dividing wall did. That will extend out the same depth from the wall as the appliances. A pantry is directly across from the chest freezer but back a few feet further from the kitchen, the freezer being at the end closest to the kitchen. But I think since they don't match the kitchen, maybe I'll also install one of those wooden slat dividing curtains on rails to open and close off the laundry from the kitchen, diagonally from the new dividing wall segment across to the wall next to the pantry door. Essentially making it into a small laundry room again with a pantry, which is just the size of a standard coat closet with a sliding door of it's own; you don't step into it.

And currently there is no real division between the kitchen and living room either, but another dividing wall will be going in on one side the depth of the Refrigerator, and then a counter with cupboards underneath on the kitchen side and stools to sit at the counter opposite that will separate the living room and kitchen, but all open with the vaulted ceiling; we're only talking about 10" high here meeting at a peak from the 8" walls, compared to the 8" ceilings everywhere else. Right now it's just the refrigerator on one side and the wood stove in the living area on the other side that sort of separate the areas. The living area has a double-wide sliding door on the backside of the house that will eventually open to a large deck. The front wall has double windows and then to the left of them about 5-6" is the front door which is at the beginning of a hall on the other end of the house. Bed rooms and bath beyond the laundry and front door on opposite ends.

 

All this talk of pantries reminds me of ours, Matt.

We went from this (which I loved for pure sentimentality and keeping with original features of the house), but it meant there was never any room to properly sort out all the pots, pans and "stuff" that seems to clog cupboards.



To this - it's a ruddy bowling alley but it ticks all Bev's boxes.



RULE ONE - Keep the missus happy.

 

Back to Atari at least, though I can't see sight of the WEFAX coast anymore, here is what your personal Fujinet online page looks like to control some stuff and set stuff up for using Fujinet on your Atari.

 

Hi, Matt - here's the area around and after the fridge for more details:



Yes - Christmas tree still up at the bottom, awaiting the lifting of lockdown as we still plan to have a late-late-late Christmas party for Bev's folks to celebrate the "opening of the kitchen" (around Easter!)

So, that unit before the fridge is basically a tall slide-out shelved food cupboard...




The area beyond is a little sit down cosy TV area which should look out on to decking when the weather improves and we get that all put down.



This week we had a tree surgeon down to prune the silver birch as a lack of light out the back was becoming a big issue in the spring and summer but we're all trimmed now...



Good luck with your design and build kitchen project, Matt, and if anything here gives you any new ideas then you're welcome to em.

 

Thanks for the pictures. Currently my Pantry just has shelves in it, but your pull-out rail shelves is how I planned on doing it eventually, but double-wide like two of yours side-by-side. it's just one of the later things on the to-do list. But I spent a day paneling it and installing and painting standard shelves in the mean time.

Your picture of it from the other perspective made it look to me like that pantry cabinet was built over the refrigerator as well and another side. But you have a dividing wall on it's other side, so mine will be similar, only cupboards to the right of it. There was a short dividing wall there originally, but they built the cupboards and counter top in right next to the original refrigerator which was a small, old thing before I started rebuilding the house, and I ended up getting a sid-by-side refrigerator freezer that was taller and wider, so I had to tear out the old dividing wall and I still have make a new on about a foot to the left. then the counter and stools will be directly across from that, looking out onto the living room and about a 4-5 foot wide gap in-between to enter the kitchen. Track lighting and/or like you have done with your ceiling lights. The living room and kitchen both have the vaulted ceiling, continuous, like your front entry way there, but actually I think they peak at about 9", and aren't as high or steep as yours.

 

it's programmed, but didn't have SD card interface or card, hopefully tomorrow.

 

Hey whilst I've been logged in and typing the bubble came up in the Alerts box for your last message @M.D.Baker

P.S SD & Micro SD breakout boards arrived today to test Fuji-Net

Edit
And I've recieved an email as well.



Both have added components I don't need, worst case the hot air gun to remove the crap (and solder in links to bypass), but the SD card should be o.k at 3.3V
the micro needs 5V but converts all to 3.3V a pain, happy with just 3.3V with nothing required between the ESP32 and the raw card socket.

 

My new SW radio arrived today. Now I just need to get or make a bigger antenna and attach it to my Fujilab trailer roof and I have to build my WEFAX decoder since I've had all the parts for a while now. But I have a few other things to finish first...

 

(I know this is very late reply)

I built that WEFAX receiver from ANTIC back-in-the-day.
As a high school student, I also managed to get a short-wave radio with vacuum tubes, and happily plugged it all into my Atari 800XL.

With proper tuning, I worked just enough to qualify as success!!

... then lost interest.
... discovered it was more interesting to listen in to nearby wireless phone calls just above the AM radio spectrum.

 

Hi Matt
My appologies
I looked through the one on AA, and I hadn't seen some of the pictures you had posted, i.e. PBI , the pins soldered to the SIO. and a few others. I had seen the ones with incognito on AOC
Not sure why I don't get updated as I'm watching your Blog .. vagaries of the board, as I don't get that many alerts, even though I ticked near every box to be alerted on. I never see any new post unless I go looking ..

Not sure I've got any decent antenna for such low frequencies but maybe a bit of long wire (or a damp bit of string) will surfice.

 

@Graham What is the "USB" mode referred too, I'm guessing this is not the same "USB" with computer I/O. My educated guess (from being a generally educated person, I've no education with shortwave radio...yet) is "ultra short band?"

It looks like for the strongest signal in my part of the world, Louisiana is the station I'd want to tune in.

 

Next Question Matt ..

Cheapest is two boards each carrying two Joystick ports each, if I do 4 inline as on the front of the 800, even closing the gap up then the board goes to $25 plus for 5. better to go with two boards and approx $5 or likely less as they will be only double sided, That way I'll change the PIA board to give 8 Bits for each port and a Ground. the 5V would have to be external and I'll add a socket to the board, and a cople of jumper headers, that way power can be applied to one board only, and the 5V line jumpered to the send board for the 5V on that leaving only one power input. Or can be left free. I'll get on it now. If you really want 4 inline I'm happy to design that one.

 

Two boards as you said will be fine. Though I'm not sure I follow with the external 5V. Why couldn't they be connected to the 800's 5V internally? I use the Atari "universal" PSU with 31VA, so there should be plenty of amperage to drive them even with all the other upgrades.

That said, I do already have a separate 5V PSU going in that drives my internal LED's (I had to do it that way because the receiver for the RGB LED remote control is housed within the LED's plug) so I could use a jumper wire from it to the 2 boards. I may need to use a 5V PSU with more amperage, but I have those on hand.

 

Hmm I'm Wrong as it's only a two layer board it would be about £4 $5 for 5x 4 port boards
Not routed and now 5V power in but something like this it's 130mm long though don't think it would fit easily.

 

Yeah, I don't want the 4 in-line board you attached an image of because it wouldn't fit where I want to put the ports. Or I'd have use that board without the DB9's attached to it and then run wires from the board to the DB9's mounted to the back case in the 2x2 orientation so they will fit where I want them, next to my DVI out. The picture below is a rough sketch of how and where I intend to mount them.

 

for Two port boards and I included a barrel jack but can change to anything .. £3 or about 4$ your call Matt
I'm unlikely to need any personally so they would all go to you, or I'll send you the design files, just thought it easier if I got them on one order and passed on
Also need to know your prefered input power connector ?? currently a barrel jack but can do anythin, USB, Mini & Micro so use a cell phone PSU ? Good source is the raspberry Pi power supplies Micro USB or Type 'C'

 

Yes, that will work and do the Dupont pins as like I said, I'll be running jumper wires from either the 800's 5V supply line or my LED 5V power to the boards. But can you design those boards so that the DB9's are sticking out beyond the boards where the DB9's port "wings" are flush with the board edge and not recessed like in the board picture you posted? Mounted the same way you did with the 4 in-line board?

 

Yep Sorry Guys' Not the same post but Hey It's all retro sinanigans .. (spelling anyone )
I'll go route the board now then.

 

No apology necessary, I started the thread and I don't mind where it meanders. I think it's sHinanigans.

 

They're going at it hammer and tong, Mac!

Sounds like it will soon come to fruition - brilliant.

 

I'm sure it will. Though I'm not interested in one internal or external for my XL's since I already have other (IMHO better) alternatives and want to get a Rapidus still, which won't work right with U1MB. I have the equivalent in the Incognito, so I'm not missing out.