Announcement https://bluescsi.com/v2

Code: https://github.com/BlueSCSI/BlueSCSI-v2/

This is the next version of BlueSCSI - a joint effort between @Androda and myself, ENJOY!

I wanted to add a thanks to @jokker, @jcs for their contributions durring the dev process and all the BlueSCSI sellers for all their feedback! Couldn't have done it without you all!

An open source, open hardware, and open design SCSI solution for vintage computers. It is built by a community of makers, and you! BlueSCSI's mission is to provide a low cost, open hardware and software SCSI solution for retro computer enthusiasts to breathe life back into their vintage computers. BlueSCSI's build is as simple and friendly as it gets, catering to novices and experts alike. We started three years ago with a few enhancements to ArdSCSIno and there are now several variations using different hardware. We take a lot of pride in the vibrant and friendly community of people having fun with their retro computers. Today we're continuing that mission with the announcement of the BlueSCSI v2! TLDR: BlueSCSI v2 is based on the Raspberry Pi Pico microcontroller and a fork of ZuluSCSI's SCSI2SD code It is open source, open hardware, and open design. It is fast, pushing 10MB/sec. It comes in 3 models, Desktop, Laptop, and DB25. It has tons of new features. It is available now to build yourself or buy. BlueSCSI v2 targets the Raspberry Pi Pico (not the Pi) which uses the RP2040 microcontroller. Like before we're building on the shoulders of those who came before us - namely this code base is based on the ZuluSCSI's SCSI2SD. This is a joint effort between Eric(nulleric) the maintainer of BlueSCSI and Jacob(Androda) a core BlueSCSI developer and maintainer of the F4 BlueSCSI fork. We've added our "special sauce" to the hardware and software. Hardware for BlueSCSI v2 will be released under the same Creative Commons Non-Commercial license as BlueSCSI v1 - we believe in open hardware and this will allow you to build the device yourself if you like. The original BlueSCSI isn't dead! We will continue to support and port features to the F1/F4 versions of BlueSCSI as we can. Not all features can be ported back, and speeds are more limited on the earlier models. In all honesty a majority of pre-PowerPC Macs won't support all the additional speed offered by BlueSCSI v2 - only a third party SCSI card could achieve the full Fast SCSI speed. Any 68k '030 Mac or lower - the real world performance difference will be negligible. 68k '040 based systems will see a larger boost. And on machines like the PowerMac 7300, look out - we've pulled 8300k read speeds on the internal fast SCSI bus. In keeping with tradition, we are using "dev modules" instead of hard-soldering everything to the PCB. Dev modules like these are easy to solder in place, and help with PCB routing. Also, the Raspberry Pi Pico is easily obtainable. Unfortunately due to the nature of the RP2040 microcontroller it is more complex than in prior designs. These are SMD-heavy boards using small-pitch and small-size components. We recognize much of the success of V1 came from it being easy to assemble, and we will continue to see how we can improve the design choices to make it easier for all of you. We know that pricing is a real concern, and are happy to report that prices won't change! We're committed to producing a good product at an affordable price, to benefit the community. Buy from an authorized seller on bluescsi.com to support the project or download the gerbers and print your own. We can't wait to see what you'll use these new devices in! Highlights of the new features: BlueSCSI Toolbox The BlueSCSI toolbox is something you only get with a BlueSCSI. It allows you to transfer files to and from and your vintage computer directly to your SD card, change CD's on the fly, and we're adding more each release. We're working with others to expand the support beyond Macs, stay tuned! ROM Disks There is 1.6MB available on the PR2040 flash, so you can store a ROM (read only) image in this space! Put all your essential utilities there, or maybe a read only system boot disk, the choice is yours! Disk Jockey has been updated to allow you to easily create this image. Apple first, but not only It's no secret the core BlueSCSI developers are Apple fans, it's what we use! We're building it for us and the Apple community but that doesn't mean you can't use it on other platforms. In fact the defaults should be fine for other platforms as well. In the cases that it's not, we've provided well documented examples on how to get it to work in your system. We've also created a web based ini file generator for those times you have to go outside the presets. Speed If you have a computer with a 5 or 10Mb synchronous bus you'll be pleasantly surprised. With the Pico we can now saturate the 10Mb/sec bus. Speeds will vary based on SD card, computer, and SCSI driver used, so test out and hotrod those vintage machines! Documentation A real test of a project is how much time they spend on their documentation. For many it's an afterthought. We've made a great effort to document as much as we could prior to launch and look forward to the community's updates to the wiki! If you see something, say something. Configuration Many of the advanced configuration is now done through an ini file. We can't ask non-developers to create an ini file so we've made ini.bluescsi.com for you to generate the configuration you need, along with presets for the Mac Plus, Mega STE, and more coming! Friendly logs Logs are for people - we've made improvements to the log messages so you can understand and take action. Hot Swappable SD Card Once you unmount all drives from your BlueSCSI device you can pull the SD Card out while it's still running and it will reconfigure itself once a new SD Card is put in. This will be handy for sampler users especially. Attribution Keeping the lineage of a project is important - who wrote what code, what changed when and where. We've restored the missing attribution and history for SCSI2SD, as well as kept the entire history of ArdSCSIno and BlueSCSI all in one repository. You can now see the full history of the code base. Also libraries that were patched are now correctly attributed. USB Serial Logging Hookup a USB cable while your BlueSCSI is running and get the logs right in your terminal! Great for advanced debugging. LED Accessibility Talking with users one complaint we had was the color of the power and activity LEDs were difficult to tell apart for color blind users. We've added white for power and blue for disk activity after talking with them. And a lot more! Three's a lot more we have planned, so stay tuned! Click to expand...

Wow, fantastic job @eric and the BlueSCSI team! I can't imagine the amount of effort that went into this. Thanks for providing the vintage computing community with low-cost solid-state storage options!

Really cool seeing this improvement.
Congratulations for the result of such a hard work.

This clearly sets a difference on the easiness for self-making it... Do you plan to release the Gerber's and the component placement files to order the boards with the SMD components in-place, like in the RASCSI?

Gerbers can be found here https://github.com/BlueSCSI/BlueSCSI-v2/tree/main/cc-nc-hardware and yes we want people to build their own if they'd like! We're announcing today and doing a bunch of documentation now that it's public! If we're missing anything when you try to order please reply here or open an issue on github!

Would it be possible for you to add a BOM/PnP file usable for a board house like JLCPCB? :)

Sweet! Glad to see the new release for this project. Will be looking into these for sure for my PowerBooks. One question, does this revision include a fix for the over voltage issue when it's used mid-chain? I know that it doesn't seem to cause any damage but I'd just feel better knowing that the microcontroller isn't being overdriven.

Awesome
I just spent some time perusing the code to see how you guys are making use of the RP2040 PIOs, because what better way to spend an evening. I gotta say, that is a very nice and approachable codebase. Everything is clean and clear, even the PIO code which such a different paradigm from normal procedural programming.
Using the PIO & DMA like that to do parity generation and validation is inspired elegance.

One thing I didn't notice is any use of the second CPU core or PIO module. Are they still available for future WiFi control and other shenanigans?

>> 3lectr1c said:

Sweet! Glad to see the new release for this project. Will be looking into these for sure for my PowerBooks. One question, does this revision include a fix for the over voltage issue when it's used mid-chain? I know that it doesn't seem to cause any damage but I'd just feel better knowing that the microcontroller isn't being overdriven. Click to expand...

I don't think "over voltage" has ever been a concern with BlueSCSI? It sounds like you're asking about whether we are using buffer and transceiver chips instead of directly hooking up to the microcontroller pins. All BlueSCSI V2 hardware uses buffer and transceiver chips, like my F4 and F4Lite XCVR designs before them.

I'm no expert in these sort of things, seems it was current related? Not sure, seems like it wouldn't be a concern anyway. I read through the whole feature list for the new revision and it seems like a big step up!

>> Kai Robinson said:

Would it be possible for you to add a BOM/PnP file usable for a board house like JLCPCB? Click to expand...

Working on that over the next few days (just so much to do!) The document will be here (just roughed out for now) https://github.com/BlueSCSI/BlueSCSI-v2/wiki/Build-it-Yourself

>> luminescentsimian said:

One thing I didn't notice is any use of the second CPU core or PIO module. Are they still available for future WiFi control and other shenanigans? Click to expand...

Quite possible. We've poked at a few things but it seems like the networking stack on the Pico has a few rough edges. No promises but it's an obvious thing to look into!

Pretty amazing stuff, Eric. Congratulations on the release. While it certainly will benefit PPC Macs the most, I can't wait to test this on a 50MHz CC Mystic!

The hot swappable SD card is truly ground-breaking. Being able to eject the SD, pop it into a modern Mac to delete or add software, then pop it back in and keep working, without being forced to restart the vintage Mac, is a superb feature. v2 seems to be all about great performance and making it easier for the end user, which is fabulous.

Bravo.

Well done!! The BlueSCSI 2 is shaping up to be an amazing release... if this infomercial (below) doesn't convince you to get one, I don't know what will. ;)

>> Kai Robinson said:

Would it be possible for you to add a BOM/PnP file usable for a board house like JLCPCB? Click to expand...

Wish Granted: https://github.com/BlueSCSI/BlueSCSI-v2/commit/bc9eada2fe09d82253473fb860949c8092c7bceb

Fast Narrow SCSI? WOW! What kind of throughput do you think you'd achieve on the Rocket's Fast/Narrow SCSI II DaughterCard?

Love the project overall, maybe with tax return . . .

In case you wonder if your Mac will benefit from the speed bump or not... https://support.apple.com/kb/TA29470?locale=en_US

A more comprehensive chart showing vintage Mac SCSI data transfer rates is given below, and it has cute bitmapped icons of the Macs too!


The LC575 motherboard in my Color Classic Mystic for example is rated at 5 MB/s. I've never gotten a SCSI to SD device to saturate it, although my fast Quantum drive does get to almost 5 MB/s. To date, MacSD has achieved the best results at about have the maximum rate (2.5MB/s), and my 96MHz overclocked DB25 BlueSCSI v1.1-a gets roughly 1.3MB/s, which again is why I am chomping at the bit to get my hands on a BlueSCSI v2 to try out.

Before BlueSCSI v1 Overclock (Sys 7.5.5), 50.0MHz LC575
[Image: 1674770226745.png]

96MHz BlueSCSI v1 Overclock (Sys. 7.5.5), 50.0MHz LC575
[Image: 1674770273132.png]

Also note that when testing with SCSI Director Pro 4, you will get slightly better results while booted into System 7.1 versus 7.5.5 or later.

I'm drafting the perf wiki page and will post that when it's up. A few from our tests - Q700 gets 4.8mb/sec, 7600/9600 8.3MB/sec, @jokker 's SGI O2 gets 9.6MB/sec. A lot depends on the SCSI drivers, the bus, the SD card, etc.

I'll try my CC Mystic when I have some time.

>> JDW said:

A more comprehensive chart showing vintage Mac SCSI data transfer rates is given below, and it has cute bitmapped icons of the Macs too! https://mirrors.apple2.org.za/ftp.apple.asimov.net/documentation/macintosh/Mac%20History%20-%20Models%2084%2095.pdf The LC575 motherboard in my Color Classic Mystic for example is rated at 5 MB/s. I've never gotten a SCSI to SD device to saturate it, although my fast Quantum drive does get to almost 5 MB/s. To date, MacSD has achieved the best results at about have the maximum rate (2.5MB/s), and my 96MHz overclocked DB25 BlueSCSI v1.1-a gets roughly 1.3MB/s, which again is why I am chomping at the bit to get my hands on a BlueSCSI v2 to try out. Before BlueSCSI v1 Overclock (Sys 7.5.5), 50.0MHz LC575 View attachment 10760 96MHz BlueSCSI v1 Overclock (Sys. 7.5.5), 50.0MHz LC575 View attachment 10761 Also note that when testing with SCSI Director Pro 4, you will get slightly better results while booted into System 7.1 versus 7.5.5 or later. Click to expand...

Please note the write line is a bit wobbly, this is a well used sd card so that may be the issue. Have a new card arriving today so will rerun the tests. So yes we can max out a 575 5MB/sec bus.

>> eric said:

Please note the write line is a bit wobbly, this is a well used sd card so that may be the issue. Have a new card arriving today so will rerun the tests. So yes we can max out a 575 5MB/sec bus. Click to expand...

Very interesting! Thanks. When you post the next test results with your new card, please let us know the brand, capacity and model of your two SD cards.

Also, when you first told me about the overclocking capability of BlueSCSI v1, I was pleasantly surprised; and as you know, I confirmed the speed benefits of doing that. It's probably unnecessary to do that on v2 in light of its incredible 10MB/sec speed capability, but to satisfy my curiosity, have you tried it? :)

Compliments for all who worked on this great new device! This brings so much to many retro computing fans!