Table of Contents
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Table of Contents
SBC-386EX rev 2.0 Board
Disclaimer: as of the end of 2018, the BIOS ROM is still a work in progress.
N.B.: The 2.0 board requires a 1-wire update (see section below).
Features
80386EX CPU running at 25Mhz or 33Mhz
FPU socket for 387SX
Serial I/O using CPU integrated 8250A
DS1302 RTC and NVRAM
32Kb SRAM
72-pin DRAM supports 4Mb .. 64Mb
IDE interface
micro SD socket
ROM socket for 64Kb .. 256Kb BIOS chip
All of the on chip features of the -EX chip
Photos
Photo 1. Dan's board using the CPU mounted on a daughterboard.
Photo 2. John's board with the CPU board-mounted.
Photo 3. Two of the adapter boards for the 386EX.
Suggested technique for soldering the PQFP-132 386EX:
A. Coat the PQFP board pads with liquid flux. IMPORTANT.
B. (optional) Tin the board with a flat tip iron with MINIMUM solder. This is not necessary if the HASL layer has enough solder to attach the chip pins.
C. Coat the bottoms of the PQFP pins with liquid flux.
D. Position the PQFP; tack down corners with a DRY (solder-free) flat or wedge tip iron. Re-check positioning constantly.
E. Finish heating all of the pins with the DRY flat or wedge tip iron until all pins pass visual inspection under a jewelers loupe (8X) magnifier.
F. (optional) If you have a low voltage (<3v) tester, buzz out the connections with straight pins used as probes. This is tedious.
Hardware Documents
| Filename | Size | Last modified |
|---|---|---|
| update-2018-02-18.txt | 432b | 2018-Feb-18 |
| sbc-386ex-2.0-sch.pdf | 499kb | 2018-Jan-21 |
| sbc-386ex-2.0-pcb.pdf | 850kb | 2018-Jan-21 |
| pld-386ex-2018-02-18.zip | 4kb | 2018-Feb-18 |
| sbc-386ex-2.0-kicad.zip | 1.4mb | 2018-Jan-23 |
| sbc-386ex-2-gerber.zip | 955kb | 2018-Jan-21 |
There is a Guide to the Schematic which may be of interest to some builders.
The current Kicad tools do not produce a very pretty Bill of Materials. This “CSV” (comma separated values) is edited to add additional information.
Board 2.0 to 2.1 (mandatory) update.
Adapter board
| Filename | Size | Last modified |
|---|---|---|
| adapter386ex-sch.pdf | 90Kb | 2017-Nov-08 |
| adapter386ex-kicad.tar.bz2 | 193Kb | 2017-Oct-09 |
| adapter386ex2mm-gerber.zip | 73Kb | 2017-Oct-09 |
Note: This adapter is not for other PQFP-132 chips. Power and Ground connections are specific to the 80386EX chip.
Software Tools
The software for the SBC-386EX has been developed under Windows using:
The Netwide assembler, NASM 2.08
Open Watcom 1.9 (2.0 should not be used)
In addition, certain tools, largely derived from the SBC-188 project will also be required: tools-2018-03-14.zip
Board Testing
Proper operation of the DRAM should be confirmed with: test1-2018-04-23.zip
The ROM images are distributed as *.HEX files in the archive. (Intel Hex)