Low budget plasma setup, what do I need?

If the 7i90 has an encoder, just wire the thcad out to encoder A observing the polarity on the THCAD. Steal 5 volt from a stepper controller output. Well thats what I did on the 7i76e.

Hi Rod,

Sorry but I don´t have a clue on what pins can be found when flashed with 7i90_epp_st8_plasma.bit

Cheers
Bengt

Neither do I. But if you powered it up and checked with halshow or showpin, a lot would be revealed...
From day 1 thats what I did. Looked and learnt with halshow, then configured.

Still want all info in place before I even start to reflash the board.

All depends on what I have here and what I need to purchase to get this working.

Isn´t there a way to take a peek into the bit file and learn what it is all about?

Yes, by using mesaflash.
If you are using a built in parallel port at 0x378, the command would be:

sudo mesaflash --device 7i90 --epp --readhmid

or if you want to save the results in a file

sudo mesaflash --device 7i90 --epp --readhmid > current_pinout.txt

The above commands assume the parallel port address is 0x378, if not, you must
add the address to the command line:

sudo mesaflash --device 7i90 --epp --addr 0x9400 --readhmid

OK thanks.
But still no answer on what else do I need besides the 7i90, obviously a breakout so I assume 7i42TA will do but is there more boards needed to get the THCAD300 connected.

If possible a schematics will help as you know whats inside the BIN file etc.

Cheers
Bengt

You can connect the THCAD directly to 7I90 pins or via the 7I42TA which would be more convenient. As rodw mentioned, the THCAD frequency out pin just needs to connect to an encoder "A" pin on the 7I90.

OK, as I have both 7i90 and 7i42TA can you be so kind and tell me where I connect THCAD.
Also are there 3 step outputs that I can connect to 7i42TA and all other needed IO for a simple plasma setup?

The firmware now is for a servo system so I have to flash 7i90 with suitable BIN file.

You need to choose suitable firmware first (since the encoder 'A' pins could be on any of the 72 available I/O pins) and then read the firmwares pinout as shown above.

I suspect the 7i90_epp_st8_plasma.bit firmware is what you want

OK, will have a whirl with this later this week. Thank you Peter.

I have one Shuttle K45 box awaiting memory sticks that I plan to use.