Ancient DT2803 manual available?

Hi folks-

(Please dust off your memories for this question)

I'm faced with the task of getting very old software communicating with a Data Translation DT2803 ISA bussed frame grabber (c 1984) to work with some changes.

Does anyone know where I can find user manuals, programming manuals, and any other useful information for the DT2803?

All I have is some lightweight C code with very few comments and I'd like to be better informed about the board.

Thanks, John Speth.

Reply to
John Speth
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Can not help with the manuals, but... There is (or there was) support for the DE2803 in the linux kernel. You may find some additional information in the source code of the video boards in old linux sources. (Circa 1999, 2000?)

-- Roberto Waltman

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Roberto Waltman

Thanks Roberto. The Linux to DT2803 connection comes up heavily in web searches. I know next to nothing about how to navigate through the Linux source files. Can you point me to a starting point of browsing the source files?

John Speth

Reply to
John Speth

Old versions can be downloaded from ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/ , as compressed tar archives.

If you are working on a Windows environment and/or are not familiar with the .tar, .gz and .bz2 file formats, 7-Zip (

formatting link
) will handle them easily.

I just downloaded v2.2.26 and v1.3.0 - Searching for DT.*2803 found nothing relevant. Will search in additional versions when I get back home this evening.

Interesting, (but not encouraging,) I found a thread in classiccmp. Somebody asked the same question two years ago, there were no replies.

Reply to
Roberto Waltman

Yes very much very dusty memories.

Yes that is old, I started at Data Translation in 1988, and it was an old frame grabber then that sold about 1 every 2 years in UK.

This is a very old ISA architecture as in 8 bit architecture (PC/XT - ISA). You will need to be to so sure the bus timings are absolutely within XT specs as a lot of AT type specs were not true.

It was a FULL length XT card so by today's standards huge.

I take it you do have a supply of these as I doubt a lot of the chips especially RAM could be easily found these days.

Even then if I remember correctly it was a 256 x 256 image grab as the typical 512 x 512 (256kB) was difficult to get in the XT memory map. The image grab was a 256 x 256 grab of RS170/CCIR monochrome video so the pixels were very non-square when grabbed, cannot remember if it only grabbed a field or frame. This is slow long ago and just from memory.

I take it you have asked technical suppport at Data Translation?

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They have had some products used by military, so they may still have copies of information available.

I think the last time I saw a request for information was 1990. That was because somebody wanted to try it in a system that had ISA 8bit slots ment for serial cards, and the power supply could not supply enough power to drive the card.

Unfortunately I did not see much of the product so have nothing around.

These days I would use any other more modern frame grabber, for size, cost, power, perfomance let alone picture resolution and ability to do colour.

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Paul

Additional followup even if you require frame grabbers there are many around, even Data Transaltion have a newer and smaller PCI frame grabber the DT3120 see

formatting link

There are many other frame grabbers out there. Most are being superceded by USB and Ethernet based cameras to reduce the host bus and driver issues amongst other things like digitising close to source.

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Paul

Well I've given up. I've run out of search ideas. My guess is that a printed manual never existed and they probably didn't sell enough of these guys hence no programmers base with any critical mass. The trail disappeared long before the internet could preserve it.

The DT2803 is a 256x256 by 6 bit mono RS170 ISA bus frame grabber sold by Data Translation starting at about 1984.

To close, here's what I could learn:

- There is supposedly a Linux driver for the board, source code not found

- The board probably only works on XT type busses which excludes the lions share of ISA type PCs

- There was a programmers library called Videolab from DT, source and binary not found

- Nobody at DT has ever heard of the DT2803

- If they have it, DT will send a hard copy to me for $150 (I doubt they have it)

Thanks for your comments and help, John Speth

Reply to
John Speth

I opened one more old(er) Linux archive and didn't find anything.

Before conceding defeat, what is the question behind your question? And the one before that? In other words, what is the original problem you need to solve?

You mentioned you have some source code. If you need to port or reimplement an old system, or replace a frame grabber that died, concentrate on the high level functionality and not the details.

Most likely you can ignore most if not all the commands on how the frame grabber was operated.

Identify the parts were the image has been transferred to the PC's memory and go from there. Anything before that is irrelevant.

If the board came with some image processing library, the function names may give enough information about their functionality.

For a simple board of that vintage, I would expect the default library to include only simple functions like cropping images, subtracting images, histogram compensation, edge detection, convolution with a generic 5x5 kernel, etc.

-- Roberto Waltman

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Reply to
Roberto Waltman

No and Yes, printed did exist when I worked there it was in my technical library as an approx A5 size RING Binder plastic covered about 1.5 in thick.. Remember the shelf of manuals, and that opened twice in my time there (1988 to 1994).

Even then it was old hat.

Correct. Might also have had input and output lookup tables.

That would surprise me considering its age and may have been some student project.

I doubt that library was ever updated from at best Turbo C V1, and M$ C V4, possibly even QBasic, (long before visual studio).

Nobody currently at DT other than possibly the President, is still there from that time. Maybe the German office might have one.

Still the same factory address, and remember the company has been around for over 35 years.

They might have it stored in an old word processing format on obscure disks/tapes. If lucky they might have an old one in a corner.

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Paul

I would expect the library for that board (from experience at the company), to have board functions (init, passthrough, grab frame), simple hardware functions Load/Read lookop tables, interupt handling, Image transfer to/from grabber memory, possibly even read/write to a file format. Later libraries used DT-Iris file format, I might still have the spec for that around soemwhere in the loft/attic.

It is highly UNLIKELY the library for that board included ANY of your suggested simple functions other than cropping by specifying what image transfer size from the buffer. I speak from experience of supporting DT products just after that era.

It might have had some functions like line drawing and maybe a cursor of the crosshair variety.

These boards worked with interlaced analog cameras ONLY. They normally had a video output for driving an analog composite or RGB video monitors as these were for use in pre Windows days so most monitors were CGA or EGA unable to easily show the 6 bit greyscale image, also with aspect ratio differences on pixel sizes. This was designed in the days of mainly serial mouse, and the new development of PS2 mouse type.

If trying to add one to a NEW design don't waste time.

If updating an existing design, consider refactoring the hardware as well as that would be old and possibly power hungry, and unable to run newer tools. Even if you had the source code you may not have the right compiler tools or testing environments to debug your new features.

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Paul

I found a project report including source code using the DT2803, but unfortunately most of the device handling code is not included. You could try writing the author and asking if he still has any of the documentation or source code. (Visit the website main page for the author's current email address.) Another document suggested that the DT2803 was also supported by an imaging software package called "PC Semper" from Synoptics, . U.S. patent no. 5394183 has information on how to program the DT2803, but lacks the register definitions. According to patent no. 5151945, the user manual is document number UM-03286A.

-a (Yes, I'm bored. Why do you ask?)

Reply to
Anders.Montonen

One thing you could try is to see if there was a qbus (dec pdp11 etc) equivalent. DT made a wide variety of things like a-d converters and other high end analog boards for qbus and if they did build an equivalent card, the internal programming interface and functionality may be similar, or even the same, though the bus interface is different.

No idea where to look, though bitsavers may be of help...

Regards,

Chris

ps: even if it's an xt card, it should still work in an at slot. They were supposed to be compatable at that level.

Reply to
ChrisQ

There seems to have been one, called the DT2603. Data Translation had a high resolution card called the DT2851 of similar vintage, for which there is a Linux driver for 2.2-era kernels:

-a

Reply to
Anders.Montonen

Forgot to add, I found a 2009 paper on vision research where a DT2803 card was used as part of the measurement system. It seems Michigan State University has at least one card still in operation:

-a

Reply to
Anders.Montonen

They made a lot of different boards the Qbus board from memory was the DT2651 512 x 512, totally register driven.

From memory the DT2803 like the DT2801 (a/d card)used on board micro for functionality of host registers and transactions.

The registers would be different as Qbus was 16bit bit and DT2803 was XT

8 bit bus.

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Paul

The DT2851 was a COMPLETELY different register set and was an AT format

16 bit bus. Also it's high resolution was 512x480 (60Hz) and 512 x 512 (50Hz). They also used a horrible AMP coax ribbon connector that was forever expensive and likely to break. Later boards DT2871, DT3851... went to a D type connector and fanout cables to BNCs.
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Paul Carpenter          | paul@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk
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Paul

That paper has obvious typo to get a sampling rate of 1000Hz would be using the DT2801 A/D card, a different card.

This thread is really dusting off my memories...

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Paul

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