how many devices can the ps2 ide interface handle??

setzer6127 · Post by **setzer6127** » Sat Feb 12, 2005 3:47 am

Hi!, i was wondering if any one knows if the ide interface will allow more than on device if a male adapter was made to beable to plug a ide cable into it?

Thanks, Casey

setzer6127 · Post by **setzer6127** » Sat Feb 12, 2005 3:24 pm

well maybe i should post more info eh? what im looking at is this, im working on a personal project, its a multi-platform nintendo emulator for ps2, im using the source to zsnes for the snes and havent decided what nes emu i want to port or write my own from scratch. but the reason i want to know how many devices can be hooked up to the ide port is because i would like to use the HDD to load roms off of, but i saw a design for a snes cart reader that runs off of the ide port, so i would like to *try* and get that to work with the ps2 ide interface once i have the emulator runing, i think it would be very cool to plug in an old snes cart and play it on a ps2 and beable to save your game back onto the cart if it has sram..but any who i want to beable to have a harddrive also to use to store emulator save game info ..i.e. save states, screen shots, and chat logs if i can get a functioning tcp/ip stack runing for multiplayer between me and my friends... so thats the low down.. any one got any ideas on the ide device count??

Casey

Post by **ooPo** » Sat Feb 12, 2005 3:33 pm

An ide-based snes cart reader? That's just.. odd.

I want one. :)

setzer6127 · Post by **setzer6127** » Sat Feb 12, 2005 3:41 pm

ehheh i thought so too... i've seen parallel port designs but never ide... the design i beleave was on zophar.net in there snesdev section... but aparently after there last sever move, crash.. whatever it was, none of the snes dev site has been restored i may have to send them an email.. but if i can get the info again and figure out how to get it to play nice on the ps2 i will post it on here if any one else wants one ;-)

splynncryth · Post by **splynncryth** » Sat Apr 02, 2005 11:10 am

The concesus seems to be that the expansion connector is acustom flavor of PCMCIA so that menas the IDE controller is in the unit to plug the HD into. Seing as I don't have a network or hard drive adaptor I can't take it apart and look up the datasheet for the controller they're using. Most chips out there have support for master and slave on a single channel, and it might even have the second channel there, but this is all speculation without even the part number of the IC in question.
An anternative might be a USB rom reader if anyonehas made somthing like this.

cory1492 · Post by **cory1492** » Sat Apr 02, 2005 11:41 am

Someone mentions whats in the network adapter elsewhere, the us version has at least a speed io chip and a brodband/modem board in it...

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Sat Apr 02, 2005 12:03 pm

The concesus seems to be that the expansion connector is acustom flavor of PCMCIA so that menas the IDE controller is in the unit to plug the HD into.

Eh, yeah. Coulda told you that :)

Seing as I don't have a network or hard drive adaptor I can't take it apart and look up the datasheet for the controller they're using.

Custom Sony chip (made by or for Sony). You won't find it. The specs known for it come from the Linux kit, and there is an open source driver available at this site.

Most chips out there have support for master and slave on a single channel, and it might even have the second channel there, but this is all speculation without even the part number of the IC in question.

Pretty sure this has already been done, but maybe someone else knows the links.

An anternative might be a USB rom reader if anyonehas made somthing like this.

Now might be a good time for you to persue all of the resources at this site, especially in CVS. You will find open source drivers for much of the PS2 hardware.