Should we have a SD card slot in the calc?
Yes
 66%  [ 8 ]
No
 33%  [ 4 ]
Total Votes : 12

As the title says: Should we have a SD card slot for the calc?
Consider the uses for it, as well as prices and such, then vote.

Happy voting! Smile
I vote yes, but there should still be some internal memory, maybe 32 MB or so, for OS files and some user space. We shouldn't force people to get one.

You know, this could replace the need for a usb mini-a port! No need to link to the pc if you can just plug in an sd card.
I think cost and the software devel costs should be taken into account on this one, remember we'd have to implement support fo FAT16 and maybe even FAT32 filesystems if we include this.
Note: Exiles from IRC says YES
================================
Personally, I think I'd save it for OTARM. We would need a controller to read SD cards, which adds cost.
I say yes!

A sd card would give otz80 calcs a large advantage over ti calcs
Definitely fat32, if we go sdhc (which we should, can't hardly buy non-sdhc anymore)

Hey, souvik, have you ever heard of the StartUp app? It's an official one from TI that lets you run a prog, display a pic, or run an app on startup. You might want to look into it if that's the kind of thing you're talking about for your sig.
"can't hardly buy"? What the heck is that supposed to mean, willrandship? I think you mean "can hardly buy" or "can't buy" Smile Oh, and regarding his signature, he means at Doors CS startup rather than TI-OS startup, although the two are the same if Doors CS is set to launch on startup. Smile

I hesitantly agree that an SD card slot would be a good idea. The actual hardware for an SD slot is quite inexpensive, but there's the software necessary to implement an SD interface, as TheStorm correctly pointed out. I like the idea of an SD card eliminating the need for a USB slave controller, though, and making it that we only need to deal with the OTz80 calculator being a USB host.
Sigh, my bad grammar gets in the way again. Razz My point is, at least around here the smallest size of SD card you can buy new is 4Gb.

Are there any licensing costs involved with the SD interface? That might be a cost issue as well.
willrandship wrote:
Sigh, my bad grammar gets in the way again. Razz My point is, at least around here the smallest size of SD card you can buy new is 4Gb.

Are there any licensing costs involved with the SD interface? That might be a cost issue as well.
Uhoh, that's an excellent question. Something is nagging deep at the back of my memory that there actually is a licensing issue of some sort...

Yup, here's a relevant link:
http://www.olpcnews.com/hardware/peripherals/secure_digital_isnt.html

"SD and SDIO card IP is protected via patents, trade secrets, and copyrights. If you follow the license terms, keep the IP confidential, and make your payments to the right parties, then you can legally ship an SD/SDIO stack."

"You really can't offer an SD or SDIO stack in open-source form and meet the licensing requirements currently in effect for these devices."

Based on the official Secure Digital website, we would fall under the HALA category:
"For the manufacture of SD host products and SD ancillary products"

Quote:
If your company is planning to manufacture or have manufactured SD Host Products (eg. SD card readers, cell phones, cameras or computers) or SD Ancillary Products, (eg. adapters or SD I/O cards) your company is required to complete the following steps:

1. Join the SD Card Association and
2. Enter into a , Host/Ancillary Product License Agreement (HALA)* with the SD Card Association and the SD-3C, LLC
3. Licensee Registration Form (pdf, 24k) September, 2009
Print and fill this form out (completely), and mail to the address above

Contact the SD 3-C, LLC at SD-3CAdmin@millerkaplan.com
@ willrandship:

No, i was talking about making an SE to run a basic prog on startup of DCS, not TI-OS.

My thread: http://www.cemetech.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4807
Then I would vote no on that issue then. I don't exactly think OTZ80 needs one, nor do we want to pay licensing fees for SD.

Is there any way to change votes?
alberthrocks wrote:
Then I would vote no on that issue then. I don't exactly think OTZ80 needs one, nor do we want to pay licensing fees for SD.

Is there any way to change votes?
Nah, but that's ok, now that we have more info we can just discuss the differences from the original votes. I also think that an SD card slot wouldn't really be necessary under those circumstances.
I voted no from the start, but I was wondering if others could change their vote too. Another phpBB2 mod for you? Wink

(Oh, and btw - phpBB is in NYC today though Saturday for interesting conferences and such. Wink Maybe someone there can help you convert to phpBB3?)
alberthrocks wrote:
I voted no from the start, but I was wondering if others could change their vote too. Another phpBB2 mod for you? Wink

(Oh, and btw - phpBB is in NYC today though Saturday for interesting conferences and such. Wink Maybe someone there can help you convert to phpBB3?)
Oh, don't get me wrong, I know exactly how to upgrade: download a stock phpBB2, run a diff against mine, collect the hundreds of pages of diffs, install phpBB3 on a test server, gradually build all my mods into it. Razz It's just that that is a massive, massive proposition.
How much is it? It's probably only a few cents, max a few dollars, per device.
willrandship wrote:
How much is it? It's probably only a few cents, max a few dollars, per device.
The preliminary one-year license just to have access to the specifications for research and development is $1000. Sad
I was under the impression that you only needed a licence if you use the SDIO access mode. All standard SD cards can be accessed over the SPI bus (similar to MMC cards) and there is a free specification for that. Accessing the card over SPI doesn't give you access to all of the exotic features and it's slower than SDIO yet I imagine it's more than sufficient for this project. IANAL but I'm using using SD cards in one of my projects over SPI and I've seen many other projects using SD cards in this way.

For what it's worth, microSD cards do not have to support the SPI mode, but all of the ones I've tried have worked.
benryves wrote:
I was under the impression that you only needed a licence if you use the SDIO access mode. All standard SD cards can be accessed over the SPI bus (similar to MMC cards) and there is a free specification for that. Accessing the card over SPI doesn't give you access to all of the exotic features and it's slower than SDIO yet I imagine it's more than sufficient for this project. IANAL but I'm using using SD cards in one of my projects over SPI and I've seen many other projects using SD cards in this way.[...]
That looks great! That document contains both more and less complex information than its 129-page length would initially imply to me, and I think that perhaps an SD slot wouldn't actually be too insanely difficult, assuming that the legality is there.
That would be SO AWESOME! Good Idea
Ever heard of Bit-Banging, also called Bit-bashing? It's a concept which allows you to access SD data, and write to SD, with only standard IO pins. It's also why you can make hardware that goes into the sd slot, that isn't a storage device.

So, SD is good after all? Yay! No need for usb then, right?
  
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