CFFA for Apple II

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Project: CFFA for Apple II, II+, IIe, IIe enh, IIgs

CFFA3000 Run #1 is SOLD OUT! Run#2 will be in summer of 2012.
Click here to get on the list for Run#2.

Project Status:

04/14/2012:
Today a package arrived from Advanced Circuits containing the 500 PCBs for run #2 of the CFFA3000!! While I wait for some of the back ordered parts, I will build up a couple of these new boards to verify they work. I hope to have all of the parts ready to ship to the assembler in about 4 weeks. I will post another update then. The other boards pictured are the 350 Remote PCBs. I am still estimating summer 2012 availability for the CFFA3000. Currently my list of interested people has about 340 people on it. I will have a pre-order phase, but this time I think I will wait until the boards are a little closer to finished than I did on Run #1.

03/07/2012:
We are now in the process of getting final quotes on parts for run #2 of the CFFA3000. We hope to be placing orders for the parts this week or next. We have not made a final decision on the run size yet, but we are looking at quantities of 400 and 500. The price of the next run will likely stay the same at US$149.95. It should be available in summer of 2012.

We are also adding support for image file directories to the firmware and making a lot of optimization to speed up all disk operations. Time permitting we will also be looking into DMA support, but there is still much work to do before we have something to test.

Project Introduction: This page describes a project to create a CompactFlash / IDE Interface card for Apple II computers (][+, //e, //e enh or //gs) that started back in 2002. Over the years I have build 1000 CFFA cards in six batches. The card is ProDOS 8 and GS/OS compatible. With an additional driver, GS/OS users get additional partitions and speed. I did the original wire-wrap prototype over the span of several months. This project is very much a case of old technology (the Apple II computer) meets new (CompactFlash cards and Altera CPLDs). My reasoning for this project is described in detail in the Background section, but suffice it to say, I wanted to be able to pull out my old Apple II and use it from time to time to reminisce about the early days of personal computers. I wanted a reliable way to store my Apple II programs and data files for many years to come. Due to the long term reliability prospects of floppy drives, and my general laziness, I decided a mass storage device is what I needed. CFFA3000 project Introduction: At the end of 2008 I sold out of my 6th run of CFFA cards. Instead of making another batch to meet demand, I decided it was time to design something new. The main shortcoming of the CFFA card was its lack of support for operating systems other than ProDOS. It was not possible to store and run DOS 3.3 games from the CFFA. So I decided to try desiging a new CFFA that would have these new features: 1) Floppy disk emulation at the nibble level and 2) USB flash drive support for storage of .dsk image files. The effort to design a new CFFA now called the CFFA3000 took about 2 years. The long development time was mainly because this is a hobby for me and not my normal job, also the CFFA3000 is about twice as complex as the orginal CFFA. Looking for the CFFA1 for Apple1 Project? Click Here! Great tool for CFFA users: All CFFA owners who use Windows... Andy McFadden has come out with an excellent tool called: CiderPress. This tool will allow you to read and write your CFFA formatted CF cards right on your PC. It will make an excellent backup tool. Check it out at Andy's Site Information about the "3 jumper" fix for older CFFA V1.2 cards: (Runs 1, 2, and 3) A problem as been found that explains why many CompactFlash cards have never worked with the older CFFA cards. I was motivated to find this problem when I realized that SanDisk 256MB cards were not working properly. To summarize, the address lines were changing near the end of the ATA bus cycle seen by the CF card. This seemed to be tolerated by the smaller SanDisk cards, but not the 256MB card or many other brands, like Lexar. So after much debugging I found the problem and was able to fix the problem with a new release of the CPLD logic (V1.4), and the addition of 3 "rework" jumper wires to the board. Click here to see the front of the board, and here to the back.