Hi! My mailsever cannot send mail to the OGO mailing-list, so I'm sending
this directly to you. Feel free to forward it to the list, if you see fit.
William Ofosu-Amaah wrote:
> At 12:01 PM 6/5/96 -0400, GWSteve@aol.com wrote:
> >The reason why Flash cards are not recommended for the OmniGo 100 is
that
> >they demand a significant electrical charge to initialize. There's
> > actually a driver on the OmniGo that supports many Flash cards,
>
> Thanks for this info! I have been trying to found out if an ATA Flash
Card
> driver was already on the OG and you just answered that with a yes :-)
Hey! When I was scoping out the PDA Page web site (via Max Mansour's links)
, I came across a company called Pretec Electronics that sells low powered
ATA flash that supposedly works on the OG!! I just called them up and
spoke extensively w/ one of their technical support people; he claimed that
their ATA flash does work w/ the Ogo although they haven't tried to use the
card for direct data access (via the GEOS drive mirroring model). They
have been able to read ebooks and launch apps like Pocket Quicken from the
card, and could copy files directly onto the card when plugged into a
laptop's pc-card slot. Sounds like it should be able to handle the
mirroring mechanism also.
> According to a message posted here from MagicRam a while back, the
current
> required by their 40MB Intel-style Linear Flash card for the OG is:
>
> "Standby 100 micro A
> Read 40mA
> Write 40mA"
>
> Typical ATA Flash cards have about the following current requirements:
>
> Read 60mA
> Write 120mA
>
> >There are some new low-power Flash cards being introduced to the
> >marketplace now that may work around the power issue.
>
> I have seen some TDK Low Power Flash cards (4MB, 12MB) with the
following
> approx. current requirements:
>
> Read 30mA
> Write 45mA
>
> I have also checked out Epson ATA Compact (mini) Flash cards (4, 10,
15MB)
> and at 5.0 Volts they have the following power ratings:
>
> Sleep Less than 1mA
> Read 75mA MAX
> Write 90mA MAX
The tech support guy said the card's power ratings are:
Sleep .6mA
Read 25/35mA
Write 25/35mA
The read/write ratings depend on the performance mode you(!!) choose:
Low performance 1Mb/sec
High performance 8Mb/sec
Also, he claimed that the ATA card is faster than SRAM and Intel linear
flash (what are their performance ratings?). He added that the Pretec card
was modelled(??) after the Sandisk card we hear so much about in the usenet
newsgroups.
As far as turning on the Ogo w/ the card inserted, it takes roughly 2
seconds (or about the same as SRAM cards).
> Maybe it is time to give one of the Low Power Flash cards a try.
They have 2MB, 4MB($199), 8MB($310), 16MB($550?), etc. cards--I didn't ask
about the 2MB price. That significantly beats MagicRAM flash in every
category except sleep mode power usage(!!), and with their 30-day
satisfaction guarantee I was sold on the deal and ordered a 8MB card which
however is backordered til next Wednesday. Their number is 510-440-0535 if
you're interested. I'll let you know more when I receive the card.
Wow, I'm finally getting a memory card. Now, if only we can find out how
that guy in Japan hacked his way into DOS text mode, then I might be able
to run Nettamer (off a pocket modem) and whatever DOS app on my Ogo at the
same speed as those clock-doubled 200lx users who so often look down on us.
Waiting in much anticipation...(!!!)
_Man_