XCOMP --  Hard Disk Controller

The controller consisted of two S-100 boards connected together with a cable at the top right of the board.  One board was used to interface with the hard disk(s) and connected to the hard disk via two cables. The other board actually processed the data and fed it to the system CPU via the S-100 bus. 

This XCOMP hard disk controller was in fact a set of boards with a different drive interface board for each type of drive. It featured great operating power in a compact, two S100 PC board package. The micro-programmed data board processing was common to all controllers and operated with a second drive interface board. They efficiently control a wide variety of drives including the following HD interfaces:

•    SMD (Storage Module Drive
•    5440 or 2315 cartridge
•    ANSI disk bus
•    Shugart SA-1000
•    Shugart Technology ST-500

Additional interfaces could probably also be accommodated.

The board had the following features.

•    A custom micro-programmable processor to provides high performance.
•    Feature multibank writable control memory for ultimate flexibility.
•    Maximum data integrity was maintained with a separate header field for each disk sector.
•    Support software available for a number of popular operating systems, CP/M included.
•    Fault isolation software for controller testing runs on host computer.

The key to the XCOMP controller was its custom micro-programmable processor which controlled data transfers. Custom microcode, provided by XCOMP, was stored in writable control memory to accommodate specific drives. This approach generated three major advantages: easy adaptation to the myriad of drives by changing only the I/O driver software, simplified testing of the controller by fault isolation software run on the host computer, and very high performance.

A sector format of separate header and data fields was used, each having sync and check characters. By testing the header for correct head, cylinder and sector before Reading and Writing on the data area, total data security was assured without the time consuming separate Read operations to determine correct head position. Average Read or Write operation latency time was only one-half revolution.

These controllers use a 256 byte sector format and had a full sector buffer. The logical sector format allowed interleaving which maximizes system performance. The design eliminated problems with interrupt response time and with bank switch systems under CP/M3 and MP/M operating systems. The buffer was used in "look ahead" mode for increased system performance.

SPECIFICATIONS
•    Buffer size - 256 bytes
•    Disc data rate up to 10 MHz
•    8 BIT bus transfer
•    Capable of 6 MHz IEEE operation on S100
•    Separate header with 2 byte check code
•    I/O addresses - any 8 address block on even boundary
•    The board could be used in programmed I/O or interrupt mode
•    Interrupts could be jumper to any level
•    Interrupts were generated on seek and/or data transfer complete

XComp actually had 4 variations of the above boards and software. They are referred to in the documentation as:-

SG/S    If you were using the above board with a Shugart 8" SA1000. (The extra pins on the top left accommodated the larger cable connector. I have an SA1000 and one day will try it out. The transparent cover where you can see the disk and heads is real neat!
ST/S    If you are using a 5" ST506 hard disk and the above board.

They also had a ribbon cable/board arrangement where the second board was in the disk drive rather than in the S-100 bus.

SG/S    If an 8" SA1000 was used with this arrangement
ST/R    If a 5: ST506 type drive was used.

The software supplied was extensive and very well done.  It's important to realize that the data processing board has its own microprocessor that needs to be fed specific "micro-code" to have it do something. Once these bytes of data are sent, the board comes alive and carries out the required function.   The board is completely I/O mapped using a block of 8 ports. The default  is 78H to 7FH.

XComp supplied source code to setup your system. Amongst the list was the following Z80 programs.

SAATS    Tests seek logic on the board
SAFMT    Format and verify the hard disk.
SAIOS     A BIOS driver for CPM V2.2
SAROM   An example of a bootstrap ROM based loader
SARDT    Random Read/Write diagnostic test
SARWT   Read/Write diagnostic test
XSBT      Test the onboard RAM buffer on the board.

I intend to extensively document this board/software in the future since it is the basic HD board I use in my own S-100 system using CPM+, CPM-86 and MS-DOS. This will however be a few months away.  For now I am just including the source code XComp supplied.

XComp HD Controller Files (.Zip Format)

The sales brochure for this controller can be obtained here.
The manual for this board can be obtained here
The schematic for the two above boards can be obtained here.
A short summary of XComp software can be obtained here.