Agon lightâ„¢ (new board revision is out, see announcement below)
IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT (July 19, 2023): Agon lightâ„¢ has a new and superior board revision, called the 'ORIGINS edition,' which supercedes this original version for all cases. Heber Ltd.'s Agon Console8 is already based on the improvements of that new revision. This repository is now maintained purely for legacy reasons. All makers and sellers should migrate to the ORIGINS edition promptly; it is 100% backward compatible with the original in this repository, but uses a couple of different parts. So be alert for the updates to the Bill of Materials!
Agon lightâ„¢ is a unique combination of instant-on microcomputer and standalone microcontroller, which allows you to control your projects from the convenience and immediacy of a BASIC prompt, without the need for a host PC or sketch compilation. To find out more about what makes Agon lightâ„¢ unique, useful and attractive, please visit the official website at: https://www.thebyteattic.com/p/agon.html.
The Hardware Manual should contain everything you need to know about the hardware.
The three modules of Agon lightâ„¢'s official firmware, called Quarkâ„¢, can be found here:
Quarkâ„¢ MOS, running on the Zilog eZ80 CPU, can now be upgraded without the dedicated Zilog USB Smart Cable, by using this utility written by Jeroen Venema. The utility is clearly documented and has been exhaustively tested.
A complete Agon Quarkâ„¢ BBC BASIC manual is available. Further firmware documentation is collected and maintained in the Agon lightâ„¢ WiKi. Because the Wiki is now the reference documentation, the 'Firmware Installation Guide' and the 'Quick Start Guide' above are obsolete and kept here just for legacy reasons.
There is now an online, community-maintained resource listing many PS/2-compatible keyboards known to work with Agon lightâ„¢. Anyone can edit this spreadsheet, so take it with a grain of salt. Nonetheless, it surely provides very useful indications.
The directory structure above contains the following information:
- /3D Model contains a, well, 3D model of Agon lightâ„¢'s board and a 2D image specifying the PCB's key dimensions. These are meant for those interested in designing and building custom (3D-printed) cases for Agon lightâ„¢.
- /Design contains all design files, like schematics, EasyEDA source files and PCB layout.
- /Manufacturing contains the files necessary to have an Agon lightâ„¢ board manufactured, such as the Gerber file, Bill of Materials and Pick and Place file.
- /Photos contains photos of a properly assembled Agon lightâ„¢ unit, so to provide detailed references for those attempting to build one themselves. These photos can also be used by the media (feel free to do so if you are a journalist or tech writer).
- /Third party documentation contains what the name suggests: useful datasheets, user manuals, guides and application/technical notes of parts and software used in/with Agon lightâ„¢.
- /uSD card files is now obsolete. The instructions in the Agon Wiki should be followed instead. Kept here for legacy purposes, this obsolete directory contains the files and folders that should be present in the micro SD card inserted in the Agon lightâ„¢ unit when you follow the instructions in the equally obsolete Quick Start Guide.
All files in this repository, except for the third-party documentation,
Copyright © 2022-2023 by Bernardo Kastrup.
All rights are reserved.
CHANGE HISTORY:
- 25 April 2023: 'Quick Start Guide', 'Firmware Installation Guide', and the README file in the /uSD card files directory have been updated to warn users that these documents are now obsolete and replaced by the Agon lightâ„¢ Wiki.
- 1 April 2023: A list of known-to-work PS/2 keyboards that can be used with Agon lightâ„¢ has been added to this README (no April Fools joke).
- 24 March 2023: The Hardware Manual has been updated with the new baud rate supported between CPU and video co-processor, namely 1,152,000 bits per second (three times faster than the previously recommended rate of 384,000 bps). All Agons, even the ones already in the field from day one, can be upgraded with this new baud rate with the next release of the Quarkâ„¢ firmware. The hardware has had the capability built into it from the get-go; it was a question of firmware. So enjoy!
- 27 February 2023: All documentation has been updated to take into account (a) the product number of the new Zilog USB Smart Cable (namely, ZUSBASC0200ZACG), since the previous version (namely, ZUSBSC00100ZACG) is now discontinued; and (b) the fact that Quark MOSâ„¢ firmware (for the eZ80 CPU) updates can be done without the Zilog cable, by using a software utility developed by Jeroen Venema; moreover, (c) the official Zilog manual for the new USB Smart Cable (ZUSBASC0200ZACG) has been added to the /Third party documentation folder for convenience.
- 17 December 2022: Link to the Quarkâ„¢ MOS cable-free upgrade utility added to this README file.
- 16 December 2022: Small update to the Firmware Installation Guide. Namely, the description of steps 45 and 47 was improved for clarity.
- 02 December 2022: Update to the Hardware Manual and schematics to correct an error: the positions of the control port pins ESPI36 to ESPI39 were documented in reverse order, but are now corrected. This update does not change the manufacturing files (Gerber, pick & place and bill of materials files).
- 23 November 2022: Update to the uSD card files and the firmware installation guide to reflect release 1.02 of Quark MOSâ„¢, Quark VDPâ„¢, and Quark BBC BASICâ„¢.
- 24 October 2022: Quick Start Guide and Firmware Installation Guide updated to reflect the fact that Agon lightâ„¢ requires a class-10, Fat32-formatted uSD-card with a partition of no more than 32GB.
- 21 October 2022: Quick Start Guide, Firmware Installation Guide, and bbcbasic.bin (in the folder /uSD card files) updated.
- 17 October 2022: All documentation updated to reflect the fact that the Zilog USB Smart Cable with product number ZUSBESC0200ZACG will NOT work with Agon lightâ„¢. The only CORRECT cable has product number ZUSBSC00100ZACG.
- 16 October 2022: Step-by-step firmware installation guide added to the repository.
- 15 October 2022: Improvements to the Bill of Materials spreadsheets for more clarity regarding which components to source.
- 11 October 2022: Update of the Quick Start Guide; The "/uSD card files" directory has been added.
- 5 October 2022: Quick Start Guide uploaded.
- 4 August 2022: Update of the Manual. The theory of operation (page 6) and the system diagram (page 7) now contain information about the two interrupt lines from the ESP32 available to the eZ80F92. A description of the control port signals (page 10) has also been added.
- 26 July 2022: Various bits and pieces of previously missing information added to the manual. System diagram (page 7) updated.
- 06 July 2022: Added power considerations to the manual (page 19). More photos (of the official case) added to the /Photos directory.
- 30 June 2022: All files of Rev. 1.0 uploaded.