Building a Superboard 600 power supply

[ianoid]

Does anyone have any suggestions/instructions for building a power supply for a Superboard 600? I know it needs 5v but I’m not sure of the amperage. If there is an easy way to use a modern switching adapter, I’d prefer that.

[Mark]

According to the C1P user manual, the Superboard needs a single voltage power supply with minimum of 5V 3A with less than +/- 5% ripple.

Originally this meant a 3+Amp iron core transformer, power regulator, large capacitor and heatsink, but modern supplies are much better.

You can get a switching power brick that meets those ratings easily like this one (just cut the 2.1mm end, or get a matching connector for OSI), or if you ever plan on expansion, you could go with a +5/+12/-12 supply for computer, disk drive and serial I/O. Like this one from JameCo or maybe something with a little higher 5v current depending on what you need to expand to. Google around, I'm sure you'll find what you need!

[dave]

If you are considering adding in a 610 board, or the Klyball replica, and plan to populate it with 2114 chips, then consider getting at least a 10 amp supply. The 2114 chips can sink up to 100 mA each, and 24k can suck up 4.5-5 amps. Of course the smarter way would be to use a 610 for the disk interface and a single chip RAM add-on (requiring very little current) for memory expansion.

It was common for a 610 board (or a 527 24k Ram board in a C2 or C4) to require its own power supply, since 5V supplies from OSI (that would fit in the C1/C2/C4 case) could only source 4.5A. The C2-8P and C8P had much beefier supplies.

[ianoid]

I am using it just for a 600, so max RAM is 8K I believe.

I picked up the power supply from the link above, which is 5V DC 5A. Interestingly when I use that power supply, the computer misbehaves. The keyboard becomes iffy and the terminal width becomes inconsistent. Do I need a higher amperage supply? I am using a female to alligator clip adapter at the end of it to connect to the board’s cable.

I’ll touch on this in my repair thread but one of the two tested boards I recently got working stopped working when I tried it with this power supply as well. Not sure if it’s the PS that upset the board or just some time sitting in a static free bag. I tried it with the C1P PS and it still didn’t work, whereas the other working board does work with the C1P PS.

Also, does anyone know the name or size for the connector that seems to be common with these Superboard 600 units?

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