Part 2o: The future of the ETA-3400X

You can find all the work I've done on the ETA-3400X and 8K ALTAIR 680 BASIC, except for the ETA-3400X Gerber files, on the ET-3400 groups.io site at:

https://groups.io/g/ET-3400/files/5.%20Projects/ETA-3400X and

https://groups.io/g/ET-3400/files/5.%20Projects/ALTAIR%20680%20BASIC%20for%20the%20ETA-3400X

You will need to become a member of the group to access the files.

The ever growing To-Do list:

• Tidy up and create an assemble-able version of the source code.
• Fix the errors on the pcb.
• Complete more of the comments on the assembly source file, especially with the math sections.
• Add the CSAVE and CLOAD commands to this version of ALTAIR 680 BASIC.
• Add a command to jump into the monitor and return to BASIC similar to how Tiny BASIC works with the BYE and B command.
• Build two enclosures for my ETA-3400X's and dress them up to look like the SWTPc 6800 and the ALTAIR 680 Turnkey enclosures.
• Improve the serial communications speed by using XON/XOFF protocol or perhaps hardware handshaking if it's possible.
• Make ETA-3400X pcbs available in complete kit, short form kit or blank pcb for other enthusiasts to build their own.
• Complete and publish the parts list.
• Place all this on my new guthub account when I learn how to use it properly.
• See if the unused 64K of the RAM chip can be accessed through bank switching.
• Burn the ALTAIR 680 BASIC machine code into high ROM to remove the step to download BASIC from the terminal. This will also require a memory transfer routine to move it into low RAM before running.

Other ETA-3400 retro projects in the works or under consideration

• One other member of the ET-3400 group mentioned porting a version of the FORTH language and it should be possible on this ETA-3400X, although it may need a lot of patching to work with the Fantom II monitor just as ALTAIR 680 BASIC did.
• One of the other ETA-3400 clones has a smaller 32K RAM chip, but only 4K is used, wasting 28K. I am currently working with another ET-3400 enthusiast on modifying this other board so it can utilise most of the memory and remap it so it can run ALTAIR 680 BASIC. This should leave about 24K for user programs which should still allow most of the 101 BASIC Computer Games and other important stuff to be run.

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