I am looking for advice as to whether an idea I have prototyped is really worth further development as a small scale commercialy viable project. Please be exceedingly blunt and give me the good and the bad as you see it.
In essence, the project takes a PC parallel port and allows it to be used to access up to 256x8 bit addressable data ports, in a modular physical design, that can be written or read in either a latched or buffered I/O mode. Testing on the original prototype went quite well and from my tests, the data thru-put capability was around 4 mega-bits/second. I am now into a second gen design that should allow the speeds to increase by a factor of 1/3 (assuming the PC can handle the I/O that fast).
I have also been able to easily interface a wide variety of currently available devices that would allow a PC to act as a medium/large scale automation control point. (That was the whole purpose of designing it in the first place)
The real question now is not so much CAN it be done, but SHOULD it be done and is it of any real value, and would ANY sector really need that much I/O. I know DI/O PC boards are available, but at the price/port they seem very expensive if one needs a large amount of I/O. Even my 1-off prototype boards came in much cheaper that what I have seen, so I am sure production quantity runs would compete even better from a price perspective. I also know that parallel ports seem to be destined for the scrap heap.
So give it to me straight as you see it.
Thanks
Dialtone
In essence, the project takes a PC parallel port and allows it to be used to access up to 256x8 bit addressable data ports, in a modular physical design, that can be written or read in either a latched or buffered I/O mode. Testing on the original prototype went quite well and from my tests, the data thru-put capability was around 4 mega-bits/second. I am now into a second gen design that should allow the speeds to increase by a factor of 1/3 (assuming the PC can handle the I/O that fast).
I have also been able to easily interface a wide variety of currently available devices that would allow a PC to act as a medium/large scale automation control point. (That was the whole purpose of designing it in the first place)
The real question now is not so much CAN it be done, but SHOULD it be done and is it of any real value, and would ANY sector really need that much I/O. I know DI/O PC boards are available, but at the price/port they seem very expensive if one needs a large amount of I/O. Even my 1-off prototype boards came in much cheaper that what I have seen, so I am sure production quantity runs would compete even better from a price perspective. I also know that parallel ports seem to be destined for the scrap heap.
So give it to me straight as you see it.
Thanks
Dialtone