Dwight discusses problems and fixes of the Intel UPP 
(Universal PROM Programmer)

Dwight Elvey, correspondence with Intel 4/40 and UPP owners
Feb 23 2023, edited slightly by Herb Johnson Feb 2024 with []'s
 
When I worked at Intel, I was responsible for the engineering side of testing the UPP product. I also was responsible for the analog board of the disk controller, because of my analog knowledge.

The UPP was a 4040 based product. Testing and analyzing failures was always a pain because it was not a EPROM based system. There was little way to diagnose them. I created, a one of a kind, what I called the "slow time emulator". It would plug into a Multibus system and then execute single instructions on the 4040 bus. I called it slow-time because it would execute a single instruction and then issue nops to keep the RAM dynamic registers alive (the 4002 were dynamic memories). I'd then be able to write or read data ports, as well as confirm ROM data. Anyway, it worked like a system monitor code. 

The most common failure of the UPP boards was caused by one of the bypass capacitor with one end stuck in the wrong hole. It just happened to be a bus line.

The other big issue, was the cable from the processor to the UPP. On a typical cable tester, they looked fine but they wouldn't work right in the system setup. It seems that the strobe lines are required to be wrapped with a ground wire, and not [carried on] a signal line. In order to catch this mistake, we'd need to take the connector apart. If we did that, the cable vendor would not except them back. 

So I and a fellow named John Sharp made a special cable tester that looked for crosstalk on the strobe wire to any of the signal wires. We'd send a tone down the wires and look for the tone showing up on a data line. We put that to a meter marked in the number of wires that were done wrong. We had one made for us and one made for the vendor.

I do have a UPP, a series II system and a MDS800. I've not had time to play with them. ( projects, project! ).
I have a SIM4-01, MP7-03 and MCB-410 that I mostly use to program 1702As. It could do 1702non-As but I don't have the need for that and haven't found [them] yet ( quite rare ).

Anyway, I'm glad to help with what ever you might need. - Dwight
 

From: Herbert Johnson  
Sent: Wednesday, February 7, 2024 10:45 AM
To: dwight   Sid Jones ; Jon Hales 
Subject: Re: 'Pittman' Assembler...side issue with UPP
 
On your comments about the UPP "cable from the processor to the UPP". 
I'm guessing, this is the external cable from the UPP box
to say an Intel intellec 8/80 box, or to another Intel development
system? Or ... is this some internal cable inside the UPP?

There's many UPP boxes in ownership, but without the Intel provided
external cable. If that cable has unique wiring, it may not be
documented. I'll have to check the UPP schematics later. - Herb

On 2/7/2024 9:05 PM, dwight wrote:

  It depends on the UPP [model?]. The cable I was talking about was for the older UPP. It would go between the UPP and a mds800 or similar. It had parallel data and about 4 strobes ( not to sure on all of that ) but it was not the latter serial. It was a funny  parallel, with multiple strobes to determine what action was to take place. It made it quite difficult to use with a PC unless you used a number of bidi printer cards.

I had what I called the slow-time emulator that I made to diagnose the UPP's. This was a 4040 like 
thing that I could execute any single instruction on the 4040 bus.

I couldn't do but 1 every few clock cycles. Because of the dynamic nature of the 40XX parts, I had to keep the buss clock running with a single instruction ( I forget which I used ). I could dump a 4001 ROM chip and test a 4002 RAM. I could exercise all the signals on the programming card. It was like a 4040 ICE but not real time. - Dwight

On 2/9/2024 6:43 AM, Jon Hales wrote:

It may interest you to see an [24-pin IC] adapter socket that was fitted to the iUPP-103 I was given when I went to collect an MDS Series-II. I also have a cable that may have been intended for use between these systems - but I've not tried to connect them. [Details of the adapter not included in this note.]

The UPP cable (for 'MDS') is specified on Drawing 4000520 in the Intel UPP schematic drawings 9800159A. The next page shows a different cable for Intellec 8 and 8/MOD80, the one after that for "INT 4/4". Cabling is also discussed in 9800133F [Universal PROM Programmer Reference Manual]. - Regards, Jon

[The three cable drawings are labeled as Jon noted. The cables show both shielded and nonshielded wires.
Inspection of schematics or signals on the various Intel development systems mentioned, would verify
which cable is for which system. The MDS cable has one connector, the Intellec cables have two connectors. 
The UPP Ref Manual describes cables only for the MDS and the 8/MOD80. - Herb]