With the experience that I gained by building the GPIO board, I used my experience to complete my senior projects class at the University. The Senior Projects class is a class that a potential graduate demonstrates their ability over about 2/3rds of a year.
The project that I built with the help of two individuals, was a disk drive alignment tool. Back in those days, most of the disk drives were build by Shugart or compatible companies. The heads tended to drift over time and with a special alighment disk a technician could re-position the head in the correct place over the media. A Real simple technique however; the alignment tools were very expensive. Something like the item pictured would be in the $900 to $1000 range today - Not an easy expense for a person paying for his own school!
The board was hand wired using point to point wire wrap wire. Each point was hand soldered. The system has RAM, ROM and enough IO to provide Zero track sense, track pulse for the next track, keyboard input and display output. I was able to score an accolade in the form of an outstanding accomplishments certificate.
Below is the GPIO board and how it was used in the Color Computer. The Color Computer was a fantastic platform. All graphics, memory management, and other functions were done exclusively by the 6809 processor. One unfortunate problem that the system suffered was that it needed an occasional re-boot. The system didn't have an operating system as we know them today.
