[time-nuts] Tektronix TM500 extender cable kit

Hal Murray hmurray at megapathdsl.net
Mon Aug 4 18:14:23 UTC 2014


> It turned out that ribbon cable appropriate for this  application was either
> not available or too expensive.

Are standard disk cables a reasonable length? (and a pinout you can use)

I don't know the details, but there are two types of disk cables.  The old 
style uses standard 40 pin ribbon cable with not-great grounding.  The 
new/fancy style uses 80 pin cables but the same old connectors.  I assume the 
extra wires are grounds with some magic in the connector to connect them all 
to the IDE ground pins.  (so they won't work for arbitrary pin assignments)


There is also twisted-pair ribbon cable.  There are untwisted/flat sections 
every foot or so where you can install standard connectors.  I'd expect it to 
work well if used with differential pairs.  Digikey carries it.



-- 
These are my opinions.  I hate spam.






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