DISCLAIMER:

Before attempting the procedures outlined in this guide, please be advised that neither Mr.Atari, nor the manufacturer of this device assume ANY LIABILITY WHATSOEVER for damages caused directly or indirectly by the installation of this product. By attempting these procedures, YOU AGREE to assume all responsability and liability for any damages that may occur.

FURTHER NOTE:

This document also assumes that your 6502C CPU is installed in a high quality, double-contact socket on your motherboard. A small percentage of XE machines were built by ATARI with socketed CPUs. The vast majority of XE machines, however, had the CPU chips soldered in place from the factory. The MyIDE-XE kit does include a suitable socket for this purpose. The procedures for removing a "soldered-in" CPU and replacing it with a socket are beyond the scope of this text. Furthermore, this task is (in our oppinion) beyond the level of what should be attempted by the average hobbyist. We reccomend referral of this task to a professional electronics repair facility, or to a person very experienced in removing and replacing "soldered-in" chips. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO DESOLDER YOUR CPU FROM YOUR MOTHERBOARD UNLESS YOU ARE SURE YOU CAN HANDLE IT.

First, remove your 6502C CPU from the socket.

There is an electrolytic capacitor directly to the left of the CPU socket. On some XE machines, this capacitor is too tall, and could possibly interfere with the bottom of the MyIDE-XE board. You can either replace this capacitor with a shorter one of the same equivelancy, or just remove it entirely. This capacitor is only used for the "audio-input" signal from the cartridge slot. VERY FEW devices (if any) have ever made use of this signal. Possible exceptions are any sort of audio sampler that plugs into the cartridge port and uses the TV/MONITOR speaker as a "live audio monitor." I am not aware of any such devices currently available for the 8-bit ATARI.

Next, carefully plug the MyIDE-XE board into the socket, making sure that all pins go into the appropriate holes. The pins are designed to be very tight in the socket. It is normal for quite a bit of insertion-force to be required, but make absolutely sure that all of the pins are going in straight before applying downward pressure.

Finally, solder the wire from the MyIDE-XE to pin 14 of the 74LS138 chip on the motherboard.

You will need an IDE notebook to desktop interface adaptor such as the one pictured above. You must supply +5Vdc and Ground to the adaptor board with wire that is of adequate size to supply the drive motor. 14ga or larger wire is reccomended. If you plan to power the drive from the ATARI's power supply, make sure your power supply is rated at least 1.5A. Some newer power supplies for the XE series were only rated at 1.0A. If you have one of these 1.0A power supplies, try to find one from an 800XL or older XE that has the higher current rating.

Place the drive in the exact position shown in the photos above, and drill the two holes in the back casework for the drive mounting screws. Please make sure that the drive is pushed all the way to the left, with the interface adaptor board against the plastic cartridge slot boss. Also, make sure that the hole (A) shown in the photo above is not covered by the drive. Otherwise, your top case-half will not fit without modification.

You will need a standard IDE cable. The picture above shows my custom shortened IDE cable. It is approximately 5 inches long. I shortened this cable to minimize the length of the IDE bus and make the cleanest possible installation, but this is unnecessary. A standard desktop IDE cable works just fine. Be sure and note the orientation of pin 1 on both ends of the cable. On the MyIDE-XE board, pin 1 is located on the rightmost end of the connector. The hardisk activity LED connector is located to the left of the CPU, as installed on the MyIDE-XE board.

This is how my finished installations look. Yours may vary, but as long as it works, and the case goes back together, it should be fine. Please refer to Mr. Atari's other on-line guides for detailed instructions on how to format, partition, and install operating systems and software on your drive. Thank you for your interest/purchase, and best of luck to you from Mr. Atari and the MyIDE-XE team.