Here's what I am proposing to build:
In Circuit Flash Emulator and Programmer
This will use the Xilinx Spartan-3E Starter Kit (HW-SPAR3E-SK-US) Xilinx Development Boards:
http://www.xilinx.com/xlnx/xebiz/designResources/ip_product_details.jsp?key=...
The Xilinx development boards are only $150 and are available worldwide.
It will feature:
10/100 Ethernet
JTAG
USB
9-pin RS-232 Serial Port
64 MByte DDR SDRAM
128 Mbit Parallel Flash
16 Mbit SPI Flash
16 character - 2 Line LCD
Board schematics may be fond here: http://www.xilinx.com/bvdocs/ipcenter/block_diagram/S3E_Starter_D_External_s...
It will interface to the mainboard via an adapter cable that will plug into a mainboard Flash ROM socket or onto the pins of a soldered in place Flash device. It may be used to program a Flash device or emulate a flash device in circuit.
This device will replace the need for the out of production BiosSaver. The BIOS ROM emulator feature will also help speed development of a LinuxBIOS port since the developer will no longer have to wait for either swapping Flash devices or for lengthy Flash programming cycles.
The design, specifications and BOM for the adapter cables will be posted on the LinuxBIOS site for all to freely use and build.
Target devices will initially be SPI Flash. LPC and parallel Flash may also be supported if there is enough interest.
The design will also allow for expansion into performing as a multi-channel logic analyzer with a JAVA client.
-Bari