Observatoire du Prieuré Gradignan

Hewlett-Packard's motion control HCTL-1x00 chip

The HCTL-1x00 motion control dedicated micro processor was designed by Hewlett-Packard around the year 1985, probably for in-house purposes; it must have been used in motor control for HP's line of printers and plotters. Its first version was called the HCTL-1000, and has been discontinued; it was replaced by the HCTL-1100, that essentially has a lower power consumption, and has had a few non essential features added, such as the possibility of presetting the position registers (this can be taken care of in software), and of synchronizing more than one motor.

The documentation for the HCTL-1100 used to be found in Hewlett-Packard's Optoelectronics Catalog since 1986, along with their interesting line of optical encoders.

The same information could also be found from HP's HCTL-1100 web page in a PDF file (portable document format, you need Adobe's Acrobat reader to read and print this).

Now these products are carried by Agilent Technologies.

I have copies of the HCTL-1000's documentation in English and in French. Also the following documentation is available with HP, and I have a copy:

• Application note on HCTL-1x00's Digital Filter parameters determination on a given movement.
• Miscellaneous application notes on interfacing the chip to various micro controllers.
• "FAQ" (Frequently Asked Questions) on how to use and program the HCTL-1x00.
• Re print of a paper that appeared in Electronics Design a few years ago.
• List of manufacturers that used the chip to build motion control systems.

All this information, whose list can be found on the HCTL-1100 web page on motion control, helped a lot in programming the necessary driver software that will be published with the design.

I am not sure what the price of this chip is in the USA. In France, it is quoted by RS components at close to $100; however those people have very high prices, so I suspect it should be available with HP distributors fro US$ 50 to 60. I would be interested in knowing street prices for it.

However, the old version of the chip, dubbed the HCTL-1000, can still be found for free; the people that own a stock are kindly willing to send you some, under the express condition that the chips *will* be used in an application, such as the present axis control card. Details on how to obtain two or three of them is available on request, just send an email.

Either chip being pin for pin compatible and sharing the same software, there is no foreseeable risk of not being able to find some for either buiding the card or fixing a "fried" component (I have fried none so far 8-).

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