Radfoo

Kevin has said he has a partial C64 core but there is tons of stuff on his list of things to do. Atari Lynx and C64 are 2 cores that I would love to see on the system but I think it is probably best to look at what it can do today if someone is going to buy it or not.

Fair enough, suppose no point compromising or you will just end up doing re-designs over and over and not getting anywhere. Sorry if our ramblings / questions on this forum are a distraction, don't want to slow down all your hard work with daft questions! Though thanks for replying, it is good to understand and have this contact with the developer of such a system. Had a tracking update and I should receive my NT Mini on friday, looking forward to having a play with it over the weekend.

Cool. Would an add-on to the NT Mini be plausible then? Suppose its irrelevant if thats not the way you want to go with it, just though it was a good idea. Suppose even if its do-able the market might be small, thinking of all those Sega Mega Drive/Genesis add-ons that never sold well! Think the Zimba 3000 name is good, it is different, but think of the daft names that Nintendo come out with, no one complains later and it wont get mixed up with all the other random clone/emu boxes.

Yeah, I suppose. Trying to remember the last spec Kevin gave for the Zimba 3000, did it have 2 FPGAs anyway with one being for the video? I suppose it would depend on how well it could integrate with the mainboard, maybe it could be used for offloading things like the audio to give more capacity on the NT Minis FPGA, or maybe as a RAM expansion? Of course all hypothetical and completely dependent on Kevin and/or Analogue.

Just an idea/question, probably no point at the moment. Technically could the NT mini be upgraded through the cartridge slot to make it closer to the Zimba 3000 spec?

I received notification and tracking number but its not yet been collected (or so the tracking info shows), I wonder if they are just working through the orders (in order), emails being sent one by one, and getting them all collected at once? Site says they will be posted 3-5 days after the order.

spoke too soon, just had the tracking number :-) You must have been refreshing 8am too, must have just been a bit quicker than me. Perhaps i'm a little inpatient, lol.

Cool, pleased yours is on the way. Did you order with the latest batch on friday? I have not heard anything yet and ordered within seconds of 8am on friday.

Thank you! Now I have ordered was just looking for more info and the tech specs but can't find anything other it has a Cyclone V, was wondering how much RAM it has?

Ordered :-)

Good question, I have a NES Arkanoid paddle, could that be made to work on 2600 paddle games?

Thats good news, when you get around to it please do some videos on it as it is an unusual/interesting system. Quite underrated in my opinion, quite a few good games.

Well, it looks like I have somehow justified it to myself to order an NT Mini tomorrow, fingers crossed there will be enough stock . The price tag is frightening but it seems to be an amazing bit of kit. Looking back at the first page I commented that $200-$250 would be the price i'd pay, i'm way off that price mark but have been waiting for an FPGA system like this for years. The existing cores are value enough, particularly the Atari 2600, NES and Gameboy Colour are systems I know well, my wife used to have a Master System so know she will enjoy it too. Looking forward to the future cores and keen to see how far this hardware can be pushed, I know its probably a long way down the to do list but do you think the NT Mini will be capable of running the Atari Lynx or will that have to wait for the Zimba 3000? Hope Kevin is rewarded by the number of units sold!

Yes, my interest in the RVGS/Chameleon was always for the FPGA to accurately play my old games not new ones (though always thought Tiny Knight looked fun). So I guess my interest was a niche bit off a niche none existant product. Zimba3000 makes a lot more sense, though looks like it will be a while until we see such a thing for sale.

Very good, fills in quite a few gaps in the story. Thought it weird how Mike tries to pitch collectorvisíon against piko for the pack in game, I know that's the least of Mikes problems unless he was looking for a way out - he could then say, console was ready but we have no software? The whole thing is just weird anyway, nothing is surprising anymore!

I'm sure you have long list of cores beyond this but just thought I'd mention the Atari Lynx, would love to see that one. Anyone know if any other fpga gurus are already working on such a core for other boards?

I hope not, though I guess it will take time. Was what I was saying before, would be happy to buy it pretty much as it is now then get refinements and extra cores later.

I think that's how to the C64 DTV came about, originally FPGA C-One then the ASIC. If not directly, certainly the knowledge learnt created a low cost game/joystick in a box combo.

Was just wondering about PAL cores, in particular if you have or intend to do Atari 2600 and NES? NTSC isn't a problem if I'm using ROMs off an SD card as almost all TVs over here since the early 90s have been able to do both. Just for when using cores with my original PAL carts, I still have all my original ones from 80s and 90s that would be nice to use. If I remember correctly the PAL 2600 pallette is completely different and speeds an issue with the NES. How's the progress going? Will you be doing more youtube videos on this showing progress like on the hi-def NES? Whilst on the subject of hi-def NES, do you know if/when they will be sold in kit form? Thanks

Yes, Retro VGS was hyped like anything and drew many of us quieter ones to comment (have been a member on here since 2002, usually just read stuff). This was a big deal and could have been huge if they stopped chopping and changing along the way, being stupidly vague, then changing the thing completely.

Yes, I know how it works. Kevin has already been working on this for a long time, strikes me as somewhat of a completionist, with his main interest in developing the cores themselves rather than selling stuff. If he just finished the hardware as it is and sold it I'd be happy getting the cores later but I am not sure if Kevin would?

Good idea, imagine an 8-bit version could be released sooner as well maybe? Keen to buy one.

At least it has finally been confirmed exactly what the FPGA can not do! Was really weird how early on Steve (maybe Mike, was listening to the audio) was advocating FPGA and then John said they basically only have one for glue logic. It was an FPGA system that was being talked about on all the podcasts and specs on there web site until last week, that is the system I wanted to buy, probably even at $299. I need to try and stop following this now, they are not flogging a system I want, its not healthy spending all this time on this.

This should have been obvious to them, hopefully they read this.

Well written, that is how I see it too. The original concept was great and I think people would buy it, though probably still not to the tune of $2million. "indie steam on a cartridge" is a bit bonkers, particularly when you start to think how this would work, it means the cartridge will contain a large amount of storage with linux, xwindow, maybe an emulator, then the game itself, certainly not going to be the instant startup you had with previous cartridge systems. Seems very PC like to me and if it isn't they need to explain how this will work.