x=usr(1536)

Well, TIL Guess that's what I get for not fact-checking my cross-platform compatibilities once in a while

No, a7800 is multiplatform - I'm running it under macOS. As for whether or not it builds on ARM, I have no idea 1536@lolbox .a7800 % file ./a7800 ./a7800: Mach-O 64-bit executable x86_64 1536@lolbox .a7800 %

As far as I'm aware, ProSystem is Windows-only, which would be an interesting OS choice for the machine. Have a question in already to (hopefully) clarify that:

Out of curiosity, does this mean that the machine is running some flavour of Windows or WINE? To the best of my knowledge, ProSystem is Windows-only.

Counterpoint: removing it will render the VCS adapter unusable. It's probably best to leave well enough alone. Removal also introduces the possibility of causing problems that weren't present in the first place, and installing a UAV remains a possibility either way.

What you're seeing may also have been someone's attempt at chasing down cold solder joins. Instead of hitting everything that may have been an issue (and socketing things like the OS ROM in the process), they likely just went after individually-suspect pins. The CPU being a bit warmer is pretty much normal. Yes on both. This probably won't work, but: if you turn the machine on while holding down OPTION, does it go into the self-test menu or do any other changes take place? One other possibility is a shot MMU / delay line IC, but I don't want to jump to that just yet.

Bear in mind that the NES saw release in 1983, with the Master System debuting in 1985. The A8 range hit retail in 1979. Comparing the later hardware against the earlier isn't necessarily going to yield an across-the-board comparison - particularly since the A8 range was aimed at a different type of buyer than people in the market for consoles. Ehh... The differences are more significant than that. No PIA on the 5200 so no SIO, a completely different OS ROM, incompatible controllers, an expansion port on the 5200 that isn't replicated on the A8s, etc. Sure, they share SALLY, POKEY, ANTIC, and GTIA, but there's more to it than just recasing a 400.

Ditto Clorox wipes or similar. Depending on the plastics in use, though, one may work better than the other. FWIW, it may be worth trying a Magic Eraser on an inconspicuous part of the buttons; they've helped with discoloration on a number of things. You'll want to test each button individually as it's possible that different colours will respond differently to treatment. Just make sure to wash them with dish soap (Dawn recommended) first and gradually work the pressure upwards to see what happens.

This is correct. Further to that: In theory, they could be running Altirra under WINE, or using the Altirra OS ROMs with a different emulator. The latter would be relatively simple; the former not so much. To my mind, it seems like the smart thing to do would be to use a MAME build with only the drivers needed for the platform. That brings us neatly on to the following: Entirely possible. They could even be using libretro for the whole thing. If they are, emulation is gonna suck. libretro blows, and for a lot more reasons than just that. I'll step down off of the libretro soapbox now.

Just being able to mount the images and extract the files is likely to be 99.9% of what the FS support is used for. There may be some corner cases in favour of write support, but given that those three versions of DOS never saw wide adoption it's probably safe to back-burner that as a feature until a suitably-pressing need arises.

Nice transitions on the floors, and it's interesting to see each level start without resetting the players' positions. The coin animations are also really fluid. Looking forward to it!

Option 2 (assuming this is a Linux-based device) would be running Altirra under WINE. This would make sense if A8 emulation is also included since both it and the 5200 could be covered by a single emulator.

@chriswhit: this is all way off-topic for this thread. If you want to discuss it, great, but please start a new thread for that discussion. Thanks.

Since Atari generally acts as the publisher, something along these lines likely happens: a meeting is called between Atari and the third party in which NDAs are signed by both parties. The game is pitched by the third party, possibly with storyboards or early gameplay being shown. Atari then decides if it wants to publish the game or not, and things proceed from there. Note that this is all notional; I have no idea as to how Atari actually conducts these sorts of things. However, based on my experience, this seems like a reasonable set of assumptions. This is why there's typically a lump sum paid up front, a second lump sum on completion, and royalties after that point. These payments tend to be tied to meeting milestones agreed to by both parties. The ramifications of turning in an unsaleable product and/or one that doesn't resemble the product agreed to by both parties will be specified by contractually-defined penalties. All of this is common practice in not only the game industry, but also the vast majority of the entertainment industry (of which game development is a part) as a whole. The idea that people just send in games and get a cheque is totally off-base. No. It absolutely wouldn't. Being completely straightforward: this is a terrible idea, and there are many good reasons why the industry as a whole doesn't follow this model.

I believe it was Chris Rock who said something to the effect of, "looking down into my newly-born daughter's eyes for the first time, I knew that from this point on in life I had just one responsibility: to keep her off of that stripper pole."

Bettar advise appeared while I was typing Deleted.

It doesn't quite work that way. What you're suggesting is sending in unsolicited material. In general, that can't be accepted for a number of reasons. To keep it simple, though, without a preexisting contract between Atari and a third party, neither side has any significant legal protection in the event of a dispute over the IP, including ownership and use of concepts. The usual course of action in cases like these is to return the IP to the sender along with a note explaining the above. It won't even be looked at as soon as what the submission is becomes apparent.

@Wildstar: Dude... This is not the thread for these discussions. Feel free to start a new thread and migrate things over there, but kindly stop using this thread in lieu of a more appropriate one. Thank you.

Sign me up Are 5200 cartridges an option, or will it be A8-only?

True, and this is what nearly killed Lancia completely. And you're dead right about the Alfasud. Same with the Alfa 33 that replaced it. One exception: most British cars. They just rusted because of shit build quality at the time. I could go into some of the reasons why, but that would absolutely be politics. The French sort-of escaped that association, but still had cars that would rust though not as badly as others.

The car that I learned to drive in was the Fiat 127, which provided a significant chunk of its drivetrain in order for Zastava to be able to build the Yugo under licence. It came my way when my mother replaced it with a Honda Civic. Courtesy of Fiat having ended up with crap Soviet iron ore in lieu of actual payment for the Lada factory that they more or less built for the Soviets (who defaulted on repayments, instead effectively bartering iron ore for it), the car would just about rust out around you. Mine wasn't bad in that regard, though, and mechanically was utterly bulletproof. I don't know what was going on in Kragujevac, but the Yugo equivalent would rust out around you and be mechanically-unreliable. I remember seeing them on dealers' lots with telltale bubbling under the paint when new. The convertibles were particularly bad, having even more ways for moisture to get in.

"After losing the two previous vehicles we had been issued, the only car the department was willing to release to us at this point was an unmarked 1987 Yugo, a Yugoslavian import donated to the department as a test vehicle by the government of that country and reflecting the cutting edge of Serbo-Croatian technology."

Understood, and having had an iMac of that generation (2008-ish), I completely understand why you're topped out at OS X 10.11. Thing is, most of the rest of the world is on macFUSE by now. And while I have no issues with you wanting to do an osxFUSE build of atrfs, please remember that you are building for an obsolete (and unsupported) target. If it works, great, but you are kind of a corner case on this one (And FWIW, I feel your pain re: upgrading. I'm typing this on an early 2018 MBP, and the next macOS release will probably be the last one that will support this machine. Not thrilled about being forced into that when this one still does what I need.)

Hang on a sec - are you using osxfuse or macFUSE? osxfuse has been deprecated for a long, long time, and was replaced by macFUSE. There were known (in)compatibility issues between them, which may be the cause of what you're seeing here.

For a FujiNet, it's easy: navigate to the SD card, select 'N' (New), and follow the prompts. Using a SIDE3 cartridge: navigate to the SD card, hit CTRL-SHIFT-I, and follow the prompts. CTRL-M at this point will also show you the menu, which has a ton more options. Most emulators can create disk images; check their documentation for specifics.