Atarimax "Maxflash" Flash MultiCarts

[WizWor]

I was thinking I'd wait until I order my SIO2USB to order a Multicart, but the price for multicarts goes up tomorrow and the new USB version of SIO2PC is not yet available, so I'm thinking about getting one today.

 

I'm a little reluctant having read the posts on their forums, but I understand that people who do not have problems tend not to post on forums.

 

Is anyone using an 8-M cart without SIO2PC?

Its the intention of the initial 1Mb and 8Mb cartridge projects to provide a easy to use platform for homebrewing of inexpensive, legal multi-carts and other software, while being small enough to allow it to be completely and quickly re-programmed in the Atari itself, using only a standard floppy disk drive or SIO2PC software.

Is it difficult to create a multicart using only an Atari computer and a floppy drive?

 

Most of the programs I have are games. I have a lot of carts, some tapes, some bootable floppies, and a bunch of disks with exe files and a menu system. I'd be content to cart the exe files on floppies until I get a SIO2PC cable.

 

How does that work? Can this be an ongoing process? IOW, can I create a cart with eight programs then add eight later?

 

thanks!

[classics]

The images that are programmed onto the carts are created by a Perl script on the PC, or by the MenuMaker software, which also requires a PC.

 

So the real barrier is getting that programming image from your PC to the Atari, where it can be used to write to the cartridge.

 

Also, another problem is size. The 1mbit cartridge is about the same size as a 1050 ED formatted disk, so you can write a 1mbit flash cartridge image to disk and use that to program a 1mbit cart, but the 8mbit cartridge holds 8x that much, so you can't transfer the programming image to a real floppy disk.

 

Adding and removing items is no problem, since it takes only 3-4 seconds for a PC to assemble and produce the cartridge image. You just need a way to get that image to your Atari so it can be put on the cart.

 

I've been considering making a USB programming adapter for the maxflash carts to eliminate the need for the whole PC->SIO2PC->Atari->Cartridge programming dance.

 

Steve

[WizWor]

The images that are programmed onto the carts are created by a Perl script on the PC, or by the MenuMaker software, which also requires a PC.

 

So the real barrier is getting that programming image from your PC to the Atari, where it can be used to write to the cartridge.

 

Also, another problem is size. The 1mbit cartridge is about the same size as a 1050 ED formatted disk, so you can write a 1mbit flash cartridge image to disk and use that to program a 1mbit cart, but the 8mbit cartridge holds 8x that much, so you can't transfer the programming image to a real floppy disk.

 

Adding and removing items is no problem, since it takes only 3-4 seconds for a PC to assemble and produce the cartridge image. You just need a way to get that image to your Atari so it can be put on the cart.

* sigh * Thanks for the authoritative response. It's not the one I wanted, but definitely the one I needed.

I've been considering making a USB programming adapter for the maxflash carts to eliminate the need for the whole PC->SIO2PC->Atari->Cartridge programming dance.

I wonder if there would be a market for that. For me, the cart programming exercise will happen very infrequently. SIO2PC will be a permanent attachment. I don't see someone buying a cart but not buying SIO2PC. Just extend the sale price of the 8M cart to one day after the usb version of SIO2PC is available

[Urchlay]

Hmmm.

 

Steve, how hard would it be to someday make a USB SIO2PC that also contains a flash drive? The Atari could see it as a drive (drive number would have to be configurable), and the PC could also see it as a standard USB "thumb drive". I guess it would be a combination of the USB SIO2PC and the SIO2USB (at least, the storage part of SIO2USB, I think there's more to it than that).

 

This would give us the best of both worlds... but I don't know enough to be able to tell whether it's a major undertaking or something fairly simple for you. If it helps you make your decision, I'd pay $100 or more for one

[Wrathchild]

The flash chips tend to have a larger 'erase' block size (e.g. 16K) and so they'd

tend to be used as just read-devices with the occasional re-programming,

i.e. wipe it all and then write all data to it. Using the AT29C040 might be OK though.

[Urchlay]

The flash chips tend to have a larger 'erase' block size (e.g. 16K) and so they'd

tend to be used as just read-devices with the occasional re-programming,

i.e. wipe it all and then write all data to it. Using the AT29C040 might be OK though.

 

Kind of off-topic now, but... does this explain why most thumb drives seem to use the FAT filesystem? The filesystem's large cluster size is actually an advantage in this case?

[eegad]

I've been considering making a USB programming adapter for the maxflash carts to eliminate the need for the whole PC->SIO2PC->Atari->Cartridge programming dance.

I wonder if there would be a market for that. For me, the cart programming exercise will happen very infrequently. SIO2PC will be a permanent attachment. I don't see someone buying a cart but not buying SIO2PC. Just extend the sale price of the 8M cart to one day after the usb version of SIO2PC is available

 

 

Well, I'd buy one. I'd love to be able to dump bunches of games to a few maxflash carts, but I really don't care to have the Atari hooked up to my PC. Atari's in the basement, PC's in the den...would be nice to have some way to hook a maxflash directly to pc, copy stuff to it, then just take the cartridge to the Atari.

[ataridano]

I wonder if there would be a market for that. For me, the cart programming exercise will happen very infrequently. SIO2PC will be a permanent attachment. I don't see someone buying a cart but not buying SIO2PC. Just extend the sale price of the 8M cart to one day after the usb version of SIO2PC is available

 

For what it's worth, I'm one of those people who decided to buy carts but not use SIO2PC. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing agains APE or SIO2PC but I really prefer to use actual hardware and don't want to fire up a PC in order to use the Atari. The biggest problem I ran into was the fact that the DOS program I was using to write Atari disks on my PC only likes to write individual files, not disk images, and all the cool cart programming files were .atr disk images. I actually didn't make use of my carts for many months because of this, but as luck would have it, I ended up buying an SIO2SD drive (great piece of hardware by the way) and now I just download the .atr images (at home, work, wherever!), write them to an SD card, and mount that file on the Atari as D1:, and that's it! For the amount of money a USB programmer would cost, I highly recoment giving some thought to SIO2SD or SIO2USB as the programming process doesn't get much simpler, and I bet the cost wouldn't be alot more....plus you get a cool new drive for the Atari!

[MEtalGuy66]

Heres an idea that soem might not have thought of..

 

If you have a home network that is "done right"... In otherwords, the ethernet jacks are in the walls of each room, and terminate at a "patch-panel" in a central place (probably where your switch/router/server/gateway, etc. is)... Then here is what you can do...

 

They make these little dongles called "etherline adaptors" that you can buy for about $2.00 each. Its just an adaptor that plugs into a DB9 serial port and has an RJ-45 (ethernet style) jack on it. You can get them for male or female serial ports, DB9 or DB25..

 

Lets say your PC is in the "Den" and your Atari is in the bedroom.. Plug an etherlite adaptor on the PC's serial port, with a regular Cat-5 patch cable going from the adaptor to one of the ethernet jacks in your wall. Then, plug another etherlite adaptor onto the end of your SIO2PC on your ATARI in the bedroom. Using a standard cat-5 ethernet cable, Hook this etherlite adaptor to the ethernet jack in your bedroom wall. Then, simply go into your "riser closet" (or wherever the patch panel is) and use a third cat-5 ethernet cable to connect the two jacks on the patch panel which correspond to the two jacks youve got the atari and PC hooked up to..

 

If you have more than one jack in each wall, you can just leave this arrangement in effect, and also still have ethernet to your PC.. Otherwise, you can just hook it up when needed..

 

You can go one step further and use multiple etherlite connectors in the "atari room" hooked to one of those DB9 or DB25 switch-boxes... Then you can select which atari has the SIO2PC connection active, just by turning the switch/knob... Of course, this requires an SIO2PC interface for each atari. Not an issue for me because ALL my ATARIs haev internal SIO2PC with a standard DB-9 serial port out the back.. A setup like this costs close to nothing, and makes it real easy to get anything to/from any one of your ATARIs and your PC..

 

Etherlite is just a standard to put a full RS232/RS485 serial connection across standard cat-5/RJ-45 terminated cables. At my work, we have a huge mixture of ethernet and etherlite connections going through the same patch panels throughout the entire place.. If you use the CORRECT standard in your etherlite connectors (that is, the pinout going from RJ-45 to DB9/DB25) then it doesnt even hurt anything if someone mistakenly plugs an ethernet device into an etherlite enabled jack, or vice versa..

 

This is not complicated at all, but if it seems confusing to you, go get a good book on networking/serial communications...

[WizWor]

Got it. LOL. Wireless makes more sense.

[MEtalGuy66]

Got it. LOL. Wireless makes more sense.

Well, when you figure out a way to hook wireless straight to an SIO2PC on multiple machines, and switch between them, let the rest of us know..

The whole point is not to have to have a PC in the same room with your atari.

 

And as far as a home network goes, 100baseT outdoes wireless B/G by a pretty significant margin, and has no security issues.. You dont see many businesses running their entire network infastructure on wireless..

 

I use wireless G for my wife's laptop, but Ive also got ethernet jacks in every wall... Its easy as hell to plug in 3 cat-5 cables..

Edited September 20, 2008 by MEtalGuy66

[Shawn Jefferson]

You dont see many businesses running their entire network infastructure on wireless..

 

TJ Maxx ran quite a bit of their store's network on wireless.

[WizWor]

The whole point is not to have to have a PC in the same room with your atari.

Right, exactly. I happen to have ethernet in most rooms -- just not near my TVs. I'm not going to figure out anything -- I'm a consumer of other people's great ideas. I'm hoping Steven works this out. BUT, make no mistake, a wireless dongle for the SIO port will revolutionize the way we use the A8.

[UNIXcoffee928]

Metalguy's answer is an elegant solution. Not only did he give you the right answer, he took pains to provide a number of real-world examples as to why this is the right way to do it.

[classics]

You could try something like this:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Belkin-Certified-Wir...2/dp/B000UYWTWS

 

I haven't used it, but if its compatible with every day USB devices it should work.

 

They make a similar less expensive device that does usb over ethernet networks as well.

 

Steve

Edited September 20, 2008 by classics

[UNIXcoffee928]

I happen to have ethernet in most rooms -- just not near my TVs.

 

Regarding this issue, just wire everything with shielded cables to avoid interference.

[WizWor]

Metalguy's answer is an elegant solution. Not only did he give you the right answer, he took pains to provide a number of real-world examples as to why this is the right way to do it.

The problem with his solution is that no one wants it. In the real world, the ability to sell a solution is worth something. How many people have, or are willing to invest in, a whole house solution? Wireless is what people want and expect. If Steve goes this way, he will sell a lot of SIO2802.11x products.

[UNIXcoffee928]

Metalguy's answer is an elegant solution. Not only did he give you the right answer, he took pains to provide a number of real-world examples as to why this is the right way to do it.

The problem with his solution is that no one wants it. In the real world, the ability to sell a solution is worth something. How many people have, or are willing to invest in, a whole house solution? Wireless is what people want and expect. If Steve goes this way, he will sell a lot of SIO2802.11x products.

 

I don't get your point. Anyone with an electric drill, wire-strippers, a screwdriver, and an ebay account can wire their home in the above described fashion for fifty bucks. In the 'real-world' that I come from, you do something right or you don't do it at all.

 

Wireless is trendy, and is useful in a coffee shop if you are homeless or a perpetually single metrosexual hipster with a mac. It's fine around the house for a PDA, but as far as data throughput is concerned, it is a joke & a waste of money to use it at home & think that you are doing anything serious.

 

I blame the "For Dummies" & "For Idiots" books, they have lobotomized the average user. People want 'simple' & 'no-brainer' everywhere you go. No one knows how to do anything anymore. End result: You have to do everyone's jobs for them, because people don't even know their own job. It is an all pervasive laziness of thought that transcends every sector.

 

Look, RTFM exists for a reason. "Be different" read a manual. There's no excuse, you have a tabbed browser, look up the protocols & technologies on Wikipedia. Everybody wants to do things half-assed in the 'real-world' that you speak of. Then they bitch & moan & complain that it is slow, or doesn't work right. If you get into the habit of doing everything the right way, to the best of your ability, you can do your small part to help fix this broken world. "Broken"? Yes, broken. 25 years ago any listless twit that didn't know what they wanted to take up in college took up... that's right "Business" that is why the world is the way it is, from the dot-com crash onward.

 

Don't believe the hype. Do it right. Spread the word. Fix the world. Do it right. Do it now.

 

We live in a society that is like a machine of infinite complexity, held together with bubblegum & duct tape. Amazingly it's gears still keep grinding along... but for how long?

[+remowilliams]

If Steve goes this way, he will sell a lot of SIO2802.11x products.

Not at the price point that they will need to be sold at. Very few people are going to pay say $100 to have a wireless connection for their $5 ancient computer.

[Goochman]

If Steve goes this way, he will sell a lot of SIO2802.11x products.

Not at the price point that they will need to be sold at. Very few people are going to pay say $100 to have a wireless connection for their $5 ancient computer.

 

$100....................Steve, when will they ship?

[WizWor]

I don't get your point. Anyone with an electric drill, wire-strippers, a screwdriver, and an ebay account can wire their home in the above described fashion for fifty bucks. In the 'real-world' that I come from, you do something right or you don't do it at all.

 

Wireless is trendy, and is useful in a coffee shop if you are homeless or a perpetually single metrosexual hipster with a mac. It's fine around the house for a PDA, but as far as data throughput is concerned, it is a joke & a waste of money to use it at home & think that you are doing anything serious.

 

I blame the "For Dummies" & "For Idiots" books, they have lobotomized the average user. People want 'simple' & 'no-brainer' everywhere you go. No one knows how to do anything anymore. End result: You have to do everyone's jobs for them, because people don't even know their own job. It is an all pervasive laziness of thought that transcends every sector.

 

Look, RTFM exists for a reason. "Be different" read a manual. There's no excuse, you have a tabbed browser, look up the protocols & technologies on Wikipedia. Everybody wants to do things half-assed in the 'real-world' that you speak of. Then they bitch & moan & complain that it is slow, or doesn't work right. If you get into the habit of doing everything the right way, to the best of your ability, you can do your small part to help fix this broken world. "Broken"? Yes, broken. 25 years ago any listless twit that didn't know what they wanted to take up in college took up... that's right "Business" that is why the world is the way it is, from the dot-com crash onward.

 

Don't believe the hype. Do it right. Spread the word. Fix the world. Do it right. Do it now.

 

We live in a society that is like a machine of infinite complexity, held together with bubblegum & duct tape. Amazingly it's gears still keep grinding along... but for how long?

Whatever. I have most of my house wired. Somehow I missed my TVs in the process. Believe it or not, my A8s are next to my TVs. I haven't wired anything since the arrival of usb 802.11g devices. I have a wireless router and put a usb 802.11g adapter wherever I want to have internet access. My PS3 came with wireless.

 

Don't hit your nose on the ceiling, UNIXcoffee928. It's not that I'm a dummy or that I don't have a drill, it's just that there are better solutions. The MIO crowd may be willing to run wires all over the place, but the rest of us are looking for something easier.

 

Does your $50 include the cost of wall plates, wire strippers, crimpers, and all the other props required to complete your project? If so, send me some links. I can't believe someone running a 30 year old computer would be so pretentious. Do something right? Get a real computer. Some of us just want to play games.

 

An SIO device that is decoupled from hardware presents infinite possibilities. If you want to plug it into a $300 MIO that has 300g of ram, that is your business, but the rest of us would be happy to be able to run xex and atr files from a PC in another room. Lighten up.

[+remowilliams]

An SIO device that is decoupled from hardware presents infinite possibilities.

Sounds like what you need is an SIO2SD or SIO2USB.

[WizWor]

$100....................Steve, when will they ship?

No kidding.

[WizWor]

An SIO device that is decoupled from hardware presents infinite possibilities.

Sounds like what you need is an SIO2SD or SIO2USB.

All those devices seem to have problems and limitations. Nothing beats Steve's device IMHO. He got it right for serial and usb. I'm sure he can work out a wireless solution.

Edited September 21, 2008 by WizWor

[ataridano]

An SIO device that is decoupled from hardware presents infinite possibilities.

Sounds like what you need is an SIO2SD or SIO2USB.

All those devices seem to have problems and limitations. Nothing beats Steve's device IMHO. He got it right for serial and usb. I'm sure he can work out a wireless solution.

 

I think remowillams has it exactly right, SIO2SD or SIO2USB are SIO devices, allow you to transfer files from a PC or Mac with ease, and (wait for it) there's no wire running from the Atari to another computer. What are these problems and limitations? I have been using SIO2SD for some time now and have nothing but good things to say, the only thing that's missing as far as I can tell is a plastic case that has "Atari" stamped on the front I have nothing against the hardware solution that you suggest, but by the time you figure how much that hardware is going to cost, it would be just as cheap to build a device that holds several megabytes of data locally... which is all the PC is doing for you anyway really (especially if you're just playing games). Just my 2 cents, if someone wants to build a wireless SIO extender, more power to them!