[AQUARIUS] Mattel Aquarius Multi-Cart

[jaybird3rd]

jay, maybe you douched on this before. is it possible to port auqarius cassette games to intellivision?

LOL, 'douched' i meant to say touched.

Yes, I noticed the typo; I just didn't want to rub it in (so to speak).

[the-topdog]

Very interesting. Thanks for looking into that. It seems so strange that Radofin wouldn't continue to produce the Mini-Expander: it remedied some of the system's most serious shortcomings, and the Aquarius was pretty weak (and thus a much harder sell) without it.

 

To be sure, it was a very Mattel-influenced design, and perhaps they didn't want that association after they got the system back. Or, perhaps there weren't enough of the old Mattel titles that used it still in production to justify making more; the later titles that they released under their own name (Chess, Zero-In, Space Speller, etc) worked fine without it.

 

There may have also been a back stock of "Mattel Electronics" mini-expanders when Radofin regained control... and they were just selling those with the Aquarius systems, with plans of making more... but by then the platform was dead.

 

I wonder if the mini-expander worked with the Aquarius II... does anyone know? It would have been sad if the II didn't support it and the hand controllers.

 

EDIT: I checked with Martin and he said that the II did support the mini-expander. He said the only difference between the original and a AII is that it "had a 'professional' keyboard and Extended Basic already onboard". He also believes that Radofin did continue to produce the mini-expander as that was part of the overall concept behind the Aqaurius marketing strategy... "selling a cheap computer and make profits from the expensive add-ons".

Edited October 1, 2010 by the-topdog

[+MattelAquarius]

Yes, the Radofin continued to make and sell the Mini-Expander.

 

The only Mattel software that actually required a ram expansion was FinForm. If you plugged it in without extra ram you received a message along the lines of "Insufficient Ram."

 

The 4K ram expansion could've been used to expand the user's workspace for: Finform, FileForm, LOGO, Extended Basic, and regular Basic, as alluded to earlier.

Edited October 6, 2010 by Jay Silverheels

[jaybird3rd]

They must have been limited to 2K RAM chips at the time the RAM expansion modules were designed. The 16K module actually has eight of them in it, all surface-mounted chips, crammed onto (I believe) two circuit boards that were sandwiched together inside the cartridge. No wonder the thing was so expensive. That's probably also the reason why the few 32K modules that were made had to be so huge. Nowadays, of course, you can get a single 32K SRAM for under $2.

 

Speaking of which, I've just finished building three 32K RAM expansion modules, which are brand new 4K modules that have been upgraded to a full 32K. I'm putting one on eBay, but if anyone here is interested in one of the other two, PM me and I'll give you the details. I'm offering them for $35 each (plus shipping) to help offset the costs of the multi-cart project.

 

As for the project itself, I completed the hardware revisions yesterday and generated the final plots, so the board design is now locked. I'm just waiting on some contact information so I can send it off for quotes, so if all goes well, the boards will soon be in production! I'm also finishing up a screen editor to help me construct the manual pages and other static screens in the multi-cart software, and I should have some screenshots to share before the end of the week. So far, it's looking really good!

[+MattelAquarius]

Well, they're very different machines, so any "port" of those programs would probably amount to a complete rewrite. The only thing the two machines really have in common is the sound chip and controllers that come with the Mini-Expander, but according to this list that the-topdog posted in another thread, few (if any) of the third-party cassette releases supported the Mini-Expander (except perhaps for extra RAM). I'm not quite sure why that is, since the games in particular could have benefited greatly from it, but that's a whole separate topic.

 

Actually most of the 3rd party tape games required the mini-expander solely because they needed a 16k memory pack in the 2nd slot to run... but I don't believe I have ever seen a tape game that makes use of the hand controllers or enhanced audio capabilities of the mini-expander (someone please correct me if I am wrong). There is one type-in game "Flight Controller" by H.B.J. Droge, from the Aquarius User Magazine that I am aware of that utilizes the hand controllers of the mini-expander. I believe this game is archived in the Mattel Aquarius Yahoo Group so you don't have to cramp your fingers typing it.

 

 

There are a few tape games that made use of the controllers and sound chip in the Mini-Expander.

 

Off the top of my head are:

 

Breakout (sound, maybe controllers)

3d Battlezone (controllers and sound)

Invaders (controllers)

Disco Fever (sound, maybe controllers)

Bounder (sound, maybe controllers)

 

 

I think I'm missing a couple more.

 

Most can be seen at my Youtube channel: www.youtube.com/mattelaquarius

[the-topdog]

 

There are a few tape games that made use of the controllers and sound chip in the Mini-Expander.

 

Off the top of my head are:

 

Breakout (sound, maybe controllers)

3d Battlezone (controllers and sound)

Invaders (controllers)

Disco Fever (sound, maybe controllers)

Bounder (sound, maybe controllers)

 

 

I think I'm missing a couple more.

 

Most can be seen at my Youtube channel: www.youtube.com/mattelaquarius

 

Thanks! It is great to know that there were some games made that took advantage of the Mini-Expander! I have most of those on your list, I'll break them out to see if the "maybe" ones support the controllers.

[the-topdog]

Ok everyone, here is an AtariAge exclusive first look at Jay's new menu-driven bankswitched Aquarius multi-cart in action on my test station! I gotta tell you all, this thing is awesome! This prototype is soooo much easier than the earlier prototypes where you had to select the games via a series of dip-switches on the cartridge. The menu couldn't be simpler and the games load instantly of course.

[psquare75]

That looks great!

[jaybird3rd]

Thanks for making that video! You're the first person other than me to see it in action, so I'm glad it's working for you. Here is an embedded link to it:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0x7SjrPfPY

 

In case anyone was having trouble making out the menu, here's a screenshot:

 

 

I should point out that the board you see in the video is one of my very first prototypes, which I cut up a bit to test my revisions, so it's kind of ugly and beat up as a result; the newer boards that you'll all be getting will look sooo much nicer! The final menu will look nicer, too; the one above is really just a placeholder.

 

Here's how the final menu will work: each cartridge on the menu will be mapped to a letter, so to choose a cartridge, you'll simply type the letter and then press RETURN to load it, or select it with the hand controller. If you already know the letter corresponding to the cartridge you want, just hold it down on powerup and the multi-cart will jump right to it, bypassing the menu completely. That idea came about by "accident" because of the way the temporary menu works, but it was such a nice timesaver that I decided to make it permanent.

 

And, in case you missed the other thread, Erik has also arranged for the manufacture of a complete set of reproduction Aquarius keyboard and controller overlays to go with it!

[psquare75]

I see you even got the demo cartridge in there. Wow.

[jaybird3rd]

I see you even got the demo cartridge in there. Wow.

Yes! And there are (I think) two or three others that I didn't include in that prototype for lack of space, like the 1541 Extended BASIC ROM, so that isn't even the full lineup. There will also be a few little easter eggs that I think you'll all enjoy.

[+cmart604]

Wow, that looks fantastic, I'm definitely in for one.

[Coconut]

They must have been limited to 2K RAM chips at the time the RAM expansion modules were designed. The 16K module actually has eight of them in it, all surface-mounted chips, crammed onto (I believe) two circuit boards that were sandwiched together inside the cartridge. No wonder the thing was so expensive. That's probably also the reason why the few 32K modules that were made had to be so huge.

Indeed. That was a typically cost wise decision back then. Model 1 TRS-80 owners also put up with various kluge 'solutions' to the cost of RAM and ROM. Both this and the first RS Color Computers had an option to use 'bad' 16 K chips as 8 K chips by sorting into "all good low half" or "all good high half" sets! This never happened as the costs plummeted from a couple of hundred (or more) dollars a set of RAM to 5 or 10 dollars!!

 

The RS Model 100/200 also had "modules" of multiple chips as memory.

 

And now we get SD cards with 32 Gb!

[Tempest]

Did I ever release the dumps for those Aquarius protos I had? There was an AD&D proto and a cart for the unreleased X10 thing at least. I think there was one other as well.

 

Tempest

[the-topdog]

Did I ever release the dumps for those Aquarius protos I had? There was an AD&D proto and a cart for the unreleased X10 thing at least. I think there was one other as well.

 

Tempest

 

There is an X10 dump but I don't know about the AD&D one. Jay might know.

[jaybird3rd]

There is an X10 dump but I don't know about the AD&D one. Jay might know.

I dumped the X10 Command Control cartridge from the collection that Ian Baronofsky loaned to me. It will be included in the multi-cart. I also got an AD&D proto, but I compared checksums and it was identical to the released version.

[Tempest]

Ahh ok then. If you got them from Ian then those are the ones I had. I thought AD&D tested differently, but maybe it was that my dumper was going bad.

 

Tempest

[jaybird3rd]

Ahh ok then. If you got them from Ian then those are the ones I had. I thought AD&D tested differently, but maybe it was that my dumper was going bad.

AD&D puzzled me at first, until I realized that it's only a 12K cartridge: the 4K ROM at $C000-$CFFF is mirrored at $D000-$DFFF. Once I put two copies of that ROM back-to-back inside the image file, the checksums matched.

[Tempest]

Ahh ok then. If you got them from Ian then those are the ones I had. I thought AD&D tested differently, but maybe it was that my dumper was going bad.

AD&D puzzled me at first, until I realized that it's only a 12K cartridge: the 4K ROM at $C000-$CFFF is mirrored at $D000-$DFFF. Once I put two copies of that ROM back-to-back inside the image file, the checksums matched.

That's odd because when I dumped it I distinctly remember it being three chips. So it was three 4K chips and two of those were the same?

 

Tempest

[jaybird3rd]

That's odd because when I dumped it I distinctly remember it being three chips. So it was three 4K chips and two of those were the same?

It was three chips, 4K each, but no two were alike. The cartridge board was set up to map the last ROM from $C000 to $DFFF, the lower 8K of the cartridge space. In the case of AD&D, the last ROM (labeled "C" in the picture) was only a 4K chip, so it was repeated at both $C000 and $D000:

 

 

Other prototypes which needed the full 16K (such as Logo, pictured below) had an 8K ROM in that slot instead:

 

[the-topdog]

I added another video to show some of the other functions of the multicart

 

Part 2 - menu-driven bankswitched Aquarius multi-cart Part 2

 

I know the videos suck but I will be shooting more professional ones soon.

Edited October 8, 2010 by the-topdog

[jaybird3rd]

You're awesome! Thanks very much!

 

I've got to finish the final menu software so people will get to see what the finished product will look like! I just need to stop playing BurgerTime testing the cartridge hardware long enough to finally get it done ...

[the-topdog]

You're awesome! Thanks very much!

 

I've got to finish the final menu software so people will get to see what the finished product will look like! I just need to stop playing BurgerTime testing the cartridge hardware long enough to finally get it done ...

 

You are just being thorough... you want to get as far as possible in Burgertime to make sure there are not any anomalies in the cart... right? right?

[+MattelAquarius]

Well, they're very different machines, so any "port" of those programs would probably amount to a complete rewrite. The only thing the two machines really have in common is the sound chip and controllers that come with the Mini-Expander, but according to this list that the-topdog posted in another thread, few (if any) of the third-party cassette releases supported the Mini-Expander (except perhaps for extra RAM). I'm not quite sure why that is, since the games in particular could have benefited greatly from it, but that's a whole separate topic.

 

Actually most of the 3rd party tape games required the mini-expander solely because they needed a 16k memory pack in the 2nd slot to run... but I don't believe I have ever seen a tape game that makes use of the hand controllers or enhanced audio capabilities of the mini-expander (someone please correct me if I am wrong). There is one type-in game "Flight Controller" by H.B.J. Droge, from the Aquarius User Magazine that I am aware of that utilizes the hand controllers of the mini-expander. I believe this game is archived in the Mattel Aquarius Yahoo Group so you don't have to cramp your fingers typing it.

 

 

There are a few tape games that made use of the controllers and sound chip in the Mini-Expander.

 

Off the top of my head are:

 

Breakout (sound, maybe controllers)

3d Battlezone (controllers and sound)

Invaders (controllers)

Disco Fever (sound, maybe controllers)

Mazantics (sound, maybe controllers)

Postman Pot (sound, maybe controllers)

Mower Man (sound, maybe controllers)

 

 

I remembered some more. Bounder does not use the mini's features, as I now recall. I was mixing it up with Mazantics.

Edited October 8, 2010 by Jay Silverheels

[Mika73]

Very nice