SlowCoder Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 I received my Genesis EverDrive Deluxe, which means it came in its own cartridge. I like it a lot! As I look at it, there's one glaring issue I haven't figured out. Once a game has started, hitting reset simply returns me to the flashed game, and not to the EverDrive menu. I have the ColecoVision Ultimate SD cart, which has a button on the top that allows me to reset the cartridge if I want to change games without powering off the unit. The EverDrive that I got does not have this button, though I've seen pictures of the EverDrive board that apparently do. I don't like the idea of having to power off the Genesis just to return to the EverDrive menu, as power cycling can be hard on equipment. I've tried turning both "hard reset" and "autorun" off in the options menu, but that doesn't seem to change anything, so currently I have to power off the Genesis every time. Ideas? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HammR25 Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 There's no way around that. Actually that button wasn't to send the game back to the menu. It was a reset button for some SMS games. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SlowCoder Posted January 15, 2011 Author Share Posted January 15, 2011 There's no way around that. Actually that button wasn't to send the game back to the menu. It was a reset button for some SMS games. Doh! That's what I was afraid of! Is there a manual or explanation of what each of the options does? Is the SMS reset button discontinued, as mine doesn't include it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 There's no way around that. Actually that button wasn't to send the game back to the menu. It was a reset button for some SMS games. Doh! That's what I was afraid of! Is there a manual or explanation of what each of the options does? Is the SMS reset button discontinued, as mine doesn't include it? Its actually not a SMS reset button, but a SMS pause button. The SMS did not have a pause button on the controllers, it was on the system. The SMS pause button was removed for a couple PCB revisions because Igor did not think it was worth the extra effort to put it on because he didn't feel many people used the SMS functionality. However enough people complained and as of PCB revision 2.3 its back. The revision you have 2.2 does not come with a SMS pause button, however one can be soldered onto it. The functionality is still on the board. As for a manual. Yes a manual will be finally published as a PDF and soon to be a printed manual that also comes with future Deluxe versions. Doing an on/off reset I really don't see as a big deal. You would have to do it if you were playing carts. The issue right now is that the EverDrive is new to you and you are probably playing a ton of games for a few minutes at a time just playing with it so you are doing a lot of resetting. Hard Reset Clears system registers before starting game. This option should be enabled for best game compatibility, however may need to be disabled for certain games and/or systems. On - Hard Reset is enabled for Genesis/Mega-drive games. In the case of Master System games the cart does a Hard Reset no matter what this is set to. Off - Hard Reset is disabled for Genesis/Mega-drive games. Autorun On - Game will start automatically after flashing. Off - Game will not start after flashing. You must start game using "play game" menu option. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 First PDF manual. Probably some more revisions coming in the next few days. EverDrive-MD_UserManual_1-17-2010_pcb2.3_fw12_os21.pdf 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Underball Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 Here's another question: I've read in some places that the FRAM where games are flashed has a life expectency, and will eventually wear out and stop working. Q 1: Is this true? I can't seem to confirm this. Q 2: If this is true, what should be the average expected life of an FRAM chip? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 Here's another question: I've read in some places that the FRAM where games are flashed has a life expectency, and will eventually wear out and stop working. Q 1: Is this true? I can't seem to confirm this. Q 2: If this is true, what should be the average expected life of an FRAM chip? Good question and the answer is that yes it does eventually wear out and the FRAM chip can handle about 10 billion write cycles per byte. So basically it should last a very long time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Underball Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 How many bytes is the fram on the everdrive? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 its 32Kbytes so 32768 bytes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psquare75 Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 One thing I'm not quite sure of is how save games work, both on the Everdrive and Supereverdrive, like say, Super Metroid. Do I just hit save (in the actual game) and turn off the unit, and that's it? I don't know what the load/save SRAM setting is all about, except I screwed up one rom once with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SlowCoder Posted January 17, 2011 Author Share Posted January 17, 2011 First PDF manual. Probably some more revisions coming in the next few days. That's a good job there, and answers most of the questions I had. +1 I'd like to recommend that you perhaps mention the format of the ROMs should be bin format. I had a problem with getting some games to work initially. I ran the smd-to-bin.exe utility on the lot, and that fixed most of my problems. Both the smd-to-bin and 32x-to-bin binaries are on krikzz.com website. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wccw mark Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 does stoneagegamer.com still sell the everdrive/super everdrive?there not even listed on the site anymore.i wanted to buy an everdrive in a few weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 One thing I'm not quite sure of is how save games work, both on the Everdrive and Supereverdrive, like say, Super Metroid. Do I just hit save (in the actual game) and turn off the unit, and that's it? I don't know what the load/save SRAM setting is all about, except I screwed up one rom once with it. Yes you save the game using the game's save function. This is not like the NakiTek GameSaver where it actually saves your place exactly like you never stopped playing the game. The Super EverDrive has one function that the MD version does not and thats auto SRAM back-up which will be explained in the Super EverDrive version of the manual. Here are some things from the manual that should answer your question. SRAM Bank The EverDrive-MD has 4 separate memory banks for game saves. So the EverDrive-MD can keep saves for 4 different games. The user must manually switch before flashing a new game. Not doing so could cause loss of save on previous game. Q: After playing and saving one game. I play and save a second game. When I go back to first game the save is gone. Why? A: This happens because the second game overwrote the save data of the first game. To avoid this problem, you must change the SRAM Bank option (under the Options menu) to a different bank. The EverDrive-MD has 4 banks total. If 4 banks is not enough then the user should back-up the data from one of the banks to a file on the SD card using the Save/Load SRAM tool under the Toolbox menu. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 does stoneagegamer.com still sell the everdrive/super everdrive?there not even listed on the site anymore.i wanted to buy an everdrive in a few weeks. I get this question a lot. EverDrives sell quicker than they are made. If you go to the homepage of my site you will see it has a huge EverDrive-MD logo and right under it says when they will be back. Super EverDrive probably won't be back until mid to late February and since I have no idea when they will be exactly I don't make mention of it on my site. The Super EverDrive just went through major PCB revision and I don't even think Igor has even received them yet himself. Trust me I wasn't selling EverDrives anymore I wouldn't have banners and big EverDrive logos all over the site. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 First PDF manual. Probably some more revisions coming in the next few days. That's a good job there, and answers most of the questions I had. +1 I'd like to recommend that you perhaps mention the format of the ROMs should be bin format. I had a problem with getting some games to work initially. I ran the smd-to-bin.exe utility on the lot, and that fixed most of my problems. Both the smd-to-bin and 32x-to-bin binaries are on krikzz.com website. The BIN thing is tricky. Yes they must be a certain format to work, normally *.bin will work and *.smd will not. However when you use the utility you mentioned they are still *.smd files, but internally they are the BIN format. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wccw mark Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 (edited) does stoneagegamer.com still sell the everdrive/super everdrive?there not even listed on the site anymore.i wanted to buy an everdrive in a few weeks. I get this question a lot. EverDrives sell quicker than they are made. If you go to the homepage of my site you will see it has a huge EverDrive-MD logo and right under it says when they will be back. Super EverDrive probably won't be back until mid to late February and since I have no idea when they will be exactly I don't make mention of it on my site. The Super EverDrive just went through major PCB revision and I don't even think Igor has even received them yet himself. Trust me I wasn't selling EverDrives anymore I wouldn't have banners and big EverDrive logos all over the site. lol,i didnt even see where it says they will be back.i will keep checking the site in mid feb until they are available.thanks for the reply. Edited January 17, 2011 by wccw mark Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psquare75 Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 SRAM Bank The EverDrive-MD has 4 separate memory banks for game saves. So the EverDrive-MD can keep saves for 4 different games. The user must manually switch before flashing a new game. Not doing so could cause loss of save on previous game. Q: After playing and saving one game. I play and save a second game. When I go back to first game the save is gone. Why? A: This happens because the second game overwrote the save data of the first game. To avoid this problem, you must change the SRAM Bank option (under the Options menu) to a different bank. The EverDrive-MD has 4 banks total. If 4 banks is not enough then the user should back-up the data from one of the banks to a file on the SD card using the Save/Load SRAM tool under the Toolbox menu. So if I play game "A" and save it , I should activate "save SRAM" after playing, if I want to play game "B" and save it as well, is my understanding? Game A will have an SRAM file and game B will still be in the flash memory? To go back to game A, I should "Save SRAM" of game B, "load SRAM" of game A, put game A in the flash of the unit, and start the same? BTW, the SD cards with stickers are functioning great, thank you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 SRAM Bank The EverDrive-MD has 4 separate memory banks for game saves. So the EverDrive-MD can keep saves for 4 different games. The user must manually switch before flashing a new game. Not doing so could cause loss of save on previous game. Q: After playing and saving one game. I play and save a second game. When I go back to first game the save is gone. Why? A: This happens because the second game overwrote the save data of the first game. To avoid this problem, you must change the SRAM Bank option (under the Options menu) to a different bank. The EverDrive-MD has 4 banks total. If 4 banks is not enough then the user should back-up the data from one of the banks to a file on the SD card using the Save/Load SRAM tool under the Toolbox menu. So if I play game "A" and save it , I should activate "save SRAM" after playing, if I want to play game "B" and save it as well, is my understanding? Game A will have an SRAM file and game B will still be in the flash memory? To go back to game A, I should "Save SRAM" of game B, "load SRAM" of game A, put game A in the flash of the unit, and start the same? BTW, the SD cards with stickers are functioning great, thank you! No. I understand your confusion because I was originally confused by this as well as I am sure others are. You have 4 SRAM memory banks. Whichever bank is currently selected is the one your game will save to if you use the game's save function. For example if you are playing Sonic 3 and you save the game. That game save data will be saved to whichever bank is currently selected in the Options menu. However if you want to play another game that also has the ability to do game saves you are going to want to switch that SRAM memory bank in the options menu to a different one before starting that game. If you don't that game will over write your Sonic 3 game save. The save/load tool is only for backing up and recovering. For example you have all 4 SRAM memory banks full and want to play a 5th game that also has games saves. What do you do? Well you can use the save/load SRAM memory tool to back-up one of those banks to your SD card. Then select that memory bank for your 5th game. Think of it like this. Your game cannot load a game save directly from the SD card, it must be in one of the SRAM memory banks. Only if you need more than 4 different game saves will you actually save to use the save/load tool to back them up and/or restore them into the SRAM from the SD card. I am not sure if that is clear enough, even reading what I wrote I can still see how people would be confused. Honestly it would be nice if Igor came up with a more elegant solution to this. You really shouldn't have to write a book explaining game saves. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psquare75 Posted January 18, 2011 Share Posted January 18, 2011 So by this logic it's. "Sonic 3".. Save... that saves to (tossing out a number) Bank #1. To play Phantasy Star, I should switch to Bank #2 before I begin the game. Right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PsychoKittyNet Posted January 18, 2011 Share Posted January 18, 2011 Is the memory identical on the super everdrive? I'm thinking of getting one to play translated version of Japanese RPGs that were never released, since i don't want to buy separate repro carts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 18, 2011 Share Posted January 18, 2011 So by this logic it's. "Sonic 3".. Save... that saves to (tossing out a number) Bank #1. To play Phantasy Star, I should switch to Bank #2 before I begin the game. Right? Yup. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StoneAgeGamer Posted January 18, 2011 Share Posted January 18, 2011 Is the memory identical on the super everdrive? I'm thinking of getting one to play translated version of Japanese RPGs that were never released, since i don't want to buy separate repro carts. Yes except the Super EverDrive actually has an auto-SRAM back-up feature as well. Not sure why he hasn't added this to the EverDrive-MD yet. Please note hacked or modded ROMs may not work on the original hardware. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psquare75 Posted January 18, 2011 Share Posted January 18, 2011 So disregard my question for the Super Everdrive then.. Just save and play as normal? (I received both from my parents as christmas gifts). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg2600 Posted January 19, 2011 Share Posted January 19, 2011 As I look at it, there's one glaring issue I haven't figured out. Once a game has started, hitting reset simply returns me to the flashed game, and not to the EverDrive menu. I have the ColecoVision Ultimate SD cart, which has a button on the top that allows me to reset the cartridge if I want to change games without powering off the unit. The EverDrive that I got does not have this button, though I've seen pictures of the EverDrive board that apparently do. I don't like the idea of having to power off the Genesis just to return to the EverDrive menu, as power cycling can be hard on equipment. The Atari Max ColecoVision carts are the exception, most flash carts do not have a reset capability. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BEERS AND VIDEOS Posted January 23, 2011 Share Posted January 23, 2011 (edited) SRAM Bank The EverDrive-MD has 4 separate memory banks for game saves. So the EverDrive-MD can keep saves for 4 different games. The user must manually switch before flashing a new game. Not doing so could cause loss of save on previous game. Q: After playing and saving one game. I play and save a second game. When I go back to first game the save is gone. Why? A: This happens because the second game overwrote the save data of the first game. To avoid this problem, you must change the SRAM Bank option (under the Options menu) to a different bank. The EverDrive-MD has 4 banks total. If 4 banks is not enough then the user should back-up the data from one of the banks to a file on the SD card using the Save/Load SRAM tool under the Toolbox menu. Alright, I've tried to saving the SRAM to the SD card, but every time I do it, the ROM file disappears and is replaced with a file that has a name abbreviated from the ROM file, is all in capital letters and is in .bin format. So after I save the SRAM to the SD card, there's not ROM file in the directory and I have to reload it from the computer. Will version 2.3 have a similar save set up to the SuperEverdrive (where you can just save and not worry about memory banks)? Edited January 23, 2011 by BLAST PROCESSOR Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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