Altirra 2.20 released

[flashjazzcat]

No, the whole display is software generated, regardless of any difficulties getting the ROM to work with the emulator.

[Roydea6]

I thought Ace80 was done in software.

http://www.atarimax.com/flashcart/forum/viewtopic.php?p=3301#p3301

over at AtariMax made for 1mb Maxflash cart.

[phaeron]

Take ACE80XL.EPR, cut off the first six bytes, and load it into Altirra as an OSS 8K cartridge.

[Darkhog]

I have an idea: How about switch in System->Video that would disable Atract mode? On PC, where Altirra is supposed to run it's of no use and only make me angry. I know it is possible to make it go away by poke-ing memory, but would like switch in emulator that would turn it off completely, despite of value of ATRACT register (if you want to check if your game/program works properly with Atract mode enabled, you'd just untick this option).

[morelenmir]

If I try that Avery, the cartridge mapper menu comes up properly and allows me to select '8k'. However Altirra seems to hang with a completely black screen. It does not respond to the keyboard or anything else until I remove the cart - from either left or right slot.

 

After a brainwave I tried it with Altirra set to 800 OS-B and NTSC. This time I got a screen, but it was one of those 'smeared' crash-type screen with black and white garbage data.

 

The two atr disk images that also came with the ace80 ROM just give 'Boot Error' continually, with or without BASIC enabled.

 

Sounds good Darkhog - to quote Jacob Taylor!

Edited April 18, 2013 by morelenmir

[Darkhog]

I'd like to ask memory configuration question.

 

Everyone knows that if I give too small amount of ram to program, it will crash. But can it crash from too much of memory? I have Altirra currently set on 320k Rambo, but want to set it to 1088k. I just want to know if I'll face problems with software/games down the road, specifically Sparta Dos X 4.46 and Action! 3.6.

[kenfused]

The two atr disk images that also came with the ace80 ROM just give 'Boot Error' continually, with or without BASIC enabled.

You would probably have to "turn the drive off" or have a boot dos disk since I would guess ace80 isn't so much an application but is just a handler.

[kenfused]

As mentioned in the one message, with ACE80XL.EPR I would try cutting the 6 bytes off as mentioned. It would show up as a 4K cart.

For the non XL one, I would cut off the first 6 bytes AND the last 4096 bytes (the last 4K bytes are all FF and probably should not be there).

Either should end up 4096 bytes after editing.

 

[phaeron]

I have an idea: How about switch in System->Video that would disable Atract mode? On PC, where Altirra is supposed to run it's of no use and only make me angry. I know it is possible to make it go away by poke-ing memory, but would like switch in emulator that would turn it off completely, despite of value of ATRACT register (if you want to check if your game/program works properly with Atract mode enabled, you'd just untick this option).

 

Not that simple. Attract mode is fully a function of the OS, not of the hardware, and there's no direct hook for this mechanism. The best I could do would be to reset ATRACT, and even that would require detecting when the OS VBI handler is running. Can't really justify the effort. After all, it takes nine minutes to kick in... and if you want anything you write to work properly on a real Atari, you'd best pay attention to ATRACT as appropriate anyway.

 

If I try that Avery, the cartridge mapper menu comes up properly and allows me to select '8k'. However Altirra seems to hang with a completely black screen. It does not respond to the keyboard or anything else until I remove the cart - from either left or right slot.

 

You need the OSS 8K option. The cartridge needs to turn itself off after boot, which a regular 8K cartridge can't do.

 

Everyone knows that if I give too small amount of ram to program, it will crash. But can it crash from too much of memory? I have Altirra currently set on 320k Rambo, but want to set it to 1088k. I just want to know if I'll face problems with software/games down the road, specifically Sparta Dos X 4.46 and Action! 3.6.

 

This can happen, but it is rare. For it to happen between 320K and 1088K the program would need to break due to the extra bank bits; the only example I can think of where this occurred was an issue with the DOS 2.5 ramdisk, which has some issues with >128K of memory when combined with BASIC XE. It's a bit more common for programs to fail if there is extended memory (>64K) by accidentally banking themselves out of the $4000-7FFF range.

[Xuel]

I have an idea: How about switch in System->Video that would disable Atract mode? On PC, where Altirra is supposed to run it's of no use and only make me angry. I know it is possible to make it go away by poke-ing memory, but would like switch in emulator that would turn it off completely, despite of value of ATRACT register (if you want to check if your game/program works properly with Atract mode enabled, you'd just untick this option).

 

Not that simple. Attract mode is fully a function of the OS, not of the hardware, and there's no direct hook for this mechanism. The best I could do would be to reset ATRACT, and even that would require detecting when the OS VBI handler is running. Can't really justify the effort. After all, it takes nine minutes to kick in... and if you want anything you write to work properly on a real Atari, you'd best pay attention to ATRACT as appropriate anyway.

 

Here's a version of the XL OS rom that I just patched to ignore ATRACT:

 

ATARIXL-NOATRACT.ZIP

 

Just select it in the Firmware menu. Almost as good a switch.

[Darkhog]

Phaeron, couldn't you just continuously write 0 to Atract register and then, when turning it off restore previous value? E.g. (in pseudo code)

 

void OnAtractSwitchon() {
oldatractvalue = atract;
}
void onupdate () {
if (atractswitchon){atract=0;}

//actual machine update
}
void onatractswitchoff() {
atract = oldatractvalue;
}

Edited April 19, 2013 by Darkhog

[morelenmir]

Well, well, well... Right again Avery!!! VERY cool to see the new display!!! It is not as good as the xep-80 though, so... Go on... You know you want to bring 80-column goodness to us all!!!

[Darkhog]

Also another idea: How about adding Scale HQ filters into Altirra? You know those which makes Mario on emulated NES looking like that:

instead of that:

 

Bilinear and others are making games just too blurry and HQx gives you high res while maintaining crisp video.

Edited April 19, 2013 by Darkhog

[drac030]

I have Altirra currently set on 320k Rambo, but want to set it to 1088k. I just want to know if I'll face problems with software/games down the road, specifically Sparta Dos X 4.46

 

SDX handles PORTB RAM expansions up to 1088k just fine (and Axlon up to 2 MB).

 

As for XEP-80, maybe it would be better to enable VBXE instead: it has an 80-column mode too, but much better than XEP: the horizontal resolution is 640 pixels (80 columns x 8 pixels), not 560 (80 columns x 7 pixels) as in XEP, so the characters are much prettier, plus you get 128 colors (XEP text mode is B/W).

[morelenmir]

From what I have read VBXE is indeed superior. Sadly I can't get it to run in basic or the atari DOS's, not so it makes any difference anyway. I thought - wrongly I am sure! - that VBXE only worked for a couple of games that were specifically programmed for it. Perhaps it runs in SDX? I shall have to see if there is any material on getting it to work more widely.

[morelenmir]

Could one of you guys point me in the direction of a tutorial to get SDX running with VBXE?

 

So far no luck, despite enabling VBXE in Altirra. I have so far:

 

set up altirra as a 130xe PAL with 320mb rambo memory

enabled VBXE in the video menu

written SDX to a large 1024k cartridge

used SDX imager to include the VBXE driver from the utils atr

edited config.sys to contain a 'DEVICE S_VBXE.SYS' line

 

No change in display yet though. 'CON 80' doesn't seem to work and I cannot find a similar command specifically for the VBXE from the command line.

[flashjazzcat]

You need to also install the CON.SYS driver (after installing S_VBXE.SYS) before CON 80 will have any effect.

[morelenmir]

LOTS of fun with this one!!!

 

CON.SYS doesn't seem to be on the SDX cartridge by default, therefore it needs to be added from SDXImager. In order to do that I need to extract CON.SYS from the 'toolkit.atr\DRIVERS\SCRDRV' disk/folder. As usual MakeATR does not like the format of the ATR image and therefore - following the sterling advice from old rdea - I hex edit byte 48 from '21' to '20'. makeATR will now open the atr, but not extract con.sys as... Windows doesn't like it!!! Honestly. That latter is soemthing I have never come accross before - windows not liking 'con.sys' as it is a file name reserved by the system.

 

And so... Sometimes, now and then you just feel you are being sent a message that it is time to stop playing silly buggers with 30 year old virtual hardware and go play mass effect 2.

 

So I have.

[flashjazzcat]

There's no real pressing need to put either driver on the cartridge, since you can run them straight from the toolkit folder. As for CON being a reserved name: just rename it to _CON.SYS or something while it's still on the toolkit ATR. You could test the setup by simply typing the following at the SDX prompt while logged into the driver folder of the toolkit disk:

 

S_VBXE.SYS

CON.SYS

CON 80

 

Not an impossible task.

[morelenmir]

Not impossible, just wearing to my patience this evening fjc!!! I'll look at it again at some point.

 

Really I just wanted to check out an 80 col display doing something useful, like running DOS. I do all my typing in of programmes inside EditPad Pro and then import them into the Atari via Altirra's 'Host Device', so it has limited use for me there. However 80 columns inside SDX could be quit handy for file details and multiple nested folders and the like. I was REALLY impressed with XEP80 over on 'atari800' though. The clarity was striking compared to the usual fuzzy-blue screen we know and, like a bit.

[phaeron]

Phaeron, couldn't you just continuously write 0 to Atract register and then, when turning it off restore previous value? E.g. (in pseudo code)

 

void OnAtractSwitchon() {
oldatractvalue = atract;
}
void onupdate () {
if (atractswitchon){atract=0;}

//actual machine update
}
void onatractswitchoff() {
atract = oldatractvalue;
}

 

The problem with this is that it will mysteriously break any program that takes over the machine and for which the memory location $4D is not ATRACT.

 

Well, well, well... Right again Avery!!! VERY cool to see the new display!!! It is not as good as the xep-80 though, so... Go on... You know you want to bring 80-column goodness to us all!!!

 

You might try System > Video > Enhanced Text (CIO Intercept), too.

[Darkhog]

Then you will turn off switch before running the program. Any problem?

[Shannon]

I've seen bad behaviour occur when messing with the ATRACT value. I added it in as a configuration option for atarixlbox (which has individual configurations) so that people who like to watch demo's and such do not have to worry about it. However I have seen games hard crash with that option enabled.

[Darkhog]

Well, if game crash with this option, then you'll just uncheck setting. Problem solved. But when you need it and know that program you will be uisng it with won't crash because of that, you just check it again.

 

What I'm saying is that I don't want it to be fixed either in atract enabled or atract disabled, because of problems that may occur (annoyance with long demos and crashes with some software, respectively). I just want an option to select if I want this or not.

 

If it doesn't work properly (crash game/program), I will turn it off (plus, there may be entry "Enable Atract" on crash screen when crash occurs and Atract is turned off).

 

If it will work, I'd be happy to play game/demo/use software without annoying Atract.

 

//edit: Now I think about it, maybe we could have similar option for I/O bleeps (keyboard bleeps can be turned off with ctrl+f3).

Edited April 20, 2013 by Darkhog

[flashjazzcat]

You could go on adding to this list till the cows come home: left and right margins, keyclick disable, debounce and repeat rate, etc, etc. I think these things are better handled by a custom OS ROM.