My Tutor homebrew PCB collection

[+retroclouds]

Here's my collection of Tomy Tutor homebew PCB's. I'll start of with the great gift I received in 2018 by Tanam from Japan.

 

 

The middle cartridge has Pitfall! converted to the Tomy Tutor. 
The more interesting one to me is Door door pictured on the left. Notice there's also a 32K RAM on there.

 

I have both a Pyuuta (=Japanese version Tutor) and later I also bought an american Tomy Tutor.

The interesting part is, that there are differences between the two.

On the Adapter board I need to remove the EPROM and pull the kill jumper to make it work on the American version.

 

@tanam1972 if you're reading this: Does the red cartridge PCB also has RAM on there?

[+retroclouds]

I'm not a hardware guy, but would like to know more about the PCB's, particularly capabilities and what the jumpers are used for.

[+retroclouds]

Next up are TeamEurope PCB's. Game adapter + Flash Cartridge version 1, it has 18 games on it (up to 16KB each)

 

Then there's also the 3D Multi-Game Cartridge with up to 4 games on there (32KB each). Look at these great games! ?

 

[+retroclouds]

What are the differences between the American and Japanese Tutor that makes them incompatible for some games. Why do I have to pull Jumpers to make it work?

[+jedimatt42]

Japanese models have a different BIOS

I believe they have physically different hardware for reading keyboard and joystick. 

I don't think the english basic is in any of the Japanese models. 

The main cartridge port on the Japanese models has more address lines... thus the 3D carts work in the cartridge slot and don't need an adapter.

 

It has been some years since I looked at it, but there was a piece of homebrew that didn't work on my US Tutor even with the adapter, and then the author made a patched version that fixed the joystick input call so it would work on my US Tutor. I have that adapter board, but no JPN ROM on there. 

 

The RED cartridge you have from tanam with your pitfall ported is just an address decoding GAL, and a FLASH chip. No RAM.  The jumpers allow picking different banks of the flash chip. 

 

 

 

[+jedimatt42]

In addition, I have a few other homebrew PCBs : https://www.jedimatt42.com/tomy.html

 

all passive though:

 

a replacement keyboard,

 

 

 

a dual SMS to Tomy joystick adapter.

 

[+acadiel]

1 hour ago, jedimatt42 said:

In addition, I have a few other homebrew PCBs : https://www.jedimatt42.com/tomy.html

 

all passive though:

 

a replacement keyboard,

 

 

 

a dual SMS to Tomy joystick adapter.

 

Matt, do these work on the Japanese variant?

[+Ksarul]

11 hours ago, jedimatt42 said:

I don't think the english basic is in any of the Japanese models. 

The main cartridge port on the Japanese models has more address lines... thus the 3D carts work in the cartridge slot and don't need an adapter.

 

The English version of BASIC is known as BASIC-1 in Japan. It comes in a standard cartridge case for the Pyuuta Mk II (I have one) and as a plug-in for the expansion port for use with the Pyuuta (I have one of these as well).

 

The version for the Pyuuta also comes with a whole-keyboard blue overlay, and includes a Centronics Parallel interface. It does not work with the Mk-II. There is a separate Centronics Interface for the expansion port that works with the Mk-II (and which should also work with the US Tutor). I also have one of the Centronics interfaces. They rarely show up for sale (I've seen two in the last ten years), so finding one will not be easy. There is a homebrew schematic for one in the old Tutor User's Group newsletters though, so I might take some time to make a layout for it at some point.

 

Cartridge ports are a bit of a mixed bag. The Pyuuta and the Tutor have the same cartridge port pinouts--and neither will run a 3d cartridge without the Game Adaptor (or the modern homebrew variants thereof). The Pyuuta Mk II and the Pyuuta Jr. both have the additional lines to the cartridge ports--and will run 3D games without any additional hardware.

[teame]

16 hours ago, retroclouds said:

What are the differences between the American and Japanese Tutor that makes them incompatible for some games. Why do I have to pull Jumpers to make it work?

main reason why retroclouds did most likely ask this, is the fact that the ULTIMATE cartridge (https://team-europe.blogspot.com/2020/09/tomy-tutorpyuuta-ultimate-multicart.html) is fully working on the Japanese TUTOR (which i used for developing it). But on the American Tutor you can just play the 32kb games with it...all other games do not start.

 

I think it's the BASIC, which is included in the American Tutor's...and i most likely map the 8kb/16kb games on the same area...

 

therefore the ULTIMATE cartridge is so far only for the Japanese Tutor owners interesting...all others will have to use the three carts.

 

[+dhe]

Jeddimatt42,

  Is the keyboard pretty much a drop in replacement - or does it require a lot of work?

[+jedimatt42]

1 hour ago, dhe said:

Jeddimatt42,

  Is the keyboard pretty much a drop in replacement - or does it require a lot of work?

You have to build it. IDK, is that "a lot of work" ?

 

I know of 1 other person who has built one. And I gave my pcbs away. 

 

If you just want to throw money at a broken keyboard problem, I saw last week that a vendor in Japan has new mylars for the rubber keyboard. I did not bookmark that so you would have to Google it. 

[+acadiel]

8 hours ago, teame said:

main reason why retroclouds did most likely ask this, is the fact that the ULTIMATE cartridge (https://team-europe.blogspot.com/2020/09/tomy-tutorpyuuta-ultimate-multicart.html) is fully working on the Japanese TUTOR (which i used for developing it). But on the American Tutor you can just play the 32kb games with it...all other games do not start.

 

I think it's the BASIC, which is included in the American Tutor's...and i most likely map the 8kb/16kb games on the same area...

 

therefore the ULTIMATE cartridge is so far only for the Japanese Tutor owners interesting...all others will have to use the three carts.

 

I have a Pyuuta and @Tanam’s boards coming in from Japan soon, and I hope to be able to take a look at this system and figure it out.  The ultimate cartridge sounds like I can use it to run BASIC.  Has anyone reimplemented the Centronics port yet?  Or adapted joysticks to Atari or TI joysticks?

 

 

[+dhe]

So there are many different level's of 'build it yourself' difficulty levels.

There are heathkits that have instructions, all the parts, etc..  you apply solder and check connections and done.

 

With the keyboard, getting a printed circuit board made - easy (after it's been designed of course!)

The keys don't looks like standard cherry key/switches that can be ordered.

The connection from the keyboard to the tomy - is that a standard part, or does something have to be McGiver'ed?

Then at the end, does the keyboard screw in or clamp in to the same place, and the same way as the original, or does the case need to be modified?

 

 

[+jedimatt42]

15 minutes ago, dhe said:

So there are many different level's of 'build it yourself' difficulty levels.

There are heathkits that have instructions, all the parts, etc..  you apply solder and check connections and done.

 

With the keyboard, getting a printed circuit board made - easy (after it's been designed of course!)

The keys don't looks like standard cherry key/switches that can be ordered.

The connection from the keyboard to the tomy - is that a standard part, or does something have to be McGiver'ed?

Then at the end, does the keyboard screw in or clamp in to the same place, and the same way as the original, or does the case need to be modified?

 

 

Yep, it is subjective. My experience involved learning to design a keyboard matrix pcb, and mapping out the existing - I am resistant to sharing my judgement of ease as most of the retro community thinks what I do is too much work. Follow the link I posted and you can judge for yourself.

[+acadiel]

21 hours ago, Ksarul said:

The English version of BASIC is known as BASIC-1 in Japan. It comes in a standard cartridge case for the Pyuuta Mk II (I have one) and as a plug-in for the expansion port for use with the Pyuuta (I have one of these as well).

 

The version for the Pyuuta also comes with a whole-keyboard blue overlay, and includes a Centronics Parallel interface. It does not work with the Mk-II. There is a separate Centronics Interface for the expansion port that works with the Mk-II (and which should also work with the US Tutor). I also have one of the Centronics interfaces. They rarely show up for sale (I've seen two in the last ten years), so finding one will not be easy. There is a homebrew schematic for one in the old Tutor User's Group newsletters though, so I might take some time to make a layout for it at some point.

 

Cartridge ports are a bit of a mixed bag. The Pyuuta and the Tutor have the same cartridge port pinouts--and neither will run a 3d cartridge without the Game Adaptor (or the modern homebrew variants thereof). The Pyuuta Mk II and the Pyuuta Jr. both have the additional lines to the cartridge ports--and will run 3D games without any additional hardware.

 

Jim - if you know - 

 

I see that Door Door on the left has 32K RAM as well as the ROM - is that because this cartridge needs the additional RAM?  (Much like our TI program do?)

 

Also, please explain the game adapter on the right - I notice it has a BIOS chip.    It obviously can work on both systems, but why the BIOS?

[+Ksarul]

10 hours ago, acadiel said:

 

Jim - if you know - 

 

I see that Door Door on the left has 32K RAM as well as the ROM - is that because this cartridge needs the additional RAM?  (Much like our TI program do?)

 

Also, please explain the game adapter on the right - I notice it has a BIOS chip.    It obviously can work on both systems, but why the BIOS?

Likely that the 32K RAM is required, although it occupies the same part of the memory map as the ROM, so I'm not sure why its needed.

 

No idea on the BIOS, unless it includes something like the later version of GBASIC.

[+acadiel]

My adapter just came in as well as Door Door.  Thanks, @tanam1972 - that was quick!

 

I think we need to probably have a hardware wiki thread where we explain all these home brew boards and what they do.  

[kl99]

On 10/18/2020 at 4:21 PM, jedimatt42 said:

You have to build it. IDK, is that "a lot of work" ?

 

I know of 1 other person who has built one. And I gave my pcbs away. 

 

If you just want to throw money at a broken keyboard problem, I saw last week that a vendor in Japan has new mylars for the rubber keyboard. I did not bookmark that so you would have to Google it. 

Here is the PCB order for a replacement keyboard PCB,  might be working with Pyuta only though.
https://www.beep-shop.com/ec/products/detail/4976

[+acadiel]

Am I missing the PCB file for the joystick adapter, @jedimatt42 - or is it not on your site?  Thanks, man.