+karri Posted December 30, 2021 Share Posted December 30, 2021 Obviously I have been a nice guy as I will shortly get a bunch of brand new Lynx carts It is a small tinkerers cart with two eeproms on it (128 bytes and 64 k). It also has a massive 2MB flash chip for those extra animations and sound tracks. Plus a small external interface for attaching small extra peripherals. You configure it by soldering in small blobs for "write protect/programming" and "no eeprom/128/64k". Cool stuff? Technical details. CART0 strobe for address pin 19 == 0 CART1 strobe for address pin 19 == 1 AUDIN for address pin 20 And it fits in the same space as my 512k cart. 7 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sage Posted December 30, 2021 Share Posted December 30, 2021 20 minutes ago, karri said: Obviously I have been a nice guy as I will shortly get a bunch of brand new Lynx carts It is a small tinkerers cart with two eeproms on it (128 bytes and 64 k). It also has a massive 2MB flash chip for those extra animations and sound tracks. Plus a small external interface for attaching small extra peripherals. You configure it by soldering in small blobs for "write protect/programming" and "no eeprom/128/64k". Cool stuff? Technical details. CART0 strobe for address pin 19 == 0 CART1 strobe for address pin 19 == 1 AUDIN for address pin 20 And it fits in the same space as my 512k cart. amazing 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted December 30, 2021 Author Share Posted December 30, 2021 Oh. I forgot. You can program the cart with the current PiHAT. For some reason I sneaked in a strange feature and connected a GPIO pin to SwVcc pin that is not normally used for anything. In this cart that pin is the WR# pin for the flash chip. But of course there is a lot of new sw required before the design is usable. New libraries for cc65 and a new programmer. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sage Posted December 30, 2021 Share Posted December 30, 2021 hehe, god that i already have it implemented 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
42bs Posted December 30, 2021 Share Posted December 30, 2021 How is the write process? Again the three-jump. Writing 256k via Lynx takes 40min. 2MB, whole day job ? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted December 30, 2021 Author Share Posted December 30, 2021 6 minutes ago, 42bs said: How is the write process? Again the three-jump. Writing 256k via Lynx takes 40min. 2MB, whole day job ? It is like the French wine. The longer it takes, the more valuable it becomes! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted December 30, 2021 Author Share Posted December 30, 2021 17 minutes ago, 42bs said: How is the write process? Again the three-jump. Writing 256k via Lynx takes 40min. 2MB, whole day job ? The cart also has a 64k eeprom that is faster for Lynx writable stuff. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
42bs Posted December 30, 2021 Share Posted December 30, 2021 34 minutes ago, karri said: The cart also has a 64k eeprom that is faster for Lynx writable stuff Fast writing, but slow reading. I did not check, but Intel Strata like Flash do not exist anymore? Or is it a 5v vs. 3V3 problem? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted December 30, 2021 Author Share Posted December 30, 2021 4 minutes ago, 42bs said: Fast writing, but slow reading. I did not check, but Intel Strata like Flash do not exist anymore? Or is it a 5v vs. 3V3 problem? They may exist. But it is so much cheaper to use common parts from the automobile industry. That is why I am interested in the M29F family of flash chips. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
42bs Posted January 3, 2022 Share Posted January 3, 2022 Karri, do you use an 29f from ST? I saw they have a bypass mode which only needs two write accesses to program a byte. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
42bs Posted January 3, 2022 Share Posted January 3, 2022 Do you think the 'old' card will work with a 29F040 instead of the 39SF040? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichelS Posted January 3, 2022 Share Posted January 3, 2022 Wow cool - 2M - that's space for a lot of animations and sound... A flash chip that could also be programmed via Lynx would indeed be cool... Repeating the byte-program sequence over and over again is so damn slow. Since you need to pulse the ripple counter millions of times, even with lots of optimisation, programming a 256K rom still takes 18.5min. Btw. Karri, are you planning to sell your brand new 2M cartridges to ordinary mortals at some point, like you did with the 512K? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
42bs Posted January 4, 2022 Share Posted January 4, 2022 15 hours ago, MichelS said: A flash chip that could also be programmed via Lynx would indeed be cool... The Karri's current 512KB chips can be programmed from Lynx, but due to the 5 write accesses at different addresses it takes a lot of time. Therefore, if the 39SF040 could be replaced by the 29F040 it would speed up programming significantly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted January 4, 2022 Author Share Posted January 4, 2022 Sorry for late answer. I don't have a 2MB cart at the moment. But hopefully I get my first batch this month. Making the proto carts is pretty expensive. So I don't believe anyone would like to buy my carts at the prices I have to pay myself Using 39SF040 chips requires a bigger board as the chip is only 512k. So I would need 4 of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
42bs Posted January 4, 2022 Share Posted January 4, 2022 No, you get me wrong, I wonder if the 29f040 could be placed on your old cards as it has the bypass mode. I do not mean to have 4 of them replace the 2MB chip. As for the new cards, please PM me, I would be happy to buy one or two to minimize your overall costs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted January 17, 2022 Author Share Posted January 17, 2022 I just got the first photo of the new Wizzy cart. It is actually quite fun to code without having to think about limiting animations or sounds. Currently I have about 70 animations added to the game and I must admit that playtesting it is so much nicer with proper details in animation. A large cart also allows me to use cut-scenes for the story. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted January 28, 2022 Author Share Posted January 28, 2022 I still have not had the time to test the cart. But Wizzy is starting to take shape. I decided to slide in the inventory/status automatically from the top when you stand still for more than 2 seconds. There is just not enough buttons on the Lynx. Acorns act as bullets. You can collect them by just walking over them. The inventory display caps at 999. But the real number is an unsigned int. So you can collect as much acorns as you want. Later in the game when you acquire stronger skills there will also be a cooldown timer beneath the spell. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted February 4, 2022 Author Share Posted February 4, 2022 Ouch! There is something strange with the cart. I cannot program it. Sigh... There is so many things that could be wrong. But I will get back to it later. The chip is too small for soldering test wires on it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Turbo Laser Lynx Posted February 4, 2022 Share Posted February 4, 2022 Ah damnit, that's not fair. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted February 4, 2022 Author Share Posted February 4, 2022 27 minutes ago, Turbo Laser Lynx said: Ah damnit, that's not fair. In worst case I restrict Wizzy to 512k and just skip planned content. Most likely I get it sorted out sooner or later. It is just that it is not fun to struggle with non-working designs. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted February 4, 2022 Author Share Posted February 4, 2022 The cabriolet version of the cart. It makes debugging easier ? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichelS Posted February 4, 2022 Share Posted February 4, 2022 A Cabriolet cartridge - cool ? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SlidellMan Posted February 6, 2022 Share Posted February 6, 2022 I can see this being used for larger games, or for that matter, compilation carts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted February 6, 2022 Author Share Posted February 6, 2022 7 hours ago, SlidellMan said: I can see this being used for larger games, or for that matter, compilation carts. Yep. The game does not even have to be "large". Using proper animations eats up space at an alarming rate. So you don't really get more play time - just more eye candy. Another thing that I found useful is to have local tile sets. When you enter an area you use a set of tiles suitable for that area. When you exit you use a different set again. This also simplifies memory management a lot. Edit: Here is a sad ending with an animated spider. This clip may also be the first glimpse of my new game Wizzy. It is fun to write. I hope to have some humour in the texts and a funny storyline. A little inspired by Lucas Arts, Monty Python and Adventure Soft (Amiga: Simon the Sorcerer). SadEnding.mp4 5 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted February 6, 2022 Author Share Posted February 6, 2022 Actually I feel so sorry for Wizzy. Such a short adventure. So I decided to try again. It will take a while to complete the game. Aiming for a 2023 release. Currently the Lynx can handle 5 spiders on the screen at once. But at that time Wizzy has more tools available - I hope... HappyEnding.mp4 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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