Help ID Mods to 800 - Omnimon and ??

[800_Rocks]

I am trying to test some interesting mods to a nice 800. The 800 works great but I don’t know what I am doing with the mods. Obviously this unit has Omnimon! added but also at least one more mod (I think). Please see comments with the pictures. TIA for any help on helping me understand what I have. Note, an old Omnimon! manual tells me to hold down Option and press System Rest but that does nothing. 

This control module attaches to custom connector on the back. So far the only thing that does anything is… when the top 2-way toggle switch (‘pill’ label) is up, basic ?FRE(0) reports 29710 free when it is down it reports 37902 free (exactly 8K more free). I can not detect any kind of change with any/all other switch settings and combinations I have tried. Note: the right switch has 3 positions (up, middle, down). 

 

I have this label just above the two cartridge slots. It can not understand it. Or how it corresponds (if it does) to the blue control module). The words I can read from left to right are: Lower, Upper, View, Off, On, Atari, Newell?

Personality board front and back. 

 

 

Two pictures of the rear most memory card

 

 

2nd memory card from rear. Front and back

 

 

memory card closest to front does not appear to have any mods. 
 

 

[+Stephen]

Sorry I can't help identify, just wanted to say it's cool not noly how many mods existed back then, but how many modded units are still showing up in the wild.

[+David_P]

PILL was a hardware tool to mark RAM as read only, so you could load cracked cartridges into RAM, set the PILL, then run the cart without fear of copy protection.  That seems like a homebrew controller to crack carts into files, and to load the cart images without the physical cartridge and then run them.

[_The Doctor__]

it's the pill and Newell RamRod board,

you are selecting where the modifications are being exposed in the address range and if omniview(80 col) is also available. You are also able to select if the plain standard Atari OS is going to be used.

You also have a standardly hacked memory upgrade of the times.

 

The arrows indicate where the previous owner liked things set, which is exactly where most people would have used it when working on projects.

 

The remote box is just that and adds the reset line as well. Just set the switches according to the cheat sheet with pill off for coding fun. You can load the rom images and turn on the pill switch for execution, off to edit, rinse repeat.

 

Atari OS switch to run normal software and test what you've done.

 

Looks exactly like something I've owned and used for years, as have others.

Edited January 20, 2023 by _The Doctor__

[800_Rocks]

2 hours ago, _The Doctor__ said:

Looks exactly like something I've owned and used for years, as have others.

 

2 hours ago, David_P said:

PILL was a hardware tool to mark RAM as read only, so you could load cracked cartridges into RAM,

 

Thanks for the replies.  The chip on the personality board is marked 'OMNIMON!'  (not Omniview).  Or is there something in the image that indicates Omniview is also present?  Is Omniview the little daughter card?

How would I test to see if I have the Newell RamRod working?  What tool/utility today would show me I have the extra memory?  If I know how to test for it it will help me with the little control module switch settings (I am not certain the little labels on the blue control module or over the cartridge slots are correct).

 

How would I test to see if OMNIMON! is activated/working?  Holding OPTION and pressing RESET as the OMNIMON! manual suggests does nothing for me.

How would I test if Omniview is activated/working?

[xrbrevin]

1 memory card appears to be populated with 256kb and associated additional glue logic

the other has 16kb

 

it would be nice to determine the quantity of extended RAM - use simple checker, xram, sysinfo etc

[reifsnyderb]

The version of Omnimon I've seen is installed in $C000-$CFFF and requires that the OS be patched.  

 

See page 16:

 

https://archive.org/details/NewellIndustriesOmnimonOmniviewManual/page/n15/mode/2up

 

Omniview instructions are there, too.

 

The Ramrod board will have to be configured correctly, as well.

 

https://archive.org/details/NewellIndustriesRAMRODMMOSManual/page/n3/mode/2up

 

Edit:  Never mind on the Ramrod board as I see you have a different arrangement.  Maybe that information on the Ramrod board will help or not....

Edited January 21, 2023 by reifsnyderb

[BillC]

26 minutes ago, 800_Rocks said:

 

 

Thanks for the replies.  The chip on the personality board is marked 'OMNIMON!'  (not Omniview).  Or is there something in the image that indicates Omniview is also present?  Is Omniview the little daughter card?

How would I test to see if I have the Newell RamRod working?  What tool/utility today would show me I have the extra memory?  If I know how to test for it it will help me with the little control module switch settings (I am not certain the little labels on the blue control module or over the cartridge slots are correct).

 

How would I test to see if OMNIMON! is activated/working?  Holding OPTION and pressing RESET as the OMNIMON! manual suggests does nothing for me.

How would I test if Omniview is activated/working?

There are 2 different upgrades for adding OMNIMON/OMNIVIEW to the 800. There is the replacement OS board called the RAMROD MMOS, and there is a smaller board which plugs into the original OS card which is what you have(IIRC it is called the paddle board, it is also supposed to be compatible with the 400).

 

There is more information in the post linked below:

 

Edited January 21, 2023 by BillC

[_The Doctor__]

**** deleted, it looks like it's all pretty much covered already.

[800_Rocks]

I continue to make some progress on testing what I have here. Recall my photo above of the blue control module. I have determined the following so far:

 

1. When the top switch marked ‘PILL’ is in the up position the BASIC ?FRE(0) cmd reports exactly 8KB less free memory than when the switch is down. I will dig up a PILL manual and try to test this further. 
    
2. I can’t find any changes with the position of the left toggle switch marked ‘upper’ ‘lower’ so I don’t know what it does. Ideas?
    
3. Pressing the red button at the bottom marked ‘reset’ does nothing that I can determine. Maybe it needs repair. 
    
4. The right 3-way toggle switched marked ‘Omnimon’ and ‘Normal’. When I place this switch in the middle or upper position I can access Omnimon thru BASIC by running the cmd X=USR(49152) as detailed in the Omnimon manual (picture below).  I see no differences between the middle and upper positions. I assume the bottom switch position is for the normal Atari OS (or is it modified too?). However, no combination of Option or Select plus Reset will invoke Omnimon. Also, once in Omnimon I can not exit with Start+Return. Also, in Omnimon the ‘?’ and/or ‘HELP’ cmds do not work. So Omnimon is there but many of the things described in the manual do not seem to work.
    
5. I will do some tracing and continuity tests on the blue control module. It is obviously possible that one or more connections are bad. 
    
6. I think I have Omniview + Omnimon. I assume that is the difference between the middle and upper positions of the right 3-way switch. Is there an easy way to test if Omniview is active?

What does it mean when all the text in the screen turns upside down when in Omnimon?  It seems like it happens when I type in a bad or unrecognized command. Then the text becomes right side up again when I type in a valid command. Is this expected behavior? Pictures below. 

Another note. I have a couple utility tools reporting that I have 15 Axlon  memory banks. This is regardless of any of the blue control module switch settings.  It looks like these are 16KB banks for a total of 240KB plus my base 48KB.  See pics below. 

 

SysInfo 2.26 reports 240KB of Axlon memory

 

I thought I hit the jackpot!!! as Oddly SysInfo 2.25 showed 1920 KB Axlon!!  Is that a known bug?

 

SimCheck 1.5 shows 15 Axlon banks for 240 KB

I ran SimTest 0.8 several times on both the 48KB base and Axlon memory. No errors reported. 

 

Entering Omnimon from BASIC using the command  X=USR(49152) as described in the Ominmon manual

 

Showing how all the text goes upside down sometimes when in Omnimon. Why?

 

Edited January 23, 2023 by 800_Rocks
for clarity

[JR>]

It looks like you have the Omnimon 8k ( https://archive.org/details/NewellIndustries8KOmnimonManual ) Upper and lower will be mostly similar but certain commands are only available in one bank or the other.

 

To see if you have Omniview set the switches to Newell, ON, View, and boot into basic type X=USR(49152)  and you should get 80 columns.

[800_Rocks]

On 1/24/2023 at 8:10 PM, JR> said:

looks like you have the Omnimon 8k

Very helpful thanks!!  Indeed my left 2-way toggle determines whether Omnimon operates out of its Upper or Lower 4K. Many commands only work in the Lower or Upper 4K. A few commands work in both. When you try to use a command in the Lower that is not recognized Omnimon turns all text on the screen upside down which is your visual clue that it is safe to flip to the other 4K and repeat the command there. Very cool.
 

When I enter Omnimon with the switch set to ‘Lower’ I am greeted with this first screen. Notice the title bar and the ‘L’ tacked onto the end of the name. 

When I enter Omnimon with the switch set to the ‘upper’ setting the entry changes to this second screen. No title bar at all. 

It is still amazing the tricks that were played like this in order to save a few bytes, in this case 4KB. Essentially a little 4K ROM banking scheme. 
 

Still no sign of Omniview. I will keep experimenting. 

[JR>]

Yeah, I don't see anywhere for Omniview to reside on that board. How does the system act when set to view?

 

[_The Doctor__]

Because there isn't any OmniView on that one. It's OmniMon only. A mistake on my part. It's not a ramrod it's and OS switcher by Bill Williams with OmniMon installed, You'd have to stack a chip and add another select to do another.

Edited January 27, 2023 by _The Doctor__