+Al_Nafuur Posted September 14, 2023 Share Posted September 14, 2023 Banking Publisher Game PlusCart UnoCart Harmony Cartridge 2K Atari Combat OK untested untested OK CV CommaVid Video Life OK untested untested untested (no cart) 4K Atari Missile Command OK untested untested OK F8 Atari Galaxian/Ms.PacM OK untested OK (MarcoJ) OK F6 Atari RS Boxing OK untested untested OK F4 Atari Fatal Run OK untested untested untested (no cart) FA CBS Omega Race OK untested untested OK (MarcoJ) F0 Dynacom Mega Boy OK untested untested untested (no cart) DF Homebrew PrinceOfIndiana 2 OK untested untested untested (no cart) BF Homebrew untested untested untested untested (no cart) SB Homebrew PrinceOfIndiana 3 OK untested untested untested (no cart) F8SC Atari Defender OK untested untested untested (no cart) F6SC Atari Dig Dug OK untested untested OK (Kroko) F4SC Homebrew Aardvark Demo OK untested untested untested (no cart) DFSC Homebrew Penult Demo OK untested untested untested (no cart) BFSC Homebrew untested untested untested untested (no cart) 32in1 Atari 32 in 1 untested untested untested OK (5V on/off switches games) FE Activision Decathlon Crashes at startup untested untested Crashes at startup DPC Activision Pitfall II OK untested untested OK ? (MarcoJ) E0 Parker Bros Super Cobra OK untested untested untested (no cart) 3F Tigervision River Patrol OK untested untested untested (no cart) 3E+ Tigervision? RPG Demo(MarcoJ) OK? untested untested untested (no cart) E7 M-Network Burgertime OK untested untested untested (no cart) DPC+ Homebrew not supported untested untested untested (no cart) CDFJ Homebrew not supported untested untested untested (no cart) CDFJ+ Homebrew not supported untested untested untested (no cart) ACE Homebrew untested untested not supported untested (no cart) ELF Homebrew untested untested not supported untested (no cart) AR Starpath SuperCharger Crash after load screen untested untested Crashes at startup GL CVC GameLine MM not supported not supported not supported Crashes at startup CM Spectravideo Compumate Black Screen untested untested Black Screen (needs Joystick plugs) MVC rbairos MovieCart not supported not supported not supported untested 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 14, 2023 Share Posted September 14, 2023 Here is a more extensive list of bankswitching types. Bankswitching.ods 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+bent_pin Posted September 14, 2023 Share Posted September 14, 2023 Need a supercharger? I would be willing to provide one to @Al_Nafuur or @Thomas Jentzsch on loan for the duration, provided that they covered both shipping charges. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 14, 2023 Share Posted September 14, 2023 I am only watching the project from software perspective. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 14, 2023 Author Share Posted September 14, 2023 6 minutes ago, bent_pin said: Need a supercharger? I would be willing to provide one to @Al_Nafuur or @Thomas Jentzsch on loan for the duration, provided that they covered both shipping charges. I have one, already tested -> Black screen 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 16, 2023 Author Share Posted September 16, 2023 I tested the Spectravideo CompuMate yesterday. It seems it is not working on the 2600 without the 2 joystick plugs plugged in. On a real 2600 the screen stays black if the plugs are not plugged. On my breadboard the screens stays also black, the code in Stella debugger looks okay, but stays in an endless loop. Is there anything known about the protocol used by the compumate? Would a stelladaptor (or something similar) handle this communication? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 16, 2023 Share Posted September 16, 2023 (edited) 3 hours ago, Al_Nafuur said: Is there anything known about the protocol used by the compumate? Would a stelladaptor (or something similar) handle this communication? I don't think a stella-daptor can handle this. Is your code stuck here (Lfb3f)? It gets there from the code at Lfb36, which checks if left pin 5 and right pin 9 are dumped. I suppose this happens when the keyboard is plugged in. Have you tried to plugin two pairs of paddles? It could also well be, that Stella does not know the cart is a CM (different MD5). Please check the game properties. Edited September 16, 2023 by Thomas Jentzsch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 16, 2023 Author Share Posted September 16, 2023 1 hour ago, Thomas Jentzsch said: I don't think a stella-daptor can handle this. Is your code stuck here (Lfb3f)? It gets there from the code at Lfb36, which checks if left pin 5 and right pin 9 are dumped. I suppose this happens when the keyboard is plugged in. Have you tried to plugin two pairs of paddles? Yes, that is exactly how it looks like in the debugger: 1 hour ago, Thomas Jentzsch said: It could also well be, that Stella does not know the cart is a CM (different MD5). Please check the game properties. There is no bankswitching in Stella, it is in the cartridge! The CartPort driver doesn't know (just like a real 2600) anything about banking and they both don't need to know, its all happening inside the cartridge and we don't care. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 16, 2023 Share Posted September 16, 2023 7 minutes ago, Al_Nafuur said: There is no bankswitching in Stella, it is in the cartridge! The CartPort driver doesn't know (just like a real 2600) anything about banking and they both don't need to know, its all happening inside the cartridge and we don't care. I forgot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 16, 2023 Author Share Posted September 16, 2023 1 hour ago, Thomas Jentzsch said: It gets there from the code at Lfb36, which checks if left pin 5 and right pin 9 are dumped. I suppose this happens when the keyboard is plugged in. Can I emulate this (left pin 5 and right pin 9 dumped) in the debugger? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 16, 2023 Share Posted September 16, 2023 (edited) Don't think so. Almost everything is locked (and not fully implemented) for the CompuMate in Stella. There is quite a lot of special handling. Why do you of all things concentrate on it? But you could change the code or the registers. So that the code continues. Edited September 16, 2023 by Thomas Jentzsch Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 17, 2023 Author Share Posted September 17, 2023 I made some changes to our write cycle, now Pitfall II (DPC banking) works. Unfortunately the changes slowed the emulation even more down: VID_20230917_184801.mp4 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 17, 2023 Author Share Posted September 17, 2023 Also (re)tested on the PlusCart with the new build: F8SC: Atari Defender OK F6SC: Atari Dig Dug not working CV: CommaVid Video Life running but half of the RAM is not written correctly? F0: DynaCom Mega Boy OK E0: Parker Bros Super Cobra OK E7: M-Network Burgertime not working 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 18, 2023 Author Share Posted September 18, 2023 Tested F4SC Aardvark Demo on the PlusCart 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dionoid Posted September 20, 2023 Share Posted September 20, 2023 (edited) Hi @Al_Nafuur, while I'm not participating in this project (but following with great interest!), I see you're currently focusing on getting different bankswitching schemes to work. But I just have a gut feeling that increasing the speed from the current 85% to eventually 100% is the biggest challenge of this project. I'm just wondering what the approach is to increase the speed; does that require changes in Stella? A faster Raspberry Pi? Or maybe additional hardware interfacing with the cartridge? Edited September 20, 2023 by Dionoid 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 21, 2023 Author Share Posted September 21, 2023 12 hours ago, Dionoid said: Hi @Al_Nafuur, while I'm not participating in this project (but following with great interest!), Thanks! 12 hours ago, Dionoid said: I see you're currently focusing on getting different bankswitching schemes to work. Basically I am focusing on letting the read/write cycles (transitions) on the bus look like a real 2600 for the cartridges, if we can do this correctly all bankswitchings inside the cartridges will just work. 12 hours ago, Dionoid said: But I just have a gut feeling that increasing the speed from the current 85% to eventually 100% is the biggest challenge of this project. I'm just wondering what the approach is to increase the speed; does that require changes in Stella? A faster Raspberry Pi? Or maybe additional hardware interfacing with the cartridge? We have tested different timers and techniques to get the delay inside the CartPort driver as close as possible to a 6502 running at ~1.19Mhz. But to me it looks like that at about 1/2 the speed of the 6502 we don't have any more speed gains in Stella increasing the driver to "full" speed. I have not seen any big differences running on an Pi3B at 1200Mhz or an Pi3B+ at 1400Mhz and I think a Pi4 at 1500Mhz will also make no difference. @DirtyHairy already mentioned (here) that Stella's main loop is not optimized for what we are trying to do, and he is currently working on a rework of Stella's main loop and threaded model. 2 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dionoid Posted September 21, 2023 Share Posted September 21, 2023 (edited) 5 hours ago, Al_Nafuur said: Basically I am focusing on letting the read/write cycles (transitions) on the bus look like a real 2600 for the cartridges, if we can do this correctly all bankswitchings inside the cartridges will just work. Good point; thanks for explaining. 5 hours ago, Al_Nafuur said: @DirtyHairy already mentioned (here) that Stella's main loop is not optimized for what we are trying to do, and he is currently working on a rework of Stella's main loop and threaded model. That is great news! Thanks for sharing! Edited September 21, 2023 by Dionoid Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Al_Nafuur Posted September 25, 2023 Author Share Posted September 25, 2023 After fixing a bug in the drivers write cycle I have retested a few bankings with RAM on the PlusCart: F6SC: Atari Dig Dug OK CV: CommaVid Video Life OK E7: M-Network Burgertime OK FA: CBS Omega Race OK F4SC: Homebrew Aardvark Demo OK FE: Activision Decathlon Still crashes at startup AR: Starpath The Official Frogger Still crash after load screen I also tested 2 cartridges: Starpath SuperCharger Now crashes at startup Activision Decathlon Now crashes at startup 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+MarcoJ Posted September 26, 2023 Share Posted September 26, 2023 Tried Decathlon just then. It loads up and shows the screen, but enters the debugger soon after. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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