Atari 2600+ Beta Update 1.1

[tradyblix]

PAL folks having a rough go of it.

 

Other than the "weird" issues occasionally i noticed (sound corruption here and there, hitting robots "twice" in berzerk enhanced, missing some "fire" sometimes in some games) which I've been told isn't an emulator issue by Thomas.... things are working swimmingly here. Those things were there in 1.0 too FWIW. 

Edited January 1 by tradyblix

[jnagy13]

 

Is this the correct update?? V1.1

[ballistik]

I would love to try the new update! I have over 500 atari 2600 & 7800 games! 
 

BB

[DEANJIMMY]

7 hours ago, Albert said:

That's an old cart with that sticker!! 

 

 ..Al

But it works on V1.1 when you press A + B and Down for five seconds when the game starts🤗

With the right MD5 checksum it is easy to implement in next release to start it as PAL, once I get a debug load to display it. Not tomorrow...

Happy new year to all of you and especialy to Ben and the developers, they are doing such a great job👍

[DEANJIMMY]

48 minutes ago, jnagy13 said:

 

Is this the correct update?? V1.1

Yes

[+remowilliams]

I can now stand and assume the fighting stance in Karateka.  The controls have like a ten second lag and the game is hideously unplayable.

 

Therefore I know the emulation is working fine now.

[RevEng]

12 minutes ago, remowilliams said:

I can now stand and assume the fighting stance in Karateka.  The controls have like a ten second lag and the game is hideously unplayable.

 

Therefore I know the emulation is working fine now.

I've had other 7800 emulator authors reach out, unsure if their emulator is broken or not, when they try out Karateka. It's always Karateka that's the problem.

[+LS650]

4 hours ago, Giles N said:

 

[Giles N]

1 hour ago, ls650 said:

 

 

«Don’t cry dear, little imperial Stormtrooper.

Most of your best friends escaped in pods in time…!

 

… they even got their revenge when they finally revealed themselves to the galaxy as the writer/producers of Star Wars Episode 8…»

 

 

Edited January 1 by Giles N

[AtariNerd]

One word :

 

Kerplunkie!

 

/escapes in a pod/

[TPR]

On 12/30/2023 at 6:26 PM, Ben from Plaion said:

Hello all, 

 

Thanks for all the offers to try out the 1.1 beta software. More people have offered then I thought so probably best if I just provide the instructions and files here.

 

How to Update

Dumper:

 

With Power Switch off on the 2600+ connect the USB lead from the 2600+ to a Windows Laptop/PC. 

 

TV TYPE lever in B W

 

Hold down GAME SELECT lever and power on the 2600+, You should hear a windows connection jingle from your Laptop/PC

 

Open AtariDumper1.1.0.2.exe, You should see the status as Detected in green text

 

Press Download and it takes about 5 seconds to flash the dumper chip. The status then goes to red not detected and thats it the dumper chip is updated.

 

How to Update

Emulator Part 1:

 

The machine needs to add a driver to your Laptop/PC to talk to the 2600+. You only need to do this once.

 

With Power Switch off on the 2600+ connect the USB lead from the 2600+ to a Windows Laptop/PC. 

 

TV TYPE lever in COLOR

 

Hold down GAME RESET lever and power on the 2600+, You should hear a windows connection jingle from your Laptop/PC

 

Goto Device Manager on your PC and click on the Unknown Device.

 

Browse your PC and click on the DriverAssitant_v5.12 (unzipped) and press Open.

 

A confirmation message should pop up showing a successful driver update. 

 

Should take you no more then two minutes to do this.

 

Emulator Part 2:

 

Now for the actual emulator firmware update. 

 

With Power Switch off on the 2600+ connect the USB lead from the 2600+ to a Windows Laptop/PC. 

 

TV TYPE lever in COLOR

 

Hold down GAME RESET lever and power on the 2600+, You should hear a windows connection jingle from your Laptop/PC

 

Open up RKDevTool_Release_v2.74 folder (unzipped) and click on RKDevTool.exe.

 

You should see the application window open and a status message of 'Found one MASKROM device'.

 

Press the tab Upgrade Firmware.

 

Press the Firmware button.

 

Find Update-1225.img and press Open.

 

You should see the IMG prepped in the window. Press Upgrade.

 

The update uploads in about 30 seconds. The whole process should again take about 2 minutes.

 

And thats everything done. Time to plug your carts in! 

 

John Hancock has already provided a list of working 7800 homebrews, so unless you just want to play those games for fun I'm more interested in receiving feedback for games he didnt test and anything else of note.

 

Bear in mind this is a beta and the purpose of offering this out on Atari Age is because of the breadth of cartridges out there that we internally just dont have easy access to - such a massive amount of carts with all their variations. I'm confident that this update will please, but some things may not work still and others havent been looked at like video touch pad, driver controller support as well as 2600 homebrew, a few odd carts and that one tricky official release Pitfall II. But we will as soon as the 1.1 is locked.

 

Thanks Ben

AtariDumper1.1.0.2.exe 5.26 MB · 127 downloads update-1225.img 68.85 MB · 109 downloads DriverAssitant_v5.12.zip 9.4 MB · 110 downloads RKDevTool_Release_v2.74.zip 2.44 MB · 102 downloads

@Ben from Plaion Update installed and running!  Thank you! I have also made a post on the AtariAge Facebook page linking to the update here.

 

Do you think you could update the first post of this thread to include this information as well?  It might be easier for people to find the files that way if it's all under the first post. 

[jaesonk]

Is there an update path for people that don't own or have access to windows computers?

[+LS650]

6 minutes ago, jaesonk said:

Is there an update path for people that don't own or have access to windows computers?

Not at this time.

[+karri]

9 hours ago, tradyblix said:

I wanna save the rainbow.... cart support anytime soon ?

The hassle with 2600+ delayed Rainbow a bit. I still lack three subgames from the game. But the game will be in a 8-games cart form later this year. The cart is the dragon-like cart in the photo.

[Loccy]

8 hours ago, tradyblix said:

PAL folks having a rough go of it.

Yep, based on what I've read I'll be holding off for now. I am predominantly PAL. 

[Loccy]

8 hours ago, tradyblix said:

PAL folks having a rough go of it.

(duplicate post - sorry) 

Edited January 1 by Loccy
Duplicate

[RadiATIon]

First of all, Happy New Year to all. Then, who can tell me how to recognize an NTSC version cartridge from a PAL version cartridge: the CX game number....?

Edited January 1 by RadiATIon

[JetmanUK]

10 hours ago, tradyblix said:

PAL folks having a rough go of it.

 

Other than the "weird" issues occasionally i noticed (sound corruption here and there, hitting robots "twice" in berzerk enhanced, missing some "fire" sometimes in some games) which I've been told isn't an emulator issue by Thomas.... things are working swimmingly here. Those things were there in 1.0 too FWIW. 

Having to shoot robots twice occasionally is not a bug. It is mentioned in the original manual that you may encounter a stronger robot that requires two shots to destroy. No doubt it was a bug and they wrote some lore around it to explain it, but the game is working as stated back in the day. 

[Gr1ff]

Happy New Year everyone. I haven't encountered any issues (PAL) other than the same ones before the update. XONOX double ender Spikes peak still not working, loads but controller doesn't work, and karateka loads and goes to black screen. 

[AtariYMás009]

But there is definitely some kind of problem with PAL games, for all those whose collection is mostly made up of PAL titles it will be better to wait for a new build to be developed that fixes these problems.

[AtariYMás009]

2 hours ago, RadiATIon said:

First of all, Happy New Year to all. Then, who can tell me how to recognize an NTSC version cartridge from a PAL version cartridge: the CX game number....?

For the atari text labeled carts, there should be a little ''p'' next to the serial number.

For the original black labeled carts (1979/80-1981/82) there sholud be a little ''P'' next to the name on the top label.

for the original silver labeled carts (1982-1984) the same as the black labeled, a little ''P'' next to the name.

And for the atari corp carts (1985-1990)(red, grey and black) there sholud be a square sticker with a letter ''P'' on it behind the cart, these are the most difficult to tell apart, because most of the times the sticker fell down, like happened to a PAL 1987 copy of crystal castles I bought for christmas, that BTW also has issues with the beta build of 1.1, the enemies disappear.

 

For the third party games I only own an imagic title that has the text in different languages on the label.

 

I hope this helps you.

[ZillaRUSH]

This is awesome...so far Galaxian and UniWars works.  No luck on Space Rocks or Draconian. Def more 7800 game targets. Hope they can get Champ Games to work next update.

[AtariYMás009]

1 hour ago, Gr1ff said:

 I haven't encountered any issues (PAL) other than the same ones before the update.

Did you tested pac-man, Crystal castles or other title with disappearing sprites?

[AtariLeaf]

20 minutes ago, ZillaRUSH said:

This is awesome...so far Galaxian and UniWars works.  No luck on Space Rocks or Draconian. Def more 7800 game targets. Hope they can get Champ Games to work next update.

If they can get Spiceware and Champ games running I'll be in heaven

[Diewaldo]

18 minutes ago, AtariYMás009 said:

Did you tested pac-man, Crystal castles or other title with disappearing sprites?

I can now also add Galaxian (PAL) to the list. In higher levels you have enemy sprites disappearing, I just tested it.