Bill Loguidice Posted August 3, 2004 Share Posted August 3, 2004 It's too early to tell about the pricing. I normally sell a board the size and complexity of this one for around $60. Then there'd be an ide cable and a cf adapter($8-$10) That solution would be kind of messy, even if I attached the ide adapter to my board and used a 3" ide cable. Integrating the cf socket will raise the price, very possibly 50% or more. I have a feeling the housing could be very expensive too. There's a clip in the coleco for it to fit into. So as a bare board I'd guess <$100 I couldn't even guess what it would cost with a custom made housing. Well, I for one would be happy with ANY type of enclosure. It doesn't have to be custom, just as long it protected the delicate elements (even a plastic snap case with a dremeled opening or something). If you can get it under $100, that would be incredible. At worst, I suppose I could try to do my own case. If you're ever interested in writing a type of technical article with lots of photos detailing the whole process (and perhaps getting more orders in the process, assuming that interests you), feel free to submit your idea to Armchair Arcade. We'd love to work with you to publish it for an upcoming issue (issue 4 will hit likely this week, so any issue after that). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stingray Posted August 3, 2004 Share Posted August 3, 2004 as a bare board I'd guess <$100 I couldn't even guess what it would cost with a custom made housing. I'd be very interested at that price. I don't need a housing. Please keep after this, and do keep us updated on your progress. -S Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruce Tomlin Posted August 3, 2004 Share Posted August 3, 2004 It would be so much better if this were for an MMC card instead of CF. Not only is MMC smaller, but it's got a lot less pins to solder down. It worked great for the Cuttle Cart 2, aside from the minor issue of the CF socket used in the CC2 going out of production. Even a Playstation 2 memory card would be nice. I'm not aware that any Colecovision carts used bank switching, or even on-cart RAM. A Colecovision equivalent of the Cuttle Cart would be much easier to design than a 2600/7800 version. It would be even better if it could be designed to somehow replace the Adam tape drive. Yes, that would probably mean patching the Adam BIOS, but it would be the ultimate in cool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 4, 2004 Author Share Posted August 4, 2004 Yes, the footprint is a problem and so are the 50 pins, but I'm comfortable with the IDE interface and I had all the parts on hand. I also like the options with CF as well, small ones are practically free or you can even have giant microdrives. I know it's overkill for this application, but I'm not planning on stopping with the CV. I'm working my way through all the consoles of my childhood. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 9, 2004 Author Share Posted August 9, 2004 I had a chance to code a little today. It now can load an image from a compact flash formatted FAT16. Unfortunately only 1 of the 3 images I tried ran. The test cart image runs great, the other 2 I tried hung so I've got some more work to do. Not sure if it's a runtime problem or loader problem yet even. Anyone have any thoughts on sound chips? I really don't know that much about them other than what I've just read. Pokey's are dirt cheap the downside is they take up a lot of board space, also I suspect it wouldn't be that big of an improvement. I'm not sure how it compares to the standard coleco chip. The speakjet looks pretty cool, but the serial interface scares me. The advantage of it would be you could load your sound effects during bootup and call them later so it'd be like having a dedicated sound cpu. I'm ordering one of those to play with. If it can sound reasonably like the votrax chip in qbert I might be sold. I'm ordering some cases to look at, I guess I really need to decide what I'm doing with the case before I know how much extra board space I have to play with. Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Godzilla Posted August 9, 2004 Share Posted August 9, 2004 Would it be able to load stuff like the Adam Tape super games like Dragon's Lair or Buck Rogers or Donkey Kong or A.E. or etc? This sounds really cool, I'd probably want one too :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 10, 2004 Author Share Posted August 10, 2004 Would it be able to load stuff like the Adam Tape super games like Dragon's Lair or Buck Rogers or Donkey Kong or A.E. or etc? This sounds really cool, I'd probably want one too :-) Probably not directly, I'd probably have to patch the bios and/or the games to use my banking/loading. I'm not familiar with those games. I played buck rogers a couple of times 20 years ago. I seem to remember waiting forever between levels for it to load. I really don't know that much about the adam computer so I just don't know yet. The problem I was having turned out to be a loading problem, but it's sorted now. Every game I've tried so far has worked on every flash card I've tried. The thought occured to me today I can probably add composite a/v out. If I offset the device to the right of the CV about an inch they can even point towards the back. I'll check into that more, but if that works ok, then there's no reason I can't do stereo with the extra sound chip. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MattG/Snyper2099 Posted August 10, 2004 Share Posted August 10, 2004 Would it be able to load stuff like the Adam Tape super games like Dragon's Lair or Buck Rogers or Donkey Kong or A.E. or etc? This sounds really cool, I'd probably want one too :-) Probably not directly, I'd probably have to patch the bios and/or the games to use my banking/loading. I'm not familiar with those games. I played buck rogers a couple of times 20 years ago. I seem to remember waiting forever between levels for it to load. I really don't know that much about the adam computer so I just don't know yet. The problem I was having turned out to be a loading problem, but it's sorted now. Every game I've tried so far has worked on every flash card I've tried. The thought occured to me today I can probably add composite a/v out. If I offset the device to the right of the CV about an inch they can even point towards the back. I'll check into that more, but if that works ok, then there's no reason I can't do stereo with the extra sound chip. Sign me up for one for sure now! Seriously, if you need someone to beta test anything, please drop me a PM. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 10, 2004 Author Share Posted August 10, 2004 I'm a long way from beta tests yet, I still haven't got a feature list yet But I can always refer back to this thread when the time comes. As long as I'm blue skying here, anyone have any thoughts on controllers? Clearly that was one of the weaknesses of the CV. A pokey has support for up to 8 paddles, it even has a keyboard scanner built in. So I've got IO to burn. I could have extra joysticks for programs that wanted them or I could probably replace the existing joysticks or an existing joy stick or even replace half the joystick, ie joystick and left button would be the new stick and the right button and keypad would be the old controller. And there's no reason the new controller needs to be a coleco or atari stick. As long as it's reasonably simple to decode I can build the adapter into the board. Anyone have controller suggestions? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cootster Posted August 10, 2004 Share Posted August 10, 2004 Either the Genesis 6-button pad or the Tandy analog stick. . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stingray Posted August 10, 2004 Share Posted August 10, 2004 The Genesis controllers are cheap and plentiful. Seems a good choice to me. By the way if you're keeping track of those who are interested in beta testing, count me in. I have CV with most of the available accessories. -S Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Troy_Whelan Posted August 10, 2004 Share Posted August 10, 2004 I'm a long way from beta tests yet, I still haven't got a feature list yet But I can always refer back to this thread when the time comes. As long as I'm blue skying here, anyone have any thoughts on controllers? Clearly that was one of the weaknesses of the CV. A pokey has support for up to 8 paddles, it even has a keyboard scanner built in. So I've got IO to burn. I could have extra joysticks for programs that wanted them or I could probably replace the existing joysticks or an existing joy stick or even replace half the joystick, ie joystick and left button would be the new stick and the right button and keypad would be the old controller. And there's no reason the new controller needs to be a coleco or atari stick. As long as it's reasonably simple to decode I can build the adapter into the board. Anyone have controller suggestions? Opcode has been working on creating new ColecoVision controllers, so you might want to send him a PM on this board. Troy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted August 10, 2004 Share Posted August 10, 2004 I say stick with the standard ColecoVision controllers. Personally I prefer using the real controllers for ColecoVision or Adam games. If it can also be programmed to alternately use Sega Genesis 6-button controllers and Atari paddles - since they all use the same connector - that would be great and probably the ideal situation overall. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 10, 2004 Author Share Posted August 10, 2004 I've just been looking at the sega 6 button, It looks a little difficult in hardware only. The 3 button looks easy. But while I was there I found labrats coleco to jaguar pad page. I think I may look at that, if I can make the keypad on that work it looks like a winner. If not it looks like the 3 button sega would would work with both R and L buttons fairly easily. The 6 button would also work but the extra buttons wouldn't do anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted August 10, 2004 Share Posted August 10, 2004 I've just been looking at the sega 6 button, It looks a little difficult in hardware only. The 3 button looks easy. But while I was there I found labrats coleco to jaguar pad page. I think I may look at that, if I can make the keypad on that work it looks like a winner. If not it looks like the 3 button sega would would work with both R and L buttons fairly easily. The 6 button would also work but the extra buttons wouldn't do anything. I can't say I feel the Jag pad is an improvement over the Coleco controllers, and it has a different pin configuration as well. The logical choice of course is to use the "industry standard" PlayStation pads, but they have mediocre digital controllers. It would be nice to have a controller that had enough buttons to reasonably simulate the Coleco's number pad with great ergonomics and feel. That solution is likely not out there, however. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 10, 2004 Author Share Posted August 10, 2004 Playstation was the first thing I thought of. Unfortunatly all the new controllers use a serial design that would be difficult to implement. With the new port being on my board it doesn't matter what it looks like as long as I can buy them. With the sega pad I can sense if it's connected and use the original port if it's not. Possibly even hold down button c to force control to the original port to use the keypad. Or use C as a shift to add more buttons. The problem is they wouldn't be labeled, but that might be worth it. Not sure yet if I can do autosensing stuff with the jaguar pad. Maybe sega would be better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 22, 2004 Author Share Posted August 22, 2004 The last couple of days I've been waiting on parts so I've been working on porting one of my arcade games to CV for the packin game. It's more a pain in the neck than I thought. So far I've only converted the 1 player game and I will have to do some fine tuning to make up for the screen being smaller and horizontal instead of vertical. I haven't touched the sound yet either. dr.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cootster Posted August 22, 2004 Share Posted August 22, 2004 Keypad controllers were a fad that just never caught on, really . . . Has there ever been a 9-pin PC stick/pad that contained a keypad ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruce Tomlin Posted August 22, 2004 Share Posted August 22, 2004 Not that I know of, but more recently there has been the Nostromo. Found one of those for five bucks recently. Ten keys, throttle wheel, D-pad. There's a later version with fifteen keys, a spinner wheel, and a D-pad. They even have OS X drivers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 23, 2004 Author Share Posted August 23, 2004 The jaguar pad is the only one I could find that had a keypad and still used a direct connection. It's not nine pin but it's close enough I could make it work. The plan right now is to add a pair of sega pads with support for directions and a and b button. Holding down the c button would force control to the built in sticks for keypad support. It would autodetect if the sega pads were connected or not. I'm also thinking of using some kind of combo to force a reset and get back to the operating system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cootster Posted August 23, 2004 Share Posted August 23, 2004 Nice scheme . . . If Jag pads weren't so rare. that may be the way to go, but they are and it's a shame to cannible them for an older system, even if said older system kicks its ass . . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atariboy Posted August 23, 2004 Share Posted August 23, 2004 Well, what about a adapter (Sort of like those for the 5200) that will allow you to plug in a Jaguar pad into it, and then plug it into the Colecovision, then you wouldn't be modifying the controller any. Is it that rare though? Telegames offers the Pro controller for 40 dollars, which seems reasonable enough. I'd definately buy one if it used the Jaguar pad, sounds like a perfect match for the system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav Posted August 23, 2004 Author Share Posted August 23, 2004 Well, what about a adapter (Sort of like those for the 5200) that will allow you to plug in a Jaguar pad into it, and then plug it into the Colecovision, then you wouldn't be modifying the controller any. Is it that rare though? Telegames offers the Pro controller for 40 dollars, which seems reasonable enough. I'd definately buy one if it used the Jaguar pad, sounds like a perfect match for the system. You can still buy them new but they're kind of high compared to the sega controllers. I guess the main reason I picked sega is I have a couple on hand and I'd have to order the jaguar pads. Iirc my design for the jaguar pads include 20+ flipflops and some extra components for a clock circuit, the sega design is only a couple of flipflops. I may be pushing the size of my cpld to do everything I want so that's the other reason for picking sega. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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