I think you're right. I forgot to take into consideration the versions released before 1.1.0
I should have said that most 1.1.0 carts out there are his custom printed boards. I think he only switched to squeedo at the very start of 1.1.0 and those quickly ran out.

Here is a pic of a real early version that I think you are referring to.

Then there must be an earlier revision before the squeedo, because I remember when he switched over to squeedo. I sold mine a long time ago when it became clear it wasnt getting updated.

Kinda right but not quite... Most EARLY MidiNES contain Squeedo circuit boards in them, but he only was given the bare boards. He didn't use any of the Squeedo firmware or bootloader. He wrote all his own stuff for it. He later printed his own circuit boards with almost identical layout and parts list as the early revisions.

Memblers states here that he only provided him with bare boards.
Source: http://forums.nesdev.com/viewtopic.php?t=780

The locked PIC chip inside is a PIC18F4410.

This news is awesome, been watching for a long time. Looking forward to it
Yogi

Most modern midines carts use the squeedo mapper and dev cart:
http://membler-industries.com/squeedo/2 … mapper.txt

Depending on the particular chip the locking mechanism may be easy or very hard to circumvent. Some chips can be tricked with quick transient voltages to unlock but others would require decapping, a process which I'm basically going to tell you now is too dangerous to do yourself (and would cost a lot to get done semi-professionally).

@tylerbarnes I'll take your word for it, I don't have much rom dumping experience. Locked chips and all that is way over my head, but you say it's been done before? Done, or only attempted? If someone has successfully dumped the files previously and they are hosted somewhere, could they be edited and compiled into an unlocked, flasher-friendly file?

There are many problems with this approach. It is very likely that the MidiNES uses a custom mapper not supported by the Kazzo. I doubt you can plug this kind of a cart into such a simple dumper and get what you're after. Also both PICs used in the cart are locked., and will cost you $350 to get dumped. I know because this has been done before.

Thanks guys, appreciate the faith.

The software/hardware is nearly done, really just holding out to release a trailer that will showcase all of the features at once. I'll be starting a new thread soon.

I feel like the people capable of understanding how the midines works probably already do. I wouldn't be surprised if building your own with one of the Infinite NES Lives carts is pretty easy. In fact, I'm pretty sure the cart in the OP is a predecessor to the INL cart. One things for sure, wayfar didn't have that flash cart produced for the midi nes. I would love to see a rom dump though.

That being said, I fully expect the FaMI to be much better than the midi nes. If only for the fact that batsly adams isn't going to screw us over. Just the fact that he's been so reluctant to drop any details even given his months of hard work says to me that he takes the project and the community very seriously and isn't setting any expectations before he know's he can deliver. I have in my hands a Star Versus cart that uses the flash cart he designed and I can say it is a quality production. I can only hope FaMI will be the same!

To be honest, based on what other people have said, it would be pretty easy.  Someone just needs to have the time to do it.  At this point, with other midi options becoming available, I'd mainly be interested in reverse engineering the MIDINES simply so there can be a complete understanding of how it works.  I could probably fix my cartridge if that were so.

So I've actually been very interested in reverse engineering the MidiNES. I was thinking of pulling the rom file from my cartridge using a Kazzo NES Dumper, putting together a bill of materials w/ assembly instructions, then releasing all of it to the public. I don't have the time or lack of morals to sell repros.

Thanks for the update, I'll probably be using FaMI whenever it is finished

Been pretty much full time on FaMI for the past three months, incredibly happy with how it's coming out. I think you'll all be excited for the new features - please hang tight, news soon!

I think so too.

Kinda stupid question, but is the lockout chip disabled ? Even if it seems that the MidiNES interprets MIDI in signals that don't exist, it might be worth trying to do so, as we have no clue about what might be dysfunctionning inside the cart. I doubt that it'll work though.