529 Reply by nitro2k01

(170 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

Bit Shifter wrote:

Holy shit, amazing. Don't mean to overreach but "while you're at it" -- begging for SRAM read/write support for earlier 1.x versions of Nanoloop.

Yeah that's the plan. Bud Melvin sent me an old NL cartridge for that purpose, 1.2 or 1.3. (The yellow type.) Weren't you supposed to lend me one of the older cartridges, the version that Bud didn't send me, for experiments? My memory is hazy.

egr wrote:

When you say it can do nano one carts do you mean the a and b sections or the main ROM?

Either way this sounds great!

All the banks. Well technically not all the banks. Not the first bank, which is write protected and holds a permanent copy of Nanoloop which is used as a backup if the normal copy of NL is somehow deleted, so you cannot brick the cartridge. But yes, Nanoloop, ROM A and B and the save area will be readable/writeable.

12ianma wrote:
HeavyW8bit wrote:

This looks amazing!! Would it be able to read EPROM carts and save it as a ROM by any chance?

Yes assuming they don't have proprietary bank switching. very uncommon however so probably not a worry

Actually... Given the Python library that come with the software, it would be easy to write your own script that dumps such a cartridge, by telling the flasher to write value x to address y and then dump memory area z. But yes, it can dump anything that behaves like a normal cartridge.
Custom mappers is common among pirate multicarts, but not EEPROM carts in my experience.

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530 Reply by nitro2k01

(4 replies, posted in General Discussion)

I think PayPal disputes are automatic, and that you shouldn't manually return money by making another payment. Assuming that's what you did.

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531 Reply by nitro2k01

(4 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

MProg is needed if the FTDI chip has somehow lost its configuration. If the FTDI chip doesn't have it's configuration, you can't use the GB Cart Flasher software. Just clarifying this, it's not likely you have this problem. Use the links in katsumbhong's post.

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532 Reply by nitro2k01

(3 replies, posted in General Discussion)

Yeah, no, whatever.

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533 Reply by nitro2k01

(170 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

shizcake wrote:

amaze!

any estimates about pricing yet?

Sorry, too early to say. It all comes down to the production costs (including the case.)

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534 Topic by nitro2k01

(170 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

It's time for an official announcement of the project I've been working on for a while now, a Gameboy cartridge flasher. The flasher will be manufactured and sold by ASM Retro and is expected to be released in the spring of 2014. Here's a description of the project.

The hardware

Although the hardware has a heritage to the existing "Polish student" GB cart flasher, I have remade the schematic and board layout as well as the firmware from the ground up. ALTANE is using a pin compatible but more powerful microcontroller. One focus for the flasher has been reprogrammability of the device's firmware. The FTDI chip has been connected to the microcontroller to allow full SPI programming of the chip, and the flasher comes with a bootloader which allows quick and easy firmware upgrades.

The firmware

The firmware is written to be smart about things. The final version will contain an algorithm which only erases and reprograms the flash sectors that need to be reprogrammed. This means that if you upgrade LSDj to a newer version, the sectors that contain kits won't have to be reprogrammed because they don't change between versions. Likewise, new kits could be programmed directly into the ROM, without having to reprogram the whole ROM.

Software and drivers

ALTANE is using a FT232 serial chip, which means that there are problem-free drivers (from FTDI) for just about every operating system. The client software is written in Python and will run equally well on all three platforms. (I'm currently developing it on Windows and Linux, but Mac support should not be a problem.) More information coming later.

Supported cartridges

One of my goals with this project is to support cartridges which are currently difficult to flash. Of course, it supports cartridges with an AM29F00x flash chip, more known under names like Bl**p Bl**p, Smartboy and Fighter Cart. ALTANE can also program the older blue EMS cartridges, which might see a bit of a revival because of this. It can also program the Nanoloop One flat cartridge. The crown jewel in programming support, in my opinion, is the white Nintendo Power cartridge. My goal is to support any and all cartridges that can be reprogrammed via the edge connector. If you have a rare/old flash cartridge that you can't progam due to obsolete LPT port flashing harware, I can hopefully help you if you lend me the cartridge for a while.

Case

ASM Retro will be handling most of the manufacturing and sales of ALTANE, as well as contributing with case design. The case has a sleek DMG resemblance and will be color-matched with the DMG's grey shell colour.

Information page: http://altane.gg8.se/
Currently being sold here: https://gameboylife.com/products/altane

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535 Reply by nitro2k01

(24 replies, posted in General Discussion)

Damn it guys. Those are not favorite favorite threads. You need to post threads that are  both favored by you and have favoriteness as a property. Get your puns straight.

DeerPresident wrote:

And defPREMIUM, how is Snoop Dogg related to this thread?....MODS!!!!

"Yo dawg, we heard you like threads, so we made a thread about threads."

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536 Reply by nitro2k01

(32 replies, posted in Nintendo Consoles)

Enclaimer: I'm an expert. (I'm an expert at making up words as well.)

Another thing that could be used for syncing is the DIN sync output of a drum machine or TB-303.

I was going to suggest reading the joypad more often than the regular every VBlank, but you're already doing that. Good. However, I think (from reading the source code) that your joypad check routine is buggy in how it handles multiple, For example, I think if you say, hold up permanently pressed, and then press start, that the start button press will be registered as an up press.

There's a way to solve this to create a trigger mask sing XOR then AND. Pseudo code, in a more Z80-ish syntax:

call READPAD         ; Let's sy this function returns the currently pressed keys in A
ld   B,A             ; Save current mask for later (copy to B)
ld   A,[OLDJOYPAD]   ; Get previous joypad state (load to A)
xor  A,B             ; XOR with current state to detect any changed buttons (target: A)
and  A,B             ; AND with current state to only store currently pressed (ie newly pressed) buttons
ld   [JOYTRIGGER],A  ; Save trigger mask
ld   A,B             ; Load B into A
ld   [OLDJOYPAD],A   ; Save current state as old state for the next comparison

Now check all bits in JOYTRIGGER.

Another idea: You could make the program have a master mode as well. In this mode, the joypad is only checked once every frame (or more exactly, once every player tick, if a song should happen to use a different sync source than VSync (NMI). (The sync source must be internal in this mode.) This would read out the controller like normal, but it would also have the side effect of ending out 8 clock pulses, one per bit that is being read. If you connect the NES controller clock line to the Gameboy's clock line, (and ground-ground of course) these 8 bits will be read by the Ganeboy as an incoming byte on the serial port. In LSDj's MIDI mode, this will be enough to synch the song.

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537 Reply by nitro2k01

(15 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

The demo version should clear the memory completely, but apparently this doesn't happen for some reason. In my test, at least the settings in the project screen were random (preserved) on the first boot. Not sure what's going on there. This sounds like a bug and I'll report it to Johan. This nonwithstanding, you cartridge may be faulty.

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538 Reply by nitro2k01

(20 replies, posted in Constructive Criticism)

A highly self-promotional and sarcastic post mentioning incest porn? I bet some fascist mod like nitro2k01 is going to close this thread soon.

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539 Reply by nitro2k01

(27 replies, posted in Releases)

So uhm yeah. Moved to the releases forum and edited title.

<- Boring weiner.

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540 Reply by nitro2k01

(11 replies, posted in Nintendo Handhelds)

Also keep an eye out for my flasher. While it's not a cartridge, it will be relevant to the market.

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541 Reply by nitro2k01

(27 replies, posted in Releases)

Everyone who still owns the old version with two tracks missing can sell it expensively as a rare collector's edition of an MP3 release.

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542 Reply by nitro2k01

(1 replies, posted in Product reviews)

Added h tags.

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543 Reply by nitro2k01

(6 replies, posted in Product reviews)

Added h tags.

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544 Reply by nitro2k01

(66 replies, posted in General Discussion)

My philosophy: If you want to be "real" use a hardware platform, with the limitations that this imposes and try to break those limitations by creative song programming. Or, if you want to approach it as a "style", use modern tools and impose artificial limits on yourself.

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