Making an Intellivision Cartridge

[+Yurkie]

I was wondering if anyone here could take the binary "system test" and burn it on an EPROM. Could this EPROM be soldered on a recycled cartridge board. I guess this is a super rare cart and I really want one after being loaned one to test some controllers that I straightened cords on. I would like to refurb intellivision controllers and straighten the cords and this seems like a must have.

 

Thanks in advance

[maximebeauvais]

2 or 3 years ago, I asked the same question to Joe.

 

he has created his own board IRC. he said that CC3 was the way to go

 

I will try to get his email and copy it here.

[jaybird3rd]

Unfortunately, the Intellivision requires a very unusual type of memory; a standard EPROM cannot be used without extra supporting logic. Chad Schell designed a new Intellivision cartridge board, and I believe this is the one that the most recent Intellivision homebrews (4-Tris, etc) have used. Or, as maximebeauvais suggests, you can use a Cuttle Cart 3.

[+Yurkie]

Unfortunately, the Intellivision requires a very unusual type of memory; a standard EPROM cannot be used without extra supporting logic. Chad Schell designed a new Intellivision cartridge board, and I believe this is the one that the most recent Intellivision homebrews (4-Tris, etc) have used. Or, as maximebeauvais suggests, you can use a Cuttle Cart 3.

 

Thanks for the replies.

 

Do you have contact info for Chad Schell? Is there anywhere I could buy a cuttle cart 3 other than second hand like on Ebay? I want the a System test cartridge for my own use, and have no intentions of selling it, I don't even care about a fancy reproduction label. Does a .pdf of a manual exist for this cartridge?

[jaybird3rd]

Thanks for the replies.

 

Do you have contact info for Chad Schell? Is there anywhere I could buy a cuttle cart 3 other than second hand like on Ebay? I want the a System test cartridge for my own use, and have no intentions of selling it, I don't even care about a fancy reproduction label. Does a .pdf of a manual exist for this cartridge?

The Cuttle Cart 3 is still available for sale directly from Schell's Electronics. It comes with its own cartridge label, and there is a downloadable manual on the website. The only other thing you'll need is an empty Intellivision cartridge shell.

[maximebeauvais]

here is one email from Joe:

 

I am in the process of designing a new cartridge board for the Intellivision. Intellivision is not like the Atari. You can't just desolder a ROM from an old game and solder in a new EPROM. That's why you don't find much information on the web about doing this. In fact, most of the information on the web was put there either by myself or Carl Mueller and Willy Moeller. :-)

 

Right now I'm doing a new board design for the Intellivision built around a microcontroller. If you were to follow my same approach, I can see a half dozen boards plus programmer setting you back $200 or more. I currently don't plan to sell blanks of my design, but if I did, you still would need to buy a $90 programmer to program them. That gets you up in the $150 range for a half dozen boards.

 

Alternately, you could just buy a CC3. When you factor in the per-board cost and the cost of the programmer and the effort involved to make a separate board per game, the CC3 looks much more attractive. And, it's available today.

 

here an other email:

 

Joe,

 

Thanks for all the info and your quick reply.

 

So I guess that since INTV is not as much popular as the atari 2600, I will not be able to find blank board for a nice price. What about all the homebrew game? Where did they get all the board? Did they use old game board with new eprom (rom) or they have created a new board from scratch?

 

Chad Schell designed the board that I currently use. All the existing homebrews use that design.

 

 

CC3 is a good idea but not as fun as creating a game

 

I was thinking of doing something similar to the picture (attach). I mean creating a cart with an eprom socket and I just have to change the eprom. Do you think that this could be done? I really think that this will be my best shoot for the moment !!!

 

Well, if you want to create something from scratch, that's not all that hard. The logic isn't too terribly involved for decoding the Intellivision's data/address bus. You'll need the following components in your circuit:

 

At least two 8-bit EPROMs or 1 16-bit EPROM. The 27C1024 EPROM is ideal for games up to 64K x 16. (Space Patrol is 16K x 16.)

Latches to hold the 16 bit address

Logic to decode addresses, since cartridges do their own address decoding

Logic to decode the Intellivision bus phases.

If you want to build this out of old-school TTL logic, you can use the schematics for the Mattel T-Card. This is what Mattel used for their EPROM carts:

 

http://spatula-city.org/~im14u2c/intv/dri/dri_9.txt

 

Note, that file uses old IBM extended ASCII. You'll have to dig around for something that knows how to display it. A DOS-based editor might.

 

If you look inside a homebrew cart, you'll see there's only two chips in there. One is the EPROM, and one is a CPLD. CPLDs let you program up a bunch of logic in software, and then use an EPROM programmer to load the logic into the chip. They're therefore much more convenient than old school logic.

 

Our cart design uses a Xilinx part. It has just enough I/O pins that we can support games up to 16K x 16. (The issue is that it can't latch the full 16-bit address. It can only latch 14 bits of it.) You'll want to get a larger CPLD or use two of them if you want to go to a larger game.

 

The other issue is memory map. Different games use different memory maps. So far, all the homebrews have used the same memory map. If you want to try to put other games on there, though, you might run into issues. So, you may need jumpers to select among various memory maps. This is similar to how Atari has all these different bankswitching schemes.

 

If this is the path you want to go down, I can give you the high level details you'll need. (In fact, most/all of them are on IntelliWiki or on m own Intellivision tech pages.) I'll leave the logic design to you, though.

 

 

 

I do not mind paying for the progammer, board...etc but I really want to go ahead with this projet.

 

I guess I'm not sure what the scope is of what you're trying to do.

 

How many actual game boards do you want to make? Just one, and then swap EPROMs?

 

Edited July 7, 2010 by maximebeauvais

[+Yurkie]

Thanks for the link. I don't really want to spend $150, but it sure does look sweet!!! Does anyone have the system test binary? Since my main objective is to have a working test cartridge I would want to have this binary prior to buying it. I was told there is a system test cart for the intellivision 2 also. Link to either or both of these binaries would be fantastic. I have had no luck searching for them on google.

[Rev]

yurkie, what are you looking for exactly?

 

i have a intv cart that says ' IMI 2 test cart'

 

it is a system and controller testing cart.

 

 

info on intv test carts: My link

Edited July 7, 2010 by revolutionika

[Rev]

Yurkie, here is a pic of it.

 

[+Yurkie]

Yurkie, here is a pic of it.

 

 

 

Is that cartridge for the Intv 2 or Intv 1 or both? Would you be interested in selling it?

[Rev]

Yurkie, here is a pic of it.

 

 

 

Is that cartridge for the Intv 2 or Intv 1 or both? Would you be interested in selling it?

 

 

 

 

 

Mattel service centers used the MTE 201 test cartridge as a diagnostic cartridge for the original Intellivision Master Component. It tests the hand controllers, sound, color and each chip on the motherboard. The cartridge pictured above used "V3" of Mattel's diagnostic software. It's impossible to decipher the test routine unless you have the Intellivision Service Manual. The IMI is believed to contain an early version of the MTE 201 test cartridge software. The IMI-2 test cartridge is believed to contain "V4.1" of the diagnostic software, which tests the Intellivision II. It has been rumored that a test cartridge exists to test the the ECS and Music Synthesizer but none has been found yet.

[+Yurkie]

Mattel service centers used the MTE 201 test cartridge as a diagnostic cartridge for the original Intellivision Master Component. It tests the hand controllers, sound, color and each chip on the motherboard. The cartridge pictured above used "V3" of Mattel's diagnostic software. It's impossible to decipher the test routine unless you have the Intellivision Service Manual. The IMI is believed to contain an early version of the MTE 201 test cartridge software. The IMI-2 test cartridge is believed to contain "V4.1" of the diagnostic software, which tests the Intellivision II. It has been rumored that a test cartridge exists to test the the ECS and Music Synthesizer but none has been found yet.

 

I would really like get have a reproduction made of the IMI-2 test cartridge. The test cartridge I was loaned and returned was labeled "system test" I want it to refurbish Intv controllers and straighten the cords. This is the only test rom I have found. If someone could put this rom on a cartridge for me, and it would work on an Intv 2 for testing controllers I would have what I am looking for. If someone has an extra test cart, or the ability to make a cart for me, I would be willing to refurb and straighten some cords as a trade.

IMI Test Cart (1978) (Mattel) !.zip

[Rev]

Mattel service centers used the MTE 201 test cartridge as a diagnostic cartridge for the original Intellivision Master Component. It tests the hand controllers, sound, color and each chip on the motherboard. The cartridge pictured above used "V3" of Mattel's diagnostic software. It's impossible to decipher the test routine unless you have the Intellivision Service Manual. The IMI is believed to contain an early version of the MTE 201 test cartridge software. The IMI-2 test cartridge is believed to contain "V4.1" of the diagnostic software, which tests the Intellivision II. It has been rumored that a test cartridge exists to test the the ECS and Music Synthesizer but none has been found yet.

 

I would really like get have a reproduction made of the IMI-2 test cartridge. The test cartridge I was loaned and returned was labeled "system test" I want it to refurbish Intv controllers and straighten the cords. This is the only test rom I have found. If someone could put this rom on a cartridge for me, and it would work on an Intv 2 for testing controllers I would have what I am looking for. If someone has an extra test cart, or the ability to make a cart for me, I would be willing to refurb and straighten some cords as a trade.

 

the guys at beeslife might be able to do it. or joe.: My link

[+Yurkie]

Thanks for the link. I sent Joe an email.