Ok I got my coco-flash from retro-innovations..now what

[+arcadeshopper]

Came in a box with the board in a static bag, an invoice and a disclaimer sheet about license.. that's it..

 

It boots up after i hold reset for a bit.. get the menu, can load dos from it (yay no more cloadm) and that works..orchestra loads, and so does the two images on it for buzzard and temple of rom..

 

There's a youtube video from Barry showing it works with the menu and stuff but no data on how to actually flash roms into it..etc. what the buttons do? what kind of audio cable is needed for the orchestra port (I assume that's the headphone jack port).. i plugged in a stereo to rca adapter and its playing music out my monitor so that works

 

 

Greg

 

[+arcadeshopper]

ok I got more information on how to program it from Barry documentation and tools are forthcoming.. i got some basic tools to try and create cart images and flash them editing the menu is easy its all in basic and then programmed to a rom slot on the card

[Nebulon]

What is this product?

 

Is there a website with more information on it?

[+arcadeshopper]

here is the product: http://store.go4retro.com/cocoflash/

 

It's so new.. that there's little/no formal documentation.. I have been successful in programming mine with cartridge images it came with the drivewire rom as one of the defaults so it is easy to set up a drivewire server to transfer data

 

specs:

 

CocoFLASH is a multi-ROM cartridge system for the TANDY Color COmputer Models 1,2 and 3.

The unit offers the following features:

• 8 Megabyte of FLASH ROM storage, enough for 1000 8kB ROM images, or 512 16K images
• 64kB of EEPROM storage (for game save storage, or other data)
• Orchestra 90 compatibility (including stereo out capability)
• 2 user defined switches
• 1 user defined LED
• cartridge bank support (ala RoboCop, up to 1MB cart size)

Firmware features:

• requires only 4 bytes of IO space
• IO base register can be modified by software to anywhere in $ff40-$ff7f)
• IO registers can be "hidden"
• Optional Robocop "offset" register
• dual offset capability (master 4kB bank register + optional 16kB offset register)
• programmatic "autostart" capability
• Manufacturer and Device ID registers

I have tested the orchestra portion and it works well. I've also successfully loaded two 16k cart roms and two 32k roms in mine.. Some conversion was required to make them loadable they have to be broken up into 16k blocks and load at a specific memory address: cartridge images must be converted to CoCo format .bin files that load at &H4000 to use with the writing software.

The menu system is a basic program and is easily modified and reflashed onto the device.

some photos:

[Nebulon]

BINs: (if you click on ALLBIN.ZIP you'll save yourself a lot of time since it contains the whole list)

 

ftp://maltedmedia.com/coco/SOFTWARE/BIN/

[Nebulon]

I don't suppose you could write a quick little point-form text tutorial on here describing how to transfer BIN files/ROMs to the CoCoFLASH, could you?

Edited March 26, 2017 by Nebulon

[+arcadeshopper]

sure.. first you determine if the binary is 16k or less. if so copy the bin to a coco disk file i used the mess disk tool attached below

after renaming the file to xxxxxxxx.bin i moved it as binary/binary to the disk i also have attached here, it has the flash utilities on it for the card

if the binary is > 16k then you need to split it into 16k chunks, I used linux split which makes it stupid easy split 16k filename destfilename and program it in 16k chunks with the 2nd bank FIRST another message will detail this process

 

then i mounted the disk file in drivewire as drive 0

 

then the file needs to be converted to have the correct start location using this basic program:

 

10 CLEAR 200,&H3FFF:CLS

20 OPEN “D”,1,”YOURFILE”,1:FIELD #1,1 AS F$

30 FOR X=1 TO LOF(1):GET #1,X:CLS:PRINT X:POKE &H3FFF+X,ASC(F$):NEXT X

40 CLOSE #1:SAVEM”ROMBIN.BIN”,&H4000,&H7FFF,&H4000

50 PRINT”DONE! CONVERTED FILE IS NAMED ROMBIN.BIN”

this will save rombin.bin on your disk

then you run "prgflash" off the disk, enter the filename rombin.bin and it will say "your file is 16k" suggest a bank number to start with based on the first available 16k bank and you just select that and the size 16k and away it goes:

once this is flashed you need to note the start bank number and edit the menu program saved on this disk to have your menu entries on it.. the data lines from 10000- are pretty easy to follow "name",start,type for each flashed rom. I know type 2 is for bank switch carts larger than 16k

once you have edited menu.bas you type RUN 60000 and it will create the binary 4k file on the disk for flashing the new menu over the old ..and you flash this to bank 0 using prgflash.bas

wimgtool-0143.zip

prgflash.dsk

[+sm3]

Wow this is cool! I've purchased a lot from RETRO Innovations for my Commodore 64, but this is the first time I've seen something made for another platform. I'll have to give this a shot myself.

 

I would expect 3d printed cases to be available from folks soon as well.

 

Thanks for the post.

[Nebulon]

 

sure.. first you determine if the binary is 16k or less. if so copy the bin to a coco disk file i used the mess disk tool attached below

after renaming the file to xxxxxxxx.bin i moved it as binary/binary to the disk i also have attached here, it has the flash utilities on it for the card

if the binary is > 16k then you need to split it into 16k chunks, I used linux split which makes it stupid easy split 16k filename destfilename and program it in 16k chunks with the 2nd bank FIRST another message will detail this process

 

then i mounted the disk file in drivewire as drive 0

 

then the file needs to be converted to have the correct start location using this basic program:

 

10 CLEAR 200,&H3FFF:CLS

20 OPEN “D”,1,”YOURFILE”,1:FIELD #1,1 AS F$

30 FOR X=1 TO LOF(1):GET #1,X:CLS:PRINT X:POKE &H3FFF+X,ASC(F$):NEXT X

40 CLOSE #1:SAVEM”ROMBIN.BIN”,&H4000,&H7FFF,&H4000

50 PRINT”DONE! CONVERTED FILE IS NAMED ROMBIN.BIN”

this will save rombin.bin on your disk

then you run "prgflash" off the disk, enter the filename rombin.bin and it will say "your file is 16k" suggest a bank number to start with based on the first available 16k bank and you just select that and the size 16k and away it goes:

prgflash.jpg

once this is flashed you need to note the start bank number and edit the menu program saved on this disk to have your menu entries on it.. the data lines from 10000- are pretty easy to follow "name",start,type for each flashed rom. I know type 2 is for bank switch carts larger than 16k

once you have edited menu.bas you type RUN 60000 and it will create the binary 4k file on the disk for flashing the new menu over the old ..and you flash this to bank 0 using prgflash.bas

 

Thanks!

 

I see that an interface for this really doesn't exist at this point. This will take some playing around to get right (for me at least).

 

Oh well, all part of the adventure...

[Nebulon]

Wow this is cool! I've purchased a lot from RETRO Innovations for my Commodore 64, but this is the first time I've seen something made for another platform. I'll have to give this a shot myself.

 

I would expect 3d printed cases to be available from folks soon as well.

 

Thanks for the post.

I'm really hoping for cases to become available too.

[+arcadeshopper]

John said he's working on a case. Which would be great his SDC case is awesome I just heard my SDC is on it's way too

Greg

[+arcadeshopper]

Ok lots more info on this device, it is a great multicart and orchestra replacement.. this is a docx zipped as atariage wouldn't let me just upload the docx

 

 

 

 

Coco Flash Guide.zip

[Nebulon]

Thanks very much for creating a document for this. I read the entire thing.

 

But because my brain is too feeble to understand all of it, I guess I need an example for my particular case.

 

I have a 128K CoCo 3, a disk drive, and the CoCo Flash unit.

 

Sadly, I don't have DriveWire and I also don't have a Y-cable or a MultiPak.

 

How would I add two 32K games to the flash unit. For example Cashman and Time Bandit (you could pick any two 32K .bin files for your example).

[Nebulon]

Anyone have an example of how to add programs to the CoCoFlash.

 

For example, how was Buzzard Bait (32K) added to it?

(maybe a simple step-by-step instructional?)

[Barry Nelson]

Came in a box with the board in a static bag, an invoice and a disclaimer sheet about license.. that's it..

 

It boots up after i hold reset for a bit.. get the menu, can load dos from it (yay no more cloadm) and that works..orchestra loads, and so does the two images on it for buzzard and temple of rom..

 

There's a youtube video from Barry showing it works with the menu and stuff but no data on how to actually flash roms into it..etc. what the buttons do? what kind of audio cable is needed for the orchestra port (I assume that's the headphone jack port).. i plugged in a stereo to rca adapter and its playing music out my monitor so that works

 

 

Greg

 

 

The support software and documentation is available here...

 

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B8RnV5G0TZFZTFVlVHlWVHRreTg