Please explain content of Atari 7800 cartridge ROM

[unebonnevie]

Hi,

 

I am mostly curious of the Atari 7800 ROMs. So, I downloaded one from the net. Looks like the below is Choplifter. And I think it's a 32KB ROM. Attached is what my programmer utility shows, the hex dump of the ROM.

 

Is the "ACTUAL CART DATA STARTS HERE" text in the ROM normal expected in the ROM?

 

Thanks!

 

 

 

[CPUWIZ]

The first 128bytes are for emulators, to describe details about the actual ROM.

[unebonnevie]

The first 128bytes are for emulators, to describe details about the actual ROM.

 

I see. So, if I were to burn the ROM into an EEPROM, e.g., the AT28C256 (a 32KB EEPROM), for the Atari 7800 to play, I need to skip the first 128 bytes.

[CPUWIZ]

Exactly

[jericho_21]

i have a question about A7800 ROMs. I can create a .BIN file for the 7800, but would I need to change the file extension to something else other than .BIN? If so, what file extension should I use to burn it to real hardware? I am curious. Thanks.

[+SmittyB]

As the file attributes are stored separately to the file itself, the contents of that bin file should always be a byte for byte copy of what would go on a ROM chip regardless of how it's named.

It may be the case that a particular burner uses different file extensions for different reasons but that would be specific to the burner used.

[jericho_21]

As the file attributes are stored separately to the file itself, the contents of that bin file should always be a byte for byte copy of what would go on a ROM chip regardless of how it's named.

It may be the case that a particular burner uses different file extensions for different reasons but that would be specific to the burner used.

I see. Thanks for the info.