AVG - Cart: A great multi-purpose cartridge with SD-card by TMP 2018. 1) short reference and overview: - loads CAR (up to 1MB), XEX (up to 1MB?), ATR (up to 512k?) and other stuff; with U1MB present it fully emulates SIDE cart; with or without U1MB it works with SIDE XEX-loader (S2loader.car) and SDX (SDX.car); with SIDE XEX-loader it can load PDM-player (PDM.xex) and playback 8Bit PDM files; and many more things... - ? shows the current version - shift-s enables IDE emulation and reboots; shift-s will reboot with IDE registers in cctl area enabled and no cart mapped - useful for u1mb machines, internal sdx and side loader should be able to access sd card as if it was IDE device (for machines without U1MB, there are two *.CAR files to load SIDE loader or SDX: S2loader.car and SDX.car) - press backspace to go to the parent directory - use arrow keys to navigate the list, use arrow keys with ctrl to jump to beginning/end of page/list - Enter and letters choose/execute item - Esc disables cart and reboots - shift-ctrl-u starts update; Note: start the update in the root directory, it requires a file AVGCARTA.UPD to be present in the root DIR to work - right button currently resets the loaded cart image but not xex - left button currently resets the AVG and jumps to the last directory used addendum for firmware 0014: no major changes except for some ATR improvements and search capability (and some important changes to SDX cart handling and better XEX compatibility!) -- ATR - OS.XEX was renamed to OSXEX so be sure to copy it from the update zip file (old one won't work since there were changes) - ATR files are now writable (it is strongly recommended having a backup of your SD card content just in case) - you can now map multiple ATR files (using TAB) to D1:-D4: and use right cart button to cycle between them - OPTION key functionality is inverted (so BASIC is off by default) -- search - use / to search for files (recursively down from the current dir) - ESC to cancel search - BACKSPACE to return to normal file listing HINT: If you search on an empty directory, press Backspace twice (2x) to see anything again 2) CAR loading: - various CAR image types up to 1MB can be loaded - press right button on the AVG cart. to reset the loaded CAR image 3) XEX loading: - use the built-in AVG cart. XEX loader and in case that one does not work (XEX crashes, shows garbage, etc.) alternatively use the SIDE XEX loader (S2loader.CAR) - note that since firmware 014 Option key is inverted (so Basic is off by default and holding the Option key will switch Basic on!) 4) ATR loading: - OSXEX must be present in root directory for ATR loading to work - uses RAM under the OS (a software or RAM-based OS), so only programs that do not use RAM under the OS will work fine - note that since firmware 014 Option key is inverted (so Basic is off by default and holding the Option key will switch Basic on!) 5) PDM player: - requires a) SIDE-loader (S2loader.car), b) PDM-player (PDM.xex) and c) PDM soundfiles - the player by FJC currently supports only mono (44khz, 8bit) - when the AVG menu appears, load programs a), then b) and finally c). - looks like the PDM player has a search function, use Shift+anykey to activate it (type in some letters and it will start searching) - press Control-B to go to the beginning of the DIR or filelist, press Control-E to go to the end of the DIR or filelist - PDM files can be created online with your browser and the great online tool "Fuji-Convert" by Xuel: https://lybrown.github.io/fujiconvert/ it will convert almost any soundfile (MP3, WAV, etc.) into the required PDM format (technically also known as PCM 4+4), in either mono or stereo and various khz rates, CAR/XEX/PDM/etc. formats; simply choose IDE-Player (flashjazzcat) for the PDM file to work with the PDM-player (PDM.xex), Gain is volume control (1.0=100% or no change, 1.5=150%, 2.0=200%, etc.); Duration is for the length of the file (-1 means the full soundfile); if you are using other carts or XEX you may want to limit the conversion to a max. size, for AVG cart. with PDM-player you can leave it at the max. size of 128M (megabytes!); resampling effort will reduce the (white) noise, but therefore conversion takes much longer! 6) SIDE XEX-loader: - with or without U1MB present, the SIDE XEX-loader (S2loader.car) will load various XEX files (even several XEX files that do not work with AVG cart. XEX-loader) - with u1MB present it may or may not have more functions (unknown to me, since I do not own a U1MB) - note that since firmware 014 Option key is inverted (so Basic is off by default and holding the Option key will switch Basic on!) 7) SDX emulation: - full (?) SDX emulation with SDX.car (with/without U1MB?) - no further knowledge here, since I do not own U1MB and rarely use SDX... 8) Movie Player: - put AVFplay in root directory - put movies from phaeron's "60fps on SIDE-2" topic into root or sub-directory Note: use 50fps movies for PAL and 60fps movies for NTSC! - make sure all movies are defragmented (contiguous on SD-card) and fitting to your A8 system, PAL movies will only play on PAL Ataris, while NTSC movies will only play on NTSC Ataris - playback works with up to 500k/s and 15khz sound (noisy!) - resolution seems to be limited to Gr. 9+11 currently (80x100 pixels) ----- AVGCART - the average SD multicart for 8bit Atari - supports CAR files up to 1MB (most bankswitching types are implemented, if you have any dump for type that is unsupported, let me know) - supports XEX files - supports ATR files (read/write) - support is limited due to cartridge port constraints - SIDE emulation (works with U1MB and SpartaDOS X) - firmware is upgradeable via SD card Keyboard reference: - arrows to navigate the list, with / jump to beginning/end of page/list - for parent dir - and letters choose item - to select multiple ATR files (right cart button to cycle them afterwards) - disables cart and resets Atari - shows current firmware version - for recursive search, use ESC to return to full navigation - enables SIDE CCTL registers and resets - creates a "tag" file (/_AVGCART/SIDE) on sd card that makes AVGCART boot in SIDE emulation mode on power-on - removes this file - right cart button pressed on power-on makes AVGCART to go to SIDE emulation mode Use left cart button to return to file selector (after reset), right cart button resets current cart's bank (also cycles ATR files) latest firmware is 0019 (changelog) flashjazzcat's SIDE firmware in AVGCART compatible CAR files (one enables SIDE emulation and runs SIDE loader, the other runs SpartaDOS X, use Shift-S to enable SIDE for use with U1MB) my older collection of CAR test files XEX files sources - http://www.mushca.com/f/atari/ - http://a8.fandal.cz/ sticker for the cart (courtesy of @Mr Robot) Unbricking information: here and here Nir Dary's demo of the cart