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Posts posted by else

  5. Posted

    I believe there are actually two variations of the box that Video Game Addict posted. There is the silver lettered one that is shown, and there is also a white lettered one. They are both pretty rare to begin with, but the silver lettered one is from the very initial release of the 2600 and is the rarest.

  7. Posted · Edited by else

    Unfortunately Atari allowed the doom net code to be released (with a slight modification to it this would not have been a problem, it would have run equally "well" on a jaglink(full) as on a catbox(half) network, if only one packet was sent at a time).

     

    I don't see how you can blame Atari for not supporting the Catbox. The Jaguar is Atari's creation and they can do with it whatever they see fit. That's like blaming a car manufactuer because this years new model doesn't support after-market parts that are already on the market. It is the Catbox that should be blamed for not fully supporting the Jaguar, imho.

     

    As a jaguar coder whishing good gameplay for the jagscene, I am totally left on my own when it comes to just this, network code. I have to first reverse engineer the hardware just to figure out what the software should initialize the hardware to, because Nowhere! does anyone describe how to use the hardware in new software. Its like they want sole ownership of the right to use it, so that their product remains "unique".

     

    The reason there is no published information is that there is really nothing to tell. The JagLink, JagLink II, and Catbox are DUMB, DUMB, DUMB devices! You turn the Jaguar on and they are ready to go. There is no initialization that needs to take place whatsoever. They just provide simple hardware connectivity between Jaguars and nothing more -- they just broadcast what ever data the Jaguar gives them to the rest of the network.

     

    I don't own a Scatbox so I can't comment on it, but I would assume the same is true for it as well.

     

    Secondly I have to invent/debug all the software protocols myself, since this info was lost/never finished by Atari (dont get me wrong, now i have free hands & i like it =).

     

    This is true, but don't blame the hardware developers for it! It would be nice if all of the games supported some sort of standard protocol. That would open the door up for all sorts of possiblities, such as a hardware device that encapsulates these standard packets in a TCP/IP header and ships them across the internet to other gamers. But since the Jaguar predates the explosion of the internet, you can't really even blame Atari. So the existing games are what they are and the clock can't be turned back...

     

    Of course the flip side of every problem is an opportunity. So here you have an opportunity to define an open software standard for future game developers to follow!

  8. Posted

    I thought i understood how they worked, but now im not sure anymore… UNLESS a JL2 network has to be connected in a circle…. Does it?

     

    The JagLink II should never be connected in a loop (i.e. a circle). It will not physically harm anything, but I doubt the network will work because data on the wires will circle endlessly. The network topologies we have already discussed are exactly how things should be connected.

     

    If it has to then i understand in principle, but then there is a programming “restriction” I wonder about, how to get rid of the “echo” of the signal (which would return after one circulation of the net) … (if this is not the case then I dont understand how one can have a full duplex 232…

     

    It's magic, I tell you! [PINKEY FINGER IN MOUTH] Muhaaaa Muhaaaa Muuuuuuuuhhhaaaaaaaaaaa [/PINKY FINGER IN MOUTH]

  10. Posted

    If every netbox out there had full duplex rs485 with 1 net ground (as it is supposed to be for minimum noise) then there would be no problem, 256 jaguars (or whatever) up to 4Km apart (or whatever)... but now due to catbox.... ?! it becomes allot of fiddeling to get anything to work... (if it even works)..

     

    Better yet would have been full duplex rs485 network... but that would be yet another "standard"... though better from a technical point of view...  

     

    This is how the Catbox should have been designed, IMHO. Instead, as you point out the CatNet portion of it is a crippled design. And because it is a dubious prospect to ask people to throw out their Catboxes in favor of something done correctly, you really need to try to stay compatible with it in some fashion. This is why I chose to go with full duplex RS232. I could have gone with full duplex RS485, but that would have meant people would have needed to buy three new devices (at a minimum) rather than just one -- since as you point out it would have been a new standard.

     

    BTW anyone got any feeling for how many Catboxes, Scatboxes, JagLink2's were sold?

     

    Well, I will say that from my experience, unless you're writing the next blockbuster game you had better be in it for love and not money. Recovering your development costs will be a challenge....

  12. Posted

    JagLink 2's rock - I love mine icon_smile.gif Much more reliable than my standard JagLinks ever were.

     

    Thanks! Perhaps I used a better RS232 chip than Atari did?

     

    Anyhow, one neat thing about the JagLink II (if I do say so myself) is that you can go from playing N-way Aircars or Battlesphere to playing 2-way Doom without any recabling. The Catbox (and Scatbox?) can't because it uses RS485 which is half-duplex while Doom expects a full-duplex RS232 connection....

  13. Posted

    Ok.. i think i understand.. =) (except how 232 can be wire-ORed ;) ...

     

    Nothing is wired together. There is another chip on the JagLink II that handles the muxing and steering of the signals -- that's the secret ingredient! :D Actually, it's not all the complicated and if you saw a JagLink II you would probably be able to reverse-engineer it easily enough....

  14. Posted

    Ahh, I think you are correct -- I think the Scatbox can only be connected like this:

     

    JagLink, JagLink II, Catbox, or nothing <-----> 1 to N Scatboxes <-----> JagLink, JagLink II, Catbox, or nothing

     

    Like I said though, I'm only speculating here. I don't own a Scatbox....

  15. Posted

    hmm.. what specs does the scatbox have? ...is it rs232 compatible? ..and rs485... and all the standard video outputs i guess?

     

    My understanding of the Scatbox is that it can have as setup like this:

     

    JagLink, JagLink II, or nothing <-----> 1 to N Catboxes or Scatboxes <-----> JagLink, JagLink II, or nothing

     

    Someone please correct me if this is wrong....

  16. Posted

    BUT!.. is it compatible at all with any "N-player" setup? ..ie can you play, say Aircars (same version then =) in a 4player setup? .All using jaglink2's..even though it is "2player/rs232" based?

     

    Yes, absolutely!

     

    You network setup can to like this:

     

    Catbox, JagLink, Scatbox, or nothing <-----> 1 to N JagLink IIs <-----> Catbox, JagLink, Scatbox, or nothing

  17. Posted

    You are correct Derek. I recently acquired the KA version and attempted the networking just to "see". It didn't work.

     

    What a cruel trick that is, huh? You would think the might have wanted to document that somewhere...like in the manual perhaps....

  19. Posted

    One more thing to point out. There are two different versions of AirCars out there (the one with the parental warning and the one without). Supposedly these two versions cannot be networked together because they contain different networking code that is not compatible with each other.

     

    I don't own both versions, so I cannot confirm this. But other people have reported this problem on AtariAge.

     

    -Derek

  20. Posted

    Hi. I'm the developer of the the JagLink II, so I can answer your questions.

     

    1---Is it compatible with the Catbox?

     

    This gets a bit confusing because the Catbox has two modes. It is compatible with the Catbox when the Catbox is used in RS232 mode. The JagLink II is RS232 based just like the original JagLink. It is not RS485 based like the Catbox "CatNet" mode. However, because the Catbox RS232 mode has a different connector than the JagLink and JagLink II, you will need to make a custom cable. I can email you the details on how to make this if you want them.

     

    I have not tested it with the Scatbox because I do not have one. However since the Scatbox is compatible the JagLink and the JagLink II is compatible with the JagLink, there is no reason why this shouldn't work.

     

    2---Or is it only compatible with itself?

     

    Yes, of course!

     

    -Derek

  21. Posted

    I just discovered that Apple released their own video card for the IIgs. In addition to what the name implies, the Video Overlay Card from Apple also increased the IIgs resolution from 640x200 to 640x400. Of course, there were and still are some serious issues with using it for this purpose:

     

    1) Apple's toolbox firmware (Quickdraw II) doesn't support the new resolution.

    2) Apple's toolbox firmware "handles" are in the same area of memory as the RAM used by the video card for the image.

     

    Still, there were a couple of slide show programs that were released that would move te toolbox code somewhere else, load an image, wait a while, and the move the toolbox code back.

     

    Too bad Steve Jobs was so fanatical about killing off the Apple II line. The IIgs had so much potential that was never exploited! Anyhow, pretty funny that as an Apple II fan I only now learned about this now...

     

    -Derek

     

    Note -- this is not an April Fools joke. There is plenty of information to back this up by doing a Google newsgroups search on "Video Overlay card" and "640x400".

  24. Posted

    i'd like a disk drive so new coleco games could easily be passed around without the trouble of making them into carts.... sorta like a game doctor for the CV

     

    A Coleco Adam with a disk drive and the appropriate software can already do exactly that. And as a bonus, an Adam gives you composite video which the Colecovision does not.

  25. Posted

    But if you study the CV expansion port carefully, you will notice that it does have more lines than both the Adam or the Super Game Module used or would have used in fact.

     

    By the way, Coleco used the expansion port for more than what you have listed. They also used it for:

     

    1) The Coleco Atari 2600 adapter.

    2) The Coleco Adam Autodialer.

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