Ksarul

Emperor Ken's artwork is always interesting and fresh. . .many thanks for preserving the manual.

The Suncom was actually a pretty good controller. . .

I put my name in to order some of these, as I have a lot of random printers that use them.

Likely that the 32K RAM is required, although it occupies the same part of the memory map as the ROM, so I'm not sure why its needed. No idea on the BIOS, unless it includes something like the later version of GBASIC.

I was looking through some sold listings from Yahoo! Japan tonight and saw an auction I'd missed. It was only a 24 hour auction--but what an auction it was. It had a Pyuuta (boxed) and all 26 Japanese game cartridges, boxed, with manuals where appropriate. All of the cartridge boxes were crisp, collectable examples. The part that made it notable was the price though--it sold for just 65,000 Yen, which is around 35 to 40 percent of normal retail, just for the cartridges in the condition shown. Several of the cartridges and manuals are near-unobtainium, so whoever won this got a definite steal.

Based on your serial number @retroclouds, yours is actually a relatively early production Pyuuta Jr. The highest serial numbers I've seen for a Pyuuta Jr were in the 22,000 range, and started with a ZVRV prefix. Note also that there is a tape adapter for the Pyuuta Jr as well, although it is rarely seen in the wild (I've only ever seen three of them sold). I probably need to open mine up to see what is inside the cartridge. . .

The Berlin PEB Speech card (an adapter for the speech synthesizer to put it into the PEB) gave a power-up greeting in German. Only about 25 of these cards were built, however. I do have one in my collection that I bought from Winfried Winkler's original production run. The SNUG SPVMC also uses a lot of the code from this card (I just don't remember if it presents the German greeting or not).

The English version of BASIC is known as BASIC-1 in Japan. It comes in a standard cartridge case for the Pyuuta Mk II (I have one) and as a plug-in for the expansion port for use with the Pyuuta (I have one of these as well). The version for the Pyuuta also comes with a whole-keyboard blue overlay, and includes a Centronics Parallel interface. It does not work with the Mk-II. There is a separate Centronics Interface for the expansion port that works with the Mk-II (and which should also work with the US Tutor). I also have one of the Centronics interfaces. They rarely show up for sale (I've seen two in the last ten years), so finding one will not be easy. There is a homebrew schematic for one in the old Tutor User's Group newsletters though, so I might take some time to make a layout for it at some point. Cartridge ports are a bit of a mixed bag. The Pyuuta and the Tutor have the same cartridge port pinouts--and neither will run a 3d cartridge without the Game Adaptor (or the modern homebrew variants thereof). The Pyuuta Mk II and the Pyuuta Jr. both have the additional lines to the cartridge ports--and will run 3D games without any additional hardware.

The patterns for the original graphics are in the source code for Parsec. You can find that in the resources thread. Paul Urbanus and I took a somewhat passable copy of the source code and turned it into a complete, modern file a few years back.

All of them were released on disk by Comprodine.

I have not received a confirmation yet--and I ordered three of the cartridges.

The only one of Quinton Tormanen's programs I've ever seen converted to a cartridge image is War Zone II. That conversion was done by Rasmus.

Get well soon, my friend. . .

I used Barry Boone's method to add to the TOMY library on the Geneve a couple of years back. I modified a number of the Japanese Pyuuta games that didn't exist on the US Tutor (his method worked with 8K and 16K files, but I don't think it worked for the 32K files).

Tomy made three things that used the Expansion port: The Game Adaptor (their spelling), the BASIC-1 Interface for the Pyuuta (includes a Centronics Parallel Adapter), and the Centronics Parallel Adapter (for the MK-II and I still have to test mine with a Tomy Tutor, but it should work there too). There was also a homebrew Cenronics Adapter publicized in the Tomy User Group newsletters BITD. Other than a modern incarnation of the Game Adaptor, and now the new multi-cart, nothing else has really used the port.

There are two different BASIC-1 cartridges. The one for the Pyuuta plugs into the back (like the Game Adaptor) and includes a Centronics Parallel Interface. The one for the Pyuuta MK-II looks like a standard cartridge and plugs into the cartridge port. The MK-II has a standalone printer interface box that also plugs into the expansion port--that was sold separately from the BASIC-1 cartridge. I have all three of these cartridges/interface types in my Pyuuta collection. I am missing a number of the Pyuuta cassette tapes though. . .and then my collection will be complete.

I have seen TI test cartridges of The Attack and at least one other cartridge that used the blob-on-board surface mount technology, and several of the prototype PEB boards also included options for pick-and-place surface mount components (resistors and capacitors).

Note that there is also one of the CC-40 cartridge development devices up for sale on eBay right now. I've seen four or five of them in the wild over the years (I already have one, and I think it may even be the same software revision). I have to look to see what documentation came with mine (if any).

Tutor/Pyuuta stuff shows up pretty regularly, and lots of random 99/2, 99/8, Cortex, CC-40, and even occasional Marinchip S-9900 posts come out of the woodwork. It may not end up being as high traffic as the main forum, but it will definitely be a good place to gather data on all these systems.

Is this one going to have Door Door on it? It is the only cartridge game I know of that isn't on the list . . .

I found an Intersil chip that is listed as a suitable substitute. My usual sources don't have any MM58274s in stock. cdp68hc68t1e.pdf Note: this chip is a functional equivalent, not a drop-in replacement.

Now that is some excellent news. Many thanks to you for hunting it down, Al.

I have to build some more of those soon, as I only have one or two assembled cards in stock right now (plenty of bare boards though).

The blue and white cover with the old-school printing press on it was the manual for Asgard's Press program. The functional version of the program was never completed by Charles Earl. The TPA manual scanned here matches mine. The Avanti99 never made it into production, as the Forth processor on which it relied was cancelled before Mike could get more than a couple of sample chips. He also produced a couple of other programs: The Geometer's Apprentice and HQ Stacks. He passed the software rights for all of his programs to Dee Turner (TR Software) in the mid-nineties, who kept them available until about 2005 when he sold off his TI and Geneve equipment.

Let's all chill a bit please--this is a hobby, and it should be a fun thing. We don't always agree with each other, but don't let a simple disagreement on any given subject @Jack the gamer 3 ruin your enthusiasm for the hobby. You are young, you have energy, and your responses are not always as mature as those from some folks here--and THAT'S OK! Be who you are--just like the rest of us are. That is what makes us a community. We all do what we do out of love for our favorite systems (or games). I like pretty much anything that runs on a TMS99XXX processor (they were made by TI)--and most of the folks here don't. That's OK too. I learn stuff from the rest of the folks here all the time. That's community too. I LOVE THIS PLACE! Marble Madness was never translated for my systems, but maybe it will be some day, and then I'll get to play a bit with it too. . .on one of my favorite systems. My wait will definitely be much longer than yours, I think. I'm still waiting for a good port of Joust!