Chilly Willy

Yeah, old versions of the original Gens don't work. You need something newer. I'm surprised that you were using that instead of KEGA Fusion... I've never met a Windows user who WASN'T using Fusion. It's the linux or OSX folks who use the different emulators since Fusion was mainly a Windows app. You can also run the games in the linux/OSX version of Fusion (3.63), but the PWM audio isn't as good as under the Windows v3.64.

Both work fine on KEGA Fusion and Gens/GS r7, but the PWM might sound "funny" if you don't have 3.64 for Fusion and the DMA PWM patch I did for Gens/GS.

Yeah, but ALL controllers wear out eventually. As you say, the keypad can be handy for many things beyond the game - it's really handy for the homebrewers. I agree with the comment about the comfort of the controller - it's surprisingly comfortable... well, surprising after hearing that it was voted worst controller. All the Jaguar hardware and games are going up in price, so I decided to bite the bullet and get one before they got to ridiculous levels. The CDROM is already out of range unless I make some extra money elsewhere this year. Ditto for the ProController. The skunkboards (when you can find them) are priced to be "competitive" with the current CDROM prices... in other words, damned expensive! In case zerosquare gets delayed too long on his "cheap" board, I've started working on a preliminary design of my own "cheap" board... in this case, a board with just a mach4128 and an eeprom, and a connector for a GBA flash cart. I've tons of GBA flash carts, and I've been doing menus for similar boards on other consoles for the last couple years. So it's "cheap" IF you have GBA flash carts lying around.

Well, been here a while, just not in the Jaguar section. And I'll definitely be contributing. At first, it'll be tested via emulator, then as I get something to allow me to try it on real hardware, it'll be tested that way as well. I must say, the Jaguar is a VERY stylish console! I hadn't paid much attention to it at the time... had a SEGA Genesis/CD/32X and went straight to the PSX. I've been buying the older consoles as I get the chance, and I'm a bit surprised by how great the lines of the Jaguar are. Atari should have played that up more... "Cool kids need a cool looking console!" I also don't see how the controller got voted "worst controller ever" - that distinction goes to the N64. The Atari controller is actually really nice. Just wish I could find a ProController for less than $75!

I'd buy a new third-party 6-button Genesis controller (like $5 most places) and then put the PCB and cable in the SNES controller, running wires from the places the buttons were to where they are on the SNES controller PCB. Wire the four face buttons and shoulder buttons to A/B/C/X/Y/Z, the DPAD to the DPAD, and start/select to START/MODE.

Wolf3D/Spear of Destiny Shareware on the 32X, xrick for 32X, an up-to-date gcc toolchain with C/C++ examples for the MD and 32X, and a bunch of different examples for the MD and 32X, all with source and my blessings to use whatever you can in your own projects. All those things can be found at SpritesMind or SEGA-16. There's now a Genesis sub-forum here, so I've debated posting stuff there. Anywho, I was itching to make a port of Yeti3D-Pro to the Jaguar... while I'm still running into issues getting that to work on the 32X (lack of ram, mainly), it should be pretty easy to get it working on the Jaguar. I have plain Yeti3D on the 32X, not the Pro version. The plain version doesn't do slopes, uses sprites, and was geared toward the GBA. My latest 32X version has MOD music and sound effects. Yeti3D-Pro requires a LOT more ram than the plain Yeti3D... even though it still has code for the GBA, it won't work on it for the same reason I am having trouble getting it to work on the 32X - lack of ram. The other thing I'd like to mess with on the Jaguar is ogg-vorbis audio: I was able to get tremor running in real-time on the 32X on the Slave SH2 (mono 22kHz audio at 24 to 48 kbps). Given the relative merits of the DSP in the Jaguar, I'd bet I can get it running on the DSP even better.

Thanks. I just got a Jaguar and parts to make my own RGB cable. I've been looking at various flash carts for checking homebrew on real hardware, but they're pretty rare right now, or expensive. I've got an eye on the cheap flash cart from zerosquare, but it's on hold at the moment. A skunkboard is a bit more than I want to spend right now, especially after getting the Jaguar and a few games.

I had the same problem when I emailed... it's like the address isn't valid anymore. The web page was up to date, and it did say there were BJL adapters in stock, so I ordered one. Crossing my fingers...

The primary culprit on Genesis video not capturing properly is the video lines aren't a proper multiple of the color subcarrier. Lines are SUPPOSED to be 227.5 clocks per line (which is the source of the odd color problems NTSC has), but the Genesis uses 228 clocks instead. This shifts all the timing down to the frame rate, but CRTs are fairly immune to minor shifts like that. However, modern LCD TVs and capture cards often get thrown off by these changes, and either don't show an image at all, or show it wrong (bad/no colors, waving, etc).

Hehehe - yeah, I've got things on my TODO list that are nearly three years old. Sometimes it takes a while to get through the list. Hopefully it's one of those things that is easy to deal with and they do so right away so that they don't forget about it.

There's no difference in the HuCard as far as TurboGrafX vs SuperGrafX goes. I currently have the NeoFlash PCE flash card, and it works fine on my SGX. I'm looking forward to getting the Turbo ED... it should be MUCH better.

I've done a number of things for the Genesis and 32X - mainly toolchains and examples. They're posted over at SEGA-16 and SpritesMind, but I could post here as well if people think it would be helpful. If people have technical questions about the Genesis/CD/32X, I can handle that as well.

And if that's the case, you should be able to burn yourself another copy of the game and see if that copy loads. Sega CD had no piracy protection. That is correct. Just watch out for 1) crappy cheap media (cough - Memorex - cough), and 2) speed zones on the CD burner. Burn at the highest speed that doesn't jump in write speed as you progress in the writing. It should stay at the same speed, or GRADUALLY increase SMOOTHLY. Jumps in the write speed indicate your burner is switching speed zones for better write speed, and while (relatively) modern CDs can handle the jump when reading the CDR, old drives like in the CDX cannot. Basically, any CD that was rated for 6X or slower won't handle CDRs written with different speed zones without choking on the changeover point.

There was a similar question about games over at SEGA-16. It was resolved between several CDX owners (including myself) that all CDs work fine on the CDX. If there's a problem, it's with the specific disc (scratched, etc) or the drive is starting to go bad. Try a few different audio CDs, if you have trouble with some, it may be the drive, not the CDX.

It consists of six bytes, of which five are BCD digits and one is a biased binary exponent and sign. You can find the complete assembly listing for the standard FP package in the Atari Basic assembly listing found in various places on the net.

I wouldn't be too concerned about the specific revision of the motherboard but more on the other stuff you list below. I don't remember there being revs of the A500 that were tremendously better or worse than the others. The "Fatter" Agnus gave you two things: the ability to have more chip memory, and the ability to change the video mode (between NTSC, PAL, VGA, etc). The original "Fat" Agnus only supported 512 KB of chip memory and was fixed to either NTSC or PAL only. KS1.3 added: Support for the Fatter Agnus/ECS Denise so that you could change the video mode; KS 1.2 was hardcoded for either NTSC or PAL only. Support for AUTOCONFIG - this allowed you to boot harddrives connected to the side expansion port; KS1.2 required you to boot a floppy that in turn boots the harddrive. The Enhanced Chip Set made some minor changes to the Amiga hardware. You could change the video modes on the fly, do larger blits, and use more chip memory. The two chips affected were Agnus (Fat -> Fatter -> Obese) and Denise (OCS Denise -> ECS Denise). Paula was not changed in the update from OCS to ECS. The 1MB setup on an A500 is either 1MB chip memory with the Fatter Agnus, or 512KB chip memory + 512KB bogo memory. Bogo memory is also called slow memory. This 512KB of memory is accessed through Agnus, but cannot be used for video or sound data. Since it is accessed through Agnus, it has the same DMA slow-downs as chip memory, hence the reason people called it Slow memory instead of Fast memory. The absolute best configuration for gaming is 512KB chip memory + 512KB slow memory. A lot of early games were hardcoded to only expect 512KB of chip memory, so they don't take advantage of 1MB chip memory properly. At the same time, 512KB of slow memory was pretty common on the A500, so many games look for slow memory. The only complaint I was aware of for the A500 PSU was that the power switch was on the power block instead of the computer. That made turning on/off the computer a little irritating to some folks. What I did was plug the thing into a power strip that I turned on/off with my toes. The PSU for A1200 got many complaints because it was so wimpy that you couldn't hardly add anything to the A1200 without also upgrading the PSU. The A500 PSU could power the base A500 + a 512KB belly slot card + one extra external floppy. If you wanted more memory or external floppies, or an internal accelerator, you would need to update the PSU. External harddrives for the A500 came with their own PSU, so you didn't need to update the PSU for a harddrive. The A500 used a clock that plugged into the belly slot, if it used one at all. A clock was pretty rare on the A500 and I don't suggest bothering with one. Many 512KB ram boards for the belly slot do not come with the clock, and one isn't necessary for any game I'm aware of. So there should be no motherboard/battery issues with any A500. At worst, it would be a battery/belly slot expansion issue.

No almost about it - the Cyclone II is the basis for the Altera DE1 dev board, which runs MiniMig, an Amiga clone. It's overkill for a flash cart, but has great potential for things like an emulated SVP so people can run Virtua Racing for the MD on the Mega Everdrive. Like others, I look forward to the PCE cart. All the current PCE carts are limited in one way or another.

The main difference is the raycasting - Wolf3D casts rays in a fixed 64x64 grid where everything is a set height. Doom casts rays in a BSP tree that has coords that can range from 0 to 65535, and there are heights for the floor and ceiling. You can't "fake" it with a bunch of sprites, but you could simplify things enough to run on the A8. It would be slower than Project M, but look fairly similar. The main thing would be in cutting back the level size to something manageable. I could also see this requiring a LOT of ram.

Sorry about that. I tried to confirm my recollections of the reason behind it, but didn't have much luck with a search engine so I just went with what I could recall. No problem. I only know because I actually tried it on my MD with the NeoFlash Myth and looked into the result.

Just a mention, when colluding, you only need to buy/sell one unit at max price to set what all the rest is worth. Make sure SOMEONE is set with enough money to buy one unit in the last round. We occasionally had a colony fail because everyone went all-in, but we wound up with no one with enough money to buy one unit of crystite. Generally, one player takes one for the team and handles making all the food and energy. They make a LOT of money in the last few rounds selling food and energy, but often come in last when the collusion drives the crystite prices to the max.

Yes, it's the VDP that is the issue, not the Z80. SG-1000 games play on the Genesis, but the Genesis VDP lacks the TMS9918 modes the SG-1000 uses, so you get a black screen. You can hear the game running just fine, but you get no video at all.

Using collusion on buying/selling Crystite for the final round is the key to high colony scores as it's the commodity that goes up the fastest. In fact, since neither energy nor food is a consideration for the final round, stockpile food and energy a few rounds earlier and convert ALL plots to crystite for the final couple of rounds regardless of the assay result. Even one unit of crystite will be worth far more than any amount of food or energy. Sometimes you'll guess wrong on the food and energy and the colony will fail in the final round, but this is the key strategy to high scores.

Yeah, it's pretty sweeping. A bit of an exaggeration, but not by TOO much. Fact. Just google them. They've also made 60 Minutes and every other similar program over the last couple decades. I'm VERY surprised you haven't heard of them before. When most people are asked about GM food, that's the first name that comes up due to their shenanigans.

This. 99% of the problems today have a lawyer at the root trying to make a buck. I'm not saying 99% of lawyers are that way, just that the few that are make 99% of todays woes. You don't even need to dig to find the lawyer at the root in most cases... they're right there in the thick of it, usually. Examples please. Patent trolls and abuse of copyright (RightHaven is a prime example) are two that most computer folks follow. Those are examples where lawyers don't even hide the fact that they are just parasites on the economy. Abuse of patents is rampant in many other fields, particularly GM crops. Google Monsanto for one of the worst. I had to look those examples up. It's pretty absurd to say all Lawyers are assholes and are responsible for 99 percent of todays woes. Seriously, come on. I find it pretty offensive too, since my brother and his girlfriend are both lawyers and are great human beings. But, you are free to have your opinion. What's wrong with the Monsato thing anyway? I've only read one article, am I missing something? Anyway, you think lawyers suck, then don't ever use one. Pretty simple. You're getting a divorce? Don't use a lawyer etc etc. Way to fail reading comprehension. Look at the bold text... I said THE FEW WHO ARE. As to Monsanto, they often drive uncovered trucks past fields, with seed blowing out of the bed, and plant their own crops in fields adjacent to regular crops, which bees then cross-pollinate. Monsanto then sues the owners of the fields claiming they've "stolen" Monsanto's GM crops. They're really nasty in court. That reminds me of a quote from Oliver Stone: Except it often doesn't work that way in real life since we are dealing with finite resources and limited abilities. In such a case, thermodynamics requires a LESS THAN SUM ZERO outcome - not only are there winners and losers, but the losers MUST outweigh the winners by at least the level of inefficiency in the system. A rising sea lifts all boats, yes, but it also puts the shoreline property owners into shelters, destroying their property. What's good for "boats" may be extremely bad for everyone else.

I don't own an Everdrive myself, but I'm willing to bet money that's the case. The Genesis version of Virtua Racing has extra hardware built into each cartridge to support the game's 3D graphics. The Everdrive would need this hardware as well, or have some ability to emulate it. It's the same reason why most Atari 2600 flash cartridges can't play Pitfall II. The 32X version comes in a standard 32X cartridge, with nothing extra added. This - the MD version of VR has a DSP in it called the SVP. It's a Samsung SSP1601 DSP used to help render the polygons. It also has an extra 128KB of DRAM in the cart as well. The 32X VRD is a plain 32X game and works fine on flash carts.