jedimatt42

You can only utilize a max of about 6 megabytes of the flash storage, as there is a file limit in the menu system. So don't get mislead looking at how much free space you have. 32k * 171 images, which in 4A terms is still massive. [email protected]

Having this fixed is pretty awesome. Having it broken for a while was also awesome, it opened my eyes to possibilities I wouldn't have looked at, had they not been temporarily necessary. One of the benefits of this cartridge, is how easy it is to play on real iron with hex-edited roms. I really only use my floppy disks when I have had to. So now a barrier has been opened up that I feel much more comfortable changing those DSK1. to HDX1. or DSK.DISKNAME.FILE to HDX1.DIRNAME.FILE... Anyway, what I am trying to say is: Thanks Ralph! [email protected]

Since I have built myself 3 of these, I went ahead and tried this, per your drawing Omega, and it works for me. [email protected]

I love it! [email protected]

That would be fine for programs that just load into expansion ram off the cartridge. However it wouldn't work for loading the favorites file from Stuarts browser, or the fblocks and font files for fbForth. TurboForth should work from this cartridge as well, and would have the same problem, as these programs all reside on the 32k ram in the cartridge at execution time. [email protected]

As for my sectors/diag output, I occasionally see a 22__ in the status output. The sector load is particularly slow too just before an error. It is perceptibly slower than I'm used too. When I remove the cartridge with the sector viewing program running from expansion ram, it becomes faster, and I don't see anything but 00__ in the status output. [email protected]

Ok, to close the loop, I get all of these same values.

That's great progress I'll steal a chance to confirm these results before bedtime... [email protected]

We can hope to dream I was just thinking, I'm glad I waited for my sockets and didn't just solder the 8515 into the board. I had to argue with myself Saturday while waiting for the sockets to arrive. Luckily, I won. Oh, I suppose if I was smart, I could compare some memory state when loading fbForth off of the Flashrom vs. the black-board-eprom... I should have time for that sort of thing on Friday. [email protected]

Anyone have the FlashRom 99 and one of the other floppy controllers? To make life easier on myself, I hex edited the fbForth 2.0:8 rom, so it would look on HDX1 for FBFONT and FBLOCKS. I only use my floppies/gotek when I really have to anyway So, I'm still very happy with my FlashRom 99 carts. So, a couple non-TI DSRs work. I wonder if Lee was on to something with the state of VDP/disk buffers? [email protected]

If you want to break ground, you might try a tripple throw switch to cut all the power sources to the card. ( maybe less throws if the card only uses fewer of the power lines... ) http://www.unige.ch/medecine/nouspikel/ti99/pebox.htm#Internal%20bus You might also get away with switching MEMEN, to temporarily lobotomize the board. Curiously, pin 12 is supposed to be PCBEN, the question is did myarc honor the that or not? I would guess nobody but TI did. I'm just guessing from the bus pinouts here. I'm also in desperate need of a SCSI controller for my Geneve, so if you want to just get rid of the WHT board, that could be a profitable option for you. [email protected]

The console writer test fails... writing to a disk, corrupts the disk, gloriously. I tried the floppy and the gotek. What a weird little program... click click click click... (oh, and I didn't specify earlier, but my 4A is an NTSC model.) [email protected]

Here is what I've done hardware wise: I've stripped the machine down to: 4A F18A PEB 32K TIFDC +80 track DSK1 - GoTek Hxc2001 firmware DSK2 - 3.5" FbForth is alone on the microSD card. DSK1 /w FBFONT, FBLOCKS, etc.. FBFONT loads corrupted most of the time. FBLOCKS reads corrupt and I rarely get the 'MENU' message. Sometimes I get the menu message, but the MENU command just produces a '?' DSK1 /w empty HFE DSK2 /w FBFONT, FBLOCKS, etc.. restart cart, no DSK1.FBLOCKS found. But forth works well. USEBFL DSK2.FBLOCKS 1 LOAD MENU and I get '?' 2 EDIT shows me a block with garbage binary at the top. Power down... Put TI RS232 w/HDX mod back in the PEB Power up... no DSK1.FBLOCKS found, GOOD! USEBFL HDX1.4TH.FBLOCKS 1 LOAD MENU (success!) 2 EDIT - block looks good, F4 all the way through, everything looks good. ( I also compiled DARKSTAR off of my HDX, and it compiled with only warnings about things that have now become resident in the cartridge. The game didn't actually run however... --- Is it possible the cart is responding on the data bus when the floppy controller is being addressed? Or the address bus? Lee - the assembly code for the menu is here: https://github.com/endlos99/flashrom99/tree/master/ti Maybe you can spot something. I'll pull the HDX back out for baseline, and try console writer now. [email protected]

Those errors actually look like successful loads. Some words on disk redefine resident words, and you get those warnings. The 64 column editor is purposefully overriding the 40 column one. [email protected]

Ah, thanks for that reminder! I have been testing hard reset back to TI boot screen and standard menu. But I'll try the solitary bin approach tomorrow. Tonight, I opened up my console, and put a power switch on my USB Adapter. Guessing that I'll always have this question in my head if anything goes wrong. It didn't help. So, I eliminated my USB Adapter, Speech, rainbow PEB extension, and still trouble with the TI FDC. Anyway, I'll try console writer, also my problem apps in single bin, and if that doesn't work, I'll strip my PEB of anything unnecessary tomorrow. I swear fbForth worked just fine for a few quick tests yesterday, and once this morning. I have two of your FlashRom 99 cartridges built. They both test to the same results. It sounds a whole lot like the same problem Omega has with 4ADOS. [email protected]

It didn't actually work that well on the game console ...

I was feeling alone. But now I feel I'm in good company! [email protected]

I'm also steeling power right off the supply for my keyboard adapter. When I get a chance, I'll have to add a toggle switch to the back of my console so I can power off the adapter. Oddly, disk I/O with the HDX interface works well, but with the TIFDC, input is scrambled, and output corrupts. This is how I know fbForth is working fine, and it is just my system. Hopefully no one else using it with a PEB is having this trouble. I would think the Gram Kracker also put far more load on power than this little cart. [email protected]

My problem is pretty inconsistent... but only happens with the flash rom cartridge. Anybody else have any ideas, how to diagnose it?

I removed my speech synthesizer, and the disk i/o seems to be improved, and fbForth works like it should. Which side powers the PEB boot at the console end of the flex cable? the console power supply, or the PEB power supply? It might be time for a flex cable card/boot tuneup... [email protected]

There was another thread actually on that... http://atariage.com/forums/topic/253095-flash-rom-cart-image-repository/ In there, you'll find the link to whtech where a repos has started: http://ftp.whtech.com/Cartridges/joined/ [email protected]

Ok, like a champ isn't quite right... right now I am having trouble with my disk I/O while using the flashrom cart. fbForth did work once well for me a few minutes ago. So I don't think my issue is a software one with fbForth. I am also having some disk I/O issues in DM2K loaded from the flashrom, but then the same disks were hosed when checked with the XB2.7 suite cart. Although the fbForth black board cart you made me is still working perfectly. I wonder if there is a power strain going on when I've got my USB keyboard, the F18A, and now the flashrom all having a party. I'll add more POWER and see what happens... [email protected]

Something that wasn't obvious to me was how is the menu created? Well, it looks like Ralph actually reads the menu entries out of the roms, so those carts like fbForth that have multiple menu entries for 80 column mode or not, or the web browser that has entries for different serial options, those all show up! There does seem to be a title length limit, you see in the flashrom99 menu for the really long entries in the web browser. 2 or 3 characters get cut of the end. [email protected]

Yep! It works like a champ! The non-inverted 32k image is perfect for it! [email protected]

I have a Geneve 9640 that is in desperate need of a bootable hard drive controller. If anyone has one they'd like to turn into money, please let me know! Thanks, [email protected]