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willbilly

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Posts posted by willbilly

  1. Posted

    Aha...DMA time. There's the bottleneck I was expecting. So, if I understand this correctly, MARIA halts the 6502 to read the DLL, determines which display list to generate, goes out and finds all the appropriate elements, then determines what pixels will be in the raster, and finally outputs the raster.

     

    Just trying to clear this up so I can theorycraft some more.

  4. Posted · Edited by willbilly

    Hi all,

     

    First post in the A7800 forum for me. I'm mostly a TI-99 guy, but the 7800 has interested me since I heard about it from this forum. I think it's a shame it never really had a chance to shine (kinda like my brother's Jaguar and my own Lynx). I've been reading a lot of this forum since then and although I don't have a 7800, I'm pretty interested in getting one and seeing what it can do, and what it could have done.

     

    I'm a machinist so I have tons of time to think when I'm doing a production job in front of the lathe. And yesterday I got to thinking about 320B mode and Nintendo's MMCs. From the software guide I gather Maria stops the processor while doing two jobs, assembling the Line RAM and then displaying. Unfortunately, while I understand some of what's happening, I don't understand most and I certainly don't grok it.

     

    So I came up with some questions:

     

    • Would it be possible to build an IC to mount in the cartridge that you could offload assembling the Line RAM to, and if you could, would that actually reduce the amount of time Maria has to use Sally's resources?
    • Would that make 320B viable for a full background including sprites?
    • Would it have been possible to do this in 1988-90? I'm trying to find a period correct solution. No ARM shoved into the cart. ;)

  9. Posted

    I used my Geneve some at my Dads shop in the 90's, tried to get him to go to using CNC machine' even found used equipment needing controllers and so forth, thought I might do some interfacing. But he resisted, though he did finally let me build him a PC to use for invoicing and viewing Auto-Cad drawings from customers- found he could not get prints from them, and design work. would have to clean it frequently.

     

    Hmm...maybe I'll get one of those mucked up TI-99s off of shopgoodwill and make an industrial case for it.

    • Like 1

  13. Posted

    I just did the early access system. If this succeeds, is there a way to get that SNES style controller added on?

     

    Brian actually posted an update about this on the KS. I went ahead and copied here for your convenience.

     

     

    First I would like to thank everyone for the great support we have received so far in surpassing 10% funding and over 100 backers.

    I wanted to let everyone know that there are options to upgrade individual reward levels.

    • For those who want to have the generic standard SNES controller added to their pledge or reward level, you would just need to adjust your pledge to add $10.
    • If you would like to upgrade from the loose copy of Sydney Hunter and the Caverns of Death to the CIB version just add $25 to your pledge.
    • If you would like to order multiple reward levels or multiple rewards of the same level, you just need to adjust your pledge to add the extra cost of the desired reward.

    The FAQ has also been updated with this information as well.

    When we send out the questionnaires we will ask/verify the desired rewards.

    Thanks,

    Brian

    • Like 2

  17. Posted

    I was gonna say that 10 year thing yesterday lol . 10 years and counting ... I bet this system will beat DKA out sadly . Some people just like to talk about things and then change things , make excuses , talk more , change things , make more more excuses and repeat . Nice to see this console coming together . When I first saw the photo of this console I thought of the Colecovision Flashback .

     

    In my defense, the design language of the original Colecovision is pretty rectangular. I had wilder ideas, but I thought they departed too far from the original for the majority of Coleco fans. The newest iteration has been refined and tweaked. Hopefully you'll find it a little more exciting.

    • Like 1

  23. Posted · Edited by willbilly

    Okay, I got the shell in, it works. I think it could probably use a tweak or two, but I think it's good to go. I'll post some pictures when I get back home tonight if I get home early enough. I'm also posting it on Shapeways for those of you who don't have a 3D printer.

     

    EDIT:

     

    Shapeways Link is HERE.

     

    There's no markup - it just costs a lot. I'm looking at ways to reduce the cost now.

    • Like 2

  25. Posted

    Hey folks, sorry for going dark. Got married last week. :)

     

    Here's some renderings of a 2X bottom shell. One has the 2X PCB in it, the other the 1x.

     

    It has optional stands for different length cart pcbs. You can see it in grey at the 1.5X position in the 1X PCB pic. I figure you can glue it in. Maybe I'll figure out a way to get it to snap together instead, just for added coolness.

     

     

    post-63287-0-62267100-1520193460_thumb.png

    post-63287-0-46952400-1520193477_thumb.png

    • Like 1
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