Waynetho

I just realized that I wasn't totally clear on my description of "Rom Smash". The reason the BASIC rom defeat and the cartridge images worked was that magical "loader" that was in the header of the dumped cartridge. The support software would ask one question, (DOS Needed?) and tailor the loader accordingly. The program would then determine whether the cartridge was 8K or 16K (nevermind the ones that have larger bank-switched memory like those from OSS). It would save the loader for that cartridge and DOS requirements and add the cartridge dump to the file after. When the loader started, it either said "INSERT DOS DISK and flip switch to 8K [*or "16K"] or just "Flip switch to 8K [*or "16K"]. The loader would be constantly checking the 8K and 16K high-byte for its inability to be changed (store, invert, read, replace if different than stored). Once the loader couldn't change the appropriate RAM position, it would start the load of the remainder of the file which was the cartridge dump. Since the BASIC rom defeat was also activated before the cartridge image is loaded, the RAM is available to hold the image. Then anytime the CPU was trying to write to memory (ANYWHERE), the cartridge selects were active, hiding the RAM in those locations. When the CPU wasn't writing to RAM, the ram was available in the cartridge area. The interesting thing is, the program relied on the ability to carefully plug in a cartridge (thus toggling the cartridge selects) WITHOUT locking up or rebooting the computer - and this worked most of the time on my 800XL and several others that I built the system for. It's all coming back to me now...

I'm not new to "invasive", although most of my mods back in the day were add-ons and they didn't require permanent modifications other than desoldering and replacing ram or socketing other chips. If I recall correctly, the most invasive I got besides a ram upgrade was when I installed my cartridge booby-trap defeat (I called "Rom Smash"). It's been 34 years since that mod but I still have one in my collection.of junk and the schematic and drawings. I just don't have the custom program I wrote that dumped the cartridges to files with a loader though.. "Rom Smash" was a combination of two separate circuits that worked in tandem. It was a built-in BASIC defeat that required pin 11 on the PIA be lifted with one wire attached to the pin and another to the socket, and a circuit that activated either the 8K (cartridge pin 14) or 16K (cartidge pin A) chip select when the CPU went into a write cycle (cartridge pin R), if the switch was in 8K or 16K mode. This effectively hid memory under the cartridge when it was in danger of being corrupted by any booby-traps in the cartridge. To this day I haven't cut a trace on any Atari.

NVM. I just found the freezer mod by Bob Woolley (Is that you, Atari Bob?) It requires 74HC chips and trace interruptions (cuts) so not as simple as I thought it could be.

Can the Antic pin 6 being pulled low work without the "Turbo Freezer" adapter being installed (assuming the "Freezer mod" is the same as the "Turbo Freezer" board I have seen online)?

It's possible but the link I found for DVI+Audio to HDMI converter is a bit pricey at $225.00 USD. Maybe there are other active converters that take DVI-D +Audio and integrate it together to the HDMI. http://www.vpi.us/promotions/new-dvi-hdmi.html

Am I the only one who gets an image from Sophia just fine, but the monitor displays an error over the screen until the OSD times out and then the screen goes to sleep? I have an HP S2031 (NTSC). I get a white box in the middle of a perfect Atari screen that says: Input out of range Change settings to 1600 x 900 60Hz If I go to monitor status it says: Current settings: H=62.8KHz V=60Hz Recommended settings: 1600x900 - 60Hz WTF does 62.8KHz by 60Hz mean and why does the monitor display it but not like it? Before someone states the obvious, yes I know the horizontal frequency is 62.8 KHz and the vertical frequency is 60 Hz. I mean in the scheme of things, what does 62.8KHz x 60Hz mean as far as resolutions?

It hasn't existed in many years but it was a small local BBS in McKinney TX called the McKinney Connection and it started out using a basic BBS software (can't remember what it was called, don't think it was FoReM). Then it was moved to BBS Express! Later after I moved to a PC computer I ran a "Remote-Access" system that was on the Fido-Net global network called "The Avenger". I haven't run a BBS since 1995. This is from the FidoNet node list I just looked up online, from 1990: 1:124/4207 Wayne Thomason Allen TX The Avenger

The resistor is only to prevent applying a hard ground to a hard voltage source. If you want to attempt this mod on an original 800, start with a 1k or 2k resistor and test to make sure it resets with that resistance. If it works, keep it, otherwise try a lower value (470 ohm for instance) until you find a value that works reliably. I just was always cautious about doing a hard ground to reset because I didn't want to blow anything up. The RESET pin though, is a PULLED UP signal (denoted by a line over the RST). If I'm not mistaken, the mainboard is designed with a pull-up resistor to keep this pin high.

That's weird. I started with a 400 in 1980 and as soon as I could afford one, I bought an 800XL and used it until retiring my Atari days in the late 90s. I could have sworn I did the reset pin thing on the 800XL but it must have been the 400 instead. I tested the pin-40 reset on my 130XE just down and it just acts like the reset button on the keyboard. Both had a lot of modifications. My 400 had a full-stroke keyboard and I built a 52k memory card from a kit and installed it. A fellow Atari person did a COMPOSITE VID/AUD mod on it. My 800XL had a hand-built Newell 256K clone (built from schematic), a homebrewed 3-OS switch-board (similar to Newell's Ramrod XL but using an easier to find 3P2T/Center-off switch instead), an external 1200XL keyboard and a small postage-stamp size board that would lock the RAM in the 8K or 16K cartridge area when selected so copies of "booby-trapped" cartridges could be run properly. I guess the reset button was on the 400.... My first floppy was a Percom that I upgraded with a DD data separator, an upgraded drive in the case and three DSQD slave drives connected via ribbon cable (I ran a bulletin board). Too bad there's not an easy way to set the "reboot on reset" flag without poking the memory location.

I've been reading several threads regarding various hard reset schemes people are using or have recommended and every method seems to be convoluted and complicated to deploy when back in the mid-80's many of my friends with Ataris and myself would simply run a momentary push-button switch through a resistor to pin-40 of the 6502 (Sally) chip that would pull the reset pin low while pressing the button. This always seemed to me to be the most elegant solution and the simplest as well. Since pin-40 of the processor is the RESET pin, logically this would be the right path. Since the pin is pulled high through a resistor already, pulling it low (to ground) through a lower value resistor will cause the processor to reset, thus rebooting the computer. The Atari users in my group of friends never had any failures due to this method of choice for hard resetting the Atari. Does anyone know why other more intricate or complicated methods are the only ones talked about now (methods that use TTL chips and focus on various other chips and pins)??

As a matter of fact, all it would take for this mod would be a little bit of adhesive to attach the 74LS07 to the UNO in "dead-bug" fashion (pins sticking up), the resistors and wires attached to the respective pins and insulated, then the unnecessary pins of the chip either folded over or clipped off.