Urchlay

If you're wanting to use the disk from within BASIC, the main commands you need to know are: SAVE "D:WHATEVER.BAS" - saves your BASIC program LOAD "D:WHATEVER.BAS" - loads a BASIC program from disk RUN "D:WHATEVER.BAS" - loads a BASIC program and runs it (shortcut for LOAD followed by RUN). DOS - takes you to the DOS menu, from whence you can delete, rename, etc. Make sure you remember to save your program before doing this, or else turn on MEM.SAV from the DOS menu (only need to do this once per disk). When you're done with DOS and want to return to BASIC, use the "B. RUN CARTRIDGE" option. Plain old Atari BASIC doesn't have any easy-to-use commands to do DOS-like things like get a disk directory or delete a file. You can use XIO commands from within your programs to do most of the DOS menu functions, or use an enhanced BASIC with disk commands. I recommend Turbo BASIC, if you have an XL/XE machine. On an 800, look into getting a BASIC XL or BASIC XE cartridge. With regular Atari BASIC, you have to type a long annoying command just to get a disk directory. From memory: OPEN #1,6,0,"D:*.*":FOR I=0 TO 1E10:GET #1,A:PRINT CHR$(A):NEXT I ...you'll get a directory, then an ERROR- 136. Type "CLOSE #1" to clean up. In Turbo BASIC, you just type "DIR"... much easier to deal with.

I've used my CC2's serial port a good bit for 2600 projects. I love coding for the 2600, even though I hardly ever finish anything I start... before I had the CC2, I used an emulator for the edit-compile-test cycle, and an EPROM burner and cart for testing on real hardware when I thought I was ready. With the CC2, I can test the code immediately on real hardware, no need to rewrite code that worked in the emulator but failed on the real thing. Of course, the emulator is still useful: the CC2 has nothing like Stella's debugger. (Wouldn't it be cool if it did, though? *drool*)

Actually, the development mode on the CC2 just lets you send ROM images from your PC/Mac to the CC2 over the serial port. Very useful for developers testing code, but also useful for non-developers. Lots of work-in-progress homebrews, hacks, and "please help me with my kernel" test/demo ROMs get posted to the AA forums. It's nice to be able to load them into the CC2 in "developer" mode, just to see what they do, without having to unplug the MMC from the CC2, and without making the test ROM part of your permanent CC2 menu. That said, I can see the other point of view: if Chad had made a version of the CC2 with the MMC slot but without the serial port, and priced it somewhat cheaper, most people would have been happy with it and would never miss the serial port "developer" mode. The other thing about programmable vs. non-programmable multicarts is the legal/ethical side of it: With a pre-programmed multicart full of ROMs, you're buying "pirated" software. Is it really OK for someone to download a bunch of copyrighted game code written by someone else (a long time ago, maybe), burn it to an EPROM, and sell it? Is it any different from buying a blank, programmable multi-cart and filling it with ROMs yourself? Different people are going to have different answers to this, but it's at least something to think about.

Actually, the graphics routines are in the OS, not BASIC. You can get the OS source listing here: http://homepage.ntlworld.com/kryten_droid/...0050912.lst.zip ...or buy the "Atari 800 Technical Reference Notes" from B&C Computervisions, http://www.myatari.com (part number BKA046). Either way, the actual drawing code is near the end of the listing (search for the string "BASKETBALL", or look on page 120 of the listing). Actually, if you know the Atari fairly well and can read 6502 code, I'd recommend reading the whole listing, start to finish. It'll take a while, but you'll end up understanding a lot of things that were mysterious before.

Here's how I do it. It's not the only way, and probably isn't the best way, but... ; Assemble this with: dasm junk.asm -f3 -ojunk.bin processor 6502 include "equates.inc" ;If you don't have an equates file, at least define RUNAD: ;RUNAD = $02E0 ; If you use an init routine, you'll need this too: ;INITAD = $02E2 LOAD_ADDR = $8000; or wherever you want org LOAD_ADDR-6; make room for 6-byte header ; 2-byte Atari executable header: byte $FF, $FF; let DOS know it's a binary load file ; start of first segment ; 4-byte segment header: word LOAD_ADDR; Load address word endbin-1; Last byte to load ; Rest of segment contains code and data org LOAD_ADDR; not really needed, guards against errors in header ; You can put data tables before the code if you want: ;YOUR_TABLE byte yourdata1, yourdata2, etc ; If you prefer, you can put subroutines before the main entry point: ;DO_NOTHING subroutine ; RTS ; Main entry point. This is where your code starts executing after it's loaded: main: lda #0 ; replace this junk ;sta whatever; with your code ; ...rest of your code/data here endbin ; end of code/data segment, start of run address segment ; 4-byte segment header: word RUNAD ; load address (loading into RUNAD lets our code run) word RUNAD+1 ; Last byte to load ; Segment data contains 2 bytes (the actual run address) word main ; the 2 bytes to stuff into RUNAD ; That's it... The example is for a simple executable with one segment full of code/data, and one containing the run address. You could easily extend this to use multiple segments, including one that loads at INITAD (which will get executed as soon as it's loaded: do an RTS to continue loading the file). There are a couple of rules to follow: - DASM requires that the origin (program counter) always increases, at least when you run it with -f3. If you're doing multiple code segments, the one with the lowest address has to come first. - For code segments after the first one, you'll want to use RORG instead of ORG, otherwise you'll end up with a non-functional mess instead of a loadable executable I haven't yet written anything with DASM that needs multiple code segments, so there might be more "gotchas" than that. The other approach to creating a multi-segment Atari exe with DASM is to assemble the file with -f2 instead of -f3. This produces an object file with a structure similar (but not identical) to an Atari exe file. You can write a program (in C, or perl, or whatever language you like) that turns this into a valid Atari file: - DASM doesn't use the $FF, $FF prefix, so you'd have to add that - Instead of storing the start and end addresses in the segment header, "DASM -f2" stores the start address and the segment length (in bytes). It would also be easy to modify DASM to output Atari exe format directly (assuming you know a little C). In -f2 mode, you'd just directly ORG your segments where you wanted them: processor 6502 include "equates.inc" org $8000 main: ; "main" is your entry point, and could be defined in any segment ; code ; code org $7000; Note: $7000 < $8000, DASM only allows this in -f2 mode ; more code/data ; whatever org RUNAD; or "org $02E0" if you don't define RUNAD = $02E0 word main You'd assemble that with "dasm file.asm -f2 -ofile.bin", then run your (hypothetical, so far) program that turns file.bin into a valid Atari load file.

I'm sure you've already thought of this, but RSI is a terrible name for a joystick... It stands for Repetitive Strain Injury, and one way to get it is from using a joystick. (However, I'm sure it's a good controller... I'll find out soon, I recently bought a Radica Space Invaders for under $10 at a local store)

You can just rename it. It still may not work (mapper might be unsupported), but at least it'll try. Nice. I should actually play the game some, I'd never seen it before... it looks like it might be fun, if I weren't trying to control the car with the keyboard.

...further information: When I run this ROM in Mednafen, it works, but Mednafen spits out this warning: ... Mapper: 11 ... The iNES header contains incorrect information. For now, the information will be corrected in RAM: The mapper number should be set to 144. ...so that's why it probaby doesn't work in other emulators: the header says the mapper is 11, and your other emus are taking that at face value. I have no idea how Mednafen figures out what the mapper really should be (I don't know that much about the NES at all... as far as I can tell, the mapper is the bankswitching scheme). I tried changing the mapper in the ROM file with a hex editor, and the warning went away. Try this in your other emulator: death_race_nes_fixed.zip I'm curious to know whether it works...

It seems to work OK in Mednafen v0.5.2 http://mednafen.com If you're on Windows, you want the "Compiled Binary for Win32"... looks like 0.5.2 is no longer available, but I bet the newer versions will work fine.

I had one of those "How to win at Pac-Man" books a long time ago that said you could park Pac-Man in the "T" and leave him there for hours, and the ghosts would never find him. I never actually had hours at the arcade to try this, but it definitely worked for 5-10 minutes. I like the idea that the new 7800 Pac-Man game doesn't have the same patterns as the arcade version... it's like rediscovering Pac-Man all over again.

Xevious is more like the arcade version, if you use the Proline (separate laser and bomb buttons, instead of constantly dropping useless bombs as you shoot squadrons of flying enemies). Unfortunately the proline is uncomfortable to use for long periods of time.

On Linux... why not run something native, that doesn't need an API translation layer? Atari++ and plain old Atari800 (without the Win) compile and run great on Linux. Though I will admit to having run the Prosystem 7800 emulator on wine (because the only other choice I know of was MESS for Linux, and its 7800 emulation isn't so great).

That... is just plain disturbing.

The built-in OS doesn't include DOS... you'll need a DOS disk of some kind (probably Atari DOS 2.5 is your best bet, at least to start out with). I'd volunteer to send you one, except that all my disks are 10+ years old and were stored in an attic. A lot of them are bad, and I don't know how well any of the good ones would survive shipping.

I found the boxes for my Atari 400 and 1050 drive in the attic at the parents' house, but I left them there for now (no room in the car for them, I was already loading up with actual computers, drives, disks, books)... The boxes are all covered in dust, but seem to be in OK shape. Sadly, I don't even have the 400 any more. I have the box my 1200XL came in, but I bought it used, and the box was torn up (one end missing entirely). The foam inserts are still useful though, I shipped it to Steve Tucker in them (and he shipped it back all shiny and upgraded).

Define "just about anything"? I used to use Copy Mate a lot, it'll copy any single or enhanced density unprotected disk, and it'll skip unreadable sectors. I can't remember whether or not it works with double density disks. With protected disks, the best (not cheapest) way to go is to use a Happy drive and the software that comes with it (or anyway software made for it; I don't know what all the options are). If you're wanting to copy protected disks, and you don't have a Happy or other upgraded drive, you could try Black Patch or Chipmunk. If you're talking about non-standard disks (77/80 tracks, 720K/1.2M/etc), you might try MyDOS's "Duplicate Disk" option (I'm not sure whether it copies all sectors, or just the ones marked as being used in the VTOC, though).

I think the name was invented by fighter pilots, long before there was such a thing as a video game. It might date from World War II, or a little later. Hm, Wikipedia says it's older than that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joystick Apparently the original name was "George stick", just be glad your magazine wasn't called that!

Good question. I haven't tried it (my one driving controller feels like it's full of tiny pieces of gravel), but... I *did* try the driving controller with a generic "joystick test" program once. It showed up as a 2-axis joystick, and turning the wheel caused motion on the two axes (one axis left, I think, then both left, then the other left, repeat). I dunno if MAME is smart enough to use this data as "spinner" data, but maybe.

You could get a Stelladaptor and plug a set of Atari paddles into that... it works great for Arkanoid in MAME, and is a lot easier than hacking up a mouse to build a spinner control.

Nothing to be sorry about, I only know this stuff cause I bought the $99 MyIDE with Transcend from Steve Tucker (aka classics), then bothered him with a bunch of silly questions about it

I've got a couple of actual Atari pads (made for use with the 7800), but they don't need any modification or adaptor to work on the Atari 8-bit or the 2600. Can't say I actually use them much... I have a friend who does use one of them whenever he comes over (he prefers D-pads to joysticks), and he says they're pretty good. Also I've used a Sega Genesis pad (no mod/adaptor required) on the 2600, mostly just to see if it'd work.

I think that there is an adapter so the CF will fit and a power supply for the CF from pin 20. If you're talking about the Maxflash+MyIDE cartridges: The Transcend drive isn't CF, it's a flash device that plugs right into the IDE connector and acts just like an IDE hard disk (except that it can take power from pin 20) The $99 one is indeed just the $49 one with the Transcend plugged into it (and pre-formatted, so it's already bootable). The pin 20 power is enabled by a jumper on the MyIDE. The $99 one comes with the jumper already set, the $49 one may not...

I have no experience in this area, so this may be a dumb question... How do you tell whether a box is in its original shrinkwrap, or whether it's an old box that's recently been re-shrinkwrapped? I'm thinking of a particular dealer I know who sells reconditioned Playstations and Xboxes in boxes he shrinkwraps himself... which isn't dishonest: the units are clearly marked "reconditioned", and they're selling for a good bit cheaper than the new units on the next shelf over. It just got me thinking: shrinkwrapping isn't rocket science, so what would stop an unscrupulous dealer from wrapping an old opened box in new wrap? Particularly since it seems like most people who buy sealed items never open them (and might never know that their "sealed" rare game is missing the manual, or has label damage, or is actually a crusty old Combat cart).

Hm, when I was working on my Clearpic mod and having problems with it, I ran my 1200XL without the top or bottom shield... basically just a motherboard on a wooden table. At one point I played the Pac-man cart this way for maybe 30 minutes, had no stability problems (had video problems due to my inept modding, but fixed them). The shield protects against RF interference... maybe you've just got a lot of it in your environment? Someone once told me the early Ataris had all that shielding to keep the Ataris from interfering with radios/TVs, not the other way around. Later on, the FCC regulations got a little less strict, so the later models didn't need as much shielding... I don't know how accurate this is, take with a grain of salt. Also... depending on what mods you're wanting to do, you might be able to get by with cutting holes in the shield instead of removing it completely.

Hm, I should go back to the shop where I got it, see if he's got any of the other sticks. Unfortunately, this one's got a loose stick, so it can rotate freely. I don't know how to fix this, but it's really annoying...