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Showing results for tags 'vbxe'.
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I tried to get a demo to work, by trying old cores, booted from the v2fx124a_vga.xbf core (dated 2010)... and now I'm stuck. I REALLY shouldn't have tried that. This is an Atari 800XL with VBXE and custom VGA port, and U1MB (FJC firmware). Using FujiNet to mount .atr files, and SpartaDOS X from U1MB. It was working fine for months, so install should be fine. I could easily change cores between the "current" versions (dated 2013). Then... I used the old FC.COM to install the old vga core in a higher slot number, marked it bootable, rebooted, and my VBXE video is now split/corrupted. I'm now using composite video out for a non-corrupted display. The initial slots still have the original cores, so I need to switch the boot core to "2" for example. FC.COM is erroring: VBXE IO error DCFG.COM is erroring: VBXE IO error Documentation seems to say DCFG.COM bypasses VBXE IO and goes straight to FPGA (oh well). I found this DCFG.COM in an old copy of release-cores.zip (dated 2009) The U1MB bios now has the VBXE option grayed out, so not detected?! What else might I try to switch boot core? (I & friends are reasonable with electronics, and could setup a USB serial connection if needed) Now I've got a double screen view and unreadable text. When I run FC.COM from the newest release (from 2013) (This is me reverting to composite video output) FC.COM fails "VBXE IO error". And when I run DCFG.COM it gives same error (even if I switch the current drive). These were the old core and FC.COM I was idiotically messing with:
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Since VBXE always lives a bit of a shadowy existence, but I'm not a big programmer either, I thought, I'd make a small contribution and create a small slideshow for it 😉. I created all the graphics by myself about a year ago (I´ve used Stable Diffusion and Automatic1111). The whole technology has developed rapidly in the last 12 months and the possibilities have grown exponentially. Nevertheless, I thought it would be a shame to let my "old" works gather dust and rather do something good with them for the beloved A8 (VBXE). You can download the demo on Demozoo (see my signature), but I attach it here anyway. If you don't have VBXE in your computer, you can watch the demo with Altirra (with active VBXE plugin) without stress. (Advantage here: With F1 you can shorten the long loading time ;)) Attached are a few preview images that were captured directly from Altira with VBXE! Note: These are not the original images but already the final converted graphics for the A8 😎. Well, then I hope you like it a bit and have some fun 🙂! Cheers, andY TMC presents - VBXE Slideshow Part I 03-2024.atr
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I am actually a bit hesitant to start the topic not to jinx it, and that early in the project too, but I figured it would motivate me to go on with this. My plan - do a 1:1 replica of Arcade Popeye on VBXE. Preliminary research tells me that using the 480i mode by Rybags it can be done, for the first level I am 99% certain by now, below the picture of what I have so far (the stairs and roof shadow are coming soon too, I need some sprites for that, too tired today, and yes, my LCD screen needs a bit of color tune down). I am learning things as I go, I did far from trivial things in a couple of assembly languages before, but not yet on 6502 (the "complicated simplicity" of it annoys me ) and never a game. I will probably fail eventually (also due to lack of time) and even if I don't, I know there are things I cannot do, sounds and music is for one, so I may need help at some point.
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NTSC 800XL VBXE install, and it won't display on my VGA monitor. (I've checked/double/triple checked wiring. Ugh) Seems it's VBXE or output cable from RGB+sync to VGA 15-pin. I have no alternate way to verify the VBXE output. No SCART, CGA or Atari/Commodore monitors. Need some advice... I tried 3 monitors, 2 monitors say frequency out-of-range, and the 3rd is shown below. See simultaneously, the correct S-Video out (via S-Video to HDMI converter), and the VBXE VGA output: I have done the simple S-Video mod, and installed VBXE. I also installed sockets for all ICs, and verified all ICs are good, and pins/traces from sockets are good... the VBXE is soldered to the board (not socketed). (After the S-Video mod, I removed a few no-effect dead-end resisters/capacitors) (I also have an extraneous black grounding wire on top for scope-ground. Ignore that) ... end result is the 800XL works, but VGA does not. Used VBXE manual's spec for RGB+sync to 9-pin CGA, mapped that to 15-pin VGA, and connected all the ground pins. @flashjazzcat had a video where he showed his custom VGA cable and detailed which pins he wired, but for the life-of-me, I just can't find it now. (I'm assuming my cable conversion is the problem, but I have no solid VBXE resources to check the VGA wiring) Here's my work, and the references I followed...
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Here I will do my best to document the XDL (eXtended Display List) of the VBXE. My code examples will be for the MADS assembler. This information is provided for people that want to directly tickle the hardware, old-school style. There is a VERY nice, well documented, feature rich VBXE driver for Sparta DOS X. I used it and in a few hours with never coding for VBXE, had a working BMP viewer in Turbo BASIC XL. This tutorial will not cover that, however. Here I will help document what I have been doing the last few months. I am learning MADS while I am learning the VBXE so please don't consider this definitive in scope or in any way expert level. All VBXE labels and documentation has come directly from the VBXE Programmer's manual, English edition, Copyright © 2013 by T.Piórek. Thanks to: @Yaron Nir for making me start this thread and make sure I keep coding regularly, by posting questions. @Mark2008 for getting the ball started with his VBXE for Beginners Tutorial Thread and game. Everyone involved in the VBXE hardware, existing software, and documentation. phaeron for the wonderful Altirra emulator which provides fantastic VBXE emulation with great debugging abilities.
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Hi everybody, In order to (hopefully) show some of the basics of the VBXE blitter capabilities, I made this source where everything is somewhat more documentated and in plain 6502 code. (The pseudo opcodes of Mads are great!) It can be assembled with Mads. At the top of the source you'll have to set the VBXE base adress manually. To assemble the source it also needs the file 'tiles_header_removed.bmp' - this is the stripdown pixeldata version of the Tiles.bmp file which is also in the .zip file. What is blitter? I'll quote @danwinslow from the XDL VBXE tutorial: Any questions or comments? Feel free to ask! VBXE blitter example.zip
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I did study a bit what VBXE could bring in for me and how it is installed, I am mostly after still improving the picture quality (right now having UAV), but also after 80 columns (though quite sure it wouldn't work with MAC/65 for example?) and be able to try the handful of VBXE games. All in all, I am not convinced to be honest, but please just quickly tell me if I got this right: - VBXE replaces GTIA, but only if I use the RGB output of the VBXE, otherwise the stock video output goes from the onboard GTIA that is still doing its thing (and none of the extra video features are available there)? - The stock GTIA cannot be removed, even if the stock video output is not used? (I am sensing I am getting this one wrong)? - It will work fine (putting aside any clearance issues) with UAV, and I can take the CSYNC signal from the composite output of the UAV instead of 4050 without loss of picture quality? - I cannot take the pre 4050 CSYNC signal directly from GTIA for the video connector? - There is no way on Earth VBXE will clear my GTIA fixer board (see photo) without building a tower of sockets under the ANTIC VBXE adapter board? And perhaps then not even clearing the case cover?
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I've got almost the entire Mines of Moria rogue-like game ported to the Atari, using VBXE and an Atarimax Flash 8Mbit cartridge. The only gameplay thing left to port is the "look" command. I will be adding joystick control, and a few other cosmetic things, and I will look into prerendering some levels and depacking from cartridge, as the random level generation is still around 30 seconds per level. I would appreciate any testing and bug reports though! Especially when it comes to the various spells, prayers, wands, staffs and potions and monsters. '?' brings up the help screen. CTRL-W enters wizard mode, which lets you cheat. CTRL-directions work in Altirra too, so you can use your direction keys (for up, down, right and left anyway.) A good page for Moria information: http://beej.us/moria/ The cart image is an Atarimax 8Mbit old style banking (cart 42 in Altirra). You need VBXE. The current colors are set for PAL. A couple of questions: What about colors of objects? I have some objects colored white and some blue. I couldn't decide whether to color all objects blue or white... monsters are currently red, which I think works fine. In some of the inventory screens there is a solid line below the inventory listing and in some there isn't. Which looks better? I restored some of the things I had initially changed (the history of messages are at 20 now), but monster recall/memories are currently not implemented. They will take a lot of memory and further cartridge banking, which may slow the game a bit. Are they important to the game play or not? (old moria players this question is for you.) Any questions or comments welcome. AtariMoria_55_alpha2.bin
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Sometime last year, I realized what great potential the VBXE has for BBS'ers. Having a full 256 character font, 80 columns, and the potential to support 8 background and 16 foreground colors means it could be used for a full ANSI/ECMA-48 terminal emulator. Right now, I have a demo program which does 80 column 16 color text on VBXE, with an IBMPC font (lots of ANSI BBS'es assumed this font for the extended graphics characters), interprets ASCII control codes (otherwise known as the C0 control character set as defined by the ECMA) and I just got scrolling done yesterday. It reads from a file right now, rather than an R: device. So I have zipped up the files with the source (don't copy without crediting me please) and put them here for people to see. ANSIVBXETERM.zip
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Fellows who have VBXE and use SDX + S_VBXE driver + 80-column CON: driver (CON.SYS), please enable the 80-column mode (CON 80 at the DOS prompt), then enter a BASIC interpreter (BASIC, TB, UBI), and run this program: 5 ? CHR$(125):A=PEEK(711) 10 FOR X=0 TO 15 15 FOR Y=0 TO 15 20 POKE 711,X*16+Y:POSITION Y,X:? CHR$(32+128); 25 NEXT Y 30 NEXT X 35 POKE 711,A If the display looks like this: and not like this: you have the CON.SYS driver to replace. Please try this one: vcon.zip (of course backing up the old one just in case).
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It seems it's not clear to the public on how to use VBXE with VGA monitors, so i've made something to cover this hope this helps somebody. As mentioned in the document, VGA for PAL systems is hit and miss, especially with LCD monitor since most of them don't know how to handle 31khz HSYNC with 50HZ VSYNC signals - CRT should don't care and display it flowlessly, but i guess it's not the point. For NTSC regions this might be a perfect choice since there is no real RGB capable LCD monitors out there, and NTSC VBXE VGA generated signal is up to the specs for these and should pose no problems. happy hacking. Please read carefully whats in the documentation about RDY/CSYNC pin, and if you're unsure, or can't really solder - let someone else who can do it. FPGA chips are not that fragile, but still, they don't grow on trees and replacing one if damaged won't be plesant thing to do. vbxe2-vga.pdf
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VBXE owners: do any of you have positive experiences with 15KHz RGB to HDMI converters, and if so, which models are recommended? I have a client who wants good video output over HDMI but since Sophia 2 is not available and he's interested in VBXE's feature set, he wants to go with VBXE. I can't really advise since I use SCART-enabled TVs and the only upscaler I own is a GBS-8200, which does a decent job of converting 15KHz RGB to VGA.
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After this little discussion: it came to my mind that it should be fairly easy to reproduce this effect using mostly VBXE blitter with little CPU intervention, also making it moving. The result is attached (the archive also contains the source code @tschak909). PS. One of the darkest shades of grey looks blueish. A bug probably. PS. 2. On Altirra the movement does not look smooth, on real hardware it does. I do not know, why. landvbxe.arc
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I am not sure if anyone was doing it before... on ST there are the so called VT-52 demos, which in fact are text mode animations, and the "executable file" is a text file containing a stream of the VT-52 terminal emulator commands. On the ST you just "view" such a file to replay the animation. I have found four such animations on the net, and wrote a program for SpartaDOS X to replay them. Here is the archive containing the four animations and the player: vt52play.arc To run the player you will need SpartaDOS X 4.47 or newer, and an amount of memory in your Atari allowing to load the data files. The longest of them is ~180k so probably nothing less than 192k will allow to replay it. The player (VT52.COM) is a crude VT52 emulator, which translates VT-52 Escape sequences into the commands of the Atari 8-bit system console (the E: and K: devices). Like everyone else I of course realize that this task can be made a better way, so that the animation goes faster, smoother etc. but the point was that the originals use the system's console only feeding it with control codes. So the VT52.COM player does not touch any hardware I/O or such things, it makes the system console calls (sending ASCII data and control codes) only to accomplish the task. To run the player you basically type VT52 filename at the DOS prompt. There are some things to know about the particular animation files, though: 1) SCHNAH.TXT This is a B/W animation for the ST low resolution (40x24 text resolution, 16 colors). It can be replayed on the standard 40-column GR.0 console, because, as said above, it is originally black-and-white only. Having QUICKED.SYS loaded speeds the animation up. It requires about 95k of free RAM to get replayed. 2) SYNERGY.TXT This is a color animation for the ST low resolution. Therefore this one requires colors (6 colors, to be specific), but it still can be replayed on the standard 40-column GR.0 console, because the VT52.COM program, when it is running on the standard GR.0 display, maps different background colors onto different ASCII characters. As above, it is good to have QUICKED.SYS loaded. But if you have VBXE, better load S_VBXE and the CON driver attached here: Since it is a 40-column animation, before running the VT52.COM program do SET VT52COL=40 at the DOS prompt to tell the VT52.COM program that it has to take only 40 columns of the screen into account (this step matters in the 80-column mode only). The animation requires about 180k of free RAM to run. 3) FUJIBOIN.TXT This animation is done for the ST medium resolution (80x24, 4 colors), so no replay without VBXE and its drivers, sorry. Before running it, make sure that you have done SET VT52COL=80 (alternatively you can delete the variable). 60k free RAM required. 4) COMMANDO.TXT As above, this is for the ST medium resolution, so VBXE+drivers+SET VT52COL=80. Out of all four, this is the only one where having an accelerated Atari does not help: quite contrary, the stock speed helps to follow the, uhm, storyline. 100k free RAM to go. Have fun
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How many mods has someone actually squeezed into a 600XL? I love the small size, but realistically I know there is limited real estate inside. It would be great to have everything: U1MB, VBXE, stereo pokey board, u-switch, TK-II or AKI, Rapidus, and I'd have to do the 64k and a/v mods. Is it doable or do I need to play it safe with a larger model?
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This is very preliminary, and not everything works as it should, but it does do something... board is connected through standard vbxe breakout board for atari xe series that was soldered in as low as it was possible on CPU board, and then ribbon cable with male and female connectors was fed through the cutout in expansion bay plastic cover just under aluminium casting as for clock, you need to remove Q103 and connec a wire from VBXE 3.5mhz clock out signal to pin D of CPU board connector D6xx signal is present on pin P of SLOT3 expansion connector and all the other signal are provided by Incognito PBI connector for CSYNC, output from LUMA signal (R189) was used and this concludes current state of the installation do not treat this as a definitive guide, as just some things do work, but maybe some of you would like to try to install it anyways
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Hi everyone, is anyone aware of an VBXE compatibility issue with the legendary "Great American Cross-Country Road Race" ? I usually don't experience any issues with my setup (130XE with VBXE) but I can't get it to work on my hardware. The games seems to start normal but after the introduction sequence with the credits, the screen turns into black and the game seem to crash. I know that a very very small set of atari games have indeed VBXE issues (for instance Gyruss). I don't recall the technical reason for it, but would be interesting to know though. greetings, twh
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I'm slowly working through my VBXE install in an 800XL. I have it installed I think, and when I turn it on, the machine works and I have a picture (just composite for now). Unfortunately, it's in black and white. Where do I start troubleshooting? Here's a pic of the install (large picture!):
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Atari Moria v55 beta2: - added joystick control (joystick is only read if at least two vblanks have passed, which seems to provide the right feel.) Joystick button can be used for most any key prompts. Joystick button and direction digs a tunnel. - fixed a few bugs, many are probably still there (report them if you see any!) - added a pause at startup to get better randomization. - added creating items to wizard mode (you'll need the source, or some of the information on Moria websites to do this properly.) - added a player structure display to wizard mode (Ctrl-C), to aid in debugging. - added the rest '*' command to rest until healed and mana restored The game is playable and should even be able to be completed in the state it's in. It seems to work well with CPU accelerators (in Altirra anyway!) Game Requirements: - VBXE - AtariMax 8mb flashcart (currently old style banking, bank 127 active at boot.) - 64k (uses RAM under the OS) AtariMoria_55beta2.bin
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I am hooking up an Atari 130XE to a DLP video projector. Because of the large size of the projection screen, I need the highest quality video possible, which is the RGB output of the VBXE. However, I want to occasionally play games that use artifacting. Instead of using the noisy composite out, can I use the RGB through an RGB to composite converter to get artifacting? I know I could just use the composite out, but I would suspect RGB --> Composite will give a better result.
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I'm choosing a host for my VBXE (Candle, V2), and I'm leaning toward a 64K, 600XL. Has anyone done this or know a reason why it would be more difficult than an 800XL or XE? -Larry
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I am looking at installing a vbxe unit into a 600xl. should i do the video mod on the 600xl prior to installation of vbxe? Douglas
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Who makes and sells VBXE...? Regularly with something resembling reliable response time? Is there an online store? US ideally, but if I have to go international, that's OK.
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With all the sio2pc-usb mkII finished, I am opening the VBXE production run pre-order thread... Details: This will be a run of the VBXE V2, exactly as candle made the last run (well i am using his files, so they should be the same ;'). You will have a choice of NTSC or PAL (I need a PAL machine, anyone have one cheap ;'), and the latest standard firmware or the VGA firmware. As long as there is atleast 10 orders, these WILL be made, but the more who order, the cheaper it will be and prices are in US Dollars... pricing: Inside US/outside US (price includes priority international shipping) $150/$160 - for up to 30 total orders $140/$150 - for up to 50 total orders $135/$145 - for anything over 65 orders... Pre-Ordering will last until December 9th. that is when the final pricing will be known, if by some stampede there is more then 30 pre-orders, then refunds will be given to the final price (honestly, I hope there is more, but with the interest expressed in the past, i dont expect more then 10-15 orders...) Delivery estimate is currently the 2nd or 3rd week of January, I was hoping for sooner by ordering the PCB's already, but real life had other plans for me... If you have ANY questions at all please ask... Also, anyone in a country outside of the US, if you live near others, and can combine international shipping, this would lower the price immediately atleast on that part... sloopy.
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Hi all, Two questions I've been speculating about - as someone not very deeply knowledgable (yet) on the hardware side of things... 1. Does a standard light-gun still work on a VBXE modified machine - on a CRT screen of course? Does VBXE modify the Atari's timing/syncing abilities, if the RF modulator is no longer present for instance? 2. A wider question... since especially with VBXE, LCD/projectors are commonly in use for us, I wondered whether it is at all conceivable/possible to interface to something like a Nintendo Wii controller with an Atari - hence light gun use on modern/very large projected screens - and without having to flash to a white screen to get enough contrast. It would be fun, but some way beyond my current skill to see whether or not there's any scope... Thanks, Wes
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