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Watara Supervision hooked on TV


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At that point, you might just want to keep an eye on the Super NT, which may (100% unconfirmed) someday have the extra fpga cores like last year's NT Mini had. NT Mini is out of production, and prices have become insane, or I'd recommend one of those. I'd direct you to the pinned kevtris fpga thread at the top of this forum, but that thread has kind of devolved into a mess

Yeah I just noticed the price of the Framemeister... That price tag is WAAAAY out of my league :D

I still wish there was another way to get this fixed :(

Edited by HtheB
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I'm actually wondering if there is a 2player link cable was available at all to play a game with 2 players. I haven't seen one at all.

The connector is the same as the one on the Atari 2600 and the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive.

I've connected them to the SuperVision, and the game just crashes.

 

The game Tennis Pro '92 has an option at the beginning to select "1 Player" only.

 

Yes, but it's like the Game Boy, you're supposed to link two systems, not plug a gamepad on it.

 

Are you playing this NTSC unit from PAL land? If so, you'd actually expect it to play slower, though, right?

Since it takes aa batteries, it can't be reliant on the 60hz power for timing.

If I remember well, early LCD screens have an odd refresh rate, like 27 htz. or maybe 55Htz, or anything in-between.

The result being that without a slightly modified hardware (which is probably why there is a whole Supervision crammed into the TV-Link) then the output is neither 50 or 60 htz.

 

Regardless it's damn interesting to have clear pics, inside and out, and even a video.

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Yes, but it's like the Game Boy, you're supposed to link two systems, not plug a gamepad on it.

 

If I remember well, early LCD screens have an odd refresh rate, like 27 htz. or maybe 55Htz, or anything in-between.

The result being that without a slightly modified hardware (which is probably why there is a whole Supervision crammed into the TV-Link) then the output is neither 50 or 60 htz.

 

Regardless it's damn interesting to have clear pics, inside and out, and even a video.

I know it's to connect 2 SuperVisions with the link cable, but did they even released any cable like that?

If not, I should find somewhere some broken Atari/MegaDrive controllers and solder one myself to see if it's working at all.

 

On a side note: I've noticed that the music on some games, are REALLY off...

The games developed by B.I.T.S. are actually sounding VERY good (but they also sound VERY good on the SuperVision, surprisingly their games are also decent)

Seems like those guys knew how to develop for the SuperVision

 

I'll make some comparison video soon

 

 

those jp's look tempting too, and one seems related to the chip right next to it (it would short two of its legs together). I wonder what that chip does, it'd probably help solve the mystery of what those 4 jp's do.

 

Which one do you mean?

Edited by HtheB
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Which one do you mean?

 

'JP1,' the one closest to the 74hc14a, would connect two of its legs together, a1 and y2(why?) and also passes through to the other side(?). Looking up the datasheet on the 74hc14a, it seems like some kind of hex inverter--whateverthehell that means: (link1)(link2)(link3). The other 3 jumpers look like they would run to ground for whatever reason.

 

I have no real idea what those jumpers are for (not an expert), but they're clearly there for a reason. If one was designing a board that might fit into multiple types of devices, say it wasn't certain if it was going into a handheld or base station, that person might put in something like this to switch between the uses.

 

I also remember that game boys can be inverted--indeed it's a pretty common mod. Here's a (link). what do we see? 14-pin hex inverters. I still don't get why the watara's jp1 connects a1 and y2, though. the a1/y1, a2/y2 of the gb mod makes more sense to me, and meshes well with the datasheet.

 

At this point, I state again, that I am no expert, and remind that this is VERY rare gear. I think this is a very interesting area of the board, but I sure wouldn't trust me on it. Maybe you should consider playing the many spaceship shooters--they probably look better inverted ;)

 

***EDIT: I bet I'm looking at this backwards. A1 goes to y1, (and inverts) which it appears in the picture could be bridged to a2 next to it which would invert again and come out y2. Nothing else on that thing seems to be hooked up--it that really just a stupid way of bridging the jumper?

post-17659-0-82417100-1518659102.jpg

Edited by Reaperman
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I forgot to post about this the other day, but I bought one of these dumb things (TV link) off ebay last year and did a bunch of RE work on it. Basically, the way it works is the chip on the right is a supervision chip, but it is not the same as the chip on the handheld system- it is similar, but the frame buffer is different and seems to be designed to be polled by the second TV chip on the left. The chip on the bottom right is a 64K ROM which contains the border graphics (I was going to dump it but haven't had time yet). The other two little carrier glop tops are the two 8K RAM chips that the supervision chip needs like usual. (8K of CPU RAM, 8K of VRAM/frame buffer).

 

The "cartridge" that plugs into the supervision handheld is a lol, and all it does is turn your supervision in a power hungry controller. The ROM on the cartridge simply reads the buttons and sends them in parallel down the cable back to the base unit- you DO NOT even need it to play the games. You can simply send the up/down/left/right/button presses down the wire and it will work fine. I guess they had to justify the use of the supervision handheld *somehow*. lol.

 

The two TTL chips form a johnson counter that divides the 21.47727 (or 26.6Mhz for PAL) down by 5 or 7 to run the supervision chip. Like the super gameboy, the frequency is off (but worse) so pitch of the audio is off, as well. The supervision runs at nominally 4Mhz, so you get either 4.295Mhz in NTSC mode (7.4% fast) or in PAL it will be ~3.8MHz (5.2% slow). The three jumpers near the chips that have two positions configures the johnson counter for the desired divisor. It's been over a year so my memory is a bit hazy now and I can't find the schematic I drew of it.

 

At least one of those solderable jumper pads is to put the video chip into PAL mode.

 

I did find the pinout (mostly complete) of the two chips.

 

The "512D" is the 64K ROM holding the border graphics.

CPUxx are the CPU address/data lines which run to the cartridge and the 8K of RAM connected to the CPU.

VRAMxx is the video RAM/frame buffer (8K) bus.

 

 

 
pinout of 64 pin video chip:
 1 - RC network; this pin to three parts to ground: R8, C3, C4 (1K, .1uf, 820pf)
 2 - video out
 3 - /RST
 4 - GND
 5 - JP4 (pulled up, no solder to ground)
 6 - 15.72KHz square wave
 7 - 59.97Hz square wave
 8 - JP3 (pulled up, no solder to ground)
 9 - VCC
10 - GND
11 - Xin
12 - Xout (21.47727MHz)
13 - some kind of timing signal, appears to be pixel clock?
14 - GND
15 - JP2 (pulled up, no solder to ground)
16 - 59.97Hz square wave

17 - nc
18 - composite synch
19 -
20 - A0 (512D)
21 - A1 (512D)
22 - A2 (512D)
23 - A3 (512D)
24 - A4 (512D)
25 - A5 (512D)
26 - A6 (512D)
27 - A7 (512D)
28 - A8 (512D)
29 - A9 (512D)
30 - A10 (512D)
31 - A11 (512D)
32 - A12 (512D)

33 - A13 (512D)
34 - nc
35 - nc
36 - GND
37 - A14 (512D)
38 - A15 (512D)
39 - D0 (512D)
40 - D1 (512D)
41 - D2 (512D)
42 - D3 (512D)
43 - D4 (512D)
44 - D5 (512D)
45 - D6 (512D)
46 - D7 (512D)
47 -
48 -

49 - CPU #64
50 - CPU #66
51 - VCC
52 - CPU #65
53 - CPU #64
54 - CPU #63
55 - CPU #62
56 - CPU #61
57 - CPU #60
58 -
59 -
60 -
61 - VCC
62 - video
63 - video
64 - video


60 - KC5475C pin #57
61 - KC5475C pin #56
62 - KC5475C pin #55
63 - KC5475C pin #54
64 - KC5475C pin #53
65 - KC5475C pin #52
66 - KC5475C pin #50
67 - KC5475C pin #49
68 - KC5475C pin #48
69 - KC5475C pin #7
70 - KC5475C pin #6
71 - KC5475C pin #13


pinout of cpu:
 1 - VRAM A12
 2 - VCC
 3 - nc
 4 - VRAM D0
 5 - VRAM D1
 6 - VRAM D2
 7 - VRAM D3
 8 - VRAM D4
 9 - VRAM D5
10 - VRAM D6
11 - VRAM D7
12 - button input
13 - button input
14 - button input
15 - button input
16 - button input
17 - button input
18 - button input
19 - button input
20 - CPU D7
21 - CPU D6
22 - CPU D5
23 - CPU D4
24 - CPU D3
25 - CPU D2
26 - nc

27 - CPU D1
28 - CPU D0
29 - CPU A16
30 - CPU A15
31 - CPU A14
32 - CPU A13
33 - CPU A12
34 - CPU A11
35 - CPU A10
36 - CPU A9
37 - CPU A8
38 - CPU A7
39 - CPU A6
40 - CPU A5
41 - CPU A4
42 - CPU A3
43 - CPU A2
44 - CPU A1
45 - CPU A0
46 - WRAM /CE
47 - WRAM /WE
48 - CART /CE
49 - GND
50 - audio out
51 - audio out
52 - nc

53 - VCC
54 - expansion port #5
55 - expansion port #4
56 - expansion port #3
57 - expansion port #2
58 - RV1 wiper
59 - battery low LED
60 - KC5475C pin #57
61 - KC5475C pin #56
62 - KC5475C pin #55
63 - KC5475C pin #54
64 - KC5475C pin #53
65 - KC5475C pin #52
66 - KC5475C pin #50
67 - KC5475C pin #49
68 - KC5475C pin #48
69 - KC5475C pin #7
70 - KC5475C pin #6
71 - KC5475C pin #13
72 -
73 -
74 - /RST
75 - GND
76 - 4.295454MHz clock in from divide by 5 off of 21.47727MHz oscillator
77 -
78 - nc

79 -
80 -
81 - GND
82 -
83 -
84 -
85 -
86 -
87 -
88 -
89 -
90 -
91 - VRAM /WR
92 - VRAM A0
93 - VRAM A1
94 - VRAM A2
95 - VRAM A3
96 - VRAM A4
97 - VRAM A5
98 - VRAM A6
99 - VRAM A7
100- VRAM A8
101- VRAM A9
102- VRAM A10
103- VRAM A11
104- nc
 
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I forgot to post about this the other day, but I bought one of these dumb things (TV link) off ebay last year and did a bunch of RE work on it. Basically, the way it works is the chip on the right is a supervision chip, but it is not the same as the chip on the handheld system- it is similar, but the frame buffer is different and seems to be designed to be polled by the second TV chip on the left. The chip on the bottom right is a 64K ROM which contains the border graphics (I was going to dump it but haven't had time yet). The other two little carrier glop tops are the two 8K RAM chips that the supervision chip needs like usual. (8K of CPU RAM, 8K of VRAM/frame buffer).

 

The "cartridge" that plugs into the supervision handheld is a lol, and all it does is turn your supervision in a power hungry controller. The ROM on the cartridge simply reads the buttons and sends them in parallel down the cable back to the base unit- you DO NOT even need it to play the games. You can simply send the up/down/left/right/button presses down the wire and it will work fine. I guess they had to justify the use of the supervision handheld *somehow*. lol.

 

The two TTL chips form a johnson counter that divides the 21.47727 (or 26.6Mhz for PAL) down by 5 or 7 to run the supervision chip. Like the super gameboy, the frequency is off (but worse) so pitch of the audio is off, as well. The supervision runs at nominally 4Mhz, so you get either 4.295Mhz in NTSC mode (7.4% fast) or in PAL it will be ~3.8MHz (5.2% slow). The three jumpers near the chips that have two positions configures the johnson counter for the desired divisor. It's been over a year so my memory is a bit hazy now and I can't find the schematic I drew of it.

 

At least one of those solderable jumper pads is to put the video chip into PAL mode.

 

I did find the pinout (mostly complete) of the two chips.

 

The "512D" is the 64K ROM holding the border graphics.

CPUxx are the CPU address/data lines which run to the cartridge and the 8K of RAM connected to the CPU.

VRAMxx is the video RAM/frame buffer (8K) bus.

 

 

That's a nice pinout you've got there!

Any idea if we can invert the output of the screen and somehow "fix" the audio?

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  • 6 months later...

So i actually also recently got a Supervision with the TV-Link and have been scouring to try and find as many of the games and as much info on the thing as possible. I've been working on testing games to see if there was any compatibility issues and the only game i have that worked on the handheld that didn't work on the TV-Link was Olympic Trials. No idea if my copy is just acting up or if it actually cant run, but getting to read the exact way the thing works has been fascinating. So thanks for the extra work on something so obscure!

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  • 1 month later...

 

I forgot to post about this the other day, but I bought one of these dumb things (TV link) off ebay last year and did a bunch of RE work on it. Basically, the way it works is the chip on the right is a supervision chip, but it is not the same as the chip on the handheld system- it is similar, but the frame buffer is different and seems to be designed to be polled by the second TV chip on the left. The chip on the bottom right is a 64K ROM which contains the border graphics (I was going to dump it but haven't had time yet). The other two little carrier glop tops are the two 8K RAM chips that the supervision chip needs like usual. (8K of CPU RAM, 8K of VRAM/frame buffer).

 

Is there a chance with all this research, a mod is possible that would revert the colors back to "normal" i.e. the 3rd screenshot HtheB posted? I don't mind the speed differentials quite as much as I mind the weird colors. I'd love it if my TV-link worked the way a supervision worked.

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