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PLATOTerm Cartridge interest


tschak909

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I have been approached by some people who have expressed interest in a cartridge version of PLATOTerm.

 

I would be okay with producing these, but I would like to work with someone to try and work out the logistics of producing a small run of these carts, as I do not have any experience doing this, and wouldn't want to fuck it up.

 

Thoughts?

 

-Thom

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You can get 16K EPROM Cart Boards from OSH Park at https://oshpark.com/shared_projects/YreZRvio

 

20 boards for about $120 - you'd need 27128 EPROMs, 74LS00s and 0.1uf capacitors (see http://www.grandideastudio.com/wp-content/uploads/pp_atari8bit_instructions.pdf);the boards fit in the Atari brown cart cases.

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@Sanny - to relate to the other threads... The final cart will be just a standard 16K cart. The problem I have is that I'm wanting to cram this onto a SpartaDOS X compatible banked cartridge image, so that I can load it into my Ultimate 1mb.

 

In the mean time, I asked @Albert for a cart board and a 16K EPROM (I just bought a burner and an eprom lamp), so that I can test this on my actual hardware.

 

-Thom

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Why not buy a MyIDE-II or equivalent?

That does 16k-cartridges and much more....

I love my MyIDE-II and love to use it for lots of cartridge images, but sometimes, for certain things, I'd rather have a solo-program cartridge like the old days. Not necessarily in this case though, and I certainly prefer loading up language cartridges from the MyIDE-II and use it as an HDD too.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks to Albert, He sent an XEGS cart board and a couple of EPROMs. After a bit of tripping over bank intiialization code, and some help from @sanny, I was able to get cartridge PLATOTerm to stably work on real hardware. Demo video below:

 

#irataonline #platoterm #plato #atari #cartridgehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-z30YqJJHRA

 

Now I'll write and typeset the manual, and do a box (I just need a template)

 

-Thom

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I will update the release tomorrow, but for now, will upload an updated build here:

PLATOTerm-1.1.1-lite-cart-joystick.rom

 

This has select-X to exit, but also fixes a very subtle bug that prevented notes numbers from appearing in the notes page (because I had incorrectly excised the color parsing code from the protocol decoder to save memory.)

 

-Thom

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Thanks, I will try this today.

Mouse problems: the driver uses pokey-timers.

Normally not a issue, but with pokey in concurrent mode (serin and serout clocked by all 4 counters), not possible....

Also when using IRQ-based drivers, make sure not to block higher priority IRQ's.

First code the lower-priority driver should do is CLI to enable IRQ again.

 

You could try using nmi for counting instead of pokey-timers.

 

Just some results from testing.

 

Have a good new year, talk to you later.

 

Sijmen.

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Some graphical issues, but beside that, it looks OK to me.

I ran it with 1200,1800,2100 baud all fine.

2400 is too fast.

 

Can you test this build for me?

It only sends Xoff out and does not do Xon.

I have blocked Xon with RTS instead of sending it out.

 

At my place, I still can not dead-stop the server, giving proof, to me that is, Xoff does not work....

I know this is and old issue and you say the server does stop eventually after delay and sending packages of data.

But somehow not at my place.

 

Grtz,

Sijmen.

post-6668-0-70868200-1546082445.jpg

PLATOTerm-1.1.1-lite-cart-joystick_Xoff-test.rom

Edited by mr-atari
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  • 1 month later...

So, I've just loaded this rom onto my Atari 800. Using the manual found here, https://github.com/tschak909/platoterm64/releases/tag/PLATOTerm-1.0, note of the keyboard commands do anything. I can't even change the color. I'm not 100% sure my 850 is fully functioning but I would assume that I should be able to get some response from PLATOTerm with or without a functioning 850. Is this a correct assumption?

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As has been noted in the release documentation and in other places, the cartridge is a cut down version that has only the functionality needed to use the terminal, and is locked to 1200bps.

 

The manual for the cart is being put together, and you can get a draft copy here:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Sq9APPfTIUNZTQlacTbYWwNzjF_-sNmw

 

The cartridge was designed to act as a bootable cartridge, in that:

 

* If you don't have a disk drive, it will bootstrap the 850 (or equivalent) R: handler itself, you'll hear a long beep, as this happens.

* If you do have a disk drive, the AUTORUN.SYS (or equivalent) on your DOS disk is intended to load the R: handler, this was done so devices like the R-Verter could be used in place of the 850.

 

Once started, you should hear a slight click, as the terminal pops into concurrent mode, to talk on the RS232 port.

 

If nothing loads, it will simply sit there, and not respond. Because of cart space constraints, I could not add an error message (I am not kidding, I only had a handful of bytes left.)

 

You need to make sure that your WIFI modem is working properly, with other programs if need-be.

 

-Thom

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Why not buy a MyIDE-II or equivalent?

That does 16k-cartridges and much more....

I love the MyIDE's but I want a single dedicated cartridge with its own label and hopefully boxed with Manual. I would most definitely pay for that. Do the box in classic Atari 400/800 black box styling with artwork and do the cartridges in classic brown label, really give it a solid 400/800 look to it.

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Yup, that's the plan. Albert pinged me yesterday and said he'd get me a box file, and I sent him a draft of the manual.

 

As for the cartridge code itself, it's pretty much done, so it's all about getting the manual and box printed. Albert made the comment that this will probably be the most ornate manual he's printed (it will weigh in at approximately 28 pages, and is color)...

 

-Thom

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I love the MyIDE's but I want a single dedicated cartridge with its own label and hopefully boxed with Manual. I would most definitely pay for that. Do the box in classic Atari 400/800 black box styling with artwork and do the cartridges in classic brown label, really give it a solid 400/800 look to it.

Yeah, this. If it happens, I will buy one as well.

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  • 1 month later...

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