What Kind of Ramrod MMOS is This?

[vespertillio]

Hey all,

 

I picked up some items a while and found this guy. I've seen the others in some prior threads but didn't see this one. Looks like strictly for the 800 though.

[Kyle22]

That is a Ramrod card for the original 800. It allows you to have multiple OSs installed and switch between them.

 

[1050]

Notably it's missing the two OSN chips E and F, instead we

see Atari 800 roms, two NTSC B roms and one PAL A rom?

 

Used to be some good pictures of one or two of these but

pictures don't seem to make it or I've lost the urls again.

 

https://atariage.com/forums/topic/270614-newell-osn-for-400800/

 

[JR>]

Nice find! OSN was optional.  In this case it looks like they were just using it to add OMNIMON.

[Kyle22]

OSN discussion here:

It would be fun to try on my Incognito. I think I would need to patch it on to an 800 OS and run it as an XL/XE to get ROM @ $C000.

 

 

[vespertillio]

Thanks all. I've got some more stuff to go through. Maybe I'll find some roms for it. Any thoughts on the worth of this thing?

[Faicuai]

14 hours ago, Kyle22 said:

OSN discussion here:

It would be fun to try on my Incognito. I think I would need to patch it on to an 800 OS and run it as an XL/XE to get ROM @ $C000.

 

 

Well, it just happens that I have been fiddling a bit with Omnimon / Omniview + OSN on Incognito, for the last week, or so.

 

It turns out that, for experimental purposes, you may not need to create a XL-rom for this. You can use Incognito's memory-mapping flexibility to your advantage.

 

Here's an alternate way, without ever leaving Colleen mode in Incognito (if you are willing to use Basic as your "firewall" to hide $C000-CFFF ram space):

 

1. Burn attached 10K OS Image (OSN) into any available 10K slot (it has Altirra's high-performance FP package, for testing purposes).

2. Copy attached pseudo .XEXs into your folder-of-choice in your Incognito's CF card.

3. In Colleen mode, enable ANOTHER populated OS slot (such as Atari OS.b) and enable BASIC, and enable 52 Kbytes linear-ram.

4. Press "S" and then press "L" to move to SIDE LOADER. Once there, ENABLE BASIC as well (temporarily).

5. Load any of the attached pseudo-.XEX files (one is the Monitor, the other is the dreadful-slow 80-col emulator). You will see they actually run after loading!

6. GO BACK to colleen mode, select OSN slot (make sure, again, that basic and 52 Kbytes ram space are enabled), and hit "B".

 

You can try a crude A=USR($C000) or simply invoke through OSN keystrokes. Any further load into $C000 from SIDE will NOT require switching out of OSN slot in Colleen mode. Also, the $C000-$CFFF memory space WILL survive most warm-starts, and changes of linear-ram space (!)

 

Have fun!

OSN-RROD.rom Omnimon-4K-C000_CFFF-header.xex Omniview-4K-C000_CFFF-header.xex

[1050]

As much as I hate to say since I'd like to have one myself,

but north of hundred at a minimum. They are Rare with a

capital R. What I'm not clear on is how much north...

[_The Doctor__]

I've got one and I'm not a rare person or collector...

you wouldn't believe the number of times a person owning an 800 knows nothing of what's under the hood. If it works they just use it. I can't say how many times I've opened one up and the owner was completely unaware they had any mods, card or upgrades only to find they do.

Edited June 20, 2019 by _The Doctor__

[+sm3]

I purchased my Ramrod MMOS for $63 back in 2014. What is really rare is the fastchip that goes on the board.  Come to think of it, I've never seen an original OSN set of chips either. The ones I have on my MMOS I burned myself from files from AtariAge.

 

It took 2014 to 2018 to find a NOS Newell fastchip for sale as well for $76 but I would have paid more for that if I had to