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KitBox expansion...


MrPix

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3 hours ago, digress said:

dina 2 in 1 support

 

a dina is a dual colecovision & sega sg1000 machine. i have 1. it had 2 slots 1 for the sg1000 carts and 1 for the colecovision.

 

adding a sg1000 compatiblibilty would be cool. My dina takes a mycard convertor too which is a rom cart like a credit card similar to what they then used in the master system.

I haven't heard of this "dina" though I've seen a couple of SG1000s. I honestly don't know what's involved. I'm not going to discount it though, because I have considered adding the 2600 functionality for the mk II release later. 

3 hours ago, digress said:

I mentioned a few ideas before. Here 1 more probably not gonna happen but...

 

often cd tracks could be played on early dos cd rom games that were just controlled by the game when to start & stop them.

so an sd version of this. So we could use full music sound tracks instead of the builtin music ability and reserve that only for sfx.

additionally this could relate to full motion video as an option too.

I have no idea about that at all. I imagine it would be quite easy with vintage CD players, but not at all easy with new ones. I haven't seen a system with this - so I'll write it down, but more out of morbid curiosity.

As a segue, there was a huge AV project in the UK back in the 80s. They used laser disks and BBC micros to distribute a crowd-sourced "Domesday Book" to make a current version of the original Domesday Book. It's amazing to me that the digital Domesday Book by the BBC has fallen into complete obscurity in less than 40 years, and is probably not even readable on any modern system.

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I'm thinking something like a cheap arduino controlled digital music player that interfaced with the colecovision through either the expansion port or maybe even just port 2.

 

The arduino player would do all the work but the cues would come from the colecovision as to when to play sfx or music digital files. I think I could manage it now that i think about it.

 

Just a silly idea that jumped into my head. 1 of many.

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On 7/5/2020 at 10:51 AM, MrPix said:

There will also be an Adam-only version, the BigKitBox, which will add features the Adam can use:

 

  • all the features of the KitBox, plus expansion space to add
  • expandable paged memory in 2MB increments - up to 12MB
  • a 2MB bitmap video card, VGA output (see below)
  • serial port
  • parallel port
  • IDE port (with CF and SD support)
  • PS/2 (or maybe USB) mouse port
  • WiFi
  • MIDI
  • speech

 

 

KitBox and BigKitBox are trademarks of 68K Computer LLC.

You got my attention with MIDI and SPEECH!!!

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I love the idea of RGB LEDs that programs can interface with to indicate things happening in the game or do be used as part of a creative game mechanic. (e.g. proximity sensor flashing colors, retro fuel gauges, klaxon danger flashing, getting "hot" and "cold" (gradually going from red --> blue) in seeking something.

 

I love your speech idea, but if you have a way to save to something like memory or SD or the like, devs can have custom speech files that can load  up for each game and the community can create speech / fix - modify - improve speech dialog over time.  If speech had the option to be custom programmed and also recorded (via mic) and saved to be played back would be amazing.

 

I would also love to have actual narrative coming from speech from the game, walking to a room in the game with speech telling you what happened in the story would be amazing immersion.

I am sure many people would love to record dialog to make the hooks in a game more immersive, imagine Leisure Suit Larry type game with background narration that matches the scenes?  A space shooter with enemy dialog talking up to the point you shoot them  down only to die screaming... haha.. amazing.

 

I think it also goes without saying that if you can add 2 more controller ports that allow programmers to create up to 4 player games would be awesome.  Coleco needs some two player twin stick shooter games in my opinion.

 

Of course these are just my wild ramblings.. haha..

 

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7 hours ago, imstarryeyed said:

If speech had the option to be custom programmed and also recorded (via mic) and saved to be played back would be amazing.

That ability already exists via the Dynomite Sound Digitizer cartridge for the Adam made by Trisyd Video Games circa 1990.

 

it was supplied with a software program and provided for true digitized sound to be used in one’s own SmartBasic or ML programs.

 

Unfortunately near impossible to find because so few have survived the test of time and collectors who own one will not part with it even though it is an Adam specific cart.

 

So long story short, what you said in your full post!!!

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On 7/6/2020 at 9:27 AM, MrPix said:

I haven't heard of this "dina" though I've seen a couple of SG1000s. I honestly don't know what's involved. I'm not going to discount it though, because I have considered adding the 2600 functionality for the mk II release later. 

I have no idea about that at all. I imagine it would be quite easy with vintage CD players, but not at all easy with new ones. I haven't seen a system with this - so I'll write it down, but more out of morbid curiosity.

If you're interested, Ben Heck made his own Dina-like system, but his could run Sega Master System games because the TI chip used in the SMS is backwards compatible.

 

 

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2 hours ago, LoTonah said:

He had my attention with CP/M 3 in ROM and the SD card.  Please be real... please be real...

The SD part is functional, and does not use AdamNet/ADE... It runs at the full speed of the machine.

CP/M 3 is underway. It's a bigger and longer term project, and mostly comes from my own personal desire to use it with its improved memory handling. I will probably stick it in whatever state it is in on github towards the end of the year. The hard part of it for me will be the bootstrap for booting it off ROM.

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On 7/6/2020 at 10:00 PM, MrPix said:

The speech is all your fault so... :D

Yeah, well I don't know if you messaged me back on that or not. I don't seem to get your messages if you did. I was just wondering if you think my speech synthesizer is fixable or not. Didn't you say the chips lost their programming? I don't believe anyone ever dumped them so it might not be possible to reprogram new ones correctly. I know ZERO about such things.

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On 7/5/2020 at 1:48 PM, MrPix said:

I think the CollectorVision Phoenix handles that role quite well. If they truly are doing this last run and that's it, I might seek to license the core for use in a miniature (Pi sized) console in the future - but we'll have to see how things shake out first. I really like the idea of a CV that fits in your pocket.

Another option wouldn't hurt, especially if it could handle higher resolutions.  

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11 hours ago, jblenkle said:

Yeah, well I don't know if you messaged me back on that or not. I don't seem to get your messages if you did. I was just wondering if you think my speech synthesizer is fixable or not. Didn't you say the chips lost their programming? I don't believe anyone ever dumped them so it might not be possible to reprogram new ones correctly. I know ZERO about such things.

I’ve got a last ditch effort IC coming from China. I have the suspicion it has the right speech patterns after listening to audio of it on a TI. If that fails, I’ll be sending you pack your synthesizer having learned a LOT about it and how it works. I could make a new one, but that’s different and easier than fixing the existing one.

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9 hours ago, MrPix said:

I’ve got a last ditch effort IC coming from China. I have the suspicion it has the right speech patterns after listening to audio of it on a TI. If that fails, I’ll be sending you pack your synthesizer having learned a LOT about it and how it works. I could make a new one, but that’s different and easier than fixing the existing one.

Sounds good!!! Keep me informed!!!

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3 hours ago, jblenkle said:

Sounds good!!! Keep me informed!!!

I found out my Facebook Messenger app on my tablet hadn't been updated in three years - that may be the heart of my IM troubles and why I haven't had good luck with it in several years.

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1 hour ago, MrPix said:

I found out my Facebook Messenger app on my tablet hadn't been updated in three years - that may be the heart of my IM troubles and why I haven't had good luck with it in several years.

Yeah, well join the club...I just found a Facebook message on my phone that was almost two years old that I had never seen before. Usually they show up on my computer too, but this one didn't.

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On 7/5/2020 at 1:51 PM, MrPix said:

So, time for a fresh thread on the KitBox, which is my expansion for the CV and Adam. It has SGM compatibility, and as a basic extra feature adds a headphone socket, volume knob and mixer knob. I'm looking to add a bit more functionality to it, and this thread is explicitly to ask for people's ideas of what else to add.

I would definitely buy one if it could run ROMs from an SD card and could save/load games in progress to the SD card, especially if it is still going to be offered in the $50 price range. Just for these 2 things alone. 

Perhaps I am alone, but I don't have any use for an audio jack.  I play my Colecovision on a CRT TV in a spare room and I sit too far from either the TV or the Colecovision to wear headphones as the leads are too short. I have never once used the headphone jack in a Genesis, for example.

Additional controller ports would be a nice extra assuming it didn't need to be programmed and would just work with existing games and maybe with mapping capabilities.

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I have a small batch of SP0256's coming in an effort to repair an Adam speech module. I'm definitely open to speech - but I'm pessimistic as I have reproduced the circuit I have on protoboards and they just don't work. 

I don't see ATAPI IDE CD ROMs ever working on the CV, though they could on the Adam. I think micro-SD cards offer a better and cheaper option anyway.

I've had some paying work come in so I will be distracted for 2-3 weeks and moving slowly in spare time on this and the Inty video project. Bills gotta get paid.

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SPO256  are very hard to find in good condition .   And often the old stocks you find are  SPO256-012    which for Intellivision and they don't have all the allophone.  You can only manage them to say "Mattel intellivision presents" and numbers....more or less.  

If you can reproduce them , it would be very great indeed.

you said you tried to reproduce it already and it does not work?  Could it be due to missing Allophones data?

 

Concerning the SD Card, yes , would be great also , if we can read file from a colecovision program and load them in  Kitbox Ram.

 

 

 

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