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Adding the expansion port.


CPUWIZ

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I have a 14" Sony CRT and the picture via RF is perfect and blue is out of style.  If anything, I'd put an animated rainbow LED in it, but for me the functionality additions are more important, like 4 BIOS images and Alexa control as well as a universal remote, to turn said TV on. ;)

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1 hour ago, Jinks said:

Do I see  functioning Rf and no blue light power led? How could you? I thought you were cool...

 

I always try to keep the RF intact on the systems I upgrade unless I'm told otherwise by the owner. And I prefer UV LEDs in the 7800 although I do have the slow RGB changing ones on hand as well.

 

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16 hours ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

I always try to keep the RF intact on the systems I upgrade unless I'm told otherwise by the owner. And I prefer UV LEDs in the 7800 although I do have the slow RGB changing ones on hand as well.

 

 

The slow RGB ones are fun.

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23 minutes ago, Shawn said:

 

The slow RGB ones are fun.

I only recently got them to have on stock as prior to that I could only find the fast blinking annoying ones. I've only actually installed one of them into the my Extron selector as the small bulbs it uses to light up behind the selector buttons are only 5v so I purchased some warm white LEDs and stuck 460R resistors off the + leads of each and then plug them directly into the socket that the small bulbs used. Been working like a charm. But yeah I have my selector for the "Retro systems" (Anything plugged off the front inputs) with an RGB slow changer. Pretty cool.

 

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The resistor I'm adding is to drop the incoming voltage to the LED down to about 3.2v or so from the +5. The LED actually came with the resistors included and I just have to solder then in somewhere in the circuit. In this case I cut the + lead off the LED really short and the same on one end of the resistor. Solder those together, shrink tube that side, and then trim the other end to match the length of the other lead as needed. The box these 100 LEDs I got were designed for using them in +5v power hence the resistors that came included. I've not seen the resistor change the speed of them so I'm guessing they have one built in already for that.

 

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On 10/4/2020 at 9:38 AM, CPUWIZ said:

I needed to modify my dev system, so it has an expansion port, for debugging my MP3 player.  Figured I'd share how easy it is.

 

1 x dual row, angled pin header.

 

Remove solder, add header, solder and done.

 

 

 

IMG-8303.jpg

62345544789--B5115FE8-A9A8-4095-84E6-644A5D482764.jpg

Hi Roman

which mp3 player do you use?

What can i do with this machine?

I guess,i need special software?

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12 hours ago, gambler172 said:

Hi Roman

which mp3 player do you use?

What can i do with this machine?

I guess,i need special software?

 

Still working on it, it will work like the Vox, but with much faster response time and no external speaker.  I will write a driver for it, when the hardware works.

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3 hours ago, gambler172 said:

Sounds great.....what Mp3 player do i need?

 

Built in MP3 player with micro SD card reader.  Games could ship with SD carts, the small ones are super cheap these days. 

 

Who knows, when I get it to work, I may walk away from it again, like I did when the PS2 adapter was perfect, or my WiFi MCP kit, which I probably go back to at some point.  :roll:

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5 hours ago, CPUWIZ said:

 

Built in MP3 player with micro SD card reader.  Games could ship with SD carts, the small ones are super cheap these days. 

 

Who knows, when I get it to work, I may walk away from it again, like I did when the PS2 adapter was perfect, or my WiFi MCP kit, which I probably go back to at some point.  :roll:

 

1gb, 2gb & sometimes 4gb cards can be had in bulk for next to nothing now :)

 

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Unless this is just for fun, I'm guessing the idea here is that you could wire in a cheap MP3 player into the cart itself that essentially would contain the OST for the game. And then use game code to trigger which tracks off the MP3 player are actually played. The audio output from the MP3 player would be tied directly to the external audio line out from the cartridge port so that the actual music would be mixed through the 7800 just like the pokey and other sound chips?

 

Since the 7800 is mono audio only from the external audio line and we are talking classic console here, you could even record the MP3 tracks at low bit quality and it wouldn't matter too much audio wise?

 

 

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17 minutes ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

...  I'm guessing the idea here is that you could wire in a cheap MP3 player into the cart itself that essentially would contain the OST for the game. And then use game code to trigger which tracks off the MP3 player are actually played. The audio output from the MP3 player would be tied directly to the external audio line out from the cartridge port so that the actual music would be mixed through the 7800 just like the pokey and other sound chips?

 

Isn’t that how the on-cart tracker in RIKKI & VIKKI works? Of course the tracker there is microcontroller-based, playing music tracks and cues in response to game code commands, but once started, the tracker plays independently, with no overhead made on SALLY on no impact on MARIA performance. 

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That potential mp3 player add-on gives me some ideas like having a Double Dragon game with soundtracks from Streets of Fire or The Warriors running the background while playing. Or maybe having a Pengo game that plays the many, many, covers of "Popcorn".

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1 hour ago, DrVenkman said:

Isn’t that how the on-cart tracker in RIKKI & VIKKI works? Of course the tracker there is microcontroller-based, playing music tracks and cues in response to game code commands, but once started, the tracker plays independently, with no overhead made on SALLY on no impact on MARIA performance. 

Yes, this is also similar to how GTROM + GTMP3 was implemented for the NES.

...or how the CD-Player was implemented in my stereo cabinet.

Edited by TailChao
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2 hours ago, -^CrossBow^- said:

Unless this is just for fun, I'm guessing the idea here is that you could wire in a cheap MP3 player into the cart itself that essentially would contain the OST for the game. And then use game code to trigger which tracks off the MP3 player are actually played. The audio output from the MP3 player would be tied directly to the external audio line out from the cartridge port so that the actual music would be mixed through the 7800 just like the pokey and other sound chips?

 

Since the 7800 is mono audio only from the external audio line and we are talking classic console here, you could even record the MP3 tracks at low bit quality and it wouldn't matter too much audio wise?

 

 

 

I put an MP3 player into a little box that auto played with the BIOS on start up to say "have you played atari today?" via the expansion port quite a while ago "just for fun" as you mentioned. It was simple and amusing for a time but that is about it. I posted about it once or twice on the forum when talking about different audio format options. Interchangeable SD cards for MP3 playback via the expansion port triggered via cartridge programming as CPUWIZ is planning is an interesting concept and way more than I could ever do that is for sure. It would be a novelty project as you kinda hint at as most 7800's don't have the pins on the expansion port and a lot don't even having the opening for the port as the mold was changed on the console to close it off totally after a few revisions. Combine that with the fact that 99 percent of users don't have the ability or means to put the header onto the motherboard or want to cut a hole in the console where the mold covers the port with plastic, Your idea of having it in the cart itself is more realistic for mass use, I agree. It's still fun to play around with the unused expansion port though. If CPUWIZ writes a driver for it to be triggered via programming who knows where it might go. Could be a few with expansion port dongles doing the job, or on cart versions. If there was a killer app it would get adopted in some way.

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