Jump to content
IGNORED

Concerto firmware thread


batari

Recommended Posts

4 hours ago, panamajoe said:

i have quite some trouble with Concerto on my PAL-machines: one of them won‘t play any 7800roms, the other 7800 machine plays only a handfull...

 

is this just me, or is PAL-support problematic at the moment?

I have 2 PAL systems and neither of them work with Concerto (very occasionally they load a rom). I need to crack them open and provide a bit of detail but happy to wait on Fred to work through the changes ATM. I'm sure things will improve.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, mimo said:

Fairly good on my pal system. I found that the SD card I was using was the biggest issue 

Sorry if you've already said already in the thread, what type of SD card have you used? Size, speed?

 

I've assumed its similar to the ntsc users with A1 models have been having, as it seems like the same problems - is your 7800 modded in anyway? You seem to have the one PAL model that actually plays well with Concerto right now ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

59 minutes ago, mimo said:

SanDisk Ultra 32GB, 120 MB/s

7800 French RGB (ish) console which may be the difference ?‍♂️

It might well be the console, generally French consoles are made slightly differently to other PAL systems so it wouldn't be surprising if it escapes the problems we've been having. Lucky! 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, mimo said:

I've got another pal one somewhere I'll have to try and find it and hope I have something that can deal with RF input

I think the French 7800s are just a pal board with an RGB daughter board 

 

Yes, though most (all?) of the SCART 7800s also have the RAM daughter board.

 

Mitch

Link to comment
Share on other sites

After a few extra loops around the USPS block I got my Concerto today - thanks Batari!

 

I took it for a quick spin using a 4gb SDHC card formatted with FAT32.  No problems

I downloaded Trebors 7800 pack and everything I loaded worked.  I did not try any 2600 games at this point.

 

It also appears my firmware is 1.0 - Not sure if changes from .95 to 1.0 have been posted?  If so I missed it.

 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 minutes ago, Goochman said:

It also appears my firmware is 1.0 - Not sure if changes from .95 to 1.0 have been posted?  If so I missed it.

 

Sounds like you got the newest firmware. Hopefully Batari releases it to everyone else soon.

 

Mitch

Link to comment
Share on other sites

44 minutes ago, Goochman said:

After a few extra loops around the USPS block I got my Concerto today - thanks Batari!

 

I took it for a quick spin using a 4gb SDHC card formatted with FAT32.  No problems

I downloaded Trebors 7800 pack and everything I loaded worked.  I did not try any 2600 games at this point.

 

It also appears my firmware is 1.0 - Not sure if changes from .95 to 1.0 have been posted?  If so I missed it.

You must be referring to the "Concerto 1.0" splash screen. That actually refers to the bootloader version, which is 1.0. The firmware version is in the menu, and is still 0.95.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hello.

I'm in France with a (PAL) RGB Atari 7800. I received my Concerto this week and wanted to give it a try...

I'm unfortunately not able to play any ROM I tried so far ?

I tested with the following SD cards : 

  - EMTEC 2Gb

  - Transcend Micro SD 4Gb (class 10) + SD Adapter.

 

My concert has firmware 0.95.

This his some of the behaviours I get

- The game starts to load but the console freezes between 10% to 80%. I have to power off/power on the console.

- The game starts to load but the console freezes between 10% to 80% then the display becomes scrambled. I have to power off/power on the console.

- The game starts to load after reaching 90%, if displays funny ">0%" or "=0%" until "A0%" until the console freezes. I have to power off/power on the console.

- The game seems to load 100% but I get scramble display at the end.

 

I tried with some .a78 attached to this thread (such as arkanoid_concerto.a78millieandmolly_demo_concerto.a78) with no luck.

 

For the record my console plays fine genuine "Pole Position II", "Hat Trick", and "Joust" cartridges as well as 2600 games from my Harmony cartridge.

 

I'll can take pictures of the screen or perform any operation that you'll suggest but it may require 3 or 4 days between the request and the moment I access my hardware.

Edited by JihemB
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Since my Concerto seemed ot be working good with 7800 ROMs I decided to install my Pokey chip today and now no 7800 ROMs will start.  I attached a picture of what happens when I try to start NTSC Ballblazer from Trebors pack.  Ive also attached pictures of my Pokey installed just to make sure I did something wrong and also the serial # of my 7800 unit.

 

It def looks like one side of my pokey sits a tad lower than the other, but it will not go in any farther on the one side - maybe the one side is too low?  I didnt not use alot of force to push the pokey in.

 

Before I take the pokey out and back in and such I wanted to verify things look good and if theres anything else I should test before hand.

 

 

IMG_9423.jpg

IMG_9424.jpg

IMG_9425.jpg

IMG_9426.jpg

IMG_9427.jpg

Edited by Goochman
Link to comment
Share on other sites

image.png.a5cba268ee206acb9840b64c6a9622cd.png

 

The POKEY chip does not look seated properly.  The lowest part (right side) may be in as far as possible, but it possibly could flush even lower than that to the socket.  The upper end (left side) is definitely not in all the way.

 

Trying to 'force' it down may not be the best move though.  You may want to remove the chip, ensure the pins are carefully aligned, and try reinserting again with consistent pressure across the chip to ensure both sides go down evenly.

 

Also, make sure the PCB is not being placed back in the console reversed.  As you insert it into the cartridge slot, the POKEY chip should not be facing towards the console buttons, but rather towards the back of the console.  Sitting normally behind the console while playing, you should not see the POKEY chip.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, Trebor said:

The POKEY chip does not look seated properly.

 

Agreed.  When I installed mine in the Concerto, I had to press down on it with both thumbs (after checking pin alignment) from the top in order to get it to seat fully.  It didn't have to be forced, but did take more pressure to seat evenly than might seem necessary.

 

Out of curiosity, is this a known-good POKEY?

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

In my experience, absent corrosion or some kind of damage to the socket or chip legs, it's not necessary to force any IC down as deeply into a socket as it can go - the tolerances on these chips and systems is usually not nearly as tight as people might think. Ultimately that maybe the cause of a lot of the 7800's reputation as a tough system for hardware mods, but that's reality. 

 

But yeah, if the POKEY itself is faulty, any number of issues might crop up. If you have a socketed 5200 or A8 computer, I'd test the POKEY in that system and make sure it's working okay. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I got my cart on Friday and have played several games -- Tank Command, Midnight Mutants, Jinks -- for between 5 and 30 minutes. I saw the corruption on the title screen of Jinks, with the vertical band of garbage that others have mentioned, but otherwise have had no gameplay issues or crashes so far.

 

However, I've noticed that the display of the cart's name in the menu is somewhat corrupted -- has anyone else encountered this? As far as I can recall it's happening there and only there:

 

image.thumb.png.9f93c82afb8af9204cb609be379abd4f.png

 

That said, I'm using a SanDisk adapter for an unbranded 2GB MicroSD card that was apparently made by Kingston (SD-C02G), so I realize I'm not exactly using the ideal setup. If a bit of graphical corruption in a menu is the only price to pay for that, I'm OK with it. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It’s a verified Pokey from Myatari.  I took out and out the okey back in - it’s seated level on the socket so I think it’s good.  BBlazer doesn’t run nor does centipede.  Commando gets to the mission briefing and hangs 1/2 way through.  Crossbow for the 7800 worked fine so it’s better than before.  Any suggestions on a known working pokey rom I can test?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 minutes ago, Goochman said:

Commando gets to the mission briefing and hangs 1/2 way through.

Just double checking as I recall experiencing the kind of thing previous (Not with the Concerto though), that it is the NTSC ROM being leveraged and not PAL.

 

There was a remake Commando cart several years back that I acquired which has a NTSC/PAL toggle.  In PAL mode, I would experience exactly what you described.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Goochman said:

 Any suggestions on a known working pokey rom I can test?

If both BALLBLAZER and COMMANDO from Trebor's ProPack aren't working, then you should consider issues with the console or the SD card you're using. Clean the cart connector contacts on the system, try another SD card, or try another 7800 if you can. 

  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, JihemB said:

Hello.

I'm in France with a (PAL) RGB Atari 7800. I received my Concerto this week and wanted to give it a try...

I'm unfortunately not able to play any ROM I tried so far ?

I tested with the following SD cards : 

  - EMTEC 2Gb

  - Transcend Micro SD 4Gb (class 10) + SD Adapter.

 

My concert has firmware 0.95.

This his some of the behaviours I get

- The game starts to load but the console freezes between 10% to 80%. I have to power off/power on the console.

- The game starts to load but the console freezes between 10% to 80% then the display becomes scrambled. I have to power off/power on the console.

- The game starts to load after reaching 90%, if displays funny ">0%" or "=0%" until "A0%" until the console freezes. I have to power off/power on the console.

- The game seems to load 100% but I get scramble display at the end.

 

I tried with some .a78 attached to this thread (such as arkanoid_concerto.a78millieandmolly_demo_concerto.a78) with no luck.

 

For the record my console plays fine genuine "Pole Position II", "Hat Trick", and "Joust" cartridges as well as 2600 games from my Harmony cartridge.

 

I'll can take pictures of the screen or perform any operation that you'll suggest but it may require 3 or 4 days between the request and the moment I access my hardware.

That´s pretty much how Concerto works on my PAL (non-RGB) console, too. Seems like it´s NTSC only at the moment...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...