GameDrive and Scatbox are not happy together :-(

[+rdemming]

After being stuck in the Christmas mail, my GameDrive finally arrived after the holidays ? But due to 2 toddlers running around the house I only just got the change to fire up my Jaguar and use the GameDrive. My Jaguar uses a Scatbox to connect to a 1084 CRT monitor (The best use for a Commodore monitor is of course to connect an Atari to it ?).

But when turning on the Jaguar (without CD drive) with the GameDrive in its slot, I only got a screen with the RetroHQ logo but not the QR-code screen as explained in the manual. Hhhmmm, I tried some Jaguar cartridges to make sure there is nothing wrong with the Jaguar itself, which all worked. Back to the GameDrive but that is still stuck in the RetroHQ logo screen.

 

Then I dug-up my spare Jaguar, checked if it worked with regular cartridges, and plugged in the GameDrive. On this Jaguar, the GameDrive is also stuck in the RetroHQ logo screen.

 

In the GameDrive manual is written that JagLink network play is not supported and the ScatBox also provides a network interface. Could this be the problem even when networking is not used? Thus I back to long term storage to find a SCART cable and connected the Jaguar directly to an LCD TV without Scatbox. And behold, there was the QR-code screen and I was able to install the GameDrive firmware to activate it and run several ROMs without problems. After playing on the TV for a while, I connected the Jaguar back to the CRT monitor using the Scatbox, but also after activating, the GameDrive still hangs in the RetroHQ logo screen.

 

Thus has anybody else used the GameDrive in combination with a Scatbox (or Catbox) and can confirm it is (not) working? Or is it a known issue that the GameDrive does not work with a Scatbox? If it is confirmed that the GameDrive does not work together with a Scatbox, is this a technical limitation or can this be solved. If you want, I can lent you my Scatbox to investigate.

 

If this is a technical limitation, I have to make myself a new "Jaguar PCB connector->1084 video cable" as the picture quality on an LCD TV is terrible ?

 

Robert

 

 

P.S. Thank you very much for creating the GameDrive. Apart for the Scatbox problem, it is a wonderful device giving me much pleasure ? ?

[Zerosquare]

Since the (S)catbox includes networking, it probably drives the UARTI signal all the time. And according to @SainT, the JagGD needs UART communication to work. Unfortunately, the way the Jaguar is designed means that the UART signal from the DSP port has precedence over the one from the cartridge.

 

One way to fix it would be to modify the Scatbox to add a switch in series with pin 3B:

[tbs123456]

Does this also mean my catbox won't work with the GD since it includes networking?

[+rdemming]

1 hour ago, Zerosquare said:

Since the (S)catbox includes networking, it probably drives the UARTI signal all the time. And according to @SainT, the JagGD needs UART communication to work. Unfortunately, the way the Jaguar is designed means that the UART signal from the DSP port has precedence over the one from the cartridge.

 

Thanks, I was already afraid it was a conflict with the networking signals. The text from the Jaguar docs you posted only mention that SCK, WS, TXD and RXD are connected to the cartridge port. But on the cartridge port schematics I have there are also UARTI and UARTO signals which are the same as UART TXD/RXD. So all the signals from the DSP port are indeed also on the cartridge port.

 

53 minutes ago, tbs123456 said:

Does this also mean my catbox won't work with the GD since it includes networking?

 

Since the Catbox is a similar device, you would indeed expect that the Catbox has the same problem.

 

Robert