Flash rom cart?

[jetset]

Yes Im being lazy (plus I’m not so good doing a search in my phone lol).

I’m very much considering getting (back) into the TI. I LOVED the text adventure games (Scott Adams particularly) question is what is the difference between the “g-rom” - which isn’t available, and the sd cart available via Brewing academy. Can it still play most games, and does it allow you to save game progress?

TIA for the help & info. ?

[+arcadeshopper]

Yes Im being lazy (plus I’m not so good doing a search in my phone lol).
I’m very much considering getting (back) into the TI. I LOVED the text adventure games (Scott Adams particularly) question is what is the difference between the “g-rom” - which isn’t available, and the sd cart available via Brewing academy. Can it still play most games, and does it allow you to save game progress?
TIA for the help & info. [emoji6]

https://atariage.com/forums/index.php?/topic/335421-A-new-99er-in-Europe#entry5054851

Sent from my Pixel 6 Pro using Tapatalk

[PeBo]

On 5/17/2022 at 11:11 AM, jetset said:

Yes Im being lazy (plus I’m not so good doing a search in my phone lol).

I’m very much considering getting (back) into the TI. I LOVED the text adventure games (Scott Adams particularly) question is what is the difference between the “g-rom” - which isn’t available, and the sd cart available via Brewing academy. Can it still play most games, and does it allow you to save game progress?

TIA for the help & info. ?

The FlashRom is a great device for 8K carts (all the original Atarisoft, DataBioTics, Romox and Parker Brothers games), but any carts that supported/used the TI GRom will not work. That is a fairly large and noteworthy list.

 

The Scott Adams should work fine (rebuttals welcome if I'm wrong), as long as you have a storage medium to load and save games to/from. Both the FlashRom and FinalGRom99 are cartridge emulators, they are not going to cover your disk or cassette needs. You will still need storage. The SD card is just for storing cartridge BINs.

 

But tell you what, PM me and I'll get your details to send you my old FlashRom for the cost of shipping (you're on your own for an SD card). I don't use it anymore, and I'd hate to see you pay for something that you will out-grow shortly after owning it (and you really WILL miss not having that GRom support just as every 3rd party developer did in avoiding TI's Drachonian licensing policies). It's why Atarisoft/Paker Brothers titles have no memory available for cutscenes.

 

And sadly, neither cart has game-state saves.

Edited May 24, 2022 by PeBo
information omission

[+videofx]

@jetset What a coincidence I just started playing the Scott Adams adventures yesterday.

 

In order to play them your will need the following:

 

1.  The Adventure Cartridge

2.  Cassette player or Disk drive and or TIPI

3.  The Cassettes or disks of the adventures themselves.

 

I am posting here a .DSK that has the first 13 adventures plus a few more

 

If you need any help just let me know

 

Bill

Scott Adams.dsk

[jetset]

Thank you Both very much!!

[HOME AUTOMATION]

12 hours ago, PeBo said:

The Scott Adams should work fine

The ADVENTURE module is GROM based.

 

Perhaps there is an alternative.

[+Torrax]

Well ... with 32K and an Extended Basic; Editor Assembler; or TI-Writer module you can use these two disks.

These are the games that came on my tape of Scott Adams Adventures from Tex-Comp in the 80's.

XB will auto load; E/A choose option 5 and press enter; with TI-Writer choose option 3 and press enter.

All will reset the system and run a GPL simulator from the 32K ram expansion.  TI-Writer will have it as menu item '9'.

 

The Adventure filenames are:

   SA_ADV1.dsk - 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 10, 11, 12, 13AE, 15AE, QP1AE, and QP2AE.

   SA_ADV2.dsk - JUNE, LOOSE, and IRON.

 

For example when it says enter device type DSK1.13AE

 

Just added the FlashRom99 file that requires 32K also.

 

SA_ADV1.dskSA_ADV2.dsk

SA_ADV8.BIN

Edited May 25, 2022 by Torrax
Added 32K FlashRom99 file

[+Torrax]

FlashRom99 "SA_ADV8.BIN" file note:

 

Fixed the menu item to display ADV-LOADER so it doesn't get confusing when seeing ADVENTURE twice when the GPL simulator resets the system.

 

You can rename it to ADV32K8.BIN to indicate ram is needed.

Edited May 25, 2022 by Torrax

[jetset]

On 5/24/2022 at 3:22 PM, PeBo said:

The FlashRom is a great device for 8K carts (all the original Atarisoft, DataBioTics, Romox and Parker Brothers games), but any carts that supported/used the TI GRom will not work. That is a fairly large and noteworthy list.

 

The Scott Adams should work fine (rebuttals welcome if I'm wrong), as long as you have a storage medium to load and save games to/from. Both the FlashRom and FinalGRom99 are cartridge emulators, they are not going to cover your disk or cassette needs. You will still need storage. The SD card is just for storing cartridge BINs.

 

But tell you what, PM me and I'll get your details to send you my old FlashRom for the cost of shipping (you're on your own for an SD card). I don't use it anymore, and I'd hate to see you pay for something that you will out-grow shortly after owning it (and you really WILL miss not having that GRom support just as every 3rd party developer did in avoiding TI's Drachonian licensing policies). It's why Atarisoft/Paker Brothers titles have no memory available for cutscenes.

 

And sadly, neither cart has game-state saves.

 

MANY thanks again! I got my unit yesterday, the FlashRom works great, but as you mentioned it is limited in the games it can run. Seems like the "Final GRom" is pretty elusive, I'm going to buy one if I see it pop up anywhere. I have a cassette player/cords and the adventure game coming so I can play that, but I definitely have a taste now and am on the lookout for the FinalGrom.
Question - if I get a 32k expansion, would that solve the compatibility issues with most of the games? Or is the Final Grom the best/only way to go?

[+Ksarul]

This problem is a bit more complex than you might think. A FlashROM cartridge will let you run any ROM-only cartridge up to 32K in size, although some of them are designed to run out of the 32K space. If the cartridge image requires 32K, it means that the image is transferred from the cartridge to the 32K RAM and executed from there. GROM cartridges are another issue. Some GROM cartridges can be executed using the FlashROM and 32K, but these require a GROM loader program (already included as part of the cartridge image for the GROM cartridges that will work this way). Large GROM cartridges (5-GROM chips) and certain utility programs (XB, EA, Minimem, TI Writer, Logo, Multiplan) won't work either because there is no room left for the loader or because the program needs the 32K space to be free as user space when executing. Note there are also some ROM cartridges that are larger than 32K--these won't work in a FlashROM either.

 

The FinalGROM has space to keep up to 5 GROM chips emulated (thus allowing large and utility programs to execute without occupying the 32K space) and it allows you to run larger ROM images too. It will also run any cartridge that the FlashROM runs.

[jetset]

13 hours ago, Ksarul said:

The FinalGROM has space to keep up to 5 GROM chips emulated (thus allowing large and utility programs to execute without occupying the 32K space) and it allows you to run larger ROM images too. It will also run any cartridge that the FlashROM runs.

So the final grom sounds like the better of the two options (grom v 32expansion). Sucks there’s none out there for sale.

[+OLD CS1]

20 minutes ago, jetset said:

So the final grom sounds like the better of the two options (grom v 32expansion). Sucks there’s none out there for sale.

It is, but as a stop-gap the FR99 works just fine for a lot of stuff, and it is what we had up until the FG99 came to be.

[fimbulvetr]

9 hours ago, jetset said:

Sucks there’s none out there for sale.

There are a couple available on eBay

 

https://www.ebay.ca/itm/115412955652?hash=item1adf25f204:g:sN0AAOSwj1hfPG~j

[+arcadeshopper]

I just had 10 finalgroms and sold out quickly..   

[jetset]

1 hour ago, fimbulvetr said:

There are a couple available on eBay

 

https://www.ebay.ca/itm/115412955652?hash=item1adf25f204:g:sN0AAOSwj1hfPG~j

 

...And then there was only one! Thanks! I don't know why that never came up via search. I have it set for worldwide. I almost pulled the trigger on the 32K expansion unit he has. I'll wait to see how the flash cart works. Many thanks for the info and link!