philipj Posted January 11, 2006 Share Posted January 11, 2006 I don't have any games that uses the "Comlynx" and I know very little about it... Does anybody know exactly how much data can be transferred via "Comlynx" and how fast in can be transferred? I'm simply curious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 The maximum speed is 62500 baud. The byte consists of a start-bit, a parity-bit and a stop bit so you have to divide the baud rate by 11 to get the number of bytes/second. The transfer is a broadcast to all ComLynxed devices so there is just one device talking at a time. The protocol is completely up to the programmer. Harry Dodgson created a way to transmit complete games over the ComLynx. The idea was that only one Lynx needs the game cart and the others just have slave carts. The ComLynx could be used for downloading anything from the master cart to all the connected Lynxes. The name for this system was LGSS. And the only program supporting this so far is Othello. So there is really no limit to how much data can be transferred. One annoyance in the ComLynx is that the voltage levels are ordinary TTL levels. You need a converter for connecting the signal to a COM-port of a PC. The highest standard baud rate that a PC can use is 9600 bauds which is a severe limitation. There is a lot of other operating systems that can communicate at 62500 bauds. I have a PPC Linux that can do it and Falcon seems to be able to do it also. But the PC hardware usually lacks the capabilities to use non-standards baud rates. I have also in the process of trying to make an USB - ComLynx dongle that could use the maximum Lynx baud rate. If it succeeds I will post the results to the forums. -- Karri Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sage Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 Harry Dodgson created a way to transmit complete games over the ComLynx. The idea was that only one Lynx needs the game cart and the others just have slave carts. The ComLynx could be used for downloading anything from the master cart to all the connected Lynxes. The name for this system was LGSS. And the only program supporting this so far is Othello. So there is really no limit to how much data can be transferred. 998745[/snapback] Dont forget the BLL downloader, whcih is included in some more cartridges, like SIMIS, Alpine Games, Champ Rally, Lynx Reloaded.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
philipj Posted January 12, 2006 Author Share Posted January 12, 2006 I'll have to lookup up the term "Baud" to understand how it works... I also need to get my hands on "Alpine" . Let's say you wanted to the Lynx to upload a file that's maybe "1MB" in size without considering the Lynx RAM; would it be possible for that file size to be up loaded in real-time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 I'll have to lookup up the term "Baud" to understand how it works... I also need to get my hands on "Alpine" . Let's say you wanted to the Lynx to upload a file that's maybe "1MB" in size without considering the Lynx RAM; would it be possible for that file size to be up loaded in real-time. 998977[/snapback] Shure. It will take lots of real time Uploading 1M takes about 3 minutes. A baud is bits/second. -- Karri Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
semicolo Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 Well in fact bauds correspond to the frequency of the carrier, if you code one bit for each period, then yes bauds and bps are equal, but if you code 2 bits per period, bauds are half the bps and so on. One could use the ftdi chips (FT232BM for example or the DLP-USB232M module ready to use), they come with windows and linux drivers and support 300bps -> 3Mbps in TTL (the base rate can be divided by numbers between 2 and 16384, so 62500 is an exact match). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 Actually I have already ordered that ftdi module for my experiments. I hope it works well. If it does then I have something fun in the pipeline for you all. -- Karri Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Laird Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 I seem to remember that the original intention of the Lynx was that you only needed one game card for comlynx games, but i gues Atari (or should I say the Tramiels) realised that was "false" economy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
semicolo Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 Yes it works well, I know someone that used it to make dreamcast serial cables (actually he swapped the 6Mhz quartz for a 6.144 one to match the dreamcast clock, that changes the usb rate too and it's not supported by every computer). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TailChao Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 I seem to remember that the original intention of the Lynx was that you only needed one game card for comlynx games, but i gues Atari (or should I say the Tramiels) realised that was "false" economy. 999032[/snapback] Actually it was supposed to be "Game Tapes" Players could take turns sharing the casette and loading the game, then giving it to the next player. This was not done because the Lynx's 64KB of RAM was considered insufficient for a full game (And tapes are godawful slow). I don't think receiving a game over comlynx was ever considered during design (Can't blame the tramiels for this one ). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Laird Posted January 12, 2006 Share Posted January 12, 2006 I seem to remember that the original intention of the Lynx was that you only needed one game card for comlynx games, but i gues Atari (or should I say the Tramiels) realised that was "false" economy. 999032[/snapback] Actually it was supposed to be "Game Tapes" Players could take turns sharing the casette and loading the game, then giving it to the next player. This was not done because the Lynx's 64KB of RAM was considered insufficient for a full game (And tapes are godawful slow). I don't think receiving a game over comlynx was ever considered during design (Can't blame the tramiels for this one ). 999090[/snapback] I read a story somewhere from one of the Epyx guys who said this was exactly how it was gonna be done! i can only assume you used a "blank" card to store the data on each system. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sage Posted January 13, 2006 Share Posted January 13, 2006 I seem to remember that the original intention of the Lynx was that you only needed one game card for comlynx games, but i gues Atari (or should I say the Tramiels) realised that was "false" economy. 999032[/snapback] Some games can be hotswapped. If you have the cartridge detection pin bridged. These are only that games which do not load things from cartrige while in game. IMO Shanghai is one candidate. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted January 20, 2006 Share Posted January 20, 2006 Yesterday I got the USB - RS232 serial board. It is really very small. Smaller than my little finger. I tried to set up 62500 bauds on it on a Debian Linux and it succeeded in about 20 minutes after opening the packet. It also has support for other operating systems. I still need to rewrite my flash applications to support the higher baudrates. But once that is done I will do some more tests. Fortunately I have a copy of Lynx Reloaded. I believe it is the only cart supporting the high speed downloader today. Stay tuned, more exciting info will hopefully follow. (And start saving for your own copy of the DLP-TxRx USB - Serial Adaptor. Because it may open up a new dimension for Lynx gaming. ) -- Karri Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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