64kib

06/15/2017

FO 07:51 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Tested PBI devices thread

External sio or the internal drives?
I'm aware of some internal sio drive issues, seems to get stuck in a bad state. foft

FO 07:47 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Demoing Eclaire

Yeah, exciting. I'd also like to see pictures. So far mine only made it as far as the local makers club. foft

06/14/2017

FO 09:25 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: F10 and cartridge selected behavior

Actually I was hoping someone could pick up firmware development so I can work on the hardware... foft

FO 09:01 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Tested PBI devices thread

Thanks, very helpful. I'm pleased the MIO seems to be working too so far. Adjusting the PCB by a couple of mm seems ok for the next revision. Did you have to file the joystick port too a little? foft

FO 07:45 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: V14 - Changes?

There is a file called 'changes' in the same folder.
I had the paddles wired up in the wrong order. foft

FO 07:03 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: SIO devices which use clockin/clock out?

No, 12v is not connected. Didn't seem worth a regulator for that. foft

06/13/2017

FO 10:04 PM EclaireXL Developer: Tested PBI devices thread

Please add tested devices here, along with their status
I'll start it off with the ones I have.
board,core,device,working,issues
v2,v14,Turbo Freezer,Yes,None
v2,v14,SysCheck II,Yes,None
v2,v13,Ide 2+,Yes,Does not work with larg... foft

06/12/2017

FO 08:34 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: SIO devices which use clockin/clock out?

I added support here in the latest core and this works for Nir. Could you check too please? foft

FO 08:26 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Custom keyboard designs for EclaireXL

Can they make some kind of 'flat covers' for the ones we aren't using? foft

FO 08:11 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Custom keyboard designs for EclaireXL

Nice!
I'd be tempted to put freezer somewhere it won't be pressed by mistake. Do we need paddle mode?
So these keyboard behave like a normal USB keyboard. Are they just stickers or actual special keycaps? foft

FO 08:08 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Keyboard

Hi, I'm alive! Just sleeping then working.
Yeah we can do all of that. Steve, did you understand the replies I sent you before on the keyboard? As I said we'll implement a custom mapping function though. I don't see why we can't expos... foft

06/11/2017

FO 08:49 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: F10 and cartridge selected behavior

Yeah, Nir mentioned this one (http://www.64kib.com/redmine/issues/25).
I will fix it...
I also notice that I get a complete system lockup on some carts now! e.g. Galaxian foft

06/07/2017

FO 05:37 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

I'm going to work on improving stability once I finish up the pbi support... foft

06/06/2017

FO 09:36 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Anybody interested in some case badges?

I'm interested probably, pending design:)
On a similar topic, these are essential for a good experience...
http://www.4keyboard.com/commodore/591-2840-commodore-atari-non-transparent-keyboard-stickers.html foft

FO 09:28 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

@xxl - no! Can you try v8? I hear v9 is iffy for some people... foft

FO 12:17 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

Weird. Try a different psu and sd card.
I'll check your video after work. foft

FO 10:30 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

How did you fix it? foft

FO 09:21 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

I just mean I'd rather people develop software that works on the real thing. I'm happy to have turbo and additional modes but don't want people to develop exclusively for them. Perhaps just an E: handler, an image viewer and a demo:-) foft

06/05/2017

FO 08:09 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

Well there is no existing software and I don't want to detract from the real Atari. I was thinking 80 col E: and a demo app or two.
Yes a 256 character font would be possible. foft

06/04/2017

FO 07:53 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

2x and 4x antic colour clock mode.
So 320*200 in gtia modes or 1280*200 in gr 0. foft

FO 07:51 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Serial port functionality?

Not on the new board since it goes straight to a usb chip.
This would require additional hardware. foft

FO 01:09 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v8 Core - First NTSC Game Tests

Bomb jack works fine here. It flickers on NTSC - as it does on altirra too. Yes it takes a long time to load...
foft

FO 09:14 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v8 Core - First NTSC Game Tests

Can you post the bombjack image? Mine turned out to be Gunpowder Charlie:)
Yeah I was starting to worry too! I wonder if some supplies are too noisy and we need more caps on the input. foft

FO 07:29 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v8 Core - First NTSC Game Tests

For my own sanity I double checked these do run properly:) foft

FO 07:22 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v8 Core - First NTSC Game Tests

That looks... errrr... pathetic, which it isn't!
I suspect the power supply.
Can you try xram21?
Although thinking about it, did you flash v8.sof or v8.jic? v8.sof only lasts until switched off and we know v7.sof is bad.
foft

06/03/2017

FO 09:50 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

In fact its exactly like the real machine - artifacting is just on composite mode and is due to combination of luma and chroma:-)
So I think on svideo mods and rgb output the real thing does not handle it either.
That said we could... foft

FO 09:33 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

I could upload v17 if it helps... foft

FO 09:15 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

That version of Quartus is ancient and probably pre-dates the cyclone 5! I'm using v16.1 and just downloaded v17. foft

FO 08:45 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

2nd bug in v9 - I broke the internal turbo freezer foft

FO 02:05 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

Arg, v9 breaks Numen!!
(I think it breaks at the same point I saw here, so I should review what that change was!:
20150408:
COMMON:Fix memopad 480i (interlace by dynamically changing dmactl during hsync bug)
COMMON:Revert an Antic ... foft

FO 12:35 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

Nir reported that v9 did not boot reliably for him. I guess timing is tight and this is a board-board timing difference.
Perhaps there is one mode that doesn't work and this is the one Nir is using!
Did anyone else have success? For... foft

FO 07:09 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: v9 core available

On the wiki (http://www.64kib.com/redmine/projects/eclairexl/wiki#Flashing) foft

FO 09:32 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

I think it was set up for 50Hz VGA by default. Some monitors and tvs will not support this directly. Did you check sound to see if its actually booting? You'll get the pokey bubbling noise. foft

FO 09:15 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

Did you do the SD card setup? The board currently uses that for the ROM. Panos posted an image, see the wiki for a link. foft

FO 07:10 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: SIO devices which use clockin/clock out?

Great:)
Don't connect it yet, I need to verify these lines on the logic analyzer furst. foft

06/02/2017

FO 11:22 PM EclaireXL Developer: v9 core available

For prototype v1 and v2(aka v3!)
Decided to call the latest pbi protoype v9, since I consider it good enough to flash to my board. Acid passes again, cartridges work again. Some PBI stuff seems to work - e.g. Turbo freezer oldOS, some... foft

FO 08:56 PM EclaireXL Developer: SIO devices which use clockin/clock out?

Do any of you have any devices using these sio pins? They are not used by SIO2PC, SIO2SD, most disk drives and cassette players.
I need to check the implementation fpga side before testing, I have a feeling they are wrong at present. foft

FO 10:43 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: XC12 power usage?

If you have an ammeter it would be very interesting to know the current on the 5V line and the motor control line. I understand this is annoying to wire up though... foft

FO 10:19 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: XC12 power usage?

I mean with a smaller PSU foft

FO 10:19 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: XC12 power usage?

OK great. Thanks for testing it. Sounds like its spikes on connect/disconnect and button presses rather than continuous current that are the problem. So perhaps we can make it more stable by a big capacitor by the SIO 5V supply. foft

FO 07:15 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: XC12 power usage?

Perhaps we need a big capacitor here Panos? Could try with a larger PSU. foft

FO 07:13 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Which case are you getting?

We've set it up to reset the boards in general. Its a push to make switch I think rather than a toggle. So if you want to replace power you'll need to maintain the state with something! foft

06/01/2017

FO 10:23 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: XC12 power usage?

Woohoo:) foft

FO 08:22 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: XC12 power usage?

Its TR2 near interface 2 foft

FO 10:29 AM EclaireXL Developer: XC12 power usage?

Does anyone have an XC12? I want to know if we give it enough power for the motor. Might be worth checking if the transistor gets hot! foft

FO 08:39 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How to center the image in PAL VGA mode?

Does NTSC mode work? foft

FO 08:20 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How to center the image in PAL VGA mode?

Yes if its there you can use it. There are instructions to make one on the wiki tag. foft

FO 07:53 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How to center the image in PAL VGA mode?

To make it last you need to make a .jic file. foft

FO 07:53 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How to center the image in PAL VGA mode?

If you flashed a sof then it only lasts until you switch off! So when you say 'when I switch on' I guess you reset it back to v7. foft

FO 08:21 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Which case are you getting?

Which one? foft

FO 08:12 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Received board, first impressions....

The mapping from ps2 to atari key code is here:
http://www.64kib.com/atarixlfpga_svn/trunk/atari_800xl/common/a8core/ps2_to_atari800.vhdl
(see http://www.computer-engineering.org/ps2keyboard/scancodes2.html)
I started with ps2 you s... foft

FO 02:12 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How does Random numbers are been generated in EclairXL?

Of course I mean lfsr! foft

FO 10:25 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How does Random numbers are been generated in EclairXL?

Pokey has an lsfr foft

05/31/2017

FO 12:10 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

Woohoo! foft

FO 11:35 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How to center the image in PAL VGA mode?

http://www.64kib.com/autobuild/private/prototype_v2/
v8.sof/jic
Instructions are on the wiki tab. foft

FO 07:39 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How to center the image in PAL VGA mode?

That said if you can make a working 50Hz mode (of similar resolution) with your pc and this monitor, please send me the timings used. foft

FO 06:39 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: How to center the image in PAL VGA mode?

Hi Nir,
NTSC works on v8, but not on v7 (it shipped with v7). So if you install that you can switch modes.
Regarding resolution 'pal' mode is 576p50 and 'ntsc' mode is 480p59.94. A lot of modern monitors handle them since they are ... foft

05/30/2017

FO 06:43 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: atari800core.arg

Great your board arrived and is up and running. Thanks for the bug reports, please keep adding them. Please don't assign to me though, I do that when I pick them up to work on:-)
Ideally I'm hoping to end up getting to more detailed b... foft

FO 09:09 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: atari800core.arg

Yeah sorry it needs to be 'structure 1'. The mcc (multiple classic computer) board has its own setup.
For reference:An .arg file is basically an encoded .rbf file, with some custom flags the mcc team added. Anyway that is another boar... foft

05/29/2017

FO 10:04 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: atari800core.arg

Too late for me to upload an image now. Sorry! Will be able to tomorrow evening.
See in here:
http://www.64kib.com/Atari%20800%20FPGA%20Manual.pdf
section 2.3 foft

FO 10:03 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: atari800core.arg

The .arg file is for the MCC216?
Are you trying to set up an SD card? There is a nice description of how to lay out the directories in the manual. foft

05/27/2017

FO 09:23 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Received board, first impressions....

Hi Steve,
Exciting it arrived:)
Thanks for the feedback. We need to keep a track of issues from this board so we make sure to fix them on all the final version. I guess I should start a new wiki page to track them.
If the main b... foft

05/26/2017

FO 08:16 PM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Any boards arrived?

Fingers crossed!
Worth flashing v8 core when you get it since NTSC works on that. I'm still trying to get v9 working with the initial PBI support...
Did you think about the keyboard mapping stuff or just get a UK keyboard in the end? foft

05/24/2017

FO 10:10 PM EclaireXL Developer: Any boards arrived?

The boards are pre-flashed with v7 I think. This does not work with NTSC. So I suggest flashing with v8 as the first action if you want to run NTSC.
I'm working on v9 which will include initial PBI support and I'll also double check t... foft

05/17/2017

FO 06:59 AM EclaireXL Developer: RE: Power Requirements?

USB B 5V input. 500mA is enough but I'd go with 1-2A to give some extra for any connected devices. foft