On Fri, 19 Mar 1999, Maarten ter Huurne wrote:
> >> ROM version of Royal Blood is 1MB.
> >
> >8-megabit Megarom??? That's impressive! Is it downloadable in any site?
>
> I don't think so. I know it exists because Takamichi has one. It contains a
> bit of SRAM as well. There is also a disk version of this game, so the ROM
> version is interesting mostly as a curiousity.
I downloaded from Funet, but I didn't have time to test it.
> I have also seen a Korean compilation cartridge (probably illegal) which
> contains many 16K ROMs combined in a single cartridge. It had a ROM of 2MB.
> I still have the ROM image on my harddisk.
I don't think that (mega)ROM cartridges are interesting. They're hard to
copy, unmodifiable (in principle) and much expensive.
> >>> Why didn't people from Japan create a kind of Megaram?
> >>
> >> Maybe they don't like doing illegal things?
> >
> >Take it easy!
>
> Don't get me wrong, I copied lots of MSX games. Only recently I started
> buying games (MSX and PSX). Now I have a part-time job (Java programming)
> and I can afford them, before I needed all my money for hardware (MSX2,
> color monitor, FM-PAC).
Ok, I was thinking that you was blaming me for software piracy. I copied
some MSX games, but I never sold copies. I never take profit of others
work. But there wasn't any kind of Japanese representatives here, so we
didn't have another way of acquireing Japanese software for MSX.
> I get the feeling the Japanese are not as fanatical crackers and copiers
> like Dutch, Spanish or Brazillians. Although maybe under the surface the
> Japanese are not the perfect citizens they may appear to be? Otherwise, why
> would games released for the Japanese market alone be copy protected?
Some Brazilian guys are fanatical crackers but not for piracy, just for
fun! Japanese software was copy protected because they knew that WE would
copy it, not the most part of the Japaneses.
> >I was talking about one manufacturer (for example, Konami)
> >sells Megaram cartridges and sell disks with the games separately. This
> >would be much cheaper.
>
> If they wanted to go for disks, they wouldn't really need a MegaRAM
> cartridge. They would just write the game in such a way that it runs on the
> internal RAM. After all, Japanese MSX2/2+ software all works on 64K RAM.
I agree completely! I see no reason to make Megarom cartridges instead of
make disks.
> Cartridge is extra quality (no loading time, more durable) compared to
> disk. Also, it is harder to copy.
And much much much more expensive! The cost/benefit relation is much
poorer than for disks.
> >> around 1990 we had to rely on imports for games like SD Snatcher and Solid
> >> Snake.
> >
> >Importing games? Wasn't it too slow and too expensive?
>
> It was slow and expensive, but clubs offered that service and it was used.
> It was the only way to get originals.
> By the way, SD Snatcher is more expensive now than it was back then...
Then it became a good investment! :-)
> >Total: 71 clockcicles. Conclusion: you're right, it's not possible to use
> >1.2Mb or 1.44Mb disks with Z80 at 3.57MHz. It's BAD!
>
> Henrik Gilvad once told me.
Is he the guy that created the IDE interface for MSX?
> >Then, there's still a chance only for Turbo-R.
>
> The built-in FDC can handle HD according to Henrik. But you would need to
> write a new diskROM...
Yes, and some hardware modifications, too.
> For normal MSX1/2/2+, 7MHz is an option. But old FDCs can't handle HD
> speeds either, so they would have to be replaced.
Some people say that WD2793 can handle 500kbit/s transfer rate. Is it
true?
> Another option is to use some kind of buffered hardware. Like Superdisk
> connected to IDE, as Peter Burkhard mentioned.
Right, buffered hardware is the best solution.
> But a Superdisk drive is quite expensive, maybe someone wants to make a
> buffered HD floppy interface? It could be very simple: two banks of 512
> bytes (1 sector) of RAM. Could be two ICs or a single dual-ported IC. One
> bank is filled by the FDC, while the other is LDIR-ed to MSX main RAM.
> Although 3.5MHz is too slow for polling the FDC, it would be fast enough
> for LDIR-ing. After LDIR-ing an entire sector it would poll for moment the
> next sector is available.
My idea was a buffer for an entire track (or maybe cylinder?)
> It would be a real benefit:
> - 720K disks are hard to find, 1.44MB disks are still available everywhere
> - double the amount of data fits on a single disk
> - disk transfer rate is doubled, making your MSX load faster
> Anyone interested in making a prototype?
I am interested, but I don't know how should I create a diskrom compatible
with the common diskroms. The biggest problem is that I don't have enough
time, nowadays.
Greetings from Brazil!
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Marco Antonio Simon Dal Poz http://www.lsi.usp.br/~mdalpoz
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