Looking at the website of Stratos Technology today I noticed they were selling something called the BlackMonolith which seems to an external SCSI connector solution for their Power Monster II CF interface cards.
This thing looks pretty nifty, especially if the setup is compatible with a X68000 compact, and if it does not need any form of external power to be connected to it.
From the documentation it seems to me that you can connect this sandwich to certain Macs without any further power connectors involved. Anyone know whether that would be possible for the compact as well?
Where is this website located?
http://www.artmix.com/CF_powermon_II.html (http://www.artmix.com/CF_powermon_II.html)
http://www.artmix.com/BakMonolith.html (http://www.artmix.com/BakMonolith.html)
After doing some research it turns out that connecting this thing to a Compact is an involved affair.
The Compact external SCSI port is a 50 pin mini Micronics. To connect that to the 25 pin D-sub port on the BlackMonolith requires a mess of cables and adapters, but should be possible if you track down and buy all the parts.
As a minimum you seem to need a Mini 50 pin SCSI to regular 50 pin cable plus a 50 pin SCSI to 25 pin D-sub cable in combination with whatever gender changing adapters are needed based on the genders of the cables acquired.
Computers, eh, gotta love 'em and their devil may care attitude towards standards.
A question though. Both my floppy disk drives seems to be permanently out of order. If I copy the eidis disk image to a CF and work it into my Compact via the aforementioned setup will I be able to get my compact to boot it without having to first boot into human68k via a bootable floppy and do some setup?
Will compacts automatically try to boot from SCSI if there is nothing bootable in the floppy drive or will I need a working floppy drive for initial setup?
Well, it depends on your actual SRAM configuration : with factory settings, it will try to boot from floppy and nothing else.
You will need to boot human68k first in order to run switch.x, activating the boot from the internal scsi rom and configure the boot order.
However, I've faced similar problem with my very first 5' floppy based x68000. It has an hard drive, but I did not have any human68k on 5' floppy by this time.
The trick I used consist of preparing the hard drive on an scsi capable PC, and hooking the x68000 RS232 line to my PC using a null modem cable. Then activating the remote debugger inside the IPL by holding the OPT2 key and powering up the x68000. This way, I were able to communicate with the whole machine using a terminal emulator, so I've modified the SRAM where the boot configuration take place in order to boot from the hard drive.
The trick is easier than it looks like. You just need a null modem cable (DB9 <--> DB25) and of course a pc with an rs232 port.
Interested ?
On newer models like Compact you should be able to boot from SCSI HD without any particular setup - if I remeber well - though here:
http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:hard_drive_on_sasi_machine (http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:hard_drive_on_sasi_machine)
it's mentioned thay you have to run switch.x and set BOOT to SCSI3.Try yourself and let us know.
P.S.
I can say that I totally removed the two FDDs from my CompactXVI (since they are not working) and I'm able to boot from 2GB Sansdisk Compact Flash inserted in a Compact flash--->IDE adapter + IDE---> SCSI converter.
Quote from: lydux on May 03, 2013, 12:51:02 AM
Well, it depends on your actual SRAM configuration : with factory settings, it will try to boot from floppy and nothing else.
You will need to boot human68k first in order to run switch.x, activating the boot from the internal scsi rom and configure the boot order.
However, I've faced similar problem with my very first 5' floppy based x68000. It has an hard drive, but I did not have any human68k on 5' floppy by this time.
The trick I used consist of preparing the hard drive on an scsi capable PC, and hooking the x68000 RS232 line to my PC using a null modem cable. Then activating the remote debugger inside the IPL by holding the OPT2 key and powering up the x68000. This way, I were able to communicate with the whole machine using a terminal emulator, so I've modified the SRAM where the boot configuration take place in order to boot from the hard drive.
The trick is easier than it looks like. You just need a null modem cable (DB9 <--> DB25) and of course a pc with an rs232 port.
Interested ?
My SRAM battery arrived DOA, I soldered it out and I have yet to find a replacement, so my SRAM is long gone.
Anyway, I believe that I do have all the required parts for the above. I have an old DOS machine, and I think I have a DB25/DB9 cable somewhere.
I just ordered the SCSI CF parts though, so it is likely going to be a few weeks before they arrive. But until then I can try and see whether I can get your trick to work or not.
How do you communicate with the X68000 using DOS? Any particular program one has to use?
What commands would I have to send to the compact to get it to reverse the boot order.
It is quite the oversight for Sharp not to give users a way to boot from external SCSI drives without having to boot into human68k first. All they needed was to make it an option by holding down a key or something.
Any chance that might be an option that is just not general knowledge?
Quote from: kamiboy on May 03, 2013, 02:21:25 AM
It is quite the oversight for Sharp not to give users a way to boot from external SCSI drives without having to boot into human68k first. All they needed was to make it an option by holding down a key or something.
They give the opposite, you can force to boot from floppy holding down OPT.1 during boot.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure in Compact model you don't need to change the boot order executing switch.x but you have only to restore an HDD (like the Eidis one) into your CF.
About RS232 communication setup , you can read more here:
http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:file_transfer_between_windows_pcs_and_x68000_machines_using_null_modem_cable (http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:file_transfer_between_windows_pcs_and_x68000_machines_using_null_modem_cable)
According to Canada post my PowerMonster II sandwich is in town, so I should have an answer to that question by tomorrow.
I really do hate computers.
So, I connect the sandwich to the compact and no dice, of course.
To make things worse after a minute or so I notice that unmistakable smell of electronics heating up beyond safety levels, so I yanked the old power cable. Turns out the sandwich, especially the CF card was super hot. Time will only tell whether something was damaged or not.
I was very careful with wiring the CF to the compact correctly, so I have no idea what is wrong.
Sort of hoping it is the jumpers but deuce if I can figure out what some of them do.
Can someone help me with these following details?
What does the RST jumper do? Should it be on or off? What SCSI ID should I assign to the CF for it to boot? I think it was set to 3 by default.
Oh yeah, I've set the CF to be powered by terminator power, anyone else made that work?
Could someone look at the pdf manual for the power monster II linked in the page below and help me through this?
http://www.artmix.com/CF_powermon_II.html (http://www.artmix.com/CF_powermon_II.html)
Please, post how do you setup your connections (SCSI wiring, power, etc..) and will try to to help you.
Last night after several hours with a multimeter I found out that the main problem was that the SCSI pinout diagram was mirrored according to how it is on the port of the Black Monolith. The pinout must have been given according to the device you are connecting it to. What a mess, what were they thinking providing users with a mirrored diagram. That is why a bunch of signal pins were being connected to ground and vice versa.
The Black monolith is clearly meant to just plug into a SCSI port.
Anyhow, once I mirrored the connections there was no longer any cables getting hot and the Power Monster II power led actually turns on.
Still no dice with booting though. Could be that my 8GB flash is not compatible, or the earlier diagram error killed either the flash or power monster.
I follow the wiki guide for connecting the solder pads to the Black Monolith SCSI port using jumper wires.
If anyone could give me their Power Monster or AztecMonster jumper setting that might help.
Did you mean the pinout in this datasheet was wrong?
http://www.artmix.com/pdffiles/CF_PM_Manual2_203_Eng.pdf (http://www.artmix.com/pdffiles/CF_PM_Manual2_203_Eng.pdf)
No, it is the SCSI port diagram on the Black Monolith pdf which is mirrored, as if you are looking at the Minolith input port from behind.
http://www.artmix.com/pdffiles/BakMonolith_Manual_Eng.pdf (http://www.artmix.com/pdffiles/BakMonolith_Manual_Eng.pdf)
I confirmed this after discovering that several signal pins had a direct connection to ground which made no sense to me. First I thought it was my wiring, then I confirmed that the ground connection only showed up when said wires were connected even just to the bare Black Monolith board.
Then I thought maybe the problem was with shorts on the Black Monolith solder point and confirmed that it was not. When I looked at which pins had GND connections it suddenly clicked, it was only pins that had a corresponding GND in the mirrored direction.
I suppose the Black Monolith is not stricktly necessary when trying to do an internal mod, but I thought it was neat because it lets you power the SCSI CF board via TERM power from the solder pads.
Here is picture of my setup:
(http://imageshack.us/a/img705/1143/photomay11112853.jpg)
Anywaste guys, assuming that the CF board is now wired correctly and is not fried, I would appreciate some help in making the Compact boot from it.
I need the following information:
What SCSI ID should I assign to the CF for the compact to boot from it?
I thought maybe it would make sense to try and assign it ID0 and flip the switch on the back of the Compact to make the internal floppy drives secondary to external devices, but that does not seem to work. Assigning SCSI ID3 also does nothing.
Furthermore, should the termination jumpers be enabled or not?
If anyone with a compact and CF SCSI setup could reset their S-RAM and see whether they can get their machine to boot from the CF without a Human68K floppy and what SCSI ID the CF had then that would help me a lot.
Right now I do not even know whether I fried my $200 wunder board thanks to the ridiclous PDF manual or not, so it would help to narrow things down.
Cheers
Hi, first of all please post a diagram of the connections you used for wiring your PowerMonter II to SCSI connector (by the way you follow my guide here http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:internal_scsi_and_cf_card_mod (http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:internal_scsi_and_cf_card_mod) and installed sockets on SCSI daughter-board?)
Then, I think the BlackMonolith card is useless so you can connect the PowerMonterII directly to CompactXVI.
Then , since you have no access to any FDD, restore the Eidis Image to the CF, them assign ID3 to the PoweMonsterII, personally I get best result with PARITY and TERMINATION jumpers set to OFF (with these ON sometimes I got random freezes or boot errors). BLOCK SIZE jumper also is set to OFF.
If everything it's correct, you should boot from CF without changing the order of the boot sequence through the "switch" command executed in DOS, by default the boot order is set to 'STD' so the machine will first try to boot from floppy disk then from other peripherls if if no disk is present.I'm quite sure of this but I'll check later and let you know.
Yeah, I put sockets on the daughter-board. The diagram I follow is the wiki link you provided for SCSI daughter-board pinouts and combined that with the Black Monolith pdf for its SCSI port pin configuration, only mirrored.
Unfortunately I have to use the Black Monolith since the Power Monster board has no junpers of its own, so I cannot even assign SCSI ID.
As for the jumpers you mentioned the Black Monolith does not have any for parity or block size.
I have triple checked my wiring and the CF does not boot. I do not even get a single access light blink at any time.
I think eithet the Power Monster II does not work in this setup, or more likely it is fried.
I wish I could confirm one way or the other.
OK, focuse your attention on the GROUND signals, I had a similar issue when I tried my CF setup (it didn't recognize any CF) and it was due some missing GROUND signals.Connect alla GROUND signals between the SCSI daughterboard and PowerMonster II.Keep us informed.
All ground pins on the Black Monolith are connected to ground pins on the daughter-board. The daughter-board has a few too many ground pins though, there is nowhere to connect them to on the Black Monolith so I left those unconnected. Cannot imagine that is causing problems since all ground pins seem to be connected on the daughter-board anyway.
On monday I'll write the maker of the Power Monster an email asking whether there is any way to confirm whether the unit is fried or not. I doubt there is any without access to a SCSI capable device such as an old Macintosh which the Black Monolith is designed to work with.
I will also have to warn him about the mirrored diagram on his pdf being the potential cause of fatal misunderstandings.
This whole X68000 endeavour has so far been a costly disaster. I am half tempted to auction it away and cut my losses.
Quote from: kamiboy on May 13, 2013, 04:08:48 AM
All ground pins on the Black Monolith are connected to ground pins on the daughter-board. The daughter-board has a few too many ground pins though, there is nowhere to connect them to on the Black Monolith so I left those unconnected. Cannot imagine that is causing problems since all ground pins seem to be connected on the daughter-board anyway.
If I remember well, my problem was just few GROUND pins left unconnected.
QuoteThis whole X68000 endeavour has so far been a costly disaster. I am half tempted to auction it away and cut my losses.
Never give up!I'm pretty sure your problem depends from insuffcient GROUND.The best thing to do would be tie all GROUND signals of the SCSI daughterboard each other (yes, I know, they are already connected each other but try anyway) and then connect one of them to the GROUND of the PowerMonster II.
I actually thought of doing that but figured it was a waste of effort since they are all connected anyway.
In any regard that is about the last thing I can try, I'll give it a go and report back.
Tried it, but it changed nothing.
Maybe the Power Monster II does not work with the X68000.
Are these SCSI to CF boards fussy as far as Flash cards are concerned?
I have a Sandisk 8gig Extreme IV card.
Quote from: kamiboy on May 13, 2013, 09:16:20 AM
Tried it, but it changed nothing.
Maybe the Power Monster II does not work with the X68000.
Are these SCSI to CF boards fussy as far as Flash cards are concerned?
I have a Sandisk 8gig Extreme IV card.
Try another CF, I succesfully use a standard 2GB Sandisk.I don't think PowerMonster II is not compatible with X68000.If you will not succeeded , you can always change it as the seller said"If you had a defective card, we exchange it"
If the card is defective then the fault is most certainly with the initial fatal mirrored wiring I did according to the provided diagram.
I think he mentions that they are not responsible for errors made due to misunderstanding. I'll shoot him a message today. I really think he should change the diagram on the Black Monolith pdf.
Well, according to Sakai, the maker of the devices, X68000 users have reported success with the Power Monster II.
I am not sure if it is the language barrier but I seem to have trouble explaining to him how the pinout diagram in the Black Monolith PDF is the mirror of the actual pinout on the Black Monolith.
The pinout in the pdf is correct for old Macintosh devices and such but since the Black Monolith faces such a device when plugged into it then it would have to have the mirror pinout for matching pins to plug into oneanother.
It makes sense when one thinks of it, but it is certainly not intuitive when trying to do ones own wiring.
I am really having a tough time trying to explain to Sakai that while the pin config in the Blacks Monolith pdf is correct for the device that the Black Monolith is supposed to plug into, such as a Macintosh, it still is not correct for the Black Monolith itself. The Black Monolith has to have its pin out be the reverse otherwise the pins will not connect right.
Below is my latest explanation. You guys try and see whether I made it clear enough or not. If I still fail to explain my point then I would appreciate a Japanese speaker here perhaps try and convey it to Sakai in lieu of a denser email chain:
No, the actual pin arrange is as below:
(https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-VWNqoNH6TJU/UZJBonQ49bI/AAAAAAAAAm0/xAn4rXT5DE4/s800/actual%2520pin%2520arrange.PNG)
They are mirrored.
I will try to explain why with a few pictures. If the pin arrange of Macintosh and Black Monolith were the same then it would result in short circuit when they are connected. You can see why below:
(https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-hc-PhfgMCMM/UZJBpNxaVAI/AAAAAAAAAm8/MTnnMYWIJcE/s800/short%2520circuit.PNG)
But since Black Monolith pin arrange is mirror of Macintosh, when they connect they face each other and therefore the correct pins will connect:
(https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-7-0PEVCkmHg/UZJBpJcWpaI/AAAAAAAAAm4/o3BWdg_x7tc/s800/mirror%2520arrange.PNG)
I hope my explanation is not too badly made. If it does not make things clear then I will ask you to do a simple test. Try to put a finger on the TPWR pin on a Macintosh and one finger on the Black Monolith TPWR pin. Then try to connect them and see if your fingers will touch when Macintosh and Black Monolith pin arrange is not mirrored.
Regards
Okay guys, I am going to need help on this one.
No matter how I explain myself I do not seem to be able to get through to Sakai.
I mean if you have two 25 pin plugs in front of you then a simple finger test will reveal why one has to have the opposite pin arrange for their pins to line up.
Just put each plug next to eachother, put a finger on the first pin then try to plug them into oneanother and you'll see each finger end on opposite ends.
Can anyone with sufficient Japanese language proficiency please help explain this situation to Sakai?
There is a dangerous error in the pinout diagram of his Black Monolith pdf that can cause users like me to wire things in a way that will cause short circuit, potentially ruining both the expensive SCSI interface and whatever it is connected to.
I just need him to understand that.
Or maybe he just does not want to admit to any mistake, I don't know.
I think his dagram cost me the Power Monster though. I am pretty sure it was fried.
The SCSI pinout showed in the Black Monlith datasheet is right because Sakai refers it to a FEMALE connector (and not to the male connector of the Black Monlith), see here:
http://pinouts.ru/HD/ScsiExternalAmigaMac_pinout.shtml (http://pinouts.ru/HD/ScsiExternalAmigaMac_pinout.shtml)
So if you connect the Black Monolith MALE 25PIN connector to a SCSI 25 Pin D-sub FEMALE connector (like the one present on Macintosh), the respective signals will match.
I think you've fried the Power Monster by grounding TERM POWER signal.Ask Sakai if he has provided a sort of protection (diode or fuse) on the PCB.
Yeah the diagram is 100% correct for whatever device you plug the Black Monolith into, if you are planning to use it with a device with such an input at all that is. But why would he put the pinout of some other device on the Black Monolith datasheet when the Black Monolith has the mirror opposite pinout.
Anyone doing their own wiring from the Black Monolith datasheet is going to fry their SCSI interface before realizing the pinout on the Black Monolith sheet is not for the Black Monolith, even though it is in the datasheet for the Black Monolith.
Also the datasheet pinout dagram just says "25 pin SCSI pin Assign", nowhere does it mention male or female.
All I want him to do is change the datasheet so it has both pinouts in it.
Also I would love to know whether my $200 investment is now a paperweight or not.
Quote from: kamiboy on May 15, 2013, 06:46:20 AM
Also I would love to know whether my $200 investment is now a paperweight or not.
You can buy one of this cgeap SCSI card and try if your PowerMonsterII + CF get recognized:
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR2.TRC1&_nkw=adaptec+scsi&_sacat=0&_from=R40 (http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR2.TRC1&_nkw=adaptec+scsi&_sacat=0&_from=R40)
Every DSUB connectors should have pinouts number physically engraved on a side or the other either for male and female to avoid pinouts order misunderstand.
The one on your Black Monolith as well. I'm pretty sure its pdf manual is in accordance with this numbering.
2 golden rules when doing freestyle wiring :
- Carefully check for these engraved pin numbers.
- Test at least for every ground signals before powering the hardware.
Now, well...
It's not clear with pictures I have, but I do see some kind of fuse on the PowerMonster II : a big green smd component near the flash.
Oh yes, there is also a fuse to check for on your X68000 side :
(http://i.imgur.com/bcpaKsj.png)
If the fuse had popped then the power led on the Power Monster should not come on when I turn on my X68000, right?
I did manage to save what looks like a SCSI card from the old company electronic bin. I can try and see if I can get it to work and try to wire this thing to it this weekend.
As to the pinout fiasco, I do not see any numbering on the Black Monolith SCSI port.
Extra precautions aside, I think having the proper pinout in the manual would be a great start.
Are you powering on the PoweMonster II directly from the SCSI daughterboard?I will try to power it from +5V of CompactXVI power supply instead.
I've already tried an external +5V source, it changed nothing.
This is a SCSI card, right?
(http://imageshack.us/a/img40/7075/photomay14214643.jpg)
(http://imageshack.us/a/img28/7381/photomay14214755.jpg)
Please, post the model of this card.It seems it uses a DC37 connector , not very usual for SCSI , maybe used in Novell®
and Procomp like shown in these pinouts:
http://old.pinouts.ru/HD/NovellProcompSCSI_pinout.shtml
(http://old.pinouts.ru/HD/NovellProcompSCSI_pinout.shtml)
http://www.blackbox.com/resource/files/productdetails/17972.PDF (http://www.blackbox.com/resource/files/productdetails/17972.PDF)
First ensure it's really a SCSI card and not a floppy or parallel one. Keep us informed.
No idea about the model, it has no distinguishing lettering or numbering on it anywhere. What numbering and lettering there is I've googled to no avail.
I found that datasheet myself when trying to figure out whether there were any SCSI cards with 37 pins, and from the sheet there certainly seemed to be, that is why I started to suspect that the card might be useful.
Today I'll try installing it into an old PC and see about measuring the pins to confirm whether it corresponds to DB-37 SCSI or not.
If the card is not SCSI or I fail to get it to work then I'll just ask Sakai whether he is willing to take back the Power Monster II and Black Monolith and exchange them for a AztecMonster card.
If he refuses then, well, that is it folks. That X68000 is going directly on ebay, I've had it. Instead of haemorrhaging more money on a very chic paperweight I am better off spending it on a Neo Geo. As far as gaming hardware on the exotic end of the scale is concerned the Neo Geo, being a console, at least just works.
Maybe in a few years I'll give X68000 another gander.
About the card, try googling the number part stamped over the various ICs, I think you shoud hit the main SCSI controller (provided it's a SCSI card).
I'll try that once I am home from work.
When you plop a PCI SCSI card into a PC Motherboard and enter the BIOS, is there not usually a way to see a bit of info on what is plugged in?
I need to try that as well.
No, generally every SCSI card should have its own bios so during boot yould should see the manifacturer and model, at least mine Adaptec card behaviours in this way.
This card is a multi interface communication controller from FarSite. Nothing to do with SCSI.
http://www.farsite.com/OEM_WAN_communications_cards/FarSync_PCI_T2P_OEM_Card.htm (http://www.farsite.com/OEM_WAN_communications_cards/FarSync_PCI_T2P_OEM_Card.htm)
As it was expected.. ;)You always know more than all , my dear Master!
I would advice to our mate Kamiboy to get a cheap Adaptec SCSI card in order to test his PowerMonsterII card.
Thanks for the information Lydux.
That extinguishes the last ray of hope.
Alas I've decided that I am not spending another farthing on this X68000 business. I have quadruple checked that the card is wired correctly to the X68000 daughter-board and I've measured each solder pad on the Black Monolith to confirm all signal lines are indeed connected to the X68000 when it is turned on.
All ground pins are connected as well, there is nothing more to do. I just sent an email to the maker asking whether he would consider exchanging the two for a single AztecMonster.
If he refuses, which I believe he will, am selling this X68000 and buying a NEO GEO AES.
Thanks for all the advice and information folks, but it was never meant to be.
So, Sakai actually took back the Power Monster II and agreed to exchange it for a Aztec Monster CF interface.
So, since that should be with me in a day or two I want to confirm the pinout in the manual is actually appropriate for the board.
Is the pinout below for the port on the Aztec Monster when looking at it head on?
(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-lVNZPr-RG0Y/UaN_PGP_moI/AAAAAAAAAnU/k2pV8I5NaCM/s800/AztecMonsterPinout.PNG)
The pinout of the AztecMonster should be correct since it use a 50 pin IDC male connector.
This is the 50 PIN SCSI female connector and if you face this with the male one ,there is correspondance of signals :
Thanks, here is hoping that my Compact will boot off of this thing without any fuss.
Okay, so last night, at the post office, I picked up the Aztec Monster that Sakai agreed to replace that presumed none functioning Power Monster II with.
I have now reason to believe that the PMII might have been functioning fine.
Here is what happened when I connected the Aztec Monster to my Compact after double checking the wiring, connecting a power source and booting the machine.
Nothing happened. Exactly as with the PMII. The difference being that now I have the power to boot into Human68k using a floppy, which I did.
After launching FORMAT.X I discovered to my amazement that according to it I have a whopping 6 different hard drives connected to my Compact. One for each ID except for one. The Id that seemed to be vacant was either the ID chosen in SWITCH.X or the ID of the CF as chosen by jumpers. I do not quite remember which.
Anyway, all those other ID's that FORMAT.X would have me choose from had the right size. Once entered I could see that there was indeed already a partition present. That would be that of the official NFGGames CF image.
Alas despite this I could not boot from the drive, nor was the drive available to browse via command prompt as typing "C:" did nothing but throw up an error to the effect of stated volume does not exits.
Anywaste, after a few hours of fiddling I finally got to a point where I could boot off of a floppy and actually browse the CF disk using command prompt. Not sure what I did to finally get that to work. But it had something to do with setting the ID jumpers on the disk and SWITCH.X.
I tried to launch Akumajou Dracula by entering its folder and typing !Start, but that only resulted in a black screen with nothing else happening.
Oh yeah, I actually managed to boot off of the drive once by going into FORMAT.X, deleting the existing partition, formatting a new one sized 1000 megabytes, which I believe is the size limit.
When formatting I chose for system to be transferred. Then after a reboot the machine actually booted off of the CF disk. Alas, even though it booted off of it I still had no access to the C drive. After boot I was dumped into the command prompt on the A: drive which was empty, typing "C:" did nothing.
Something strange is going on here for sure.
Can someone help clear some thing up for me?
That SCSI ID option in SWITCH.X, what exactly does it do? Does it appoint which connected drive should be the main drive?
When I have my CF connected I can choose between 7 ID's there, is that normal? I thought I was supposed to jumper my CF with the same ID as selected in that option, but that does not seem to work since my Compact thinks there are 7 drives connected when there should only be one.
Drive letters are not set in stone like on a DOS machine.
The boot drive is always A:, if you are booting off the CF, then CF card = A:, FD0 = B:, FD1 = C:.
The SCSI setting in Switch allows you to limit amount of IDs. Meaning if it's set to 7, you can have 7 devices.
If you set it to 6, then any device set to ID7 would be ignored during boot.
I suspected that about drive letters so I actually tested several different drives without luck.
I guess I can try to set number of SCSI ID's to 1 and then set the CF to ID 0 to see what happens.
But is it normal for the single CF card with a single ID to show up as so many different drives with different ID's?
I'm a bit confused by this, take a pic of the screen plz. Need to see what you are seeing here.
Sure thing boss. I'll grab a few screens when I get back. Maybe my limited knowledge of Japanese is the culprit here. But the fact is the machine is not booting off of this CF as it should. I am starting to think that perhaps something is wrong with the Compact hardware.
Have you checked for the fuse I noticed on my previous post (#32) ?
It's involved with pull-up resistors packs powering on all SCSI device signals !
Without them, some SCSI devices could answer everytime or randomly to any SCSI ID request. (I have already seen this)
Yeah, I changed that fuse.
What do those resistor arrays do again? It seems every signal pin is routed through one, so they just remove a bit of voltage or something to that effect.
I have for a long time suspected something to be wrong with the connections between the signal pins and those resistor arrays. The TERM PWR pin for an example is only carrying 4.7V when I believe it should carry a solid 5V. But a while back I tested for continuity between every signal pin and pins on those resistor arrays and I managed to find a direct connection for all of them.
When the CF is connected and the Compact is turned on I measured the voltages of every signal pin via the solder pads on the Aztec Monster. Every pin except for TERM PWR measured around 2.7~2.8V with TERM PWR being 4.7 of course.
I wonder whether that is within range.
Quote from: kamiboy on May 30, 2013, 12:01:55 AM
Yeah, I changed that fuse.
What do those resistor arrays do again? It seems every signal pin is routed through one, so they just remove a bit of voltage or something to that effect.
Those resistor arrays act as pull-up resistors, they bring inputs of a digital circuit to a high logic state if disconnected or in high impedance state.
Quote from: caius
Those resistor arrays act as pull-up resistors, they bring inputs of a digital circuit to a high logic state if disconnected or in high impedance state.
HA ! My young jedi learn fast ! I'm glad ! :)
Basically, SCSI devices signals are "open-collector". In digital electronic, that means a signal can have 2 values : 0 (0 volt = grounded) or "open" (disconnected from circuit). Wiring a pull-up resistor like this on these lines will change this "open" state to a logic 1 (exactly to a voltage compatible with the host, +5v in our case).
This trick allows multiple devices with different operating voltages to be wired together into a single SCSI chain. Pull-ups will be in charge of voltage convertion.
Quote
I have for a long time suspected something to be wrong with the connections between the signal pins and those resistor arrays. The TERM PWR pin for an example is only carrying 4.7V when I believe it should carry a solid 5V. But a while back I tested for continuity between every signal pin and pins on those resistor arrays and I managed to find a direct connection for all of them.
Don't worry about the 4.7v, there is always a little voltage drop because of various reasons. There is a pretty large tolerance with 5v ic. Unless it's not under 4v, that's ok.
Quote
When the CF is connected and the Compact is turned on I measured the voltages of every signal pin via the solder pads on the Aztec Monster. Every pin except for TERM PWR measured around 2.7~2.8V with TERM PWR being 4.7 of course.
I wonder whether that is within range.
Seems correct to me. You got ~2.7v because those signals switch between 0v and 5v very often and quickly, your voltmeter can't measure that fast and will show you an average voltage.
Sorry... I were sure it was this fuse.
The good news is that your Compact and SCSI parts works for sure. There is just a single things we don't get yet...
Quote from: lydux on May 30, 2013, 01:10:02 AM
HA ! My young jedi learn fast ! I'm glad ! :)
I'm proud to say that I've been at your school, my dear Master!Then, arcade boards widely use pull-up and pull-downs resistors, I've just pepaired a board which shown stripes on sprites, it was falut of a broken pull-up resistor network connected to address lines of sprites ROMs ;)
Regarding the Kamiboy CF issue, I think it's software related and not hardware.
Instead of FORMAT.X command I'd use tge SCSIFORMATX.X one following this guide:
http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:hard_drive_on_sasi_machine (http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:hard_drive_on_sasi_machine)
Obviously I'd double-check also the wiring from AztecMonster to SCSI CompactXVI daughterboard with particular attention to GROUND points
I've already double checked the wiring, it is correct. In fact every time I do a wiring job, something is not right and I suspect my wiring it is never the wiring.
Every ground pin on the daughter board is connected to a ground pin on the Aztec Monster. Of course with its 50 pins Aztec monster has quite a few ground pins left over. I am fairly confident those ground pins need not be connected to anything since every ground pin on the Aztec Monster is directly connected to one another.
Of course to be sure I'll do a multimeter continuity test once I get home.
I'll also try formatting the drive using scsiformat.x. If I can get the drive to a point where I can boot off of it then I can always just use disk explorer to copy games over to the CF afterwards from a PC.
Quote from: kamiboy on May 30, 2013, 03:44:19 AM
I've already double checked the wiring, it is correct. In fact every time I do a wiring job, something is not right and I suspect my wiring it is never the wiring.
Every ground pin on the daughter board is connected to a ground pin on the Aztec Monster. Of course with its 50 pins Aztec monster has quite a few ground pins left over. I am fairly confident those ground pins need not be connected to anything since every ground pin on the Aztec Monster is directly connected to one another.
Of course to be sure I'll do a multimeter continuity test once I get home.
The important thing is that every GROUND pin of the SCSI daughterboard has to be connected to a GROUND pin of the AztecMonster.For me it didn't work until I connected every daughterboard GROUND toghether and then tied one of these to my SCSI-->IDE converter GROUND (but I use I piggyback board adapter and not a direct cable like you)
QuoteI'll also try formatting the drive using scsiformat.x. If I can get the drive to a point where I can boot off of it then I can always just use disk explorer to copy games over to the CF afterwards from a PC.
Yes and if you will succeeded in it check the drive assignement under Human OS by command DRIVE.X.Keep us informed.
Guess what. The first thing I tried when I got home actually worked. All I did was to jumper the drive ID to be 0 and not only could I access it at C: after booting off of a floppy but I could also boot off of it directly at which point, and to my surprise, it was assigned to drive A: with the two floppies being routed to B: and C: respectively.
If, however, I jumper the ID to be 7 I am greeted by this when entering FORMAT.X:
(http://imageshack.us/a/img534/4253/photomay29170622.jpg)
Notice how FORMAT.X thinks there are drives connected for every ID but the one ID I actually jumpered my drive to? It is like the list is reversed. No idea what is causing this, but since jumping to ID 0 works maybe I should just count my blessings and let sleeping dogs lie.
Of course no sooner than I get this internal drive going than a few new problems crop up. First thing first, I am very dissapointed to find out that both Strider and Dai Makai Mura are in the Games3 folder, which I believe means one has to have an over 2mb machine to run them.
But even more dissapointing is discovering that a few games in the Games2 folder also seem to refuse to run. Akumajo just gives me a blank screen when I tey to launch it, via the GUI or via naked Human68K prompt.
Chourensha68K also refuses to run, it seems to complain about ~17kb of memory or something.
Space Harrier just vomits a bunch of random colours on screen, plays a few notes and stops there.
It seems all the games in the Games2 folder that I've tried have failed to run. Is there some obscure option in SWITCH.X that is necessary to run these games?
My memory is already set to 2048kb in there. Should SRAM be set to anything specific? Currently it is set to not used.
Quote from: kamiboy on May 30, 2013, 06:51:07 AM
If, however, I jumper the ID to be 7 I am greeted by this when entering FORMAT.X:
(http://imageshack.us/a/img534/4253/photomay29170622.jpg)
This is normal, you can't assign ID7 to a SCSI device because it's usually reserved for the SCSI Host Adapter.Is it right, Master?
That may explain it, but I am pretty sure that initially my SCSI ID was set to 1 and I got the same result, only FORMAT.X reported disks on every ID except for ID1.
In any regard, I am having flash backs to the curious nightmare that was PC gaming anno 1992. Such arcane knowledge one was forced to master in order to get DOOM to launch on my pappy's Schneider 386 machine.
I'd utter expressions such as "those good old times" only the tortures one had to endure for the humble act of playing a simple game turned me into a stone cold console gamer for life.... Until now that is.
So once again into the breach dear friends.
I somehow managed to get Akumajou Dracula to run; it was either setting the parity termination jumper or the taking out and reinserting of the midi board that did it.
By, the by, how do you save in that game? Is there a standard way to exit launched programs? CTRL-C or X do not seem to do the trick.
I also managed to get Courensha68K to run, all I needed to do was kick the file browser to a low mem mode by pressing ESC and choosing the scond option. But I do not understand how exiting it completely did not work. Or maybe I do not know how to exit the file browser properly.
Also, how come in the standard file browser mode my free mem is reported as low as 1425k? That is pathetic, what is eating up the remaining 500k? Is there anything in the Eidis image Config.sys and Autoexec.bat that can be safely removed to free some additional kilos?
You know, a short primer with a few vital information about this or that would be a huge time saver. Does such a thing already exist? I dont remember having come across such a thing.
Lastly, since it seems I need a memory upgrade to play some of my favourites, could someone guide me through my options. I know there are these cheap memory expansion boards you can get to plug into one of the expansion board slots in the back. There are also the super expensive and rare internal upgrades specific for each system.
So ignoring the expensive internal upgrades, can any of the expansion board memory upgrades be used with a Compact IV?
You are correct Caius ID7 is reserved for the SCSI controller. And 0 should always be used for a primary boot drive.
Too free up space, simply quite LHES, push ESC and select the first menu option. This will put you into DI, which uses less memory, and another escape will put you to pure prompt. But you will need more RAM for a lot of stuff. Some games will only work from pure prompt no matter how much RAM you have though.
You can only save in Dracula when you get Game Over. Konami did this on purpose, as a Game Over resets your score. Meaning you have to 1cc the game for the big points.
Ah, I see thanks.
I think my midi board is bad. Once again Akumajou started getting stuck during startup, but I got it working by taking out the midi board. I noticed the game would hang right around the time where you would get the soundtrack select menu. I guess it checks for the presence of a midi board to see if the menu is needed or not and that is where things go wrong.
I already replaced the caps on that board, so I am not sure what is wrong. It has two jumpers on it, one for selecting between board 1or 2, which I set to 1 since that is the slot I put it into, and another of unknown function.
The part number is CZ-6BM1A.
I guess I can live without midi tracks for now.
On another note, I have a pro tip for any who wants to stick a Aztec Monster in their machine and likes their wiring to be neat.
The Aztec Monster does actually not seem to use the TERM PWR input pin. If it was designed to, like the Power Monster II + Black Monolith, it could have powered itself from that 5V input.
So here is what I did, I neglected to connect TERM PWR from the daughter board to the designated Aztec Monster pin. Instead I just soldered that wire to the solder pad for the external power supply molex connector. Now the Aztec Monster is being powered by TERM PWR instead of letting that useful 5V go to waste. No need to butcher the PSU/Motherboard connector to tap 5V.
It works fine. Anywaste, thanks for all the help guys. I think I am just about ready to start closing up my Compact for good. I'll wait a few days just in case though.
Midi board 1 or 2 is needed for when using two midi boards at once (needed if one wanted to have a 32 channel midi file), the other one switches between Midi Out 2 or Midi Thru.
Quote from: kamiboy on May 30, 2013, 06:51:07 AM
Of course no sooner than I get this internal drive going than a few new problems crop up. First thing first, I am very dissapointed to find out that both Strider and Dai Makai Mura are in the Games3 folder, which I believe means one has to have an over 2mb machine to run them.
Yes, Strider and Daimakaimura requires 4MB like Chourensha68K and others.
Space Harrier runs fine with 2MB but it has to be launched under DI or pure DOS like all other games in Games2 directory.Read here for more informations about:
http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:sxsi_disk_image_with_games_and_lots_of_mdx_files (http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:sxsi_disk_image_with_games_and_lots_of_mdx_files)
Chourensha68k is a 2meg game, I got it running by quitting the browser.
As for Daimakai and Strider, well. I suppose if I had two working floppy drives I could run them off of a disk. Strider needs you to have several drives, but you could run Daimakai from one disk drive in a roundabout way. Just put in disk one and whenever the screen comes up with a file error just pop in the other disk and press space or enter. Keep doing that and eventually the game loads fine.
Trouble is my floppy drive, despite having been aligned to read some previously written Human68K disks perfectly, still refuses to read any new disks that I write. So a pro tip on head alignment, try many different disks from different sources.
In any case, my comment about ram upgrades for the IV got lost in the shuffle.
Are there any affordable way of upgrading the RAM to 4?
Will something like this work in a Compact IV for an example?
http://www.gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:sh-6be-2_4m_-_memory_expansion_board (http://www.gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:sh-6be-2_4m_-_memory_expansion_board)
I have some of those super rare 6mb internal compact xvi ram boards. Let me know if you need one. That would put you at 8mb ram which should be plenty to run everything.
I have this 4MB RAM expansion for my CompactXVI paid , if I remeber well, 5000 yen :
https://imageshack.us/scaled/large/580/1002968o.jpg
Model is 'AICZ6BE4'
Thanks guys. There are none AICZ6BE4 board on yahoo right now, but at least now I know that they exist.
And BlueBMW, I will most certainly take you up on your offer if it is within my price range. With 8 megs I may even be able to run the baller image, though if I remember right that one was made for 12mb machines.
Very few games actually need more than 8mb. Only some of the 5+ disk games running in floppy emulation.
Why does a game like Daimakaimura require more than 2mb to run again? When launched on disk it runs fine one a 2 meg machine. I am guessing it refuses to run from a hardrive so you have to use some sort of floppy emulator which eats up significant amounts of memory?
Quote from: kamiboy on May 31, 2013, 12:08:13 AM
Why does a game like Daimakaimura require more than 2mb to run again? When launched on disk it runs fine one a 2 meg machine. I am guessing it refuses to run from a hardrive so you have to use some sort of floppy emulator which eats up significant amounts of memory?
Not properly.If you look at Daimakaimura directory (as well other) you will find all the content of the disks extracted (using DiskExplorer) so launching the game in this mode will require more memory than executing it from FDD.Then, there are other methods to launch game from HDD, some of them will require also floppy disk simulator (2HDSIM.X).Give a look at this wiki on how to install games to HDD:
http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:installing_games_to_hard_drive (http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=x68000:installing_games_to_hard_drive)
Daimakaimura is programmed to run straight off HDD on a 2mb machine. It fully recommends HDD installing the game.
How this works is make a directory "daimakai" on the root of the HDD. Then copy all files off both disks into this directory.
To boot you would then put just the game's system disk into the drive. Upon booting from the floppy, the game will find the directory and boot off HDD with only 2mb of RAM.
The catch is that the game is heavily copy protected. If you don't have an original disk, you need to run a protection emulator which fools the game when it preforms the disk check. This takes some memory the original game didn't need. Still though, if you download the Disk A image with the crack, I believe you can then play the game with just one floppy and 2mb of ram.
And yes all 5 capcom games support HDD install with a boot disk. When doing so, you can play all of them with just one floppy drive and an HDD with just 2mb of RAM. (Except Super SFII which needs 4mb). You just have to copy the files to the correct directory name. Super SFII actually has a real install utility, the other 4 are all done manually.
Quote from: SuperDeadite on May 31, 2013, 01:09:48 AM
The catch is that the game is heavily copy protected. If you don't have an original disk, you need to run a protection emulator which fools the game when it preforms the disk check. This takes some memory the original game didn't need. Still though, if you download the Disk A image with the crack, I believe you can then play the game with just one floppy and 2mb of ram.
Are you referring to this protection emulator, perhaps:
http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4610.msg30422#msg30422 (http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4610.msg30422#msg30422)
It will extract some files from original disk called type.x and type.dat which you have to put into the copied disk modifying the config.sys to run them.
Anyway for Daimakaimura , Eidis got the solution:
http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4394.msg31592#msg31592 (http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4394.msg31592#msg31592)
That disk image is the one with files on it already. So yeah if you put that image on a floppy, you boot with that and run the game off HDD on a 2mb machine. But files must be moved to A:\daimakai\
And yes it is a "protection emulator" The typex file isn't pulled off the disk. Proemu searches the disk for unreadable sectors, then generates the .dat file and the typex driver needed to run it. The driver is booted before the game, and it feeds the .dat file when the game preforms the protection check. It emulates the unreadable sectors, the game has never been truly "cracked."
Sadly there are still a few games where the protection has never been broken. I hold my breath every time I boot up Y2...
Quote from: SuperDeadite on May 31, 2013, 01:44:50 AM
And yes it is a "protection emulator" The typex file isn't pulled off the disk. Proemu searches the disk for unreadable sectors, then generates the .dat file and the typex driver needed to run it. The driver is booted before the game, and it feeds the .dat file when the game preforms the protection check. It emulates the unreadable sectors, the game has never been truly "cracked."
Sadly there are still a few games where the protection has never been broken. I hold my breath every time I boot up Y2...
Have you ever tried this Proemu on a real machine with original disks?Which are the supported protections?
I remember I tried it once but it never stopped to read the disk and most of times it generated always the same .dat and typex regardless which game was in the FDD.
How's your Japanese? When you run Proemu, you'll notice the 10 categories, these refer to the locations of unreadable sectors used, and you'll see company names besides them. Most companies choose one style and stuck with it, so you can jump ahead to scan certain sectors.
Most of the games that Proemu supports are already available online. But for fun I've ran some of my originals through it, I was able to generate files for all the Capcom games, Phalanx, Genocide II.
If I remember right you own a Compact correct? If you are writing images to 3.5'' disks, Proemu will not find anything. It searches for actual unreadable sectors on the disks. This is hardware, not software. The sectors only exist on the original factory made floppy disks. Proemu doesn't work for you because your disks don't contain the protection sectors.
Doujin game makers got creative and came up with new protection forms that nothing is able to reproduce (Y2 and Last Tempest). I have an original Y2, and absolutely nothing gets past the check besides the original disk. But what's interesting is that it's on standard Maxel disks that you'd buy in a store, Torimu must have created their own authoring program to write it with, and it's super sensitive, out of the 30 or so times I've booted the game, it failed the check once, gave me a damn heart attack, but a reset and it passed...
Oh, I've been trying to get Xak II to run off of HDD, game is not protected, using SUBSTs I can get the game to boot and play the intro fine, but when I start a game, it just hangs. After trying this in an emulator, it seems the game is still expecting the files to be on the floppy drives, even after using the SUBST. (When it hangs if I "insert" the disk image into the drive, it reads it and loads the game).
Quote from: SuperDeadite on May 31, 2013, 02:37:02 AM
How's your Japanese? When you run Proemu, you'll notice the 10 categories, these refer to the locations of unreadable sectors used, and you'll see company names besides them. Most companies choose one style and stuck with it, so you can jump ahead to scan certain sectors.
My japanese?Very bad..:)
Also Phalanx and Genocide II?So, did you install these fully on HDD (without the installer and the need of the system disk, I mean).I tried in all ways to install these two but I was only able use 2HDboot with these two.
QuoteIf I remember right you own a Compact correct? If you are writing images to 3.5'' disks, Proemu will not find anything. It searches for actual unreadable sectors on the disks. This is hardware, not software. The sectors only exist on the original factory made floppy disks. Proemu doesn't work for you because your disks don't contain the protection sectors.
Yes, I own a CompactXVI and obviously I knew Proemu works only on original 5.25" disks and neither 3.5" or 5.25" copied ones.But I tried also on my Expert with the only original disk I have, Bomber Man by System soft and it didn't find any unreadable sectors , maybe this game doesn't contain ant kind of protection
QuoteDoujin game makers got creative and came up with new protection forms that nothing is able to reproduce (Y2 and Last Tempest). I have an original Y2, and absolutely nothing gets past the check besides the original disk. But what's interesting is that it's on standard Maxel disks that you'd buy in a store, Torimu must have created their own authoring program to write it with, and it's super sensitive, out of the 30 or so times I've booted the game, it failed the check once, gave me a damn heart attack, but a reset and it passed...
Oh, I've been trying to get Xak II to run off of HDD, game is not protected, using SUBSTs I can get the game to boot and play the intro fine, but when I start a game, it just hangs. After trying this in an emulator, it seems the game is still expecting the files to be on the floppy drives, even after using the SUBST. (When it hangs if I "insert" the disk image into the drive, it reads it and loads the game).
Xak II?Isn't already included in Eidis image?Anyway, I'm going to try to HDD install it, as you know, there are other methods than the SUSBT one...:)
P.S.
I forgot..The Last Tempest (and also Racing Champ) protection has been bypassed ,look here (there is also a mention about you):
http://fullmotionvideo.free.fr/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1092 (http://fullmotionvideo.free.fr/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1092)
Yeah Bomber Man doesn't use that type of protection, it won't find anything.
I generated the files, for Phalanx and Genocide II, but I honestly never tried them, as in the end it really makes no difference to me. Both games need to use SIMDISK and I couldn't be bothered to set it up as I have 12mbs in my machine. I did try with SuperSFII and Daimakai, and they did work fine. I can send you the files if you want to try them though.
I'm aware of those games being hacked, Racing Champ is nice as it's a real hack. But Last Tempest just uses emulator debug tricks, won't work on the real machine.
As I said with Xak II I can get the game to boot and play the intro. But once you start game, it doesn't see the rest of the files. It runs fine if I write the images to disk though. 2HDBoot and 2HDSim won't work for this game as it uses 2HDE disk format.
Quote from: SuperDeadite on May 31, 2013, 10:52:23 AM
I generated the files, for Phalanx and Genocide II, but I honestly never tried them, as in the end it really makes no difference to me. Both games need to use SIMDISK and I couldn't be bothered to set it up as I have 12mbs in my machine. I did try with SuperSFII and Daimakai, and they did work fine. I can send you the files if you want to try them though.
Yes, you can send these files to me, I'll try to install these two games.Thanks.
I'm aware of those games being hacked, Racing Champ is nice as it's a real hack. But Last Tempest just uses emulator debug tricks, won't work on the real machine.
Quote
As I said with Xak II I can get the game to boot and play the intro. But once you start game, it doesn't see the rest of the files. It runs fine if I write the images to disk though. 2HDBoot and 2HDSim won't work for this game as it uses 2HDE disk format.
I just tried Xak II under XM6 emulation and I can enter in game, it seems to work fine.Yes, the disk images are in .DIM fomat so they cannot be converted in .XDF with usual program (like Virtual Floppy Image Coverter) neither it's possible to extract the files inside.Anyway these are the disk images I use:
http://www.mediafire.com/?bob12owr2u5nqf0 (http://www.mediafire.com/?bob12owr2u5nqf0)
Quote from: caius on May 31, 2013, 07:17:42 PM
I just tried Xak II under XM6 emulation and I can enter in game, it seems to work fine.Yes, the disk images are in .DIM fomat so they cannot be converted in .XDF neither it's possible to extract the files inside.Anyway these are the disk images I use:
Hello caius, happy to be part of the x68000 collective, as well as to help out.
So, you CAN convert .DIM to .XDF
So easily its funny. This is the first time Ive told anyone. Im sure it will help quite a few. ;)
All you need is a texteditor, like "textedit" for mac.
Open the .DIM with textedit
it will say "DIFC HEADER 'Hudson" or "DIFC HEADER 'whatever"
You simply erase DIFC HEADER to the '
So it will look like
'Hudsonsoft 2.00
instead of
DIFC HEADER 'Hudsonsoft 2.00
close/save, then rename the extension from .DIM to .XDF
That simple ;)
& I dont know anything about code. haha
Oh! also, you can even do that on .HDF
but your system needs some juice to run it I presume?
When I tried Chorensha in .xdf, graphics would disappear, but yeah.
Phalanx and Genocide 2 files here:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/jse7if (http://www.sendspace.com/file/jse7if)
The type10.x files must be run before the game.
As for Xak 2, I think you are confused.
XDF format is only for 2HD (1.2mb) images.
Xak 2 uses 2HDE (1.4mb, 9 sector) images.
I can convert your .DIMs back into proper .2HE files easily, and then I can write these to real floppy disks, and game is 100% playable (I've beaten the game this way). What I'm trying to do is run it off HDD directly, so no floppys are required.
Using SUBST, I can boot the game, and the intro plays fine, but it gets stuck when I select "Start Game". 2HDSim and 2HDBoot only support 2HD format images, they are not compatible with 9-sector formats (2HDE, 2HS). The text file on the disk even states "this game is not copy protected" hence I'm confused why it won't run fully, it's not a protection issue.
Extracting the data from your floppy images is easy. You just have to run the 9-sector disk driver first.
http://www.vector.co.jp/soft/x68/util/se022414.html (http://www.vector.co.jp/soft/x68/util/se022414.html)
Quote from: SuperDeadite on June 01, 2013, 12:15:16 AM
Phalanx and Genocide 2 files here:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/jse7if (http://www.sendspace.com/file/jse7if)
The type10.x files must be run before the game.
Thanks, I will try to HDD install this.
QuoteI can convert your .DIMs back into proper .2HE files easily, and then I can write these to real floppy disks, and game is 100% playable (I've beaten the game this way). What I'm trying to do is run it off HDD directly, so no floppys are required.
Using SUBST, I can boot the game, and the intro plays fine, but it gets stuck when I select "Start Game". 2HDSim and 2HDBoot only support 2HD format images, they are not compatible with 9-sector formats (2HDE, 2HS). The text file on the disk even states "this game is not copy protected" hence I'm confused why it won't run fully, it's not a protection issue.
Extracting the data from your floppy images is easy. You just have to run the 9-sector disk driver first.
http://www.vector.co.jp/soft/x68/util/se022414.html (http://www.vector.co.jp/soft/x68/util/se022414.html)
Yes, I knew the difference between .XDF and .DIM format.What I meant is that I couldn't extract files directly from .DIM neither convert this .DIM in a format (like .XDF) I could extract files from.But, now, if you said me is it possibile to extract files using 9-sector driver, then we could also transfer these files to a common 2HD disk image (respecting the autoexec.bat and config.sys files).
Besides, do you know if other games which it's not possble to extract files from (the ones which show empy directory like Naious, etc..) can take advantage of this 9-sector driver?
P.S.
How did you convert .DIM to .2HE format? I used Virtual Floppy Image Coverter but it didn't work, I was only able to convert them to .D88 or BKDSK format.
Naious uses a custom disk format I'm not familiar with, it's standard 2HD format. Will not work with this method.
I convert images by "dumping" them into HD image by using emulator. Here's a 5 min demo video (XVid format)
showing how I do it. First I run the the 9 sector driver, and use it to browse the Xak 2 .dim image. Then I use DPACK to "dump" it into proper 2HE format (DPACK is very powerful image software, much better then MKIMG).
http://www.sendspace.com/file/czayei (http://www.sendspace.com/file/czayei)
However, 9-sector images are very sensitive. If you try to extract them via Disk Explorer they will corrupt every single time, and Jsplit doesn't work either. So I can't get these images out of the HDD image, but the images are correct, I can use DPACK to write back to floppy on the real machine, and they work 100%.
Quote from: SuperDeadite on June 01, 2013, 03:23:23 AM
Naious uses a custom disk format I'm not familiar with, it's standard 2HD format. Will not work with this method.
I convert images by "dumping" them into HD image by using emulator. Here's a 5 min demo video (XVid format)
showing how I do it. First I run the the 9 sector driver, and use it to browse the Xak 2 .dim image. Then I use DPACK to "dump" it into proper 2HE format (DPACK is very powerful image software, much better then MKIMG).
http://www.sendspace.com/file/czayei (http://www.sendspace.com/file/czayei)
However, 9-sector images are very sensitive. If you try to extract them via Disk Explorer they will corrupt every single time, and Jsplit doesn't work either. So I can't get these images out of the HDD image, but the images are correct, I can use DPACK to write back to floppy on the real machine, and they work 100%.
OK, thanks.Instead I used this method: under XM6 emulation first I run 9SCDRV.X, then I mount the .DIM image on drive 0, finally I copy the entire content of mounted disk image to HDD using COPYALL B:*.* command
To extract out of the HDD image the .2HE created with DPACK without corrupting them try to compress them in a .LZH archive and then extract the archive with DiskExplorer, I think it could work.
By the buy guys. I hear Human68K cannot read standard 1.44 floppies without some sort of driver installed first. Anyone know where this driver is and details on how it should be installed?
It would be great if it could be installed to S-RAM so as to not take up additional memory.
Quote from: kamiboy on June 01, 2013, 03:40:52 AM
By the buy guys. I hear Human68K cannot read standard 1.44 floppies without some sort of driver installed first. Anyone know where this driver is and details on how it should be installed?
It would be great if it could be installed to S-RAM so as to not take up additional memory.
I think the driver is FDDEVICE.X.Besides, I found a document on how to modify a CompacXVI FDD to read 1.44 MB but, sadly, It's in japanese.
SuperDeadite, since I presume you understand japanese language, could you look at this driver called 15disk.sys,please? It could allow to mount up to 15 floppy disk in a single virtual drive simulating an HDD.I tried it but without success due my bad japanese knowledge again.. :D
Quote from: caius on May 31, 2013, 01:33:55 AM
Quote from: SuperDeadite on May 31, 2013, 01:09:48 AM
The catch is that the game is heavily copy protected. If you don't have an original disk, you need to run a protection emulator which fools the game when it preforms the disk check. This takes some memory the original game didn't need. Still though, if you download the Disk A image with the crack, I believe you can then play the game with just one floppy and 2mb of ram.
Are you referring to this protection emulator, perhaps:
http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4610.msg30422#msg30422 (http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4610.msg30422#msg30422)
It will extract some files from original disk called type.x and type.dat which you have to put into the copied disk modifying the config.sys to run them.
Anyway for Daimakaimura , Eidis got the solution:
http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4394.msg31592#msg31592 (http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?topic=4394.msg31592#msg31592)
Is the solution in the lowest most link confirmed to work?
I tried extracting the three files from the [a2] file and copied them to the Daimakai folder and edited !Start.bat but DM.X still quits complaining about file not being found.
On a slightly different note, just for fun I decided to make a Mega Drive controller to X68000 converter cable using the diagram below.
http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=4415.0;attach=1226 (http://nfggames.com/forum2/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=4415.0;attach=1226)
Unfortunately I found out that since I only have 6 button pads they do not work right unless used with games that are written to support them, like Street Fighter II.
At the very least Akumajou did not work right, not recognizing LEFT or RIGHT and mapping button II to the START button.
Holding down the MODE button when plugging in the pad, turning on the X68000 or when launching the game do not seem to work either.
I suspect that cutting the COMM line to the X68000 might perhaps make 2 button games work right, but I cannot be arsed to try. Just a head up, lads.
Quote from: SuperDeadite on May 30, 2013, 11:35:34 AM
Midi board 1 or 2 is needed for when using two midi boards at once (needed if one wanted to have a 32 channel midi file), the other one switches between Midi Out 2 or Midi Thru.
Finally got around to take a second gander at the my CZ-6BM1A midi board issue.
I discovered that when I jumper the board to ID1 Akumajou hangs with a black screen right around the time you should get a midi module option screen. If I set the jumper to ID2 on the other hand Akumajou starts up fine. It starts up in FM mode with no option of choosing other midi modules ever showing up. If I remove the jumper it behaves like with ID2.
It is pretty evident that setting ID to 1 is the right way to go when wanting to use external midi modules but something is causing the game to hang when, I assume, it tries to poll the midi board.
When booting a game with a midi board inserted do you actually need to have a midi module connected to the board and ready to go?
Maybe the game hangs while trying to communicate with the midi module. If not then my board might be bad. I already exchanged the capacitors, so not much else I can do I guess.
As far as I know you shouldnt need an actual module connected. I think the game just looks to see if you have a midi interface and if you do it asks which module to load sound for. I know some MIDI boards had some compatibility issues, but i'm not sure if that board was one of them.
I wouldnt expect Sharp's own official board to have compatibility issues.
I wouldnt think so either. I seem to remember someone saying the sacom boards worked the best though.... I'll see what I can find out.
The M1A is what I use, and is the best board there is imo. As I stated the switch needs to be set to 1 unless you are using 2 boards in the same machine. Dracula and most games only use the Output line. It's a one directional signal, game has no idea if you having something attached or not. Regardless, you should be able to select the internal FM option from that screen. If it keeps locking up, something is wrong. Could be the MIDI board, could be the IO slot itself. And even could be a RAM problem.