Re: Nice Gfx9000 idea...

1999-07-24 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 20:28 21/07/99 +0200, you wrote:
 If that's so then you can create a game/program showing 3-layers!!!
 The background doesn't move or only moves up and down, which is the v9938
 screen. If it's a bit vague, that doesn't matter. It's just a background.
 The second and third layer are the layers of the P1-mode...

I am sure the GFX9000 alone can display more than 3 layers using a 
few tricks... It might not be 3 full screen layers however..

btw. I would like to work with a good coder to do a nice 
GFX9000/Moonsound demo (I volunteer for the music part!)..

In the past, the time of the release of the first version of GRAFX9000,
I've made some test with the superimpose capability of the GRAFX9000, just
forget about the clock synchronisation explanned by Koen van Hartingsveldt
and Peter Burkhard, there is an other problem.

Since the superimpose of the GRAFX9000 use pulse for line and frame
synchronisation instead of using a VCO and a PLL (Phase Locked Loop) to
ajust the clock oscilator frequency input.
The result when you want to use the line interupt capability of the V990 is
that you computer hang!

I noticed that when I wanted to add a background on a P1 mode multi layer
scrolling. Then only way to make the multi scrolling work again was to
switch off the superimpose mode.

Martial.



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Re: Phoenix project - The new MSX platform pro-standarization

1999-07-24 Thread Martial BENOIT

By the way, there was some guy (dunno where) developing an OPL3 board!!!
Aargh! Let us make it MoonSound-compatible and convince this guy to use
OPL4!!! (which can still be achieved).

Why would he have to use OPL4? It would certainly be more expensive,
because the instrument ROM costs money (copyrights) and SRAM isn't cheap
either, especially 512K ICs. And probably the OPL3 itself is cheaper than
OPL4.

Hum the actual price for 512K SRAM 70ns DIP is 160Fr (divide by 3.3 for
Dutch Gulden)


I would have no problems as long as the OPL3 board would be compatible with
the OPL3 part of the MoonSound, which means it would have to use the same
I/O addresses. In that way, a single program could play music on both, FM
only ofcourse.

Bye,
   Maarten




greetings,

Martial.



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JOYNET information and MISC

1999-04-27 Thread Martial BENOIT

Hello everyone,

Just have two questions:

1/ where to get the JOYNET BIOS and latest specifications for the cable?

2/ Anyone having information about a "MEGA" demo for year 2000 where 'old'
MSX group are welcome to come and code their lest production for MSX?


greetings,

Martial.



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Re: Terminal program?

1999-04-06 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 21:11 05/04/99 +0200, you wrote:


Cesar Cardoso schreef:

 Hi all,
 can someone point me to a FTP site (or even send attached to me) where I
 can find a terminal program that works on ASCII-based serials, or use BIOS
 acess to it?
 Thanks a lot.

 CESAR CARDOSO [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 http://www.momentus.com.br/users/cardoso
 UIN 32237133

If you have a serial interface with bios a terminal program is build in
just use CALL COMTERM to use it.

the only serial intafaces with bios i know of are the sony (bios in rom)
and the
philips (bios must be loaded from disk into ram).

erik de boer


and you forgot: ASCII RS232C interface with multi channel capability.


Martial


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Re: Joynet and BIOS

1999-03-02 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 22:43 02/03/99 +0100, you wrote:
On Tue, 2 Mar 1999, Laurens Holst wrote:

 The MSX BIOS changes the pins of the joystickport while reading the
 joystickports. Therefor, you can only send/recieve while interrupts are
 disabled, or -I perfer this option- you can write your own
interrupt-routine
 which doesn't modify
 the pins of the joystick-port on which JoyNet is connected.

Of course, that is what I do as well. But when I want to access the disk
(BDOS), I need to have the bios in page 0 (or at least the slot switching
routines). I don't have them in my own 0-page code, or at least not in a
dos-compatible way. (They will be dos2-compatible, but they don't switch
the usual way on rst 20). So does the BIOS always switch 1's in the
buttons and a 0 in the strobe, or is it random?

Thanks, bye,
shevek

hum...

why don't you use the DOS? I mean you are talking of BDOS, by the way buy
making the game directly load from DOS prompt, you'll have the DOS and BIOS
entry in page 0 that is RAM in DOS mode, therefore you just have to modify
RST38 RAM location so it jump to your own interupt driver, this way you
still have acces to CALL 0005h for disk rouitnes and still use your
interupt driver at the same time.

just copy the data at location RST38 (5 byte if I remember well...) and
restore the 5 byte when exiting you application.

hope this help


Martial.



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RE:XTAZY

1999-03-01 Thread Martial BENOIT

 Well that's shit, real shit. I can easily get a MoonSound (in fact, I have
 one) and a Gfx9000. These an still be bought. But a MSX turbo R... Heck,
 those are rare!!!
 It's quite shit that XTazy is tR-only. If this game was MSX2 I would have
 bought a Gfx9000 only to play this game (and then maybe make one
myself)
 Now I, a simple MSX2-user can't play XTazy and have to wait for other
 Gfx-games which DO work with a MSX2... Does XTazy really need so much
 processor-power? Couldn't it, for example, work on an MSX2 7MHz, which
still
 can be aquired?
 
 
 ~Grauw
 

Hi

All this messages about XTAZY are not
true.
Martial Benoit stopped the coding of this
game, now Stichting Sunrise found a new
coder. I'm shure that XTAZY works on a
normal MSX2, but not in the same speed
as on a Turbo-R.

Peter Burkhard



Hey!! guys!

As I told to people who did asked me instead of other member of the XTAZY
project:

"The code is not R800 only and is FULL Z80 compatible, therefore if I can
buy a MSX2 with Z80 running at 7Mhz then I'll make XTAZY run for this
configuration, since the R800 is almost running at 7Mhz because of the
enormous ammount of I/O access to V9990 and OPL4, only ennemies calculation
(ennemy bullet for example are really calculated at 28Mhz).

Here are the 2 most important reason why I can't go on with finishing XTAZY:

1- I'm 28 years old (soon 29 in May) and I've restart to study and this is
after my job, so you certainly understand that don't have time left for MSX

2- I haven't been able to find someone that can help me to fix the bug I
have with Moonblaster replayer Zelly modifyed for me so I can use 4 voices
of the OPL4 for stereo sound effect purpose.

I will soon realease my assembler code as a public domain code (if I
can find time to put it on a FTP server or on my web page...


many greetings, from PARIS

Martial.

PS: I sent my appology to all the MSX user that trust in the ABYSS team for
the release of this game and the release of MKID as well :-(




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Re: Memory mapper

1999-02-24 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 16:09 24/02/99 +0100, you wrote:
Hi
Does anyone have a schematic of a memory mapper that can use 1 MB SIMMs ? 

I'll ask a friend about this, I only have it for Turbo R internal


2nd question: where do I get 50 pin header connectors or experimental MSX
slot PCB's ?

humm let's see. try your local electronic part dealer ;-)

3rd question: anybody happens to have the schematics of a Canon V20 MSX1 ?

I don't have it but I'm very interesting in it, once I've started to drawn
it by looking at the PCB, but it take hours of verification to make it
right...

4th question: does anyone know of a MSX-site that has anything related to
MSX-hardware (schematics etc.)

don't know

Thanx

you are welcome :-)


Martial.



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Re: Undocumented BASIC commands ??

1999-02-10 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 10:43 30/12/97 +0900, you wrote:
Hi all,

 Happy new year to all of you, MSX freaks!

 
 And Novaxis SCSI had plenty of commands like :
 
 CALL INFO
 CALL MAP2
 CALL SLOW
 CALL FAST
 CALL INQUIRY
 
 As I remember, those are documented in the manual.

Greetings from Korea,

  - Jun.



You are right Jun. the NOVAXIS interface was sold with a manual explaining
some SCSI command and also the BASIC CALL statment added for BASIC users!

NOTA: those command were already include in the orginial SCSI interface by
Henrik GILVAD!!! I do use his SCSI BIOS because the transfer rate is a bit
higher than the NOVAXIS :-) (that was the case with NOVAXIS V1.5 maybe this
have changed with new version...)

ALL the NOVAXIS SCSI interface are based on the layout of the Henrik GILVAD
SCSI interface, that let me think and say that NOVAXIS is a copy of the
original :-) (that's a personnal point of vue..)

As far as I know the most power full SCSI controler ever made for MSX is
the Japanese one called, MEGA SCSI, it's more expensive than the NOVAXIS
but much more powerful.


Any way, let me send the standar wishes for all the MSX user for this
comming soon year of 1998.

Martial BENOIT (ABYSS coder)

PS: any one able to send me the way replay routine of the MoonBlaster V1.05
will be welcome, because we do have lot of problem with the replay routine
1.03 we use in XTAZY, because of that the coding of XTAZY don't look very
good to me :-( (loading a full wave replayer for each song you want to play
is not a good way, is it?)



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Re: A BASIC compiler

1999-02-10 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 06:30 09/01/98 +0200, you wrote:

Making a new BASIC compiler is not bad idea at all, but I think, that it
should be also compatible with this "old" BASIC.

   ,_.
   _=_=_=_=!_MSX_!=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_,
  ! A1ST ~--- - I  ( o o o o o o )i
 /`,
/ .::;::;  .,
   / :::.:.:.::::!.  -=- `,
   ~==
  NYYRIKKI : [EMAIL PROTECTED]


please forget about compatibility for this kind of things!!! did Microsoft
and Hitec made their onw assembler compatible ofcourse not!!


Did GFA BASIC was compatible with other basic, ofcourse not!!


If you think about syntax then if people did learn the MSX BASIC, learning
an other one is not a great brain storming...

For internal point of view here is a simple example:

MSX BAISC handle float type using DCB byte!!! that a simple way to handle
this kind of number but I'm not sure that it is the fastest way to do it, I
would like prefer use pure binary coding and only convert the binary form
when printing on screen this way float computation is faster

I think that a new BASIC should be use to improve part of the BASIC that
should be improved...

an other simple way to use  float number in a range of 0.0 to 65355.996132
is to use 16 bits of integer and 16 bit for fractionnal part this mean the
Z80 will compute de number on 32 bits with an integer part of 16 bits like
this:

4 byte:

byte1   byte2   ,   byte3   byte4
MSB INT LSB INT ,   MSB FRACLSB FRAC

I this kind of trick for XTAZY in the enemy VS player position this way I
can render the right X and Y increment for the enemy bullet :) I'm close
the the precision of the LINE statment of the MSX BASIC :) (the LINE
fonction certainly use the Brezennam algorithm).


that's all for now


greetings from PARIS,


Martial.



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Re: Higher printquality on your MSX was:Re: Word Processor for MSX...

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 10:14 14/03/98 +0900, you wrote:

 
 But hey, VI ported to MSX would be fantastic! Especially if it would be
VIM. 
 Joon-Sung Kim: why don't you contact Bram Molenaar?
 
 vim source code is available. However, I like coding more than porting :)

 Besides it, when I port it, I must use C comiler... it's very very slow
and I like ML better.

I like this guy!!! I do also prefer ML than C, I think that C suck!

 Also I don't want full function of vi(m). In fact, I only use very few
commands of vi. That's enough for me at least.

 Another point, more functions makes program run slow and large.

 Conclusion:
   I want (to make) a compact, fast and vi-like editor.

Greetings,
 - Jun.

So you want An editor for ML coding !? ;-)

* TED is public? And better than MPW?

I do use TED for my ML coding, but I've also use MPW 1.2 before, the force
of MPW is that you can have two file open at the same time! TED cannot do
that, but TED offer the possibility of changing the short cut of each
fonction, MPW does not!

greetings from PARIS,


Martial.




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Re: VDP 9938

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 15:12 18/09/98 +0200, you wrote:
At 11:30 PM 9/16/98 +, you wrote:

-For most screens, there is a relationship between the exact VRAM 
address, and the VRAM page/pixel-coordinates that is about what you 
would expect. In some screen modes (I think Graphic 5  6 modes, that 
is, SCREEN 6  7), this relationship is different, so the contents of 
for instance 2 SCREEN 5-pages is not visible in one SCREEN 7-page, 
but 're-arranged' somehow (does anyone know how exactly?). In SCREEN 
8, this is 'back to normal'.

I thought VRAM arrangements were different in SCREEN 7  8.

The reason is in hardware. In SCREEN 7  8, more pixels per second are
needed to generate the image. Because fast RAM is expensive, instead they
used 2 slower RAM ICs as VRAM. In SCREEN 7  8, of every byte the
odd-numbered bits come from one RAM IC, and the even-numbered bits come
from the other RAM IC. In all other modes, all bits come from the same RAM
IC.

This is also the reason why the V9938 databook says that SCREEN 7  8 are
only available in 128K configurations. In theory, you could have SCREEN 7 
8 with just 64K VRAM, because one page takes 54K. But 64K VRAM means just
one RAM IC, and that's why SCREEN 7  8 won't work on 64K VRAM.

Note: I'm not sure I got every detail right, but this is the general idea.


The right way is to say that there are two banks of memory and each bank is
composed ot 2 chips of 64K by 4bits (so two chips gives you 64K 8bits)

Since the DRAM memory used for the bank was slow YAMAHA decided to switch
between two bank to get double speed of pixel rate (also called DOT SPEED
of something like that)
(your explanation was good for this)


Martial.



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Re: MSX380 my opinion

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 16:43 03/10/98 +0200, you wrote:
At 04:14 AM 9/13/98 +0200, you wrote:

Question: In linear address space mode, is it still Z80 (MSX) 
compatible?

From Zilog Z380 user's manual, chapter 3:

The Z380 has a native and an extended mode.

In native mode the Z380 is compatible with the Z80. It can only execute
code in the first 64K of memory. Using a trick you can access data anywhere
in memory, but in the default configuration this is also restricted to the
first 64K.


Not 100% true, even in native mode the Z380 ALU still 32 bits and by the
way some coding tricks like:

imagine you have to countdown the time of a game or what ever you want

LD  DE,(TimeCounter)
LD  HL,-2
ADD HL,DE
this wont give the good result on Z380


If you code it the right way:

AND A   ;clear CARRY
LD  DE,(TimeCounter)
LD  HL,2
SBC HL,DE

Then you'll get the right answer.


Explanation:

in the first exemple, -2 is FFFEh in 16 bits size but in 32bits size it
should be FFFEh !
Now imagine that the value of TimeCounter is 2 (0002h in 16 bits), if you
add both HL and DE:

0002content of TimeCounter
+   FFFE-2 to be add
---
  1 32 bits sized result
16 bits sized result

Ok, if we just look at the first 16 bits the result is the same but in
16bits sized ALU the Z flag will be set but not in 32 bits ALU

Think the same way for the next example, imagine you have a counter that
count from 0 to 65535 (h) if it is h and you increment it then it
goes to h and set Z and C flags of Z80, but in Z380 it will simply
gives: 1h with out Z and C!

Their will be a big task for people who gona code the System ROM

BTW I've never used the ADD with -2 tricks in my onw code, but I know that
some did. So compatibility is not garanted if we do not take care of this
kind of problem.

I'm not really interested in an MSX380 100% compatible with MSX, if I want
ot play MSX game or demos, I still have my MSX Turbo R or an MSX2. I think
that the "new" MSX should free the power of the Z380 and other hardware to
get a realy stong machine, the project paper sheet I've seen in Tilburg was
very interesting, it was planing to use an enchanced version of the SNES
(super FAMICOM) VDP for the video, I really prefer the the system is
desinged to operate in 32bits to boost disk and memory access, using fast
SRAM or maybe SDRAM.


greetings and good luck for the project


Martial.


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Re: NOVATEC Group Schematic Archive open!

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 18:50 04/09/98 +0400, you wrote:
Hi Everybody!

I and Max Vlassov decided to make all our hardware projects free and
available to anyone. Visit our website, http://novatec.da.ru, and look
at the "projects" section. Not too much right now - only SuperATA
IDE interface. More to be added soon, including modem and ethernet
card bridges, Z180 accelerator, 10+ MHz turbo engine.


Hi Egor,

one file is missing:

*** message from the server ***

File Not Found

The requested URL /MSX/projects/atarom.zip was not found on this server.

*** end of the server message ***

greetings, 


Martial



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RS232C Bios

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

Hi everybody,

is there any of you having the technical information about the internal
hardware of the RS232C interface from ASCII Corp.? 

This interface has a build in DMA memory of 8KB and it seem that the I/O
are memory mapped. I've not found any acces to the I/O, that's not
really true since at the start of the ROM there are some access to I/O 83h.
But I've find out some strange thing at #7FE0 to #7FFF...

If you also have the desassembled file of the RS232C BIOS I'm interested in
it.


greetings,

Martial.


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Re: FLAT SCANNER IN OUR MSX

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 17:08 25/01/98 +0200, you wrote:
Hello friends,
In our MSX system we have HD, ZIP, CD-ROM and everything we need, but we
have not yet a very important equipment, a FLAT-SCANNER and now they are
very cheap, when you are going to make the soft we need for use a Scanner?
REGARDS. ALBERTO

In 1996 if I remember well, I have seen at the Tilburg fair the Japanese
group ESE FACTORY the one that make the MEGA SCSI. They were demonstrating
a scanner program connected to the SCSI bus.


greetings,

Martial.


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Re: Seeking for foreign exhibitors

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 10:50 14/01/98 +0100, you wrote:
Hello to all:

I am Ramon Ribas, from Barcelona, Spain.
I am writing you those lines as an organizer of the Barcelona 
meetings and member of the MSX Friends Association. The 
objective is to advertise the next Barcelona meeting -the XIII- 
which is going to be celebrated the next may and making 
known that we are interested in having foreign exhibitors.

This meeting is going to be celebrated -if there aren't any last 
hour change- the next may 2nd, saturday. It MAYBE will have 

Which week end??

Satuday 2nd and Sunday 3?

or

Saturday 9th and Sunday 10?


Of course, if any of you is interested in coming, he can count 
with the special support from the organizers.

I'll may be be interested, if you can give me the date for sure...




greetings from PARIS.

Martial

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Re: Looking for Ram

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 00:27 26/05/98 +0200, you wrote:

The problem with the MSX turbo R is that the pull-up resistors in the
engine (S1990) have a
too low resistance, which makes the current that high that even the
low-bit produced by an
external large mapper will be pulled up. In theory this can damage both
the external mapper
and the S1990. I don't think that Panasonic will produce a new version of
the S1990 to solve
that problem. I don't think that Panasonic will produce anything anymore
for MSX. So we will
have to live with these problems and work around them with software
routines! Whether we like
it or not :-(
 
I use a self made upgrade using a 1MB SIMM 80ns (30 pins PC DRAM) and some
74HCxx chips to enable read and write to the 'missing' 3 upper bit of the
mapper registers, and I haven't destroy my S1990 until now.

It seem that you have the some data about the internal structure of the S1990.

May I ask you if you could tell me what is the value of the pull up
resistors for the 3 upper bits of the mapper registers?



Best regards,
Alex


greetings,


Martial



PS:

Alex Wulms/XelaSoft - MSX of anders NIX - Linux 4 ever

LINUX is THE Operating System!


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Sunrise RS232C

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

Hi Erik,

Do you remember me?

Well this mail is not only to ask you if you remember me :)

But to ask if I may ask you to translate me the DOC files that explain how
to use the ML routine of the driver.

I would like to use the driver instead of use direct I/O

thank in advance.

Martial.


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Re: Re[2]: Re[2]: Looking for Ram

1999-02-09 Thread Martial BENOIT

At 22:28 25/05/98 +0100, you wrote:
 Are you saying that I can expand my computer to 512 kb without
 problems? (internally or externally?)
 
 Yes. In the S1990 the upper 3 bits are fixed to '1'. So the lower 5 bits
 work. 5 bits gives you 2^5 = 32 pages, 32*16K = 512K.

I know the problem of the fixed '1's in the S1990. It really is a 
design flaw and I cannot imagine why they made it this way. It takes 
more transistors to drive the upper 3 bits to one than to leave them 
floating. But even when it would take less transistors it would not 
make sense as the exact number of transistors does not 
matter for the costs of a chip, not even at that time.

A possible explanation may be that a full 8-bit mapper is implemented 
in the chip. On the chip are two pins to select between a 64K, 128K, 
256K and 512K mapper. In the chip, there may be an additional 
signal to select between 1024K, 2048K and 4096K. However, as this
signal is not lead to any pin, it is impossible to use this part of 
the mapper.

By the way I've upgraded internaly my Turbo R GT and some ST and GT of some
friends and I can say that it's possible to uprade the internal mapper up
to 1MB without problem. I did try up to 4MB but it did not work even when
I've tryed to use the different "BANK" of the R800

The R800 do have CAS pin for different BANK of DRAM if I remember well, but
only two of them seem to be activated... Since I don't have the R800 and
S1990 datasheet I'm not able to check if 4MB internal will work one day.

For 1MB you'll also need to add some 74LSxx or 74HCxx chips for the
handling of the 'missing' bit of the mapper registers of the S1990.

Does anybody know what sort of process the S1990 is made with? 
(cmos, nmos or pmos)

It should and must be CMOS and maybe it is HCMOS


Greetings,


Martial.

alias: SLAYERMAN
function: coder
group:  ABYSS Software

real name:
Martial BENOIT
36, av Maurice Gallais
93150 LE BLANC MESNIL
FRANCE

TEL: 01 48 65 22 79

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