Posts by turrican9

I've tried a few cores like the Amiga core where you can turn off the scandoubler and use 15KHz mode. And I know several other cores can do this aswell. Would this be possible to implement for the C64 core?

Some interesting findings. First of all the left monitor (BenQ BL 912) shows substantial less ghosting VS the BL 702A (The one on the right). Not only that, but the TC64 V2 on the left (the one in cartridge mode) shows a tad less ghosting/smearing than the one on the right (the one in the docking station).

If that was not enough, using it in the docking station makes it even worse. I can only guess it has to do with a cheap Chinese power supply or less groundplane when using it in the docking station VS using it in cartridge mode? I've tried all combinations here. Swapping TC64 V2s around, monitors and cables. That's how I know this.

The setup on the left mostly shows a few ghost/smearing shadows for the white character. There are almost no visible ghosting/smearing trails for the blue and red character. However, the setup on the right has many ghosting/smearing trails for the white Karate dude but also very visible trails for the blue and red character. Monitors makes the biggest difference here, but docking station and the specific TC64 V2 also shows. Oh, and the TC64V2 on the right was an early one. Bought right after they were released. Not that I think something was changed component wise between the two TC64V2s. It's only a small difference.

Certain games with certain colour combinations shows this more than others. This game (IK+) is one of those games that shows it clearly.

I don't know why I haven't noticed this before, but there is a substantial difference between these two setups. I'm quite satisfied with the results I get from the BL912 setup here. Using 768x576@50Hz and VICII sync enabled. Which gives the best results for me. 640x480@50Hz is also good but will not show the whole vertical area in all games.

It seems the TC64V2s are very picky with regards to monitors. will do more testing. The Lenovo q24i-10 monitor looks promising from pictures and information I saw over in the TC64 facebook group. Anyway, I'm quite surprised the BL912 shows noticeable less ghosting/smearing VS BL702A when used with the TC64V2s as I thought they were essentially the same based on how they behave on my Amigas, appart from 17 VS 19 inch sizes of course.

Quote from Jens

There is no "power saving feature" - it's the output drive power settings that were reduced to the required minimum "per signal" for all cores, so nothing that can be seen or controlled from the Amiga-side. I've done that to reduce signal noise and improve metastbility. For some of the known-bad power supplies, it actually makes the PLL mod unnecessary.

I see. I was probably thinking about the download description for the update and remembered something about lower power setting:

• Indivision ECS Update file V1.15 (june 3rd, 2012) - pure update file, please flash with flash tool. This includes changes of V1.10, but uses lower power settings for the FPGA, which may improve performance with flaky power supplies.

I have two Indivision ECS V1s. Same thing happens with me when I flash vv1.15. I assume v1.15 is a slightly modified v1.10 and that's why they didn't change the version number on the startup screen. I think they added some power saving feature in v1.15 VS 1.10. So very minor change.

I still would love the option for 640x512 and 720x576 resolutions on the TC64/TC64 V2. Especially 720x576. If it's at all possible

Quote from Timm

Here's a bootblock that I hope works better and fixes more titles.

It shouldn't crash anymore, and it should also coerce the system a bit more into PAL.

So this is an *.img file. Is it possible to write this to a floppy using ADF blitzer? I use ADF blitzer for writing ADFs to floppy.

Quote from MikeVee

Not looked at this demo, but you could not miss the ghosting on the V2, no sign of it on the V1 or the ScanPlus

Appreciate the tip regards copper tape, but the V1 copes fine without it.

As there is no ghosting on the V1 I'll wait until the V2 patch board is available then decide which one has the better overall picture then sell the runner up.

What Amiga are you using ECS V1/ECS V2 in?

Quote from MikeVee

I managed to get an 'Indivision ECS V1' from eBay and the picture is far superior to the V2 on my setup.

Its better than my 'ScanPlus ECS' in the interlaced modes and it works well with HighGfx.

On the ECS v2 the ghosting was so bad I could read the text in the ghosted image, ECS v1 no such issue.

I'll probably hang on to the v2 to see what that's like once the patch board is available.

Did you try Andromedas DOS demo on your Indivision ECS V1? I still get a little bit of ghosting on my V1s. But when they are in my A600s with the VGA connector secured to the RF shield it's barely noticeable. In my A500s it's quite noticeable.

For my ECS V2 I now get a crystal clear and sharp picture with the latest profile I made. You can find my profile in post #175 with a download. I also added copper tape to the VGA cable. There is still visible ghosting, especially in DOS demo, where it's very visible. But in general I don't see that much ghosting outside of examples like DOS demo or stuff that has certain colour combinations. And the picture I get on my BenQ BL702A and BL912 monitors with this profile is actually sharper than I get from ECS V1. It's crystal clear, sharp and shows perfect patterns with no artifacts. So appart from the ghosting which can be seen in certain scenarios, the picture is extremely good with this profile.

Oh, and I'm using the latest firmware for ECS V2

Jim Power the whdload version seems to work fine here. I played it for 10 minutes probably. Or do I need to do a longer test? My Specs are ACA 500+ and A500 Plus (replica board) with 2mb chip RAM.

For this test I hit F1 from the ACA 500 plus menu. The slave version for Jim Power was version 1.1. I believe I am using whdload version 18.6.

Quote from Tobias

You'll have to mount the image and load it in BASIC just like you would do on a real C64. For most original games that means typing LOAD"*",8,1 and press return. For most games you'll also have to make sure no other hardware expansions are enabled, and only one disk drive.

Thanks. I had already tried that but didn't wait long enough for the game to load. I simply assumed something was wrong. I sometimes forget how slow a 1541 can be

Thanks again, will go and try out some G64s

I downloaded a big library of G64 games. When I open the G64 files I get a PRG file inside it. Pressing return on the PRG file does nothing on any of the G64 images I've tried thus far.

Anything I'm missing here? I tried to look in the 9M version of TC64V1/V2 manual but couldn't find any info regarding how to run these types of images.

Quote from pwsoft

No not so easy as the VIC 20 core doesn't have a menu system like the C64 main core has. So most of the settings are set static during the compilation of the core and can't be changed by software.

Thanks for the answer. Not a big deal as 800x600@72Hz is 'good enough' for VIC20 use

Quote from Tobias

So yes, it seems to be this bug.... I am on it, but its kinda tricky

Thanks. As I said, no big deal for me at least. Keep up the great work

So I updated to the latest VIC 20 core in order to be in line with the new video modes that came late last year with one of the Chameleon firmwares. 9J I think it was. I see that the Vic 20 core is locked at 800x600@72Hz? Is it possible to implement it so this can be changed to 640x480@50Hz or 768x576@50Hz as these gives the best picture quality for me?

Not a big deal. But I just wondered if this was easy to implement. Or maybe it's there and I missed it?

Quote from Tobias

There must be a misunderstanding... the right button is always "short press" for reset (reset the c64), and "long press" for reloading the core. Right button behaviour can not be changed at all

Regarding Cartridge Images... we have a bug that occurs when "reset goes to menu" is enabled, perhaps this is what you are seeing? see here under "reset logic"

By right button I mean the red button. And when selecting under the menu options for buttons that the left (black one) is used for changing disk image for drive 1 instead of back to menu and the right button (red) which is normally reset I select 'go to menu' instead. Did I misunderstand something? At least It will bring me back to the menu when I'm messing with multidisk demos and stuff lately. When I do a short press on the red button. Long press will reset or restart the core I think.

So then it's probably the bug you linked to. Because it seems to happen with cartridge images for the most part.

Not a big deal anyway, because I enable this only when messing with multi disk demos and stuff. So I don't need to have it set like this all the time. Even when messing with multidisk stuff it's quite easy to just go back to the menu and mount images the normal way.

I don't know if this is a bug or something. When having my TC64V2 in cartridge mode and I configure left button for drive 1 and right button for menu (short press for menu and long press for reset) I get some problems. When I'm in a game/program and press the right button (red one) with a short press it will reset the chamelon more often than it goes to the menu. After it has done this reset it will reset the chamelon every time I try to load a cartridge image. Until I change the buttons back to default settings (left button for menu and right button for reset).

I was using this TC64V2 a few days ago and had the buttons configured with left button for drive 1 and right for menu/reset. It was working fine then. I have been swapping back and forth with a C64c and an older breadbin. Today I was using the breadbin. Maybe I was using an older TC64V2 firmware. I don't remember exactly when I updated to 9m. Or maybe it's related to the breadbin C64. I don't remember if I was using the C64c when I had configured the buttons to let left to drive 1 and right do menu/reset. If so, there is a bug related to my older breadbin

Edit: I just tested with the C64c now. Same thing. But it actually resets the Chamelon every time I try to load a cartridge image when having the buttons configured left for drive 1 and right for menu/reset. And this is without touching the buttons. Very strange. So maybe it worked before I updated the firmware to 9m. Will have to go back to an older firmware to confirm I guess

Quote from robinsonb5

Well if it happens with two unrelated cores that doesn't bode well. How much is missing? Does the TV give any clue as to what mode it thinks its displaying? (There isn't a standard mode that looks anything like scandoubled PAL, so the TV's probably guessing, incorrectly, that it's receiving 720x400.)

It's missing enough where quite a bit of the graphics is not showing. Sounds very plausible that it's guessing 720x400 instead of 720x576. Probably 176 pixels missing. Strange thing is I don't think this happened with an older Amiga AGA core I was using. I still have the older core in my other TC64 V2. Will test it and confirm.

Picture shows up correctly on the older AGA core (832AA0). So you must have changed something in the later core/cores that makes this happen on this TV. And the NES core must be using whatever you changed.

In PAL mode the picture is missing the bottom part on my 32 inch LCD TV. Same goes for the latest Amiga AGA core. However, on my BenQ BL702A the whole pictures shows. At least on the Amiga AGA core.

Anything that can be done about this?

btw, the various cores that has a VGA or TV config file. It is clear to me that I can select one of them. But do they go into the root of the SD card or they are supposed to be in a separate config folder? Also, are these only for video settings or do these store the whole config of each core?

Quote from captain_zzap

Just a psa, better don’t plug original Megadrive/Genesis controllers into a C64. It might destroy your cia and your controller.

I will not do that. But I assume it wouldn't hurt the TC64V2/docking station?

Quote from Tobias

More likely a screwed up Filesystem... generally for those cores its a good idea to use a fresh card formatted with "SD Formatter" and then only add files to it, dont delete any. Especially windows has a tendency to screw up the second FAT copy on the card, which can confuse the very barebones/limited filesystem implementations.

Maybe. Strange that it does not come with any init faults with the NES core. I don't want to format this card. It has like 15GB of software and it will take ages to copy it back after a format. It's not the fastest SD card. I may try other SD cards to see if I get the init errors. As said, it works if I eject and insert it when I get this error message.