CrossBow
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Posts posted by CrossBow
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This might be pricey for some, but I couldn't help but also order up one of these! The samples of the music are outstanding. I'm pretty sure they are using a separate audio chip to produce this since it sounds way too high quality for what the stock Genesis 2612 can produce. Still, I think it will be really neat to have in my collection!
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Oh, awesome, mine has the expansion port. I had no idea it has superior sound quality.
Well...even then there are variants as the expansion port remained for a long time. It is usually considered that the va2 and v3 versions of the model 1 have the best overall unaltered audio from them. However, the audio from the headphone jack is a bit on the hot side.
The audio you hear in this video I made was done from my va2 model 1 genesis. I added RCA jacks that come directly off the 1034 preamp inside so most of the extra filtering that goes to the headphone jack is skipped. The only way to get more pure sound would be to tap the audio directly off the YM2612 but then you don't have the PSG mixed in there if you do that. Would require additionally amplification as well regardless since the audio would be so low directly off the chip.
Mine is modded with a separate YM3438 attached inside. Basically two synth chips. But the audio output of the original 2612 is disabled and only the 3438 audio out is used in my setup.
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There are no real issues between the two sites. I'm a member of both and both have some good stuff to offer.
Now there has been at least one AA person who signed up here and tried starting something that didn't fly here and got booted. AA is bigger, so it is more difficult to police. And what is accepted on one site may not be accepted by the other, since they are run by two different people. There may also be times when a topic comes up and opinions may vary by site.
But all in all, both are great sites for Atari fans and both have some great members.
The strange thing is I seem to recall that I found Atari.IO through a thread posting originally at AA where there was some issue or another and both sites were referenced. But I don't care either way because as you stated, NSG we all have our opinions. And yes...AA is a much larger community than it was from the days of the 2600 Nexus and I'm sure it is difficult for all the Mods to Mod...all the time. For me I just ignore what I might not be interested in or agree with and continue on.
Now as to Crystal Quest, what I did play of the pre-release ROM version, I also couldn't get past world 2. In fact, I was never able to beat the first boss on World 1 and could only get to world 2 by using the warp. I've seen postings that state the first boss is apparently the most difficult and that the others aren't as tough. I would have thought that would have been brought up in some official play testing?
So once I do open my official release I'm curious to see what changes to the difficulty if any were made from what I had played of it before.
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Well, if nothing else, you can use the ROM on a multicart or emulator -- Bob flat-out said he posts the ROMs so people can play!
Except in the case of Bentley Bear's Crystal Quest, he hasn't publicly posted the final version of the rom, or even a near final version. The last one he posted didn't have Pokey audio in it and the one before that did, I believe wasn't a complete game yet. Having said that, there were ways to get a later version of the ROM though still not final that did have a completed game and pokey audio. That is how I was playing it on my Mateos flash cart before I bought the official release.
Now, I have suspected there was some issues here between AA and Atari.IO though I'm not privy to the actual details.
But I've never had an issue with AA not getting an order put through for me. The only time they didn't have an item I needed available was when they were sold out of AVox+ units for quite some time.
The only item they haven't made available since initially offering them, are the redemption adapters for the 5200. All the games are available and even those they don't have listed, they will put to a cart and make a label for you if they have one. That is how I got my copy of the Atari 8-bit Satan's Hollow conversion. So I'm not sure why there would be doubt about them not offering or making Crystal Quest available again? The real issue with the availability of this particular game and Super Circus Atari, is the quickly dwindling sources for affordable Pokey chips. If they have to spend $15 - $20 on a pokey chip, that makes the games cost that much more and makes it much less appealing to have them on offer. My understanding is that the redemption's weren't being made due to a lack of available parts as well. Though not having looked inside one, I'm not sure what parts it would be. I know that Console5.com has extension cables for the 5200 and NeoGeo and even replacement joystick cables they have access too. If they work on the 5200 and NeoGeo, I don't see why those couldn't be made to work with redemption like adapters as well? But..ehh...
Point is, I've no reason to believe that Bentley won't still be available as parts are available over the time to come.
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Little bit of history on this...
This was a demo featuring 5 songs composed by the great Sega Chiptune artist known as JRedd. It took place at the Datastorm demo party in 2014. There is only one other vid of this entire demo music cart on YT and it was done through an emulator. Well, with the generosity and my donation to Sigflup, I was able to get a cart of BlowFish made for my own enjoyment. I recorded the playback of the entire album using my actual model 1 va2 HDG Sega Genesis. This is quite possibly some of the best music heard on the Genesis technically at least until Paprium is released...
Enjoy!
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Thanks for the follow up. Very happy to know you got it solved and working properly.
:thumb:Not sure I would say I got it solved exactly. It is all theory and speculation and adding in higher amp output VRs is really more of a work around than a fix. Afterall, i didn't solve the issue causing whatever it happening, just put in higher tolerant stuff to counter it. Will have to see if it resolves the issue in time.
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Well, I realized I hadn't updated this so wanted to point out a few more things I found out and what surprisingly seems to have corrected it, or at least worked around the issue:
With more and more testing, I found that what triggers this is obviously heat related and kicks in once the CPU temp hits about 150°F and the ambient temp in the Genesis case is about 112 - 114°F. However, while triggered by temps, if it also requires that the 32x be attached and...be plugged in with its power adapter. So if you unplug the 32x the snow pattern would immediately go away regardless of the high temps in the case. Plug it in and the snow pattern would immediately come back.
Now to add more lemon into this mystery, the 32x doesn't even have to be warm. In fact, I did a test where I took the 32x out and had the genesis playing VR Racing in demo mode for about 1.5 - 2 hours. I was curious if I could get the Genesis hot enough on its own to produce the effect. No such luck as the SegaCD bios screen looked just fine after this. Then I plugged the 32x into the Genesis and plugged the power to the 32x and turned it on and there was the snow pattern! Remember the 32x was just plugged into the genesis so it hadn't been powered on but seconds. So the 32x is a trigger, but apparently not the cause.
I finally had a theory and from most of the temp measurements that the bulk of the heat in the genesis was coming off the original 7805C regulators. These are supposed to be +5 volt 1amp output regulators. But they did seem to be getting very hot. Not enough to shut them off, but so hot that the heatsink and AV out ground shield plug was too hot to touch. So...what did I do?
I replaced both VRs with 78S05CV versions. These are modern +5 linear VRs with a 2amp output rating. My theory is that with the mods in my genesis, the genesis itself is pulling more current than the original VRs were really ever expected to generate. Add the 32x into the mix and now there is additional current being fed into the system that is causing an over current situation. Again not enough to fry anything or cause thermal shutdown on the VRs, but enough that it had to be given off as additional heat.
So now with the new VRs in place the console doesn't quite as hot as before. It does get warm, but only slightly more than the other Genesis I tested with that does NOT produce these results. Either way, I was playing Star Cruiser last night and had it running from 6pm until after 1am nonstop and the Genesis no longer produces the snow pattern with the 32x in place from the SegaCD video side of things.
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My first Atari experience was likely sometime during its initial release in the late 70s as friends of my parents had them and I can remember playing breakout and Freeway. We didn't get our own 2600 until Christmas '81 or maybe '82 when I would have been about 7 or 8 years old. But it didn't come from Santa (for a number of reasons..not the least of which, was because I already knew the truth about that since I was about 4 years old.) But it also wasn't much of a surprise, because my parents had wrapped it as it was in the normal box. So it was maddening to me for the last 2 weeks before Christmas because I knew what it was under that tree!!!
Kept that 4 switcher until I finally gave it to my cousins about 5 years later.
- Justin, socrates63 and Clint Thompson
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I'm not sure I've seen much mentioned here about any of this...but get something to drink as there is some history to talk about first:
As I'm sure those of you know who might be awesome enough to own a working Vectrex or know someone who does, they buzz...like...a lot! Well, the Vectrex I have was actually given to me back around 2010 as I recall and has always been a particularly noisy buzzing monster.
So about 3 or 4 years ago, I decided I would try and get rid of the buzz on my Vectrex. So I hit up Console5.com and ordered the stuff needed to recap my Vectrex and build and install the de-buzz kit. It took over a day to get everything worked out with it. In the end the buzzing was much less but never quite totally gone. But gone enough to not be as big a deal.
Now that leads up to this year and a fellow Vectrex enthusiast and electronics guru by the name of Charles Tweedy developed his own Buzz Off kit for the Veccy. Very simple installation that doesn't require modifying anything inside the Vectrex at all. Just three wires to solder on and that is pretty much it.
Soon after this Charles began work on a new device he was calling the VAT. It stood for Vectrex Audio Tap. Basically it is a breakout audio amp that attaches directly off the Vectrex sound chip and provides an external audio line out, Headphone out, and an audio input designed for the AtariVox+ or VecVoice device and can mix that audio internally so you can hear them from the internal Vectrex speaker or from the lineout. Awesome stuff to be sure and like the Buzz Off, the installation is very minimal and only requires removing the sound chip off the Vectrex (Easy since it is socketed on most Vectrex units), and you place the sound chip onto a new socket onto a new daughter board. That daughter board in turn plugs back into the socket on the Vectrex where the sound chip originally was. The daughter board has a thin cable that comes off it and eventually routes outside the Vectrex and into the separate breakout audio box using RJ45 connections with the breakout box using standard 1/8" TRS audio and headphone cables.
Well, I purchased both items and they arrive the other day. Last night I installed them and had quite a bit trouble with such a simple installation setup. Long story short, it required me to completely undo and reverse the old Console5 de-buzz modification, get the Vectrex back to factory audio and then everything was good to go.
With that..I present to you... an audio demo of the Vectrex from the VAT line out. The VAT has one other feature that is pretty cool. Especially on games and audio that make good use of it...
Enjoy!
- RickR and GRay Defender
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I like that Ivory Tower.
Yes, the Never Ending Story was and has always been a large influence in my life. Look at my avatar pic? I even have a painting done by a local artist of Falkor from the movie that hangs above the door to my game room. Every single computer I've built that I use personally at home since I built my first PC back in '96 have been called Ivory Tower with my network domain named "Fantasia".
I like the idea the movie presents wherein everyone's imagination and creativity forms the basis of the existence of a magic land. Or to put it another way, the creativity and imagination of every one of us, is what keeps creativity and imagination alive. Without these things we lose our uniqueness, invention, and ultimately...our humanity.
Okay..that got way deeper than it should have and way off topic so my apologies.
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As I hinted in my original thread with my initial thoughts on the game. Here is my completed video game play review for this really fun homebrew from OrionSoft.
- Justin and GRay Defender
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I've posted this at AA and on the Sega-16 forums as well so if you already seen my praddle on about this I apologize and you can ignore. That said...
I noticed about 2 weeks ago, something odd on my Genesis/32x/SegaCD combo setup. Basically after the system has been on for about 30min to an hour, there appears to be a great deal of heat built up inside the Genesis itself. I actually measured this with my Fluke temp probe and the ambient air temp in the Genesis reaches about 112°F around the AV port. That seems excessively hot to me but perhaps not?
The specific issue this seems to cause is that video overlayed from the SegaCD itself will show up with a snowy like pattern on the screen. But only from the video from the SegaCD itself. I've posted a link below showing the effect. Basically at first when you power everything on and look at the SegaCD bios screen everything appears normal. Then after some time, it will produce a horrible graphics corruption issue as is shown second in the video. Then, if I remove the 32x completely from the system the video is normal again.
Now I have found out that the 32x appears to be the cause. Not sure why, but it is. In the video, the actual video you see on my TV is using the AV out port on the Genesis itself and not from the 32x. However the same results appear from the 32x AV port as well. So the video corruption isn't from the 32x encoder but somehow from a combination of the 32x being attached along with the SegaCD.
So far this graphics corruption isn't actually seen in games with the exception of those using FMV. As an example notice in the sega CD bios screen the graphics issue is only within the window frame of the bouncing Sega CD logo and doesn't affect the text graphics outside that? When I play Sonic CD with the system warmed up and doing this, the graphics glitches are present within the window showing the Sonic CD cartoon intro, but not outside the frame of the intro and do not appear at all within the actual game. Even on the bonus stages where the rotation and scaling effects are being used do not show this issue. Normal cart games are fine as well and if I remove the 32x, the Genesis doesn't seem to get as warm and of course the graphics issue from the Sega CD doesn't appear at all.
Has anyone seen anything like this before? I'm trying to get ahold of another 32x base unit for cheap that works to see if it is the 32x actually causing the issue or something within my genesis somehow.
https://youtu.be/LMS6E46EhUo -
I've done quite a few mods on various systems. Pretty much all of my classic consoles have been AV modded in some way either with composite or composite and s-video. Rather than list pics of the ones I've done, here is a link to my YT playlist where I've documented a good portion of my mods or repairs.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLypzYHeVZt9mmepsDRL-2oBIemEfp0XdC
- Sabertooth, RickR and Justin
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So these were back in stock over the weekend and I purchased one of the Genesis cables along with the model 1 to model 2 adapter.
Gotta say the picture is excellent! I'm lucky to have a TV that appears to support the 240p off the Genesis, however, the info from the TV states the signal is 480i...but ehh it works and looks great!
Now..having said that. I can't get the damn cable to work at all on my SMS at all. It is a launch release SMS. The AV out seems to work fine using a standard Genesis composite/audio cable from it. But using the HD retrovision cable gives me nothing for video on the composite. I checked the pins on the AV connector and have continuity to all the right pins on the video encoder itself.
Odd thing is that if I connect up the SMS with the cables, and then switch my TV to composite. I get a black n white composite picture. So it sees something but this TV using a shared composite and green component jack just does NOT like the SMS. To be fair, I also have a scart to component converter and have a genesis scart cable. The SMS won't work with that either. I'm wondering..does anyone know if the early release SMS units require amps for the RGB outputs?
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Hmm.. this is a tough one. But using the AA scale the following would be my rarest loose carts in my VCS collection:
Master Builder
Crazy Climber
Boing!
Chase the Chuckwagon
However, I consider both of my Parker Bros. prototypes carts to be the most rare. Especially my WIP version of Star Wars: TAG.
I also have a decent condition Activision Checkers....with the foam insert. I keep that in the glass case as well. It was the last Activision title I really needed for the collection (Loose of course), and to find it with the foam insert still completely in tact was even better.
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I had a Scrapyard Dog that did this very thing along with an F-14 Tomcat for the 7800 that started doing this just about a month after I got it. I ended up exchanging it for a copy of F-18 instead bitd. Anyway, my understanding is that some of these later made 7800 games actually were done using eproms instead of masked roms. As such many of them technically have a limited lifespan. I don't know about Basket Brawl specifically but I know that many of the Absolute and Activision 7800 games were made this way. You can kinda tell by looking into the cart edge end. If you look carefully you can usually make out the hex inverter chip that is installed to be able to use the eproms in them.
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This is amazing! You have one outstanding collection
Thank you! It isn't nearly as large a collection as many others I know of even here where I live. But I mainly collect the games I've wanted through time and not so much trying to collect for completion. After all, that would be a never ending goal and one that I simply wouldn't have the fund, time, nor the energy these days to try and keep up with!
But thank you again.
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This was done last year but you get the idea. Few games here and there have been added but essentially this is my room of fun for the whole family!
- Arenafoot, Sabertooth, jmjustin6 and 6 others
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Isn't this coming to the Jaguar also?
I believe Orion had toyed with the idea to port it to the Jag. But given that he has pretty much stated he is done programming for the homebrew scene, I would say that the ports of this game we did get, DC, GEN/MD, and GB are it.
BTW I did finish this game up over the weekend. I really need to capture some video of my playing it and giving my thoughts in an on play video review of it similar as I've done with other games. There is a lot in this game to like. And there are a few things that nag me a bit. But I'm still very glad to have picked it up!
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Is this strictly for the SMS version of the game I'm assuming?
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I honestly don't remember this as I would have only been about 6 years old at the time. In fact, when I think back on things, I really can't remember much of anything that far back other than a few memories of when I was about 7 years old and go my first Atari in about Christmas of '81 or '82, and then most of my memories seem to be in check starting around 1984 when I was about 9 - 10 years old.
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Actually that GE wall oven could very well be from the 80s. I recall we lived in a house that was built in the mid 80s and had an oven similar to that. We replaced with a new hotpoint that look nearly like that GE only it was black but still had the same clock/timer combo..etc.
As for older houses with wall oven's being tough to replace, you aren't kidding! My current house was built in '65. The Kitchen has been remodeled at least once in that time so I'm not sure what it originally looked like, but I suspect the wall over was added into a cabinet it would seem. We changed all the appliances out in the kitchen with newer. The current wall oven and stove top were early 90's Jenn-Air units. Replaced them with newer Bosch but it was really tough to get a wall over we both liked and had the features we wanted because the original space was only made for a 27" inch wall over. Most Wall ovens today are of the 30" variety. It was another reason we went with Bosch since they had a 27" in model that had the features we wanted. We still had to get it special ordered from Bosch, but they at least offered such a sized model.
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I used to use the Ben Heck mod in my CV but had saturation issues all the time, plus the transistor would get stupid hot! Found out from a post at AA that while Ben's mod does work. it isn't correct in regards to voltage and the transistor gets so hot because of the 12v going into it. Eventually the transistor will burn out before its time if you play the CV often. In the end I took it all out and bought one of Yurkie's AV boards but just the board. That way it replaced the simple circuit show for the Ben Heck mod, and I still use the RCA jacks I installed on the back. Looks much better than the simple mod here and best of all, no heat being built up anywhere.
The No Swear Gamer Atari 2600 Reviews
in Atari 2600
Posted
That is why Kristof created Vector Pilot!!!