stardot.org.uk

Hi, [Again, not my discovery! Thanks to our anonymous friend for finding all this fascinating content.] A zip with the HFEs is attached, as is a zip with some extracted assembler files. The files are just sitting around the DFS catalog! It's not known if all the Trivial Pursuit, Young Player Edition...

Hi, [Again: not my discovery or code. Credit to a legend who prefers to remain anonymous.] Attached is a bundle of HFEs for one of the Repton Infinty variants we have. Also attached is a piece of code that will access raw sectors from the Repton Infinity disc to reveal a surprise image. This time, I...

The fact that I can't get any to load makes me suspect I'm doing something wrong. However, if I create a hfe file using Greaseweazle, it loads up in HxCFloppyEmulator just fine. That HxCFloppyEmulator version looks a bit old. I have v2.5.6.7 and I took the first HFE (Elite) and it loads fine. Cheer...

KenLowe wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 25, 2021 7:55 am

Do you know why the HFE files in your archive (at least the ones I've tried) won't load into HxCFloppyEmulator?

Can you give a link to a specific HFE or two? And I'll check them out.


Cheers
Chris

Hi, [Again, forwarding along an interesting discovery on behalf of someone else. Not my discovery and not my code!] The beeb archiving effort has captured 4x Empire Strikes Back discs so far. They all have the same fingerprint, but that doesn't necessarily make it a boring disc... there's actually a...

Very few were 50fps, but those that were really stood out. I can think of Contraption, Pipeline, maybe Firetrack? I think this is a wonderful cue for discussion! It celebrates the most skillfully coded games from back in the day. My additions for consideration: - Syncron. Notoriously too fast? Prob...

I've just downloaded a couple of .hfe files from the archive (Level 9 Colossal Adventure & Snowball Adventure), and copied these over to my gotek (Flashfloppy v3.23) but I get a disk fault 0E with both of them when trying to read the disk (1770 controller / DFS2.26). If I try loading the .hfe i...

Has anyone considered doing a machine code profiler for the Beeb? It seems like something that could be put into an emulator, A 64K x Integer array that holds a count for each memory location. It would increment when an instruction is executed there. Maybe when displayed it could also multiply the ...

billcarr2005 wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 19, 2021 4:06 pm

I've managed to piece together the complete program.

What an unexpected win!


Cheers
Chris

Yes I was also wondering how where the computers linked for this game. So if you pick "run slave loader" from the menu and then have a look at what it's doing: [ITRP] 06EB: DEX [ITRP] 06EC: BEQ $06FC [ITRP] 06EE: LDA $FE6D [ITRP] 06F1: AND #$10 [ITRP] 06F3: BEQ $06EB [ITRP] 06F5: LDA $FE6...

Here's a Discbeast image of Double Phantom; the 2-computer, dual player version of Phantom Combat. CRC32 B892E2D I imaged both sides of the disc, but side 2 seems unformatted. Thanks! Added to the archive. Looks like an interesting disc -- it's got the crazy Western Security disc protection: Disc b...

Hi, I think this is a great find! Credit for this one goes to an anonymous individual I'm working with to fingerprint and archive their disc collection. Raise your glass to them :) We've found various Winter Olympiad 88 variants. One is fairly unusual: the 40 track side appears to have been mastered...

Thanks. I need to fix a fencepost error then

Hi, I don't currently have an 8271 beeb setup (and the kids smashed the TV on the 1770 beeb :evil: ), so I'm wondering if someone with an 8271 + Gotek setup would be kind enough to to try the attached Fire Track HFE? It's a borderline capture, so the test is pretty simple: boot the disc, and what ha...

Mine also has the dot-matrix-style disc label, but more interestingly the original owner had created a lovingly hand-drawn map, stuck together with now-brittle sellotape. I wonder if anyone here recognizes it? That map is a wonderful piece of work! Your dot-matrix disc label is different to the oth...

TechieKeith wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 18, 2021 12:43 am

Those tests also look really useful too. Where can I get hold of the "teletest" test?

It lives here: https://github.com/scarybeasts/beebjit/ ... est_v1.ssd


Cheers
Chris

Cheers mate! You're welcome -- and also credit to my co-conspirator VectorEyes who handled a lot of UK logistics. He also discbeast'ed the disc to check its fingerprint. The disc reads fine and it matches the few other Starquakes we've captured. We haven't found any variants yet, so does this sugge...

Hi, beebjit-0.9.5 is out. As always, it lives on Github: https://github.com/scarybeasts/beebjit The v0.9.5 Windows build is here: https://github.com/scarybeasts/beebjit/blob/master/builds/beebjit_win_0.9.5.zip There's been plenty of work, with continued focus on where beebjit strives to do well: acc...

Hi, Here's the MOS1.2 sound routine. (Hit tip to http://mdfs.net/Docs/Comp/BBC/OS1-20/EAD9) It doesn't explicitly delay between writing the bus value and turning on the sound chip. But it does seem to delay after turning off the sound chip. EB22 SEI ;disable interrupts EB23 LDY #&FF ;System VIA ...

Thanks for sharing the Chuckie Egg screenshots with the mistimings ThomasHarte! It's always good to know one is not alone in having these mishaps :-) No game screenshots this time from me. I've been mostly working on putting together a configuration menu. Ah, I love this idea! A built-in MODE7 styl...

Is there any interest in variants of Mini Office / Mini Office 2?

The original disc archiving effort has now encountered variants of both where some of the DFS program files are different.


Cheers
Chris

Fast forward to this week, when I decided to try to progress from getting Chuckie Egg working, to getting Elite working. This required a lot of improvements to video emulation - during which I discovered that if I was deinterlacing video, I really didn't need to run at 50fps, which was lucky for th...

Nice. More history! With thanks to billcarr, attached is another unusual Citadel. It's a "sample" disc. Perhaps it's the same as the "early" or "pre-release" Citadels floating around such as http://bbcmicro.co.uk/game.php?id=2396 or the one in the STH. Unlike the "...

Diminished wrote: ↑

Sun Feb 07, 2021 12:24 pm

Nice. More history!

Related, I just accidentally noticed the Citadel notes at https://www.stairwaytohell.com/cheats/h ... n6-b-L.jpg, while researching Perplexity.

It goes a bit into how Citadel was ported to the Master, and who did it.


Cheers
Chris

Hi, Attached is a zip with 2 Perplexity variants (standalone disc release). The 1B63D371 variant is the earlier release and is allegedly not completeable due to an errant wall section on level 8! The D0DA71BB variant has this fixed. I learned of this from a HacMan article (boxed in green), archived ...

Does anyone know if a real 6845 allows the screen start address (registers 12 and 13) to be re-programmed part way down the screen? You can reprogram them, but they won't take effect until the start of the next 6845 frame. There are plenty of tricks to display multiple horizontal slices in a single...

Hi, I've attached an HFE of an interesting Citadel disc image. It's the original standalone release, but a later release (13 in the DFS cycle count, V1.3?) that is Master compatible. I didn't know these existed until someone sent me to add to the HFE archive. I thought only the Play It Again Sam was...

I notice that this file is different across the discs: D.REPTON1 002FD0 002FD0 0013FF (two earlier discs) D.REPA 002FD0 0043A0 0013FF (later disc) This was bothering me. The logic here is that since the D.REPTON0 loader file is the same, then a difference in D.REPTON1 must be significant. So I look...

That said, I simplified to just using the high-frequency timer because it keeps me filling the audio queue regularly enough that it’s not a specific concern. I'm particularly curious about this piece above. If you trust the high-freq timer as the source of time, does that ever "drift" vs....

That does make sense - but there's a limit, because fast-reaction games will not play well with poor (or very variable) keyboard latency. Most likely, that limit is much greater than the likely N for how many instructions to run, as a maximum. This is an interesting topic for sure. Many emulators w...