+stephena Posted March 27, 2009 Share Posted March 27, 2009 This is just another bugfix version in the 2.7 series. The TIA improvements aren't quite done yet, so I didn't include the bulk of them. I was able to include a fix for TIA SCORE mode emulation, though. But probably the biggest fix is for the 'red screen' issue with ATI video cards in OpenGL mode. * After about 2 years, finally fixed the infamous 'red screen' issue when using ATI video cards in OpenGL mode in Windows. In the end, it was determined to be a bug in the ATI drivers. Special thanks go to Phillip Pi for bugtesting and constant feedback wrt this bug. * Fixed bug in TIA SCORE mode emulation when the Priority bit is also set. This fixes a very noticable graphical glitch in 'Swordquest Waterworld', as well as minor glitches in several other ROMs such as 'Space Shuttle'. * Treat spaces as normal characters in the ROM launcher. This means that ROMs with spaces can be located with quick selection (ie, typing characters will automatically jump to a ROM with that name, and typing 'space' won't cause the launcher to jump back to the top of the list). * The debugger window can now have a minimum height of 620 lines (previously the minimum was 690), but you lose access to the TIA 'RAM' bytes when using this resolution. This should allow it to work better on devices with small displays. As usual, Stella can be downloaded from the Stella homepage. Please report all bugs here in this thread or by email. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ransom Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 Nice! Thank you for doing yeoman work on this project. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SeaGtGruff Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 What happened to 2.7.4? Did you decide that 2.7.3a was really 2.7.4, so you went straight to 2.7.5? Anyway, thanks for all your hard work with this emulator! Michael Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 (edited) What happened to 2.7.4? Did you decide that 2.7.3a was really 2.7.4, so you went straight to 2.7.5? I wonder more about what happened to the break Stephen wanted to take. Edited March 28, 2009 by Thomas Jentzsch Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted March 28, 2009 Author Share Posted March 28, 2009 What happened to 2.7.4? Did you decide that 2.7.3a was really 2.7.4, so you went straight to 2.7.5? I wonder more about what happened to the break Stephen wanted to take. Yes, I wonder about the same thing ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TwiliteZoner Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 What happened to 2.7.4? Did you decide that 2.7.3a was really 2.7.4, so you went straight to 2.7.5? I wonder more about what happened to the break Stephen wanted to take. Yes, I wonder about the same thing ... Your work is appreciated Stephen. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buzbard Posted March 28, 2009 Share Posted March 28, 2009 (edited) Your work is appreciated Stephen. Thanks! Yes, ALWAYS appreciated. thanks. I think I may have found a bug (not sure) I hadn't noticed this in previous versions (because I just started using fullscreen mode). I have a 20" widescreen monitor 1680x1050, Stella is set to full screen, OpenGl, Zoom 5x. I've noticed that the NTSC roms run at near fullscreen but PAL roms run at 2x and when I use Alt= they won't go larger than 4x. Attached is my current stella.ini file if you need it. stella.zip Edited March 28, 2009 by Buzbard Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted March 28, 2009 Author Share Posted March 28, 2009 (edited) Your work is appreciated Stephen. Thanks! Yes, ALWAYS appreciated. thanks. I think I may have found a bug (not sure) I hadn't noticed this in previous versions (because I just started using fullscreen mode). I have a 20" widescreen monitor 1680x1050, Stella is set to full screen, OpenGl, Zoom 5x. I've noticed that the NTSC roms run at near fullscreen but PAL roms run at 2x and when I use Alt= they won't go larger than 4x. Attached is my current stella.ini file if you need it. When you see a PAL ROM that's acting this way, try immediately switching to windowed mode by pressing 'Alt Enter'. I'm willing to bet you'll see large amounts of blackspace in windowed mode as well, and if so, this is a result of PAL ROMs not taking advantage of all the vertical space available. As such, there's nothing I can do about that one. But if you're referring to something else happening, I need to perform more testing. EDIT: I looked at your INI file, and it seems you're using Zoom2x, so if PAL ROMs run at 2x then that's exactly what's supposed to be happening. Since you're using OpenGL mode, might I suggest to turn on 'GL stretch'. This will stretch the image in fullscreen mode as much as possible. The real issue is that normal zoom levels only work on whole numbers (ie, you can have 4x or 5x, but not 4.5x). The base PAL image size is 320x250, which at 5x is 1600x1250. This won't fit in 1680x1050, so you're bumped back down to 4x (1280x1000). Turning on 'GL stretch' will use the max width/height allowed, while keeping the aspect ratio. So the image is scaled to approx. 1344x1050 (~4.2x). This feature is only available in fullscreen OpenGL mode. EDIT2: Oops, now I see what you mean. PAL ROMs do indeed start at 2x in exactly the fashion you describe. I will look into this, but for now using 'GL stretch' will hide that behaviour. Edited March 28, 2009 by stephena Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buzbard Posted March 29, 2009 Share Posted March 29, 2009 I looked at your INI file, and it seems you're using Zoom2x,... I'm not sure how it got set to 2x, probably because I was adjusting the size for the PAL rom maybe? IDK. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted March 29, 2009 Author Share Posted March 29, 2009 I looked at your INI file, and it seems you're using Zoom2x,... I'm not sure how it got set to 2x, probably because I was adjusting the size for the PAL rom maybe? IDK. I'm thinking what's happening is PAL is trying to use 5x mode, and because it can't (as I described above) it's going back to the minimum of 2x. What it should be doing if 5x is too big is successively trying smaller modes first (5x -> 4x -> 3x ...). I'll get this fixed ASAP. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted April 1, 2009 Share Posted April 1, 2009 Hey another maintenance release? This is great and part of what makes this the standard for 2600 emulators.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+LS650 Posted April 1, 2009 Share Posted April 1, 2009 Sweet - I was just playing some Space Invaders and some Berzerk yesterday on my little Acer Aspire with Stella! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted April 1, 2009 Share Posted April 1, 2009 It would be great if the game type (bankswitching mode) was displayed somewhere when set to "Auto". I'd like to know which mode Stella selected for the game, and I don't see any obvious way of determining that. Thanks! ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted April 1, 2009 Share Posted April 1, 2009 I would like to see binary and decimal values of the registers too. There seems enough space to do so. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted April 1, 2009 Author Share Posted April 1, 2009 It would be great if the game type (bankswitching mode) was displayed somewhere when set to "Auto". I'd like to know which mode Stella selected for the game, and I don't see any obvious way of determining that. Thanks! ..Al This is shown when you turn on the scanline count. But I just realized I don't have a UI item to turn this on and off. For now, you can use Alt-l (or Shift-Cmd l for OSX). I just tried it with 'Summer Games', and it shows 'F6* (16K)'. The F6 is the format used, the '*' indicates that it was autodetected, and the 16K is the actual size of the ROM file. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted April 1, 2009 Author Share Posted April 1, 2009 I would like to see binary and decimal values of the registers too. There seems enough space to do so. Which registers? The ZP RAM contains boxes below the RAM area for decimal and binary (as well as the label, if any), but is always shown in hex. This is for space reasons, as the values will always be at most 2 hex digits. The TIA cycle counts/colour clocks, etc are always shown in decimal, because I think that makes the most sense. I guess you mean the CPU registers? If so, you can always switch decimal or binary mode with the following command (typed in the debugger prompt): base bin base dec base hex This changes the CPU registers to use the specified base. As for adding more widgets to do this, I have to think about how to proceed. It's hard to accomodate both smaller debugger window (for devices with limited resolution) and larger window (so we can show more stuff). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted April 1, 2009 Share Posted April 1, 2009 I guess you mean the CPU registers? If so, you can always switch decimal or binary mode with the following command (typed in the debugger prompt): base bin base dec base hex This changes the CPU registers to use the specified base. Didn't know this (Note to myself: RTFM!), thanks. Still, I don't know why this is necessary as there is plenty of space behind the CPU registers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted April 1, 2009 Share Posted April 1, 2009 It would be great if the game type (bankswitching mode) was displayed somewhere when set to "Auto". I'd like to know which mode Stella selected for the game, and I don't see any obvious way of determining that. Thanks! ..Al This is shown when you turn on the scanline count. But I just realized I don't have a UI item to turn this on and off. For now, you can use Alt-l (or Shift-Cmd l for OSX). I just tried it with 'Summer Games', and it shows 'F6* (16K)'. The F6 is the format used, the '*' indicates that it was autodetected, and the 16K is the actual size of the ROM file. Thanks. ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wickeycolumbus Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 Thank you for the update! I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this yet, but is there any chance you can implement the EF bankswitching scheme in a future version? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Impaler_26 Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 Thank you for the update! I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this yet, but is there any chance you can implement the EF bankswitching scheme in a future version? You can't select it in the Game Properties menu but EF bankswitched ROMs already work in Stella, i just tried it in Stella 2.6.1. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted April 5, 2009 Author Share Posted April 5, 2009 Thank you for the update! I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this yet, but is there any chance you can implement the EF bankswitching scheme in a future version? I think EF is the last remaining BS format that Stella doesn't support. Can you provide sample ROM(s), and more importantly, a description/specs for this format. I can't seem to find much about it online (but then again, I haven't looked to hard either). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted April 5, 2009 Author Share Posted April 5, 2009 Thank you for the update! I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this yet, but is there any chance you can implement the EF bankswitching scheme in a future version? You can't select it in the Game Properties menu but EF bankswitched ROMs already work in Stella, i just tried it in Stella 2.6.1. Hmm, that's odd. When you load the EF ROM, what bankswitch type is autodetected (turn on online scanline count to see this info)? And can you provide that ROM, or point to where I can get a similar one? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Impaler_26 Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 Thank you for the update! I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this yet, but is there any chance you can implement the EF bankswitching scheme in a future version? You can't select it in the Game Properties menu but EF bankswitched ROMs already work in Stella, i just tried it in Stella 2.6.1. Hmm, that's odd. When you load the EF ROM, what bankswitch type is autodetected (turn on online scanline count to see this info)? And can you provide that ROM, or point to where I can get a similar one? I use the ROM in this post, an EF Bankswitching conversion of Dynacom's Megaboy Cart. Stella autodetects MB (Dynacom Megaboy) for this ROM though it is different than the original Megaboy ROM, i compared them with HOM3. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+stephena Posted April 5, 2009 Author Share Posted April 5, 2009 Thank you for the update! I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this yet, but is there any chance you can implement the EF bankswitching scheme in a future version? You can't select it in the Game Properties menu but EF bankswitched ROMs already work in Stella, i just tried it in Stella 2.6.1. Hmm, that's odd. When you load the EF ROM, what bankswitch type is autodetected (turn on online scanline count to see this info)? And can you provide that ROM, or point to where I can get a similar one? I use the ROM in this post, an EF Bankswitching conversion of Dynacom's Megaboy Cart. Stella autodetects MB (Dynacom Megaboy) for this ROM though it is different than the original Megaboy ROM, i compared them with HOM3. OK, then I guess it's a fluke that it worked (since the original ROM was MB anyway). Can anyone provide other EF ROMs that don't work in MB mode, or more importantly, a description of how the EF scheme works?? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted April 5, 2009 Share Posted April 5, 2009 I use the ROM in this post, an EF Bankswitching conversion of Dynacom's Megaboy Cart.Stella autodetects MB (Dynacom Megaboy) for this ROM though it is different than the original Megaboy ROM, i compared them with HOM3. Most likely because its the only 64k ROM. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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