48 replies to this topic

[vtrucco]

Hey guys,

I just complete my Atari mod, mounting a "Emulador de Cartucho" (cartridge emulator) inside a Polyvox Atari 2600. For who doesn't know yet, the Emulador de Cartucho was my first

"serious" project and works simulating a real cartridge for many 8 bit systems like Atari 2600/5200/7800, Odyssey 2, Colecovision, Vectrex, SMS, Zx81, Spectrum, MSX and others, reading

the roms from a SD card. This project complete one year last month.

I put 1207 roms separate by A to Z letters and navigate to the desired rom thru buttons in the front panel. Doesn't need to switch on and off a million of times to find a game


You can see the building process in my Picasa
http://picasaweb.goo...adorDeCartucho#

Attached Thumbnails

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[brojamfootball]

WOW!!

[Cebus Capucinis]

SO COOL!

[save2600]

Yeah, great job. Love the transformer and its fuse to protect your PCB board too. Does AC come into the 2600 now and that little guy steps it down? Don't see a bridge rectifier though, unless that's done on your board...

Do you plan on selling these? If so, how much? Would be REAL slick if you turned your board 90˙ and Dremelled out a slot for easy access to that card...

[vtrucco]

save2600, on Sat Dec 12, 2009 4:03 PM, said:

Yeah, great job. Love the transformer and its fuse to protect your PCB board too. Does AC come into the 2600 now and that little guy steps it down? Don't see a bridge rectifier though, unless that's done on your board...

It's a 9v transformer with a couple of diodes. The power come to original power input to Atari and to my board and I regulated to 5V to logic and 3.3 to SD card.

save2600, on Sat Dec 12, 2009 4:03 PM, said:

Would be REAL slick if you turned your board 90˙ and Dremelled out a slot for easy access to that card...

I don't bother about to remove. I already put all the great games in the card
But thanks anyway. I'm thinking about to build an odyssey 2 the same way. Maybe I do a removable card this time.

save2600, on Sat Dec 12, 2009 4:03 PM, said:

Do you plan on selling these? If so, how much?

I already selling the Cartridge Emulator almost one year, but it's a little expensive to send outside Brazil. Using today currency rate, cost U$217 with shipping to USA. Ouch...

[save2600]

Thanks for answering my questions Vtrucco.

Yeah, $217 is a lot of money, but still a slick piece of kit. And about the removable SD card... I know "all" the games are already on there, just be nice if you could easily add latest homebrews or hacks in the future was all I was envisioning Still, for an all in one solution - love the concept!

[dragos]

so how would one order that cart emulator? would it also have to be soldered in or does it normaly com with a cart connector?

You should sell 2600s already modded like that!

[nonner242]

Wowza!

[Rom Hunter]

Very nice!

Love the display.

Edited by Rom Hunter, Sun Dec 13, 2009 2:10 AM.

[Nathan Strum]

Sweet!

[cd-w]

Nice work. Looks like you have a PIC which reads the ROM images from the SD card and programs them to a W27C512 (64KB) EEPROM? This is a bit different from the harmony cart, which uses an ARM chip to feed the ROM data directly to the 2600.

Chris

[maiki]

You mean Harmony cart does not have any kind of "buffering"?

[cd-w]

maiki, on Sun Dec 13, 2009 5:02 AM, said:

You mean Harmony cart does not have any kind of "buffering"?

The Harmony loads the ROM image from the SD card into internal flash RAM, but the requests from the Atari are serviced by software (which allows it to emulate SARA, Pitfall 2, Supercharger, etc).

Chris

[Sr. Ferraz]

Dear friend vtrucco,

Welcome to AA and congratulations on the new project !
The Cartridge Emulator is very good and now installed in the console is better and more practical !
People may not know that this console was made in Brazil by Polyvox and had the internal power supply.
Very good work !

[Impaler_26]

Awesome!

[Vic George 2K3]

Love the readout "Air-Sea Battle...PRONTO!"

[vtrucco]

dragos, on Sun Dec 13, 2009 1:34 AM, said:

so how would one order that cart emulator? would it also have to be soldered in or does it normaly com with a cart connector?You should sell 2600s already modded like that!

Drop me a PM. We can talk about an order.

cd-w, on Sun Dec 13, 2009 4:41 AM, said:

Nice work. Looks like you have a PIC which reads the ROM images from the SD card and programs them to a W27C512 (64KB) EEPROM? This is a bit different from the harmony cart, which uses an ARM chip to feed the ROM data directly to the 2600.Chris

W27c512 act like a CPLD here to emulate a cheap method to do F6 and F8 bankswitchs

Vic George 2K3, on Sun Dec 13, 2009 12:24 PM, said:

Love the readout "Air-Sea Battle...PRONTO!"

Forgot to translate this message. PRONTO=READY.
When you are selecting the game, the 2 display lines show the complete name of the rom stored in the SD. After press the emulator select button the "Ready" message appears and you can play the game.
I recorded a video and post in Youtube one year ago with a huge explanation (Portuguese only, sorry)
Cartridge Emulator Prototype

Edited by vtrucco, Sun Dec 13, 2009 6:40 PM.

[S1500]

Now THIS is an Atari Flashback unit! It's a freakin' Christmas miracle! Let's pin this thread and un-pin the other one!

[JustJeff2]

This is just plain bad ass. I want one!

[tetrode kink]

vtrucco, on Sat Dec 12, 2009 4:30 PM, said:

I don't bother about to remove. I already put all the great games in the card ...

Man, that is one SWEET MOD!

save2600 is right, though, you're really chopping your ass off to spite your foot if you don't make that card externally removable! That's like closing the patent office because all the great inventions are already invented... In other words, there are still GREAT new homebrews and hacks coming out, the total game list for the 2600 may NEVER be complete!

Seriously, I predict that one day soon you'll swear at yourself because you have to open that thing up to put One... More... Game... on that card!

Mmkay, 'nuff preaching, I'm going to go back and drool over your pictures now...

-tet

[crunchysuperman]

vtrucco, on Sun Dec 13, 2009 6:40 PM, said:

Forgot to translate this message. PRONTO=READY.

It's better that way!

PRONTO!!

[vtrucco]

tetrode kink, on Wed Dec 16, 2009 1:31 AM, said:

save2600 is right, though, you're really chopping your ass off to spite your foot if you don't make that card externally removable! That's like closing the patent office because all the great inventions are already invented... In other words, there are still GREAT new homebrews and hacks coming out, the total game list for the 2600 may NEVER be complete!

Didn't want to disrespect homebrew scene...
There's a lot of great homebrews in my SD. Anyway, I was looking again my PCB and if I rotate the board 180o, the SD slot will be right in the front panel. So, just need to cut a hole for SD and it's done...

[S1500]

vtrucco, on Wed Dec 16, 2009 10:02 AM, said:

tetrode kink, on Wed Dec 16, 2009 1:31 AM, said:

save2600 is right, though, you're really chopping your ass off to spite your foot if you don't make that card externally removable! That's like closing the patent office because all the great inventions are already invented... In other words, there are still GREAT new homebrews and hacks coming out, the total game list for the 2600 may NEVER be complete!

Didn't want to disrespect homebrew scene...
There's a lot of great homebrews in my SD. Anyway, I was looking again my PCB and if I rotate the board 180o, the SD slot will be right in the front panel. So, just need to cut a hole for SD and it's done...

You didn't disrespect the homebrew scene at all. If anything, you gave it, on the Atari 2600 side, a swift kick in the ass.

[nathanallan]

That is an excellent mod! I will forever think of it as the PRONTO MOD!

Love that blue display! What are the wires going to what looks like the rear of the console?

[vtrucco]

nathanallan, on Wed Dec 16, 2009 12:26 PM, said:

That is an excellent mod! I will forever think of it as the PRONTO MOD!

Love that blue display! What are the wires going to what looks like the rear of the console?

Composite Video and Audio