One Chip MSX is to get a second chance!

By spl

Paladin (856)

23-10-2005, 15:17

Good news. Hope it will be sold

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

23-10-2005, 15:22

yay, g00d news!

But.., there's always room for pickers ^_^

Why not all the memory the device has? Why only 256k ? I see good use for such software like Meridian.. whicch *really* seems to need serious RAM if you want to do lengty songs..

By Ivan

Scribe (1354)

23-10-2005, 18:08

Forget the extra RAM. According to the current poll we need a printer port.

By Ivan

Scribe (1354)

23-10-2005, 18:10

And I want the case in pink colour. Otherwise I won't buy it.

By Mafcase

Master (178)

23-10-2005, 18:19

http://retropc.net/img/weblog/20051021msx_01.jpg

On this flyer there are a lot of japanese tokens and numbers! Can anybody tell me if there's something like a price is mentioned???

By mars2000you

Paragon (1848)

23-10-2005, 18:26

Yes, in the last part, there's a price : 20.790 yens

I presume that there's a comparison with the price of the MSX1 One Chip : 19.800 yens

By Ivan

Scribe (1354)

23-10-2005, 18:54

Still no case?

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

23-10-2005, 18:55

Actually it's the price inc. VAT (and 19.800 ex VAT), being the exact same price as when ASCII had it on offer. Damn, those Japanese only have 5% VAT...

By Patsie

Master (199)

23-10-2005, 19:50

Why does MSX asociation think they can sell 5000 this time, when not even 2 months ago they couldn't?

By [D-Tail]

Prophet (3142)

23-10-2005, 21:14

Umm, first off: because of the WAY BETTER specs? Secondly, they have some fame of name right now, and more people will initially react, because they've heard of it before, I assume.

I WANT IT!!

Where's the order page? Not to rash anything, just out of curiosity... ;-)

By konamiman

Champion (397)

23-10-2005, 22:26

256K RAM? What the hell...? What would be the cost increase if selling it with 4M??? Or at the very least 1M!

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

23-10-2005, 22:27

nothing..

just some VHDL-coding..

By djh1697

Paladin (681)

23-10-2005, 22:58

Can anyone here code in VHDL ? we could have an msx.org challange? the most useful add on for OCM!

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

23-10-2005, 23:22

I propose: .. an ogg/mp3-decoder that doesn't take too many gates ^_^

By Edwin

Paladin (826)

23-10-2005, 23:39

Once I get my hands on an OCM, I'll be able to code vhdl.

By Samor

Paladin (983)

24-10-2005, 00:50

256 aint so bad....
my vg8235 is jealous of it (it only has 128

)

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

24-10-2005, 01:34

yes, it isn't bad, but it isn't ideal either..

Just use the whole 32 Megabyte minus some

By Sonic_aka_T

Prophet (2365)

24-10-2005, 02:00

I must say, 256kB doesn't make a whole lot of sense... I would expect the 4MB limit (slot), but not something below that. Having said that, it shouldn't be too hard to change, tho personally I don't see why you wouldn't wanna ship it with at least 4MB in the first place...

By Gilneas2

Master (192)

24-10-2005, 06:55

Whatever happened to all the alternative names we came up with for the OCM?

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

24-10-2005, 13:14

btw, the newspost says:

"MSX2 compatibility (256kB RAM)"

So did my 8245

Which ofcourse was: 128 RAM + 128 VRAM

So it might not even be 256k main RAM !

Ahwell it's all speculating.. bottomline is that the thing should at least come with 4MB right from the start

By Sonic_aka_T

Prophet (2365)

24-10-2005, 13:39

no, it says 256kB main RAM... Heck, I just noticed it even says it in 'plain english' in the lower right corner of the leaflet. Still, if it's pretty much a variable in the VHDL code, why not set that variable to 4096 instead of 256? (Or more likely, $0100 instead of $0010)

By sunrise

Paladin (800)

24-10-2005, 13:40

Happy programming

By BiFi

Prophet (3142)

24-10-2005, 14:04

Does this mean they're going to wait for 5000 orders again before the production even starts?

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

24-10-2005, 18:36

Hmm, BiFi, are you saying in a roundabout way that you'd want to finance the production in advance?

By Sonic_aka_T

Prophet (2365)

24-10-2005, 18:43

judging from another thread I saw, Repair-Bas is the one with the real big money!!! (in cash too!)

By BiFi

Prophet (3142)

24-10-2005, 18:46

Thank you for this elaborating reaction... I would've expected a more serious answer from a Bazix official.

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

24-10-2005, 19:11

scary huh, even people from Bazix have a sense of humour these days

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

24-10-2005, 19:20

<serious mode> As it looks now, 5,000 One Chip MSX computers are to be produced and delivered to market in the first 3 quarters of 2006, meaning the production will continue no matter what, not depending on the success or failure of a pre-order period. More info on this to follow in the (near) future. </serious mode>

By Sonic_aka_T

Prophet (2365)

24-10-2005, 20:02

I like you better when you're not serious...

By Edwin

Paladin (826)

24-10-2005, 21:15

The serious answer was more helpful though!

By sunrise

Paladin (800)

24-10-2005, 21:19

If it is serious, where do we need pre-ordering for ?

By spl

Paladin (856)

24-10-2005, 21:44

I want to order one!

Ok, being more serious, where we will be able to order the OCM?

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

24-10-2005, 22:13

Snout, make sure you nag those guys in the far east enough to ship the 1cm with 4meg out of the box! 256k is a joke

By Sama

Ambassador (1262)

25-10-2005, 02:42

I'd really like to see Snout nagging in Japanese

And to answer Sunrise's question: a pre-order is quite a normal phenomenon; new gameconsoles and other products can usually be pre-ordered as well. People who are eager to get one as soon as possible, get it immediately after it has been produced. There will be little or no delay in shipping the product when it's finished.

By Grauw

Paladin (1010)

25-10-2005, 02:46

Pfft.

If the device is anything like its predecessor, it’s got a lot of RAM onboard which can probably be mapped to the MSX main RAM relatively easily.

If not, ah well... The second slot’s good for my memory mapper then

.

Anyways, 256k isn’t that bad... Few things need more than that, except cracked ROMs.

~Grauw

By mars2000you

Paragon (1848)

25-10-2005, 08:11

Anyways, 256k isn’t that bad... Few things need more than that, except cracked ROMs.

..... and some demos, like thre great Sphere demo

By msd

Paladin (744)

25-10-2005, 08:12

And width dos2 256KB is really not enough to still run all software

By sunrise

Paladin (800)

25-10-2005, 08:29

Rikusu, I didnot asked for the explanation of a custom do so, but simply the question what is the use of pre-ordering if you want to produce it.
I would say, if you are sure , why again this circus. So no hesitation produce !

By AuroraMSX

Paragon (1475)

25-10-2005, 09:56

If we just keep nagging about the lameness of this OCM thingy, will MSXA push up the specs just in time before production and give us a turboR-OCM?

(Coz only by then, I'll start thinking about getting one...)

By konamiman

Champion (397)

25-10-2005, 10:29

Anyways, 256k isn’t that bad... Few things need more than that, except cracked ROMs.

What if I want to load Compass, install InterNestor, and create a RAMdisk all at once, as I usually do? Sorry but 256K is VERY bad.

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 10:47

aurora: the only lameness atm is those programmers typing "2 5 6" instead of "4 0 9 6"

By spl

Paladin (856)

25-10-2005, 10:51

As I have a external 512KB ram cart, actually I don't mind about the 256 limit.

Yours,

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 10:57

oh, perhaps an old question.. but does it or does it not have an RJ45 connector?

By msd

Paladin (744)

25-10-2005, 11:07

Spl: I've an external mapper of 4096KB and I mind.. I rather keep those slots free for an opl4 and gfx9000

By sunrise

Paladin (800)

25-10-2005, 11:20

Well, if you can use your Moonsound ofcourse

By msd

Paladin (744)

25-10-2005, 11:47

If it has no 12Volt then I will put it on there myself

By sunrise

Paladin (800)

25-10-2005, 12:08

The real spirit for a DIYC

By spl

Paladin (856)

25-10-2005, 12:25

Actually, I know that Moonsound and GX9000 are good hardware, but with few owners. Also, are those piece of hardware part of MSX standards?

By msd

Paladin (744)

25-10-2005, 12:28

well there are more carts using 12Volt, but hey it's just strange to put the default settings on 256KB. There is 32MB onboard. Those board are maybe not standard but the cartridge slot pins are

By sunrise

Paladin (800)

25-10-2005, 12:33

spl , a gfx9000 works, that into the first place.
Furthermore it is not only a question of the Moonsound, but philips modul, thosiba modul ,rs232c, msx audio, thus talking about a fully support of the 50 pins a cartrdige has
Many people understand this, a msx-1 was built that way, msx-2, msx2+ and a Turbo-r also.
Have we suddenly lost the knowledge or what ?

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 12:35

Besides, iirc the Moonsound is not obsolete, they can still be made (@ 25 orders), so there's nothing in the way to make the Moonsound a really generally accepted 'standard' ..

By J-War

Master (249)

25-10-2005, 13:43

I'd like to request the one chip msx to have WinXP + 256 Mb ram + x800 + 160 Gb Hard disk and a Wolf_ Sticker on it, please

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 13:45

I think the first options could be done.. the last one however... o_O

By Grauw

Paladin (1010)

25-10-2005, 17:37

Memory-wise, this OCM configuration is better than my current MSX.

So I have no problem with it, although it would be nice if it had more memory, of course.

With regard to 4 MB, were there not some software products with faulty memory detection routines which had problems with that amount? 2 MB would be fine by me as well (that’s what I currently have, and it’s enough).

What strikes me is that no matter what they do, people always find new stuff to complain about. So now it’s got an MSX2 config, but ‘I still won’t buy it, because it has too little memory’. Whiners! ;p

By msd

Paladin (744)

25-10-2005, 17:41

We are no going to 'change' the hardware because some programs contain some bugs?

By Samor

Paladin (983)

25-10-2005, 18:00

>With regard to 4 MB, were there not some software products with faulty memory detection routines which had problems with that amount?

Yes. I have a 4MB memorymapper and some programs lock up when using it.

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

25-10-2005, 18:02

the OCM doesn't have too little memory, by default it's configged as a 256k MSX2. There's 32MB on board, you can do with it what you like. Now you can use a lot of memory for FPGA add-ons (if one is to implement wavetable/OPL4 audio, some memory for soundbanks would be nice, right?). If you want 4MB memory and loadsa VRAM, you got it. I think it's really strange that some people just simply can't (or won't) look any further than the default configurations of the OCM, because with FPGA the default config is only of minor significance. It's just a starting point... you get all the FPGA code you need with it to make all the adjustments you'd want to make.

By Sonic_aka_T

Prophet (2365)

25-10-2005, 18:08

Something tells me VRAM won't be as easy as RAM tho. The expansion RAM could prolly be done, but that's of not much use anyhow... You'd pretty much have to re-rig the whole V9938 for more VRAM than that...

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 18:45

Snout: I already estimated that MSX-RAM would cost FPGA-RAM .. I don't think anyone has an issue with that. The point is however whether all the RAM is already used out-of-the-box or not. If not, put it into MSX-RAM. Yes, we know we can change everything with the VHDL'ing (which is nice), but does that mean that the standard-config should be small?

I dunno, but if I was to sell an OCM to an audience, I'd feel a bit like "oops, hm.. done wrong!" when it turns out that ppl upgrade the MSX-RAM to 1..4MB the same day they got the machine (that is, when they know how to). The better way should be (my 2 cents however) : ship it with much MSX-RAM, and if ppl need more FPGA-RAM, they know where to take it from.

It's a bit like selling a can of yellow paint and a can of red paint to an audience who screams for orange paint.

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

25-10-2005, 20:02

Wolf_: I'm not sure what you mean by 'FPGA-RAM', but just in case: adding more memory to the MSX does -not- cost you any LE's/gates. You can use the 32MB SDRAM on-board for that. However, I do think 256kB of memory is sufficient as a default configuration and just because you don't like it doesn't mean everybody doesn't. If the One Chip MSX had been static hardware, I would have agreed with you, but the One Chip MSX isn't static. If you want 4MB RAM, make it so (or let someone else make it so). Actually, I would be quite happy if people started developing VHDL upgrades for the OCM the day they received the device.

By mars2000you

Paragon (1848)

25-10-2005, 20:24

In blueMSX, all our generic MSX2/2+/Turbo-R machines have by default 512 Kb RAM. The main reason of that is to avoid complaints from newbies about so-called non-working of or game of a demo, like the great Sphere demo (and I speak here by experience).

So, the question is to know if the main goal of the One Chip MSX is to interest only the MSX 'experts' or to attract a new generation to MSX. If the second option is the good one, than the RAM size must be 512 Kb by default.

By djh1697

Paladin (681)

25-10-2005, 20:27

Since ASCII are allowing you to update VDHL from MSX-DOS maybe we could have a memory driver? along with a USB mouse driver? a USB printer driver? since a MSX-DOS driver for OCM will not work on a real MSX does that mean it isnt a true MSX program ? or course it is! future generations offer compataility upwardly.

If USB drivers are produced for OCM, perhaps some hardware genius could bring out a compatable USB cartridge for previous MSX versions? That would be neat!

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 20:40

Snout: what's wrong with 4MB being default?

And when I speak for developers, I also speak for users since they need to be able to run typical developers-configs. "because I want it" ? That would mean that only composers would buy soundchips, not normal end-users, they rather prefer PSG.

So again, there's not a real complaint orso.. in this case I agree with Mars however.. I'd go for a strong out-of-the-box system, to meet the more n00b'ish users. The only thing I don't understand is why there isn't 4MB out of the box. Even if it's enough for 90% of the users.. just let the creators type in the code to get 4MB.. and you please those 90% users AND the other 10% .. and while I don't know a bit about all that memory-stuff, nor do I know about VHDL.. I can't imagine that it's more than 30 seconds work. In the best case it's just a variable-assignment.

By mars2000you

Paragon (1848)

25-10-2005, 20:54

I don't think that 4MB RAM by default should be a good choice. On the real machines, there are no problems with such RAM size if you use a MSX2 or MSX2+, but incompatibility problems happen on a Turbo-R because the Turbo-R memory mapper acts differently from the 'Philips" MSX2 memory mapper for example.

As the logic evolution in the future of the OCM is to support also Turbo-R, I don't advice to chhose 4MB as RAM size by default. Again , to avoid complaints ....

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 21:04

well, 2MB then.. but at least more than 256k

Meridian needs to run orso, and have space left for the songdata..

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 21:18

The question is btw whether future developments of the ocm should be compatible with the old msx'es. I dunno a bit about that tR RAM issue .. but should we always stick to <4MB just because of a tR ? Question is whether the ocm should go forward taking the style of the old msx with it, but not the flaws of it.
Once you start VHDL'ing the machine, and improve the sprites or palette or whatever, then it's already not compatible with old machines anymore..

By mars2000you

Paragon (1848)

25-10-2005, 21:30

Wolf : see here for more explanations about problems with memory mapper :
http://www.msx.org/forumtopic4600.html (read mth answer, it's the last one).

About go beyond the Turbo-R limitations : it seems me a very good idea, especially if the final goal is to create a MSX3 (even if it will probably be named otherwise)

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

25-10-2005, 22:12

About the idea of the MSX3 .. it does raise some MSX-ethical questions ^_^

* what to inherit?
* what to drop?
* do we care about backwards compatibility?
* should the ocm really take-over the current MSX'es as 'main computer', regarding software (as in: OCM-only software that really can't run on old MSX'es)

By djh1697

Paladin (681)

25-10-2005, 22:41

MSX TurboR dropped the cassette port, I guess ASCII can choose to change it at any time. I like to idea of MSX-DOS loadable drivers, then the facitlity to reset to VDHL code via software! You could rewrite the VDHL for a particular purpose, then put it back to the default specification.

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

26-10-2005, 00:47

err.. there already is a tool to load and save the PLD code (from and to the FPGA chip)... so that's a couple of ppl happy I suppose

By opcode

Expert (65)

26-10-2005, 03:47

Considering the current flyer, is it safe to say that MSXA dropped FM and SCC from the OCM?

By BiFi

Prophet (3142)

26-10-2005, 07:46

SCC shouldn't have been in there in the first place... I can imagine FM to be added from MSX2+ since these machines (at least the japanese versions) tend to have it internally anyway.

By spl

Paladin (856)

26-10-2005, 10:20

Humm... it doesn't have FM PAC?

By Samor

Paladin (983)

26-10-2005, 12:31

I think it will when you insert one in a cartridge slot.

By Samor

Paladin (983)

26-10-2005, 12:34

>I don't think that 4MB RAM by default should be a good choice. On the real machines, there are no problems with such RAM size if you use a MSX2 or MSX2+, but incompatibility problems happen on a Turbo-R because the Turbo-R memory mapper acts differently from the 'Philips" MSX2 memory mapper for example.

I had problems on a vg8235 with an added 4mb memory mapper. I don't think it's limited to a Turbo-R.....
or I have a dodgy memory mapper. Still, I don't think so...

By Sama

Ambassador (1262)

26-10-2005, 13:14

Development and sales of the OCM is one thing, getting people to create VHDL for it to make it worth its status as non-static computer is something else. If the OCM comes standard with 256kB RAM and many people wish to have more, this may be a good incentive to start exploring the possibilities of VHDL. Imagine the satisfaction you get (especially when you're a n00b) if you succeed in giving the computer as much RAM as you wish it to have.

Little people will buy an MSX2 of approximately 200 euro; there will be more who are willing to buy a computer they can tweak themselves. Factors like these were taken in serious consideration when determining the out-of-the-box configuration. It was even an important reason for the original OCM to be no more than an MSX1 out-of-the-box.

By spl

Paladin (856)

26-10-2005, 13:18

Samor: I have a original FM PAC, so no problem... FOR ME or FM PAC OWNERS. The problem is that according Bazix, OCM had FM PAC - MSX MUSIC. So now, MSX MUSIC has been dropped from OCM

By mars2000you

Paragon (1848)

26-10-2005, 13:36

Samor : indeed, mth answer in this thread is more complete about memory mapper problems :
http://www.msx.org/forumtopic4600.html

By msd

Paladin (744)

26-10-2005, 15:48

Stating the Turbo R as example or a machine with a not so good 4MB mapper has nothing to do with this. I have a 4MB mapper for years the only time I've found a program that didn't work was Uknown Reality, but nothing that a quick hack didn't fix

and if there are any other programs out there with 4MB problems I will personaly change the ram check of those programs

By AuroraMSX

Paragon (1475)

26-10-2005, 18:04

Development and sales of the OCM is one thing, getting people to create VHDL for it to make it worth its status as non-static computer is something else. If the OCM comes standard with 256kB RAM and many people wish to have more, this may be a good incentive to start exploring the possibilities of VHDL. Imagine the satisfaction you get (especially when you're a n00b) if you succeed in giving the computer as much RAM as you wish it to have.
Still, as wolf_ pointed out already: there's something wrong if 99% of the buyers upgrade their OCM memory config first thing after unpacking the thing. And really, in the time that we're discussing this whole memory story, MSXA's VHDL programmer could get himself a coffee, read the internet, have a vacation and replace the "256" by "4096"!

Anyhow, I'm really anxious to see how many people will start developing VHDL stuff for the OCM and very curious about the actual applications!

/me envisions www.1cmforge.net (like sourceforge.net

)

By Grauw

Paladin (1010)

27-10-2005, 14:32

Snout: what's wrong with 4MB being default?

Didn’t Samor just say what’s wrong with that? 2MB is a much better choice. Really, I have that and I never needed more, and at least you won’t get problems with software not running because their memory detection routines can’t cope with 4MB (which is 256 16k pages which has to be special-cased in the memory detection routines or it’ll overflow to 0).

Anyways, when can we start pre-ordering this thing?

~Grauw

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

27-10-2005, 14:36

To those worrying about MSX-MUSIC: have no fear, the OCM is still delivered with MSX-MUSIC on-board, as expected. As for pre-ordering: somewhere betewen now and the end of the first quarter of 2006 ^_^.

By spl

Paladin (856)

27-10-2005, 14:42

Thanks Snout

By msd

Paladin (744)

27-10-2005, 14:58

Grauw: Didn't I say I would fix any programs with 4MB problems

By Sama

Ambassador (1262)

27-10-2005, 15:01

Still, as wolf_ pointed out already: there's something wrong if 99% of the buyers upgrade their OCM memory config first thing after unpacking the thing. And really, in the time that we're discussing this whole memory story, MSXA's VHDL programmer could get himself a coffee, read the internet, have a vacation and replace the "256" by "4096"!

I disagree, as that means that 99% of the buyers have immediately taken their first steps in tweaking the One Chip MSX VHDL code

.

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

27-10-2005, 17:55

indeed.. those who don't know VHDL have just bad luck..and are stuck with 256k ... o_O

By Tanni

Champion (476)

27-10-2005, 18:26

Still, as wolf_ pointed out already: there's something wrong if 99% of the buyers upgrade their OCM memory config first thing after unpacking the thing. And really, in the time that we're discussing this whole memory story, MSXA's VHDL programmer could get himself a coffee, read the internet, have a vacation and replace the "256" by "4096"!
I agree! MSX should be fun, not causing problems right after unpacking. By the way, I like VHDL. I would be glad if as many as possible MSX user would learn it and code for some MSX extensions. But being forced to code just to get more memory, even if you're not interested in coding, that's not the way to go. Coding in VHDL is not so easy as coding in BASIC. I also don't know if it is sufficient to just replace 256 by 4096. And you must resynthesize the VHDL sourcecode and therefore downloading and learning to use a VHDL compiler, too. Possible solution: Two FPGA configuration streams, one for 256 and one for 4094 KB memory. Not to restart a discussion we already have, but this ''MSX should be fun, not causing problems right after unpacking'' is one of the reasons I would like the OCM having CAS port, printer port and +12V/-12V support. If OCM has everything you usually find on a MSX, then there will be no problems for sure.

By Grauw

Paladin (1010)

28-10-2005, 17:18

indeed.. those who don't know VHDL have just bad luck..and are stuck with 256k ... o_O
Nonsense.

Grauw: Didn't I say I would fix any programs with 4MB problems

Somehow it seems easier to me to just have 2MB. Really, would you miss the other two? If you do, you can always choose to have the VHDL map 4MB, but at least everything would work out-of-the-box for everyone else.

~Grauw

By AuroraMSX

Paragon (1475)

28-10-2005, 18:25

I disagree, as that means that 99% of the buyers have immediately taken their first steps in tweaking the One Chip MSX VHDL code

Hm, somehow, I think that you've just lost about 99% of your potential buyers

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

28-10-2005, 18:59

Upgrading from a 256kB configuration to 4MB doesn't require every single One Chip MSX owner to tweak the VHDL code on his own, it requires one single person releasing the code needed to do so. Everybody else can use that code as an upgrade. Furthermore, as the vast majority of (legal

) MSX software easily runs on 256kB memory, I don't think of it as a bad out-of-the-box MSX2 config. Most MSX2 computers had 128kB or even 64kB memory. Once again, the whole point behind the OCM is that -for the first time- you can develop the computer far beyond its default configuration without making a single physical hardware adjustment. Just because a few of the elite members of the MSX community would appreciate 4MB by default, doesn't mean 99% of the potential customers are lost, it doesn't even mean that 99% of the customers would upgrade the OCM to 4MB first thing. It means that a couple of OCM owners would like to upgrade -and will- to 4MB, some of them making their first steps in VHDL design, others using the result of those first steps. Sounds like a good 'hey this FPGA stuff actually works, lets see what else I can do with it'-experience to me.

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

28-10-2005, 21:22

If elitists are gonna use 4MB .. they're prolly use it to create a large-scale project .. a demo or game.. imagine a game with 4MB worth of msx-scale media.. oodles and oodles of graphics or layered maps, oodles and oodles worth of sprites, samples, you name it. And if you're out of inspiration.. "who needs 1000 sprites?" .. use smoothly animating sprites then.. there's always a creative reason to fully use the available RAM

So, only the elitists are the ones to play those games/demos? You'd need an audience, so more or less automatically everyone will eventually need all that lot.

So, stating that 256k is enough for everyone reminds me a bit of uncle Bill. ^_^

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

28-10-2005, 21:27

The beauty of the One Chip MSX is that you have to worry less about your audience. If you want your product to use 4MB, distribute the needed PLD code with it (or auto-update and restore-to-previous-state). Same goes for supporting 6 PSG channels, more sprites, more colors, other resolutions, ADVRAM, whatever...

By wolf_

Ambassador (5677)

28-10-2005, 21:33

Distributing your own temp PLD code with a product is actually good food for another discussion.. does the audience allow overwriting their config?

By snout

Ambassador (5381)

28-10-2005, 21:39

If the OCM in the end gets restored in its original state I see no reason why not. Of course you'd want to run safe software only, so on the MRC we will make sure and double-check software that changes the PLD restores the PLD in the end before posting it online... but that's quite a lot of steps ahead already...

By sunrise

Paladin (800)

28-10-2005, 23:18

Arises the question also how many times can you reprogram the fpga itself and or the flashrom

By Grauw

Paladin (1010)

28-10-2005, 23:42

Hm, somehow, I think that you've just lost about 99% of your potential buyers
As I said, some people can only see the bad things. MSX1 wasn’t good enough. Now it’s MSX2, it still isn’t good enough. They seem to just look for excuses not to buy it.

What’s with all this milling on and on about the same lame thing. It is new hardware, it is cool, it is going to be produced (yay!) and it will be easy to tweak for everyone who has got different demands.

On a side note, if this device is meant for the ‘general public’ and not just for the ‘MSX freaks’ (which I think is the case, because I don’t believe there are still 5.000 active MSX users around), then 99% of the users will use it for the 99% of the games that work just fine with 256kB of RAM.

So, stating that 256k is enough for everyone reminds me a bit of uncle Bill. ^_^
Actually, uncle Bill never really said that, it’s an urban legend.

~Grauw

By boukichi

Supporter (6)

29-10-2005, 11:36

does anyone know the OCM has no RTC(Real time clock)?

btw,from previous news
>An extra flashrom containing the default MSX2 configuration

does the OCM have this one?
and is it correct that the flash is for upgrade VHDL safety?
it's very nice if it's like this:
http://global.aopen.com.tw/tech/techinside/DieHard.htm

By Guillian

Paladin (997)

29-10-2005, 12:32

Yes, the RTC is not implemented yet but the code was written some years ago. RTC needs a battery (which is not present in ESE MSX System 3). Another problem is that the FPGA power cosumption is too high for a normal battery. They just need to decide if it is better to implement a RTC that works only when the EMS3 is ON, or increase the production costs adding an external RTC.

By Tanni

Champion (476)

31-10-2005, 16:42

So, stating that 256k is enough for everyone reminds me a bit of uncle Bill. ^_^
Who is uncle Bill?

By Tanni

Champion (476)

31-10-2005, 16:59

As I said, some people can only see the bad things. MSX1 wasn’t good enough. Now it’s MSX2, it still isn’t good enough. They seem to just look for excuses not to buy it.
MSX1 was good enough for me for many years and would still be good enough for me today for that what I have in mind to do with it. Yes, I would like to have an OCM for replacing my MSX1 computers which are defective. Yes, I would like to contribute to improve the OCM if I can do it. For me, it doesn't matter if the OCM will have 128KB, 256KB, 2MB or 4MB, I would be glad to have one with 64KB RAM and 16KB video RAM! Everything beyond that would be good, yes, and we should talk about what would be best approbriate to our needs. But, as the memory is available and -- obviously -- can be accessed via VHDL code modifications, everything concernig memory will get solved when the OCM will be available.

By Tanni

Champion (476)

31-10-2005, 17:05

My previous post was the 100th reaction to this thread!

By Sonic_aka_T

Prophet (2365)

31-10-2005, 18:51

I'm sure uncle bill would appreciate that!

By spl

Paladin (856)

01-12-2005, 19:00

Any news about OCM?