Carnivore2 detection problem on cartridge port

Supporter (6)

24-08-2022, 19:34

Hello everyone,
I have an unusual problem with the Carnivore2 cartridge.
I have to say that before (2 or 3 months ago) everything worked perfectly.
My problem is the following:
When the C2 is on the port1 of my SX1 mini, it is not detected. The SX1 boots in classic Basic mode.
When the C2 is on port2 of my SX1 mini, it is perfectly detected.
Don't think it's just a dipswitch problem, they are well configured, as proof when I put a Konami cartridge or a megaram 512kb mapper, my SX1 mini detects them all.
I continued my tests: when I put the C2 on a real MSX2 (Philips VG-8235), the cartridge is well detected on its two ports.
You will say "it's a contact problem on port1 of the SX1 mini", and you would be right but ... I continued my tests:
I'm lucky enough to have a ZEMMIX too, and when I put the C2 on port 1 (closest to the MSX logo) it is detected this time ... but not on port 2 (closest to the connectors).
I got Daniel from 8bits4ever, he advised me to reset my card and with C2man to put back the files of version 2.40, the version I had. But without success.
I then updated the C2 to version 2.50 with a USB Blaster cable and put back the files corresponding to this version, without success.
When I look at the configuration of the C2 card: "I/O port for ID control" is set to [--], so logically the cartridge should be recognized automatically.
In short, I don't understand at all.
If you have an idea, I'm interested because I'm going in circles with this problem.

Thank you very much.

By Wierzbowsky

Guardian (3571)

25-08-2022, 18:36

Is there a value for the port for Carnivore2 next to the [--] in the configuration screen?
Does C2FINDER detect the cartridge when it's not started in slot 1 (run the utility from an alternative disk device; make sure you have firmware 2.50)?

Recently, I've heard quite a few complaints about Carnivore2 having problems with the so-called "MSX hardware emulators", including SX1, SX2, Zemmix, OCM. But not a single complaint that it doesn't work on real hardware. As all these emulators have the same code base, I would suspect that there was a bug somewhere in the source code that made it to all these devices.

By Nono78

Supporter (6)

25-08-2022, 19:49

Hello,
Thank you for your answer.
I'm with firmware 2.50 (and bootmenu v2.52)
When the C2 boots on the SX1 mini in slot 2, the configuration next to [--] is #F1.
C2FINDER does detect the C2, it indicates in detailed mode :

Port #F0 - not detected
Port #F1 - Carnivore detected in slot2!
Port #F2 - not detected

Slot 1 - not detected
Slot 2 - Carnivore2 detected!
FlashROM ship detected: M29W640GB
Manufacturer's code : 20
Device's code: 7E 10 00
Extended Memory Block: 08
EMB Customer Lockable
Slot 3 - not detected

When I launch C2 on slot1 (so when C2 doesn't boot on it), C2FINDER says :
Port-based detection :
Port #F0 - not detected
Port #F1 - not detected
Port #F2 - not detected

Slot-based detection :
Slot 1 - not detected
Slot 2 - not detected
Slot 3 - not detected

If this is a bug, there is nothing we can do.

By sdsnatcher73

Prophet (3851)

25-08-2022, 20:00

What I don’t understand is why you want to use C2 with OCM devices. In my opinion C2 does not offer anything that the OCM cannot do already (it has Nextor, SD card, FM, dual SCC).

By tfh

Prophet (3317)

25-08-2022, 20:17

sdsnatcher73 wrote:

What I don’t understand is why you want to use C2 with OCM devices. In my opinion C2 does not offer anything that the OCM cannot do already (it has Nextor, SD card, FM, dual SCC).

Well, maybe the sound-circuit of the C2 is a lot better. The OCM devices I have seen/heard have very, very noisy audio outputs. Furthermore the OCM's don't support the 2nd PSG.

By Nono78

Supporter (6)

25-08-2022, 20:22

The story comes from the fact that I bought on msxcartridgeshop.com (yes, I bought) a superb dematerialized game: Shump!
I was able to test version 1 of this game in MSXdev 2013, but the commercial version is much nicer in every way.
But it was impossible to run this version on the SX1 with Sofarun. When I asked the question here is the answer:
"SHMUP! Kai is a plain 64 kB ROM. It does not use mapper.
AFAIK, SofaRun can not run this kind of ROMs without extra hardware like MegaFlashROM.
If you do not have such device, SofaRun can not use it to run that ROM (No suitable device found)."
That's when I took out my C2 to test this game and realized that there was a problem with the C2 launching on Slot1.
Here's the story :-) I'm not saying I couldn't have done something else, I just did the simplest thing, put the game on the C2 (which works great when the C2 boots on slot 2).

By Wierzbowsky

Guardian (3571)

25-08-2022, 20:37

Hmmm, interesting... Technically, those slots should be identical. Is port F0 somehow used in SX1? Please force Carnivore's port to F2 and see if this changes anything for slot 1.

By Nono78

Supporter (6)

25-08-2022, 21:03

All I can say is that I have nothing but C2 when I boot up the SX1. I don't know if port 0 is blocked or used by the SX1, which is why I thought about pushing back the SX1 firmware thinking that would reset everything, but it didn't help.
I forced the C2 port to F2, but I don't have a boot on slot1 (but the C2 still boots on slot2).

By sdsnatcher73

Prophet (3851)

25-08-2022, 21:14

tfh wrote:

sdsnatcher73 wrote:

What I don’t understand is why you want to use C2 with OCM devices. In my opinion C2 does not offer anything that the OCM cannot do already (it has Nextor, SD card, FM, dual SCC).

Well, maybe the sound-circuit of the C2 is a lot better. The OCM devices I have seen/heard have very, very noisy audio outputs. Furthermore the OCM's don't support the 2nd PSG.

I have not had audio issues with any OCM (I have the original OCM as well as a Zemmix Neo and SX-2 from 8bits4ever). 2nd PSG should not be too difficult to add to SX-2.

By ducasp

Paladin (677)

25-08-2022, 23:59

Nono78 wrote:

Whenever a game doesn't run in sofarun, please let Louthrax know so he can try to figure it out. Also, on OCM devices, there are quite a few games that do not run on sofarun but they will run if you use MGLOCM to load. MGLOCM is distributed along with KdL OCM-PLD Packs, that you can download at http://gnogni.altervista.org/index.html , usually you can find it in msxtools\mglunch folder of the pack.

By Nono78

Supporter (6)

26-08-2022, 08:18

I didn't know this tool at all.
I just tested it on the commercial game Shmup! and ... it works (without C2).
Wow!
Thanks for the info ducasp.
Well, this story will have shown that in some circumstances there would be a bug between C2 and SX, Zemmix etc...
We'll probably know the reason one day.