Nextor: the whole story | MSX Resource Center (Page 4/6)

Prophet (3367)

10-08-2011, 23:06

You're right, the messages aren't on the TPA (*1), but under the BDOS reserved area. Those are the strings I found:

1) Strings used by the VER command. It's not exactly that it needs high performance to be kept in such a precious memory area:

000de30: c35d e035 de4e 4558 544f 522e 5359 5320  .].5.NEXTOR.SYS 
000de40: 7665 7273 696f 6e20 322e 3030 004e 6578  version 2.00.Nex
000de50: 746f 7220 7665 7273 696f 6e20 322e 3030  tor version 2.00
000de60: 2061 6c70 6861 2032 0d0a 436f 7079 7269   alpha 2..Copyri
000de70: 6768 7420 2832 3031 3129 204b 6f6e 616d  ght (2011) Konam
000de80: 696d 616e 0d0a 0d0a 0021 7df3 22e7 e53a  iman.....!}."..:

2) Strings for error messages:


000dc30: ff48 d9ff 0000 0000 556e 7265 636f 676e  .H......Unrecogn
000dc40: 697a 6564 2063 6f6d 6d61 6e64 00ff ffff  ized command....
.
.
.
000e600: f300 4161 0300 5272 0049 6900 0020 7265  ..Aa..Rr.Ii.. re
000e610: 6164 696e 6700 2077 7269 7469 6e67 0020  ading. writing. 
000e620: 6472 6976 6520 003a 0041 626f 7274 206f  drive .:.Abort o
000e630: 7220 5265 7472 7920 2841 2f52 293f 2000  r Retry (A/R)? .
000e640: 4162 6f72 742c 2052 6574 7279 206f 7220  Abort, Retry or 
000e650: 4967 6e6f 7265 2028 412f 522f 4929 3f20  Ignore (A/R/I)? 
000e660: 002a 2a2a 2000 0049 6e73 6572 7420 434f  .*** ..Insert CO
000e670: 4d4d 414e 4432 2e43 4f4d 2064 6973 6b20  MMAND2.COM disk 
000e680: 696e 2064 7269 7665 2000 3a00 5072 6573  in drive .:.Pres
000e690: 7320 616e 7920 6b65 7920 746f 2063 6f6e  s any key to con
000e6a0: 7469 6e75 652e 2e2e 2000 4e6f 7420 656e  tinue... .Not en
000e6b0: 6f75 6768 206d 656d 6f72 792c 2073 7973  ough memory, sys
000e6c0: 7465 6d20 6861 6c74 6564 0057 726f 6e67  tem halted.Wrong
000e6d0: 2076 6572 7369 6f6e 206f 6620 4d53 582d   version of MSX-
000e6e0: 444f 532c 2073 7973 7465 6d20 6861 6c74  DOS, system halt
000e6f0: 6564 00ff ffff ffff ffff ffff ffff ffff  ed..............

It doesn't seem too much, but they sum up to 335 bytes. If those messages weren't there there, the end of the TPA area could be raised from D906h to DA55h. It's less than the DC06h achieved by the DOS1+CTRL, but still an improvement nonetheless.

*1: TPA is the Transient Program Area. IOW, it's the space available to run user programs. The BDOS reserved area is the memory reserved by the system to itself.

Par sd_snatcher

Prophet (3367)

20-09-2011, 21:31

Another improvement suggestion:

Support for 1.44MB FloppyDisks on FDCs that have this possibility, like the TC8566AF contained on most Panasonic/Sanyo machines.

(a 1.44MB floppydrive will be required for that, off course)

Par retrocanada76

Champion (480)

21-09-2011, 18:16

And about the MSXDOS2 rom cartridge. Isn't possible to load the ROM into the memory mapper ?

Par dhau

Paragon (1563)

21-09-2011, 19:21

Sorry if I missed, but is there plan for FAT32 or ExFAT for >2GB SD/CF cards?

I know I could make multiple 2GB partitions in FAT16, but it is a bit difficult to read those on Windows.

Par edoz

Prophet (2301)

21-09-2011, 20:45

I like the story

Par retrocanada76

Champion (480)

21-09-2011, 21:05

Well since the MSX-A doesn't even have a website anymore (virtually it doesn't exist) In protest a hacker group should invade and steal the MSXDOS2 sources you have. So in this case it's not your fault

Par retrocanada76

Champion (480)

21-09-2011, 21:11

Btw, did you sign any non-disclosure agreement ?

Par konamiman

Paragon (1084)

22-02-2013, 10:40

retrocanada76 wrote:

Btw, did you sign any non-disclosure agreement ?

No, I didn't sign anything, I just received the sources.

dhau wrote:

Sorry if I missed, but is there plan for FAT32 or ExFAT for >2GB SD/CF cards?

Not as far as native support is concerned. But as I mentioned in a previous message, I plan to add support for filesystem drivers, so an ad-hoc driver for FAT32 could be developed.

But... wait a second! What am I doing here after one year and half?? Well, there are news: a new Nextor release is in the oven. And a piece of hardware that will be released with Nextor built-in is in the foundry: MegaFlashROM SCC+ SD.

Par OeiOeiVogeltje

Paragon (1374)

22-02-2013, 17:42

thats is GREAT!!
But ehmmm
you still work (if nessesary) on the Nextor for CF interface ,right?

Par konamiman

Paragon (1084)

22-02-2013, 17:58

The Sunrise IDE driver (which works on the CF interface) works as it is now, all the modifications from the previous version have been made in the Nextor code itself.

Anyway that driver still can't detect media changes. Nextor can handle that, but with reduced performance (anyway this can be solved by locking drives).