Thanks man, I think it's a nice project too. If I can make it work I'll let you guys know. The way I see it, it should be possible to make a cart with a ROM chip containing BASIC extensions for the cassette commands, and a cassette din connector connected to a ADC for loading software and a DAC for saving software, along with support circuitry. Does that seem like a feasible way to go about doing it?
Why not just use LOADCAS or modify it for your needs ?
Like I said, I know that those utilities are out there, and I will use those for most times I want to use cassette software, but for me, I like to do things that aren't currently doable. Like NearDark said, it's a proof of concept, there's no reason other then "Because I can."
Since 2004 it's possible to connect a Data Recoder to Turbo-R machines and load software from real tapes using Martos' TRCAS tool. With TRCAS you can connect your cassette to the MIC input of the PCM sampler.
Yes that's possible, but you can't tell your datarecorder to start and stop loading that way.
I never used that feature, even when using the original cable and a MSX1
Well, the short time before I had a MSX with diskrive I did use that feature. I think it's quite personally.
I really like the start stop feature too, but I've always had trouble with it on my CX5MII/128. I don't own an actual MSX specific bitcorder, so I was just using an old Sony professional tape recorder. If I remember correctly, it would tell the tape to start, but it wouldn't stop it. Or maybe it was some other problem, I can't quite remember. It's nice to know that you can still use a real tape recorder with the turbo-r though!
I love that 'remote' feature when I still used tapes. Actually, I was very used to it. I don't think I could live without it (if I had to use tapes).
For me, I've operated other tape based computers that didn't have the remote feature, so it's not as crucial for me, it's more of a useful bonus, rather then a mandatory feature. I still think I would like to design the cart based tape extension that I was talking about, just for fun. Once I get my turbo-r I'll see where it takes me. I know for a fact that it's possible to add extensions to MSX-Basic, as there are many other carts that do exactly that, so that will be no problem. What I have to worry about is the ADC/DAC components, that might be tricky to get them to work in the same way as the original tape subsystem did. We'll see though...
