What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Discuss hardware-related topics, such as development cartridges, CopyNES, PowerPak, EPROMs, or whatever.

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Banshaku
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What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by Banshaku »

That may seems like a strange question but 10 years in IT is an eternity and so many things changes that I think I should refresh on the subject ;)

When I started, the most common way was to build you dev cart. I still have all those carts in a box waiting to be used "except" for the flash eeprom burner which only work on winXP (...) and takes a eternity to write 512k (5 minutes is intolerable for 1 chip). So to re-use that I will need first to figure out a way to re-use the software (vm, etc) since they never updated to support later OS.

I will need to test sooner or later an mmc3 build and I want to confirm if my scanline split test are working fine. Most emulator do it fine (fceux, mesen) but for some reason nintendulor doesn't seems to like it and create a few artifacts, thus my concern for possible issue with the code. Maybe I'm using an old version by accident and will try to re-download the latest, just in case.

What are people using these days to test mmc3 or other mapper? Still using dev carts or now flashcarts are more the way and accurate enough? If it was just me, I would buy 1 flash cart per system and go wild but right now I cannot afford even one so, that will be one of my dream, someday (nerd heaven :lol: ).
lidnariq
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by lidnariq »

Naruko specifically made it possible to flash carts using his kazzo, not only read it. He's already implemented support for flashing MMC3.

I'm not entirely clear what rework has to be done beyond putting some kind of flash on the board, but I bet he'd answer your questions. (Or maybe it's already on his wiki?)
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Banshaku
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by Banshaku »

oh! If the prize of a kazzo is not that expensive it could be a cost effective solution to my issue. I didn't know about that one! I don't have a pile of eeprom but if the speed is fast enough, that would be a lot better than the pile of junk I unfortunaly bought a long time ago. I'm sure the kazzo must be a lot cheaper then that thing I bought :lol:

Thanks for that info, it may be the solution I'm looking for!
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Broke Studio
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by Broke Studio »

You can get a programmer and a MMC3 board at Infiniteneslives too.
My first game : Twin Dragons available at Broke Studio.
calima
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by calima »

Flashcarts are the current common way, they catch basically everything but init issues. It'll soon be Black Friday which means -20% off Krikzz prices, that'd be a good time to grab a Famicom Everdrive.
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tokumaru
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by tokumaru »

Almost anyone who is serious about retro gaming owns Flashcarts by now, and they do offer some advantages over other methods of running homebrew games:

- No worries about drivers or operating systems: you simply copy files to flash memory;
- Support for nearly every mapper in a single cartridge;

But there are also a couple of disadvantages:

- Boot/menu software tempers with the boot up state;
- Mappers aren't guaranteed to be 100% accurate to the originals;
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Banshaku
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by Banshaku »

@glutock

Depends what you mean by programmer, you mean the kazzo? If not, I do have one, it's a leaper-3c if my memory is good, but they never updated the software for later os.. I guess if it's used in a manufacture you don't need a new os for that but still... If there was a way to write a quick software to interface with it and use it to write flash eeprom then it would be great but I would be surprise if you can do that.


@calima

I'm in Japan so maybe it won't be cheaper even if it'b black friday with the shipping cost ;) For now I cannot afford one. Hopefully someday I will.

@tokumaru

It seems to be the easiest way if you want to do a quick test. I need one for each platform :lol:
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tokumaru
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by tokumaru »

Krikzz's shipping used to be dirty cheap a few years back (something like 5 dollars IIRC), even all the way to Brazil. If things didn't change, I'm sure it'll be a reasonable price to Japan too. Buy from Krikzz's store directly, rather than through one of the resellers.

Providing your own case for the cartridge may help reduce the overall cost. You can make professional-looking holes in the case (for SD cards, USB connectors and such) using nothing but a nail file and some patience - it may take up to 20~30 minutes to do it right.
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Banshaku
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by Banshaku »

I saw that Infiniteneslives have something that replace the kazzo but what I'm not sure is if I can use that to program my home-made flashcart. It seems possible but I'm not sure. My main goal was nes but if that new tool can even interact with future home made devcart for snes, genesis etc then it would be quite interesting. Doesn't support SMS but you cannot have everything, I guess :lol:
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Broke Studio
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Re: What is the more common way to test on hardware in 2018?

Post by Broke Studio »

Banshaku wrote:I saw that Infiniteneslives have something that replace the kazzo but what I'm not sure is if I can use that to program my home-made flashcart. It seems possible but I'm not sure.
By programmer I mean the kazzo even if INL last programmer is a bit different.
It depends on your homemade flash cart but it could be possible by rewiring some pins and maybe write a custom script.
My first game : Twin Dragons available at Broke Studio.
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