Cumulus Issues

In this forum you can write about anything that does not fit in other forums.
This includes generic Oric talkings and things that are totaly unrelated but want to share with people here :)
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barnsey123
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by barnsey123 »

metadata wrote: :D how can you insert the card upside down? i tried that and you need a lot of force to do it.
It's easy when you are a clown like me! :wink:
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Dbug
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by Dbug »

ibisum wrote:In #oric on freenode?
Probably explain why I never saw you in the (years old) #Oric on ircnet :)
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metadata
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by metadata »

so the official channel is on ircnet?
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ibisum
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by ibisum »

Probably explain why I never saw you in the (years old) #Oric on ircnet :)
d'oh!! :)

Anyway - SOLVED! I have Cumulus! :)

http://i.imgur.com/r7DYD4u.jpg

Tomorrow I will build and then try to burn the new firmware bootloader .. then I'll catch up with you, DBug! :)

EDIT: Please, no inline monstruous external images that ruin the formating of the threads.
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Dbug
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by Dbug »

ibisum wrote:Tomorrow I will build and then try to burn the new firmware bootloader .. then I'll catch up with you, DBug! :)
About that, I have a conceptual issue:
I could just update the "fw" folder with my changes, but what I'm changing is not necessarily the direction other would have wanted.
So I think I will create an alternate firmware branch in the SVN depot so people can evaluate the changes and select whatever they want.
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Dbug
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by Dbug »

Submitted:
http://miniserve.defence-force.org/svn/ ... s/fw_dbug/

What I suggest is that anyone interested make their own branch and do not modify any other version. Just go wild and be happy.

After a while when everybody feel confident, we can propose the various changes to the users and they can evaluate which features/versions are the way to go, and then we can regroup and make an ultimate Cumulus firmware if needed, or continue with variants :)

Mine is based on usability for developers, which means fast iteration for development.

And by the way, I wrote a small batch file called CopyToUsbAndEject.bat:

Code: Select all

copy Build.production.bin F:\CUMULUS.BIN
C:\Tools\RemoveDrive\RemoveDrive.exe F: -L
With that I can insert my SD Card, rebuild, copy it to disk, get it safely unmounted, all very fast and automatically.

RemoveDrive can be found here:
RemoveDrive V2.4.1.0 - prepares removable drives for safe removal
Freeware by Uwe Sieber - http://www.uwe-sieber.de

Win32 version works on Windows 2000, XP and higher including x64 version of Windows.
x64 version works on x64 versions Windows only.

Homepage: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/drivetools_e.html
Also highly recommended for things like copying your DSK to the SDCard efficiently when testing :)
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Chema
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by Chema »

All these great news... I can't wait to receive mine! Have you tried several programs? Any kind of glitch or trouble?

This is all fantastic! Thanks metadata!
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ibisum
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by ibisum »

I've been through 5 Atmos' and an Oric-1 so far. Two of the Atmos won't boot with it inserted, or indeed without it inserted either (yikes). 3 Atmos work with it - one, however, sometimes 'glitches out', is the best way to describe it. Doesn't seem to do it without cumulus attached. The Oric-1 seems to love it, too, although I only loaded SEDORIC.dsk .. I've been playing as many .DSK's as I can on the 'best Atmos' all evening, and its just too much fun .. Tomorrow I'll try to update my cumulus to get the FW update, and then I'll go find another set of cables for another Atmos rig, so we can have two Atmos+cumulus rigs in the house. The kids love 'em!


EDIT: I just want to say a very big THANK YOU to everyone who made Cumulus possible. This is really, like, a life-changing event for me - you see we now have functioning Oric's in the house, with which to teach the kids computing! Cumulus has really made the Oric a stellar play-thing .. again.
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by vrozos »

ibisum wrote:... we can have two Atmos+cumulus rigs in the house. The kids love 'em!

EDIT: I just want to say a very big THANK YOU to everyone who made Cumulus possible. This is really, like, a life-changing event for me - you see we now have functioning Oric's in the house, with which to teach the kids computing! Cumulus has really made the Oric a stellar play-thing .. again.
The kids love them? I was always thinking modern kids as spoiled by 3D CGI, super graphics and user friendly environments. I am surprised (and happy) they appreciate the magic of 8-bits.
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ibisum
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by ibisum »

Oh, the first thing my kids did was school me on the number of games in the Oric collection "that don't have enough pixels in them" .. ;) So its been a wild ride watching all these new hi-res games hit the scene, because every time you guys make a nice release with fancy non-text-line graphics, my kids play it and enjoy the nostalgia!

Of course, we have our Nintendos' too, but the Oric is a computer they can play with in Daddys' office without getting growled at, unlike the Nintendo .. :)
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dave3622
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by dave3622 »

ibisum wrote:Oh, the first thing my kids did was school me on the number of games in the Oric collection "that don't have enough pixels in them" .. ;) So its been a wild ride watching all these new hi-res games hit the scene, because every time you guys make a nice release with fancy non-text-line graphics, my kids play it and enjoy the nostalgia!

Of course, we have our Nintendos' too, but the Oric is a computer they can play with in Daddys' office without getting growled at, unlike the Nintendo .. :)



Nice one!! 8)
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barnsey123
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by barnsey123 »

Can confirm that the following SDHC card works OK (I never knew I had so many lying around!)

SanDisk Extreme 16gb Class 10

What I thought was a Cumulus issue is probably an Atmos issue (I need to power on the Atmos a good 10 mins before trying to load anything from the cumulus otherwise I get garbage on screen). Once warmed up it loads and plays pretty much everything (demos games etc)

The only problem so far is that despite an extended warm up period the game 1337 refuses to load (v1.20). It gets as far as displaying the DF logo then zip...any thoughts?
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Chema
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by Chema »

At that point is where 1337 tries to load the overlay ram with the tables for the 3D engine, music, some graphics and so.

Not sure what may be wrong there. Does Space:1999 run correctly?

Also has anybody else tried 1337 with Cumulus? I can't imagine my disappointment if it does not work for me :(

(If you need some time of warm-up before an old machine runs well, it is usually a problem with the condensers)
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barnsey123
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by barnsey123 »

Hi Chema,

well, I've sort of got it to work...but on my machine its a bit twitchy. I managed to play the whole intro scene but then had to manually reset a couple of times to get into the main game (which later hung).

Space1999 loaded the intro, rebooted and loaded the main game. It displayed "OUT OF MEMORY" but actually allowed me to play the game.

Quintessential demo played ok the other day but froze half-way through today. Buggyboy and Barbatoric played all the way through.

My own game has played perfectly a couple of times but hung once and another time took pieces that didn't exist...(and I'm not doing anything fancy with the overlay memory). I haven't been able to repeat this in Oricutron.

It's hit and miss. I think it's my Atmos that is playing up.

So guys, what do you think? Strained condensers? Dodgy memory? Dilithium Crystals? Heeeellllppp!
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Chema
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Re: Cumulus Issues

Post by Chema »

Well, I'm afraid I can be of no help in this.

What I'd do is make a small program to test the memory. Write patterns and read the, back, and see if there is any error. Finding which addresses/bits are misbehaving could tell which chip is having problem.

In a Spanish web of retro computers, members are used to repairing old machines and usually the very first step is changing all the condensers, specially the electrolytic ones.
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