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Post by Peer on May 2, 2020 1:47:10 GMT -5
Greetings everyone, this is a new thread for all my Vectrex activities, experiments and ongoing projects which are not directly related to the Academy Programming Class. Details are shown here:
The page is still (and probably will always be) under construction. Updates will come at irregular intervals. Many Cheers, Peer |
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Post by D-Type on May 2, 2020 2:28:58 GMT -5
RAM Checker: Maybe worth adding a ROM checker also? One day they're all going to start failing...
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Post by Peer on May 2, 2020 2:43:57 GMT -5
Ha, since you are the first one to respond: Please try the RAM Checker(s) on your real console and let me know the result. Thing is, I really do hope that all RAMs out there are still in prime condition, but finding a real faulty RAM would prove the checker to work. So far, I could only test it by injecting runtime faults in an emulator.
ROM Checker: the Test Cartridge binary in a sense does a ROM check by computing the checksum of the BIOS. If it is not one of the "known" values, then this is suspicious. Or a yet unknown new BIOS version  |
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Post by Peer on May 2, 2020 12:08:43 GMT -5
Latest modifications - Experiment "Draw_Grid_VL" added on 05/02/2020 at 19:00
Cheers, Peer
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Post by VectorX on May 2, 2020 13:35:05 GMT -5
Ha, a spin-off from the original course! Nice.
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Post by playvectrex on Jun 4, 2020 21:48:28 GMT -5
Results ---------------- RAM Checker - NO RAM ERRORS FOUND  RAM Checker Endless - <program crashes, on Vide as well.. uht oh!> |
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Post by Peer on Jun 5, 2020 2:10:29 GMT -5
Results ---------------- RAM Checker - NO RAM ERRORS FOUND RAM Checker Endless - <program crashes, on Vide as well.. uht oh!> Thanks a lot for trying and reporting back. The binary definitely does not crash with my Vide installation. So most certainly your Vide has some faulty RAM
Could you please send me some details: Which Vide version are you running? What are your Vide configurations settings, and which ROM version do you have selected in Vide?
As for the real console: What kind of flash cart are you using? Does it have a "menu"? Some flash cart menus (ab)use part of the RAM for their own purposes, so naturally this can lead to trouble if the RAM checker alters the RAM cells. I am using a VecFlash in dev mode, no menu.
How quickly does the crash happen? The endless checker does exactly the same as the one-pass checker, just in an endless loop.
I will be happy to investigate.
Cheers, Peer
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Post by D-Type on Jun 5, 2020 3:52:15 GMT -5
Latest modifications - Experiment "Draw_Grid_VL" added on 05/02/2020 at 19:00
Cheers, Peer
I just spotted this analysis, thanks for publishing it, at least you can see that it does something, albeit not really usable due to production RUM differences. |
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Post by playvectrex on Jun 5, 2020 15:24:23 GMT -5
Results ---------------- RAM Checker - NO RAM ERRORS FOUND RAM Checker Endless - <program crashes, on Vide as well.. uht oh!> Thanks a lot for trying and reporting back. The binary definitely does not crash with my Vide installation. So most certainly your Vide has some faulty RAM
Could you please send me some details: Which Vide version are you running? What are your Vide configurations settings, and which ROM version do you have selected in Vide?
As for the real console: What kind of flash cart are you using? Does it have a "menu"? Some flash cart menus (ab)use part of the RAM for their own purposes, so naturally this can lead to trouble if the RAM checker alters the RAM cells. I am using a VecFlash in dev mode, no menu.
How quickly does the crash happen? The endless checker does exactly the same as the one-pass checker, just in an endless loop.
------------------------------------------------
I'm using a VEXTREME flash multicart, but there should be no reason why the game crashes because of USER RAM. The way VEXTREME loads a new game is it loads the entire game in STM32's RAM (to be ROM emulated), and effectively jumps to $F000 to warm reset the game. When the game loads, it can do whatever it wants and whatever it typically does with USER RAM. The failure looks like this: RAM CHECKER (endless)'s header loads, and when it tries to start the game, the screen remains black. The same thing happens on Vide. Vide version is v2.60-rc.2 (http://vectrex.malban.de/tmp/Vide_Brett.jar) special release for me to fix a YM Music export bug. I think it's interesting that the "endless" version is much smaller in size than the single one... leads me to believe it's not the final version  665 vs 616 bytes. I just tried it on VecFlash and it crashes as well... I'm guessing that's not the one you meant to upload! |
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Post by Peer on Jun 6, 2020 0:06:24 GMT -5
Not a bug, but a feature 
You are mistaking a blank screen for a crash, which is not what the blank screen does indicate.
- The first binary (ram_checker.bin) will execute one single round of tests. If no errors are detected, then a success message is displayed. The console can be switched off now.
- The other binary (ram_checker_endless.bin) will continue its checking in an endless loop and thus do a RAM stress test. Nothing will be shown on the screen, unless an error is detected. This binary is intended to find glitch errors in RAM cells, that occur only every once in a while.
The second binary is smaller, because it does not contain any code or data for displaying a "no errors found" message. That is the nature of an endless check.
So everything is fine with your console RAM. And also with your Vide RAM
Many Cheers, Peer
PS: If you run the endless check in Vide, then you can actually inject faults by using the Vide RAM-variables-window to alter the value of a specific cell. You can then see how the checker reacts and reports this cell.
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Post by Peer on Sept 16, 2020 13:36:34 GMT -5
Vectrex Academy LabLatest modifications - Project "Rotor" added on 09/16/2020 at 19:40
Cheers, Peer
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Post by Peer on Sept 24, 2020 13:08:06 GMT -5
Greetings everyone,
I have completely revised the Vectrex Academy Lab page and added some stuff you might enjoy to explore. Among other things I have restored some pages from the previous, now inaccessible intranet server, and moved them to this place.
Latest modifications: - Game Project "The Count" added on 09/24/2020 at 13:00
- Picture Gallery "Brown Box" added on 09/24/2020 at 12:30
- Picture Gallery "Lab Tour" added on 09/24/2020 at 12:00
- Picture Gallery "Mint Condition" restored on 09/23/2020 at 21:10
- Project "X" added on 09/23/2020 at 20:50
- Page redesigned on 09/23/2020 at 20:40
Hope you like it.
Many Cheers,
Peer
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Post by 50tbrd on Sept 24, 2020 14:06:19 GMT -5
FYI, there's already a War of the Worlds on the Vectrex. Based off the original vector arcade game.
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Post by Peer on Sept 25, 2020 2:03:53 GMT -5
FYI, there's already a War of the Worlds on the Vectrex. Based off the original vector arcade game. Thanks for checking out the project page
The current "working titles" are meant as teasers. They are the results of a guessing game I had with my students when I told them that I am working on a new experimental thing. I told them the basic story line, and then they were guessing mainly movie titles.
If the whole thing turns out to be worth the effort, then it will be my personal take on one of the classic arcade games, regardless of wether or not there is already some version for the Vectrex. I am just curious if I can do this in pure Vectrex C without explicitly adding any low level assembly code, and if I can do it 32k only.
More teasers will soon follow on the project page
Cheers, Peer
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Post by SiLic0ne t0aD on Sept 25, 2020 2:28:19 GMT -5
Very cool, Thanks for sharing! Can't believe you found a NIB Vectrex! Amazing. I'll definitely give all these bins a go. |
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665 vs 616 bytes.
