"Ultimate Expansion" - new firmware for FE3

[srowe]

I had been running a previous version of this firmware (Ultimate), and turned on my Vic-20 today and I get no menu etc, just a BASIC prompt.

That doesn't sound good. I would think that would indicate the flash is either corrupt or not working at all.

I want to upgrade to 1.7 so I have to use the flasher.prg as I have no menus of any kind.

When I run flasher.prg I see

**** SYSTEM FLASH ****
LOAD_FILE
<FE3FIRMWARE>

CURRENT VERSION: ????
NEW VERSION: 1.7N
VENDOR:20 DEVICE:20
ERASING ... OK
BLANK CHECK ... FAIL

That vendor/device pair looks bogus. My flasher doesn't bother to validate those values, could you try the program in the original firmware?

https://ops.github.io/FE3-Firmware/

Any ideas on how to update and get this working again?

If the device went from working ok to not I would suspect a hardware cause. Check all chips are seated in their sockets and check the board over carefully for damage to traces, dry joints etc.

Edit: try running the fe3diag program in the original firmware zipfile.

[telengard]

thanks for that info!

running your flasher program I get:

vendor: ??
bad eeprom

diagnostics I get this:

register.... ok
vendor/dev.... 144/144
rom/xmode....error#1
ram-mode1....ok
blk-protect....ok
blk-disable....ok
ram-mode2....ok

fe3-512kb detected

My card is in a 3d printed shell, I can't imagine how a chip would have got loose in there. Can these just go bad or be corrupt (although I'd expect to be able to re-flash a corrupt one).

[srowe]

diagnostics I get this:

Code: Select all

register.... ok
vendor/dev.... 144/144
rom/xmode....error#1
ram-mode1....ok
blk-protect....ok
blk-disable....ok
ram-mode2....ok

fe3-512kb detected

OK, I think this shows that the CPLD and RAM parts of the hardware are OK. The vendor/device are still bogus and the ROM mode tests fail.

My card is in a 3d printed shell, I can't imagine how a chip would have got loose in there. Can these just go bad or be corrupt (although I'd expect to be able to re-flash a corrupt one).

Given the EEPROM is not responding correctly to the vendor/device query I don't think reflashing is going to work. There's either an issue with how it's connected (dry solder joint, bent socket wiper) or the chip itself has died. If you're confident, I'd reseat the EEPROM and try again. If that doesn't work I think your only choice is to replace it.

[telengard]

I re-seated and cleaned the pins of the chip and get the same behavior. I may have missed it last time but there was a line this time that said something like HP=4XXXXX. Still get the error though.

I purchased some replacements, hopefully that will fix things up.

thanks so much for the help!

[MrSterlingBS]

Hello,

i have the FE3 as an .prg file from the BADAPPLE demo with rev020.
After flasing the FE3 to version rev022 everything works fine.
But after a new start of the VICE the flashed FE3 is with rev020.
That is clear for me. I do not save the .prg file.
But how can i save the flashed FE3 to an .prg file?

I hope someone can help.

Best regards
Sven

[Mike]

i have the FE3 as an .prg file from the BADAPPLE demo with rev020.

Please note that the Bad Apple demo comes with an own dedicated firmware for FE3:

to play on VICE emulator, first add fe3badas7.5.prg as a Final Expansion cartridge. Then attach badrom7.5.d64 as a 1541 disk image.

This firmware dump is different from the original firmware development trunk and also from srowe's "Ultimate Expansion" re-implementation that actually is the topic of the thread here.

If the Bad Apple demo indeed also worked with the original Rev. 020, then just by pure luck (most probably, some optimizations Javier put into his implementation of the firmware are not there with Rev. 020, leading to frame drops or the like).

[...] how can i save the flashed FE3 to an .prg file?

There's a menu in VICE which enables writeback to flash, which allows VICE to update that file containing the flash ROM dump that you use as firmware for the FE3 cartridge emulation. This is exactly the file you could also use with fe3flash to write it into a real FE3 cartridge.


Edit: The same as srowe already told you some time ago (see here), for the command line, to quote:

[...] to persist the changes you make you also need the -fewriteback parameter. I would copy the initial ROM image and name it so you remember it has your images in it. So something like

Code: Select all

xvic -pal -cartfe fe3_with_flash_images.bin -fewriteback

[MrSterlingBS]

Dear Mike,

thanks a lot for your answer.

I had thought that the reset write protection only counts for the storage function itself and not for the software version updates.

Learned something again. Asking helps.

BR
Sven

[MrSterlingBS]

[MrSterlingBS]

I've found my FE3 to be a versatile cartridge, once I worked out its features. There were a couple of enhancements I wanted it to have so I took a look at the source code and, before I knew it, I'd ended up re-writing the firmware.

In my hubris I've named this "Ultimate Expansion", I like to think I've made it a little better.

Changes are summarized below:

New Features

• Anonymous chain loading
• Bank-aware machine code monitor
• Batch cart image flashing
• Load & run wedge command (↑)
• RUN/STOP load from disk

Other Improvements

• Faster entry to BASIC
• Faster loading from SD2IEC with Zippy
• More compact cart encoding
• Various bug fixes

Further information in the documentation.

It has had significant testing within VICE (without which development would have been much more difficult) and a limited amount of testing on a PAL
FE3. I've tried a selection of entries from the FE3 Collection image, fixing problems when I came across them.

I'd like to hear if the NTSC image works with real hardware, or if there are compatibility issues with loader files.

There is still some space left, I'd be interested to hear of any other enhancements people think could be made.

Please treat this as a Beta release, only try it out if you are comfortable with reflashing the FE3 firmware using a standalone program (in case of problems). I would recommend backing up any current cart images (tools provided) and taking a note of your current firmware version first.

Code as usual is available here:

https://eden.mose.org.uk/gitweb/?p=fina ... ;a=summary

I miss two thinks on the FE3.
- a clock like Mikes IRQ clock
- some old fashion screen saver

I have not yet the knowledge to implement this stuff.

[srowe]

I miss two thinks on the FE3.
- a clock like Mikes IRQ clock
- some old fashion screen saver

Do you mean these to be available while in the FE3 menus (rather than the BASIC wedge)?

For the clock I'll have a think if that would fit on a subset of menus but screen space is tight so that wouldn't really be possible in, say, the entry selection menus.

The screensaver would easier, I find them irritating on modern computers myself.

[MrSterlingBS]

Yes, I mean some screensavers can be implemented with the F2 key. But this is only a gimmick.
The IRQ clock, i mean could be placed under the normal screen. And of course with an alarm set and alarm tone.
Even just a wish. But then the FE3 would be perfect.
Or what is the RTC for?

BR
Sven

[srowe]

The IRQ clock, i mean could be placed under the normal screen. And of course with an alarm set and alarm tone.

Taking over the IRQ once you've left the FE3 menus would be tricky. If you enter BASIC it would work ok until you wanted to run a program. It certainly wouldn't behave well if you launch a loader entry.

Or what is the RTC for?

The RTC is embedded in the SD2IEC, it's not easily queryable (only via the command channel). I guess it's used to set the timestamps of files written to the SD card.

[Mike]

I guess [the RTC is] used to set the timestamps of files written to the SD card.

This.

Unfortunately, many other (commercially available) SD2IEC drives economize on this aspect.

[javierglez]

i have the FE3 as an .prg file from the BADAPPLE demo with rev020.

to play on VICE emulator, first add fe3badas7.5.prg as a Final Expansion cartridge. Then attach badrom7.5.d64 as a 1541 disk image.

If the Bad Apple demo indeed also worked with the original Rev. 020, then just by pure luck (most probably, some optimizations Javier put into his implementation of the firmware are not there with Rev. 020, leading to frame drops or the like).

Please take into account I didn't develop or modify any firmware. I think most programs can just take advantage of FE3 massive RAM.
The quoted version of the demo uses the flash banks in the same way as the primary version of the demo uses the RAM banks.
I noticed that by chance it just happens the flashed data *doesn't interfere* with the firmware.
The reason was to have a version that could be run from the emulator without recurring to warp mode, because I don't think many people use the 1541 JiffyDOS ROM in their emulator (I wasn't even aware at the time TBH). Whileas many people use SD2IEC on their real VIC20. At least that's what I have in mind.

I'm sorry for the delayed answer and for the confusion.

[8bitDenial]

Hi Simon

I really appreciate the work you are putting in, to keep the FE3 relevant.

Does the linked zip file contain the latest release (1.7) of the FE3 firmware?

Edit: NVM. Downloaded it and flashed it to check. v1.7p (I renamed the PAL binary).

I swear, I downloaded this yesterday and ended up with v1.4p...

Don't worry. I'll only be a nuisance for a few days more, until my PU+2 arrives.