ENIO NES expansion

[jpx72]

My mouth waters at that picture for unknown reason....

[Kyon]

you are the  most awesome person on earth (at least in the section of expanding nes abilities).
the only thing missing for now is:
1. nes googlemaps, that would be a nice add on and i actually can imagine how this could be done
2. nes mmorpg (not sure if nes can handle that much input but i also have an idea for this one)or a game that connects you to atleast another person on the world that you can play with/against 

if the cpu board, the one that features the ethernet connection, is ready to use, i would be pleased to buy one^^

[YoshiFan501]

YES! make the google april fools joke a reality!

[Chykn]

YES! make the google april fools joke a reality!

1. nes googlemaps, that would be a nice add on and i actually can imagine how this could be done
2. nes mmorpg (not sure if nes can handle that much input but i also have an idea for this one)or a game that connects you to atleast another person on the world that you can play with/against 

Someone mentioned making a  Google Maps NES version on my Youtube post and I thought "what is this guy smoking?"  Then I saw the video he was talking about.  It would not only be a wicked demo, but it would also play into making the RPG.  But a Google Maps RPG - wouldn't that be funny?

I asked about an ASCII API here, but didn't get very far.  If there were an API that a host could use to render the map data to ASCII, it wouldn't be too hard to work it into the existing map engine.

http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!msg/maps/UFG-J1eO0cQ/KMQG8NTVYHUJ

[YoshiFan501]

can you make it so we can load roms to the ENIO?

[Duke.Togo]

can you make it so we can load roms to the ENIO?

This would be ideal, since you could load FDS images and games with expanded audio easily.

[YoshiFan501]

can you make it so we can load roms to the ENIO?

Is there any memory?

microsd slot

[Chykn]

can you make it so we can load roms to the ENIO?

If you're asking about using the ENIO as a storage repository for ROMs, the answer is yes.  A homebrew will be able to perform basic file functions against the ENIO's MicroSD.  List, read and write files.  This will be defined as part of the CGP protocol.  For instance, someone could make a relatively cheap SRAM cart with a two stage bootloader.  The first stage, the boot ROM on the cart, would copy a second stage boot file from the ENIO MicroSD to SRAM then jump to that code.  The second stage could then display a menu and allow a user to select a game to play.  Sounds like a pain, but it allows you to have a very flexible SRAM cart.  Updating the second stage would be as easy as updating a file on the MicroSD.  Of course that's just one approach; I'm sure there are plenty of better ways to accomplish this.

[YoshiFan501]

ill take that! if i can have a way to just stick a microsd card on my nes for loading fds roms, im ok!

[Chykn]

This would be ideal, since you could load FDS images and games with expanded audio easily.

So the answer is "NO"

ill take that! if i can have a way to just stick a microsd card on my nes for loading fds roms, im ok!

I apologize for any confusion.  If you're talking about running FDS images directly from the ENIO, I'm going to agree with 80sFREAK.  The ENIO cannot emulate the FDS.  If you had a cart that could emulate the FDS and run FDS images, the ENIO could be used as a source for FDS images.  Just like the PowerPak.  If my understanding is correct, the PowerPak does not execute ROMs directly from the CF card.  It copies the ROM from a file on the CF card to the onboard SRAM for execution.  To use the ENIO as an FDS image repository, you would first need a cart that was capable of emulating the FDS.

[P]

......or the FDS RAM Adapter itself maybe.

But since the CPU board connects to the expansion port on the NES that the Famicom doesn't have, is it possible to make a Famicom version?

[Chykn]

......or the FDS RAM Adapter itself maybe.

But since the CPU board connects to the expansion port on the NES that the Famicom doesn't have, is it possible to make a Famicom version?

Yeah, you're right.  You'd probably have to have a cart capable of emulating the functions of the FDS RAM adapter and the FDS itself.  Unfortunately I've never dealt with it so anything else I say about it would be pure speculation.  Sounds like a massive undertaking, though.  Has anyone ever tried emulating either one in hardware?EDIT: If I'd done more than one search on the interwebs I would have found that the PowerPak does support loading FDS images.  Doh!

Yes, the CPU board can work with the Famicom one of two ways.  Either make a custom 60-pin cart that can feed the necessary signals to the CPU board or use a PowerPak with a 60 to 72 pin adapter and wire one end of the ENIO's 26-pin cable to the necessary signals on the 60 to 72 pin adapter.  One of the reasons I went with a two board solution (instead of having everything on the EXP board) was so that the CPU board could work with other systems.  The CPU board is absolutely not NES specific.  As long as a 5v or 3.3v system can provide the following lines, it can talk to the CPU board without updating the CPLD...

• 5V


• GND


• Data 0


• Data 1


• Data 2


• Data 3


• Data 4


• Data 5


• Data 6


• Data 7


• /CE *


• R/W

That's assuming you stick with the current CPLD firmware.  Keep this in mind though.  Of the 26 pins on the CPU board's header, 22 of them go straight to the CPLD.  If you know Verilog or VHDL you could update the CPLD to do whatever.  It's a Xilinx XC9572XL.  It's primary purpose in the ENIO is to act as a two byte bidirectional register.  NES sends a byte, the PIC32 gets an interrupt and picks it up.  PIC32 sends a byte and the NES gets it according to whatever logic you put in a homebrew.  The NES IRQ line is run to the CPLD, but not currently used.

* The /CE signal is active low if the ROM accesses a specific memory location, $4700.  The PowerPak can handle this with a mapper update, but a custom 60 pin cart would have to have the logic necessary to send the /CE signal when accessing $4700.  You could do this with an existing cart (Famicom or NES) by wiring a 74HC688 comparator to A8-A14 & PRG /CE.  This is how my SN-ROM dev cart activates the CPU board.

[P]

EDIT: If I'd done more than one search on the interwebs I would have found that the PowerPak does support loading FDS images.  Doh!

The powerpak has some basic FDS emulation, but it doesn't support multi-disk games. I also heard that the emulation of the FDS sound-chip is of questionable quality.

If a PC counts as hardware then there's also "fdsloadr".

[Chykn]

For anyone who is interested I put up a Youtube video.  It's pretty much all information that's already been presented, but for those who want a quick recap...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBSdktDG_tk

Over the next week or two I'll try to put up another one that goes into the details of how the CPU board works.  Mostly information that is already up on the project page.

[shybry]

Would be neat to see someone try hooking up a Famicom Data Recorder to a Famicom Keyboard to a NES through this device, and see if the save and load features on the NES version of Excitebike work.

"[...] programmed in for potential product developments" indeed - it only took 27 years!