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USB Sega Nomad

Discussion in 'General Sega Discussion' started by Bibin, Dec 5, 2009.

  1. Bibin

    Bibin

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  2. Mad Echidna

    Mad Echidna

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    WHAT IS THIS BLACK MAGIC???? KILL THE WITCH
     
  3. ICEknight

    ICEknight

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    Hmm? Does the signal from the Nomad always show black borders?

    And also, no right border? Odd.
     
  4. JoseTB

    JoseTB

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    Next mod should be something that silently dumps whatever catridge is in to a SD hidden inside, and send it to drx :v:

    Actually I'm surprised no one went for it yet...
     
  5. The Game Collector

    The Game Collector

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    Oh you use the same capture software that I do. Technically you can also record by plugging a normal Genesis 2/Nomad AV cable into a capture card with dongles on one end and USB on the other.
     
  6. Bibin

    Bibin

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    Yes, but I did this so I could do this inside a store with protos without having things hanging from my tiny laptop.
     
  7. TmEE

    TmEE

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    The border is probably eaten up by software or the capture device in the Nomad.... There is always a border around the image on any Sega hardware, not necessairly black though, in Sonic 1 it would be light blue in 1st stage for example.


    Anyway, nice feature addition, I would give it a power switch... never mind, it gets it power form USB port
     
  8. The Game Collector

    The Game Collector

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    Yeah that does make it quite a bit easier when you don't have all those wires to mess with. I wonder if the video quality is better using direct USB?

    Another thing I wonder is if the same mod would work on Game Gear. I'd love to do Game Gear playthroughs somehow without resorting to emulation.
     
  9. SegaLoco

    SegaLoco

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    It's been suggested. Many times before actually. Could you hook up some kind of modern flash card to the Nomad? Could it even handle running the game and dumping it? Furthermore, is there even addressing space to access a whatever GB flash stick you put it in? How practical would something like that actually be?
     
  10. Alan

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    Its not as simple as that. Megadrive has 16bit bus with 24 address lines. Most flash chips are 8bit and use banks or a different interface such as SPI. You would also need some logic to convert between the two. As for dumping megadrive has to be held in reset, while you increment each address and dump 16bits at a time.
     
  11. Phos

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    It would make more sense to base it on one of those fake handheld ones. I know of one that accepts real cartridges. If it loads the entire ROM, you could perhaps replace that DRAM with Flash RAM, and also modify it to make it possible to dump to a PC. That is assuming it loads the whole thing, of course.
     
  12. Alan

    Alan

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    What system copies the game into DRAM before playing it? They just connect the CPU address and data lines to the flash chip on the cartridge and go.
     
  13. Phos

    Phos

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    Because the reproduction hand helds only emulate Mega Drive hardware, it might work like this. If it did, you could do that, if it doesn't, I guess you'd have to rig up something in between the cart and system that does, and then acts like the cart itself.
     
  14. Alan

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    It was nice idea, but sadly its not done like that.

    Easiest way to dump a ROM is direct from the flash on the cartridge without the need of the Megadrive being there. I removed the 'lock on' connecter from sonic and knuckles then interfaced that to a FPGA, that then used RS232 to interface with my computer.

    Of course thats a little sidetracked to the idea of being able to go into a store with a Nomad and steal a ROM :P
     
  15. Phos

    Phos

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    I know a real MD doesn't work like that, but the units I was referring to aren't real MD's, they're SoaC's that only emulate the MD, and other versions that use the same hardware store something like 20 games in a single location.
     
  16. Alan

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    The ones I have come across;

    They store the built in games on a flash chip and hold one of the higher address lines high to get a cheap banking method, then when you attach a cartridge the CPU is reading from there and not the built in chip. It doesn't copy it over before playing it.

    Do you know of one that does?
     
  17. Phos

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    No, it was just a guess.
     
  18. SegaLoco

    SegaLoco

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    Ya know, if anybody can answer this, TmEE can. I will try to get him to check this out.
     
  19. Bibin

    Bibin

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    The SoaC chips don't emulate; they are clones of the original chipset, inaccurate as they are.
     
  20. Phos

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    I'd heard they were ARM chips running an emulator.