My 464+ fixes and conversion

[Gryzor]

Oh I wouldn't know... how would you drive it? Through the expansion port? Is there a way to have a constant supply of data without specific software running constantly?

[Bryce]

Yes, you could have it displaying the contents of the data bus or the frequency the CPC is running at (a bit boring on a fixed frequency system) or (with a little bit more hardware) even the contents of some specific address in RAM (Score display?).

Bryce.

[||C|-|E||]

Data bus contents is something very cool as well, and useful I would say 

[Bryce]

Data bus contents is something very cool as well, and useful I would say 

It would be changing so quickly that it would be unreadable.

Bryce.

[Gryzor]

Yes, you could have it displaying the contents of the data bus or the frequency the CPC is running at (a bit boring on a fixed frequency system) or (with a little bit more hardware) even the contents of some specific address in RAM (Score display?).

Bryce.

Yeah, the frequency would be cool, even if static; it'd give you the impression it can be changed I thought of the contents of an address, but you'd need to be able to specify that address, and also it'd just be empty unless you run something that uses it?


Bus contents would be great if you could add something to delay it and sample it say, twice a second or something like that. 

[||C|-|E||]

Another idea, but more complicated, would be to use them to display several things. In this case, next to the leds we would have a button or a couple of them and we would be able to cycle through several options: ABBA switch status, data bus, ram content... and more things. That would be super cool! 

[Gryzor]

...a thermal sensor inside the case...

[Bryce]

A row of dipswitches could be used to select the address you wanted to monitor. If you knew the address where the score is stored it could display this. Temperature is also easy, but also not really that interesting (I doubt it changes much after the initial rise after booting). I don't see the point of an ABBA display. There's only two options and you can see how it's set from the switch.

Bryce.

[||C|-|E||]

Well, the interested in the ABBA display is just that I am extremely forgetful and my switches are in the cable of the floppy. I never remember when it is A, B, side 1 or side 2  On the other hand, I lived 29 years a flat that had two light switches next to each other and, until the last moment, I was always turning on the wrong one  I still do, when I visit my parents 

[Gryzor]

Well, how about the slowed-down display of the data bus?

[Bryce]

Well, how about the slowed-down display of the data bus?

That's easy, but of what use?

Bryce.

[Gryzor]

That's easy, but of what use?

Bryce.

Looking cool? Duhhhh! 

[||C|-|E||]

Looking cool? Duhhhh!

Of course! 

[Gryzor]

But I thought that this was the whole point, really

[||C|-|E||]

Actually, the RAM thing is useful by itself, or at least extremely cool It would be great, for example, to see what is in there not only for the score, but for the energy, etc. And I have a book of POKES for many many games. Of course, combining this with a tape counter system in a 464 Plus would be awesome.

[Gryzor]

Yeah, I thought of a tape counter too, but it'd require more hardware...

[||C|-|E||]

The tape counter is not trivial, for sure 

[1024MAK]

Instead of DIP switches, you could have two IO port addresses to write an address value to (low byte, high byte). Then the display can show that memory location (or rather, a copy of whatever is stored there).
Of course, this would require rather a lot of conventional logic chips. Unless a 5V CPLD was used.

With this, before a game is loaded, a couple of lines of BASIC can select a useful memory address for the game you are intending to load 

Mark

[Skunkfish]

Have it display the current time, for those with an RTC installed.

[Audronic]

Found this on the net somewhere ?


Ray

[||C|-|E||]

That actually seems to be a tape counter already 

[Audronic]

Sorry i don't know where i got it from, I will have a look to find out.


Ray

[Audronic]

@ ||C|-|E||

Found it, The site Looks interesting.

The display connects to a Gotek

The World's Best Photos of amstrad - Flickr Hive Mind,retrocomputer/Interesting


Ray

[||C|-|E||]

True, it is just the display of the Gotek  Maybe is showing the number of the disk image you are loading?

[Bryce]

That would be a sensibe use for the tiny 7-Seg displays, displaying the track number of the drive. The displays have 4 positions, so it could display A/B in the first segment (to show which letter the internal drive has and the two right hand digits could display the track number.

Bryce.