ArduiTape/CASDuino/TZXDuino - The cassette player replacements

New firmware . TZXDuino 1.15.3 Adapted the MAXDuino ID19 code and TurboMode for ZX80/81. To access Turbo Mode for ZX80/81 and Electron please switch Turbo Mode On in the menu Also added UEF Chunk 117 which allows for differing baudrates in BBC UEFs. Added a Spectrum Font for OLED 1306 users converted by Brendan Alford. Option added to userconfig.h Added File scrolling by holding up or down buttons. By Brendan Alford. Download from here. CASDuino 1.24 Added a Spectrum Font for OLED 1306 users converted by Brendan Alford. Option added to userconfig.h Added File scrolling by holding up or down buttons. By Brendan Alford. Download from here.

Firmware Updates Primarily I have updated the firmwares to include RGB I2C 16x2 LCD screen but there have also been some improvements made to TZXDuino and CASDuino. Arduitape 1.8 can be downloaded from here. CASDuino 1.22.1can be downloaded from here. Changes . Added RGB I2C 16x2 LCD Speed improvements Improved compatibility with TOSEC Dragon CAS files TZXDuino 1.15.1 can be downloaded from here. Changes Added RGB I2C 16x2 LCD Improved UEF support Dragon CAS file information. This is a bit of boring technical information in regards to Dragon CAS files from TOSEC and why they didn't work before. Unlike MSX CAS files Dragon and CoCo CAS files start with a byte hex value of 55. To be recognised as a CAS file by emulators it only needs to have one byte with hex value of 55 at the beginning. To be recognised as a Dragon/CoCo CAS file by CASDuino it requires a minimum of 8 bytes with a hex value of 55 bytes. To be recognised by a real computer it requires aroun...

It's been a while since ~I've added anything new to the blog I have been still working on the project. TZXDuino 1.13 I've updated the TZXDuino firmware to include HQ.UEF support which was programmed by Rafael Molina Chesserot of the MAXDuino Team. Most unzipped UEFs will now work with the TZXDuino on both Electron and BBC. The only exceptions I've found so far are Uridium and Starquake on the BBC. Because the TZXDuino is now working on so many other models of computer and not just the Sinclairs I've added a Pause at Start option to the Menu. With this on, when you select a file and press play the file will be automatically paused unless you have typed in your load command on your computer and pressed enter and the motor control is plugged in. It's exactly the same way a cassette player with motor control would work. You can download the firmware from here. New Software Speaking of UEFs Ricky El-Qasem has made a UEF extraction tool that makes it so much more ...

The more I build and try to improve on the various firmwares I've realised that it's not entirely friendly for new users to edit their firmware for their version of device. In an aim to correct that I have added userconfig.h to the various firmwares. This is just a little settings file that users can change without fear of harming the main programme. It allows you to set which screen you are using and in future which startup logo for some screens and maybe other settings. How to use. At the moment the userconfig.h looks like this ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// /*                                                             */ /*    ...

Thanks to the help of Rafael Molina Chasserot some new features have been added to the TZXDuino and CASDuino firmwares which has freed up some memory as well, which may lead to more features being added in the future. A percentage counter and a timer counter have been added to all screens so that you know how much is left of a file to play and how long it has taken to load. The OLED1306 and PCD8544 use completely new routines for the firmwares saving a lot of memory. Folder navigation is now different. Rather than using the Menu button on TZXDuino or the Stop button on CASDuino to return to the ROOT directory, if you press the stop button when no file is playing you will go up one folder only making it easier to navigate. TZXDuino The TZXDuino has had a menu added so that MSX users can set the Baud rate of TSX files so that they can load faster than normal. A few more emulator only IDs have been fixed so that they are skipped by TZXDuino. CASDuino CASduino has had a Baud Rate of 3...

Whilst it may seem there han't been much going on in recent months we have been working behind the scenes on improving and adding more options to the various firmwares and trying to improve the hardware. The main difference with these firmwares is that OLED 1306 screens are now fully working on all of them and that the PCD8544 has added as a screen option. I will go into the hardware changes needed for that at a later date. ArduiTape 1.5 What's New Added support for the PCD7544. Download from here. CASDuino 1.15 What's New Improved support for CoCo and Dragon Added support for OLED1306 and PCD8544. Download from here. TZXDuino 1.8 What's New Added ID2A Added support for PCD8544 Download from here. TZXDuino 1.8.1 What's New TSX support for MSX TSX files added by Natalia Pujol. Not officially supported and any bugs should be reported to her. Download from here.

You can go to my Etsy shop and buy my builds of TZXDuino, CASDuino, and ArduiTape with the standard 1602 LCD and coming soon you will also be able to buy the new version with the PCD8544 LCD screen.

It's been a while since I've updated CASDuino but I've been trying to bring the firmware in line with TZXDuino and ArduiTape to make possible integration of the three firmwares at some future date. The major problem had being getting it to work with the OLED 1306 screen which has now been solved. Included in this firmware update is a 3rd screen option which is for the PCD8544 which I have also been working on and am now almost ready to share instructions on. What's New:- OLED1306 Support PCD8544 Support Improved Dragon compatibility Improved CoCo compatibility (auto run on CoCo games has not been fixed yet but we are working on it.) You can download the firmware from here. There are also reports of improved compatibility with the Phillips VG 8020 MSX however as far as I know any incompatibilities were due to a difference in the hardware chipset so how this has happened is a complete mystery but a win I will take.

I've finally managed to get hold of a CPC464 so I can see what compatibility is like with TZXDuino. One of the first things I did was add a DIN so that I could connect the TZXDuino to it. Rather than the normal 5-pin DIN that the CPC664/6128 use I decided that as I already have the cable for the MSX I would add an 8 pin DIN. After some testing I found the best places to solder the connections and now it is up and running with full motor control. As there are no TOSEC like downloads for CDT files I have been using both CPCRulez and CPCPower for the downloads. TZXDuino compatibility is quite good with CDT files although there are a few that use the ID15 block which currently is not compatible but I did notice some issues. Some games seemed to have insufficient pause blocks and whilst they worked on emulators they did not with either TZXDuino or WinTZX playback. These were quite easily fixed by adding a pause block to the CDT file (Aliens, Ghouls and Ghosts, Turbo Outrun). Others howe...

It's been a while since I've published anything on my progress on converting things to the Maple Mini so I thought I'd keep you up to date. I have converted TZXDuino to the Maple Mini and it is working but not properly. For some reason, even though it is using the same values as the Nano the frequency of the output is higher. So much so that fastloaders cannot be recognised and TAP and simple TZX cannot all register with the Spectrum. Oddly this would indicate that a microsecond for the Maple Mini is different to the microsecond for the Arduino Nano, yet the files play for a similar length of time. It's all highly confusing and I've put the project on the back burner for a while so I can concentrate on working any errors out of the CAS/TZXDuino Shield PCB. The good news being that when I was trying to figure out what was going wrong I noticed that TZX2WAV which we had been using as a benchmark to test our coding actually has a typo in it a decodes slower than the TZ...

I've updated the CASDuino firmware so that it will load some games with Xroar but there has been no luck on an real Dragon. Can you please give it a test and let me know the results? Thank you. Download

I've managed to get the CASDuino firmware up and running on the Maple Leaf Mini. It's not perfect, there are issues with 3600 baudrate and it cannot store your baudrate selection as of yet as the Maple Mini does not have an EEPROM to store your selection but it is now working. Sadly whilst .CAS files on the MSX work, the ones for the Dragon have been broken TZXDuino is proving particularly stubborn at the moment, it is at least playing sound but is very stuttery and that also causes ID errors after the main loader.