@manuel: You can always use the linux port of bluemsxlite. At least its better than nothing.
The ported games was just a matter of smaller changes of the VDP, PSG and PPI handling, some even worked with a patched MSX BIOS. SVI-328 and MSX BIOS/BASIC are almost identical. The major difference is the memory handling.
MSX SVI-328 --- ------- BIOS_OUTDO: $0018 $0018 BIOS_WRTVDP: $0047 $3536 BIOS_RDVRM: $004a $3734 BIOS_WRTVRM: $004D $372A BIOS_INITXT: $006c $0047 BIOS_INIGRP: $0072 $004A BIOS_GICINI: $0090 $4066 BIOS_WRTPSG: $0093 $40B6 BIOS_TAPIN: $00e4 $006C BIOS_TAPOUT: $00ed $0075 BIOS_ISFLIO: $014a $68C2 etc. PRN_WRITE_DATA: $91 $10 PRN_WRITE_STROBE: $90 $11 PRN_READ_STATUS: $90 $12 VDP_WRITE_DATA: $98 $80 VDP_WRITE_LATCH: $99 $81 VDP_READ_DATA: $98 $84 VDP_READ_STATUS: $99 $85 PSG_WRITE_LATCH: $a0 $88 PSG_WRITE_DATA: $a1 $8C PSG_READ_DATA: $a2 $90 PPI_READ_PORTA: $a8 $98 PPI_READ_PORTB: $a9 $99 PPI_WRITE_PORTC: $aa $96 PPI_READ_PORTC: $aa $9A PPI_WRITE_CTRL: $ab $97
There existed also a hardware adapter, SVI-606. The adapter was connected to the SVI-328 expansion slot and had an MSX cartridge slot, cassette port, 2 joysticks and small keyboard. However it was too expensive and wasn’t that compatible.
http://www.saunalahti.fi/hifi4/svi/new/SVI606.jpg
The SVI-328 with the Super Expander was also a competitive CP/M system.
http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?st=1&c=228
dvik: I tried a few times, but without any documentation, I can't get it working. It's not really usable for me...
manuel: You can also try SDLMESS and use cartridge or disk for loading Frantic Freddy.
The ported games was just a matter of smaller changes of the VDP, PSG and PPI handling, some even worked with a patched MSX BIOS. SVI-328 and MSX BIOS/BASIC are almost identical. The major difference is the memory handling.
Way cool!. I'm really curious about how a SVI game looks, I'll try to disassemble one my favourites and I'll try to find the differences you spotted. Luckyly being most of them 16Kb games there must be no memory handling (you mean memory banking, isn't it) at all.
Btw, are there complete SVI BIOS/hardware documents anywhere?
The SVI-328 memory banks are 32KB each instead of 16KB and have no sub slots. If we translate this into MSX language you would get:
SLOT 0 SLOT 1 SLOT 2 SLOT 3 FFFF +---------+---------+---------+---------+ | BANK 02 | BANK 12 | BANK 22 | BANK 32 | PAGE 3 | RAM |ROM CART | RAM | RAM | 8000 |00000000 |00000000 |10100000 |11110000 | PAGE 2 +---------+---------+---------+---------+ 7FFF | BANK 01 | BANK 11 | BANK 21 | BANK 31 | PAGE 1 |ROM BASIC|ROM CART | RAM | RAM | |00000000 |00000101 |00001010 |00001111 | PAGE 0 0000 +---------+---------+---------+---------+
Take a look at the "Spectravideo Assembly Programming" manual at Roger Samdal's page, it's a valuable resource although most parts are written in Swedish.
http://www.samdal.com/svdocuments.htm
Ow... I loved Frantic Freddy on the C64... How is the SVI version?
Manuel, I guess you are talking about this game:
http://www.lemon64.com/reviews/view.php?id=53
I like it too!
Spectravideo´s Frantic Freddy is totally different game...
Here's a link to a SVI-328 and SVI-728 symbol files that could be used for reference and debugging with for example blueMSX. The SVI-328 naming are all in MSX format, therefore you could find a lot of resources.
http://www.bluemsx.com/dev_download/svi328/SymbolSvi328Msx.zip
I have a question about this system. Does it run ROMs of its own that was published? When I try to convert games, it just refuses to run them. Am I doing something wrong?
Have you found the Porting MSX games to SVI-3x8 & vice-versa thread?