KCS Power Cartridge emulation

[rgc]

Hi,

I'm searching some information on how this cartridge works. I have some information from ar.c64.org but the tech description of IO1 and IO2 are incorect or incomplete.

Cartridge goes on ULTIMAX mode on freeze button action, that's ok. But it must go back to ULTIMAX mode at the end of the toolkit BLOAD command to show the freeze menu again after a complete C64 restoration.

CCS64 is the only software emulator I know to be able to emulate correctly the KCS Power Cartridge. So the author knows how this cartridge works. And it would be nice if he can share this information with me.

Why am I asking that ? Because I'm trying to add KCS emulation to the 1541 Ultimate II cartridge. It's a piece of hardware that embeds an FPGA and some more that has to be connected to a real C64.

Help is welcome.

[Stuart Toomer]

A bit of an obscure request, but I've e-mailed you what little information I have.

[rgc]

Thank you for your reply.
I've been looking at the information you sent me but I'm afraid that this won't help me.
I've tried to contact KCS (the company still exists) but they have no archived information about this cartridge as their business is no longer related to commodore.

What could help me is the piece of source code from ccs64 emulator that handles type 2 (kcs) cartridges (or just the logic to go to freeze mode/ultimax). Vice emulator handling of type 2 cartridges is incomplete, ccs64 does it better. I may be asking something the author does not want to share. I'm a bit lazy and if this help could prevent me from a complete desassembly of the cartridge ROM I would appreciate.

[Stuart Toomer]

You would need to contact Per Hakan Sundell himself; but I doubt if he'd want to give you any actual source code, since CCS64 is not open-source, and he is busy with other domestic matters at the moment. I think that the emulator developers themselves only learnt originally by dumping the actual cartridge contents and investigating it for themselves... I cannot say, since I am not that technical, with respect to C64 emulation.

You may find it more beneficial asking at the Forum at Lemon 64:
http://www.lemon64.com/forum/

[rgc]

Hi,

I see that a new version of CCS64 has been released.
I'm still stucked on my KCS power Cartridge emulation problem.
Can Hakan Sundell check my request ? I sent him an message last year but got no answer. I don't need full source of CCS64, just information about the KCS internal logic.

René

[John1970]

It is sad that this small request doesn't get answered. The small Commodore Community should work together and share information in an effort to keep the Commodore 64 alive and not compete with each other.

John

[Stuart Toomer]

Hello again,

Hakan is in the middle of moving house and other domestic matters at the moment, so he probably won't be physically able to reply to you. He is the only one with the source code to CCS64. I don't know of any more details, other than what I already sent you before, I'm afraid. Until Hakan is in a position to be able to answer you, have you contacted the VICE Development Team? VICE is open-source, so you might get a good start there.

I know this isn't the answer you're wanting at the moment, but there's not much more that I can do right now, until Hakan is in a position to be able to reply to you...

Thanks for your continued patience.

Kind regards,

Stuart Toomer.

[rgc]

Vice emulator suffers the same bug as my development. We are using the same source of (incomplete) documentation.
I am not writing a C64 emulator. It's FPGA code to simulate the hardware of a power cartridge on a real C64.