MiSTer updates and changelog

[Sorgelig]

NES:
- Update palettes from Sho's v2.4 (Terry Janas).
- Enable large mapper 28 (Kitrinx).
- Updated framework.

[macro]

Universal Cosmic series games:

- Space Panic, Cosmic Alien and Magical Spot

Two more games to be added at a later stage and bound to be some problems (as well as the ones I already know about )
- coin settings for Magical Spot are wrong
- CPU clock for some games is too fast (but game should be correct speed since it is tied to screen flyback)

[Sorgelig]

Linux:
- Add support for DualSense (PS5) controller.
- enable CH341 and PL2303 USB serial drivers.
- Update SSL certificate to latest.

Main:
- input: use gamepad LEDs to display player number (DS3/4, DualSense, Switch, Wiimote).
- Add milti-instance no_merge_vidpid INI option.
Note: correct player LEDs behavior is guaranteed only on official gamepads. Clones and compatible controller may have different LED behaviors.

[Sorgelig]

NeoGeo:
- Support for spinner (also mouse as spinner) for Hypernoid and Pop'n Bounce.
- Support for mouse as trackball for Irritating Maze
- Fix color expansion (Kitrinx)
- Updated framework.

[Sorgelig]

SNES:
- Fixes from srg320.
- Updated framework.

[FPGAzumSpass]

GBA:
- fixed sprite drawing edge case
- fixed flickerblend option reset

[Sorgelig]

Main:
- MegaCD: add support for subcode (zakk4223)
- GCR mode for all cores using D64 and G64 disk images.
- FC option: support for DDR3 loading.

MegaCD:
- Enable subcode support (zakk4223).
- CRAM dots (retrorepair).
- Updated framework.
Note you must update Main to latest version!

C16:
- C1541: updated to latest version, support GCR mode.
- Emulate 2 disk drives with automatic disable when disk is not inserted.
- Add External IEC.
- Updated tape module to latest version.
- External tape input support (not tested).
- SID: updated to latest version.
- Updated framework.
Note: you must update Main to latest version!

VIC20:
- C1541: updated to latest version, support GCR mode.
- Emulate 2 disk drives with automatic disable when disk is not inserted.
- Add External IEC.
- Updated tape module to latest version.
- External tape input support (not tested).
- Keyboard layout has been updated to match C64 core layout.
- Updated framework.
Note: you must update Main to latest version!

[Ace]

Gyruss
First official release
Improves the overall accuracy and audio quality of MrX-8B's original design using a new model built using Time Pilot '84 as a base

[theypsilon]

MRA-Alternatives:
- Gyruss MRA changes for new core (Ace9921)
- Irem M62 MRAs (Atrac17 and birdybro)
- Pleiads MRA update (mcbazface)

[Sorgelig]

Main:
- TurboGrafx16: fix CD audio (David Shadoff).
- IDE: some reorganization, split from Minimig, support for Archie.
- input: support for Atari VCS joystick.
- AtariST: small adjustments in menu.

Archie:
- Use standard IDE interface and module.
- FDC: update the module, adjust the timings.
- Updated framework.
Note: you need to update Main to latest as well.

Atari ST:
- Updated blitter.
- Updated FDC.
- Updated framework.

TurboGrafx16/CD:
- Audio fixes (David Shadoff).
- Updated framework.

[Sorgelig]

TurboGrafx16/CD:
- Hotfix for CD audio (Dave Shadoff)

Genesis:
- Updated cheat engine, support for byte compare/write.
- Updated framework.

MegaCD:
- Updated cheat engine, support for byte compare/write.

[Ace]

Iron Horse, Jackal:
Two new arcade cores.

[Sorgelig]

NeoGeo:
- Use original system clock for AES mode.

[Sorgelig]

VIC20:
- Fix for external tape input.

[theypsilon]

MRA-Alternatives:
- Iron Horse MRAs (Ace9921)

[Sorgelig]

ZX Spectrum:
- Use TAB as G mode switch.
- Updated framework.

[Sorgelig]

C64:
- C1581: update fdc1772 code.
- CIA: icr3 set priority over clear. (fixes Arkanoid and may be other games).

[Sorgelig]

Main:
- ini: spinner_axis option (for spinners using Y coordinate).
- input: don't open Switch accelerator, lit the home led.
- Fixed tape writing SharpMZ - goes to correct directory now (alanswx).
- input: improve Atari VCS spinner handling, combo to enable/disable the spinner: hold down both red and back buttons then rotate spinner: right - Enable, left - Disable.

[Kitrinx]

New Core: Intellivision by Grabulosaure
- Supports Intellivoice
- Uses raw int/bin style roms, not ROM/INTV headered roms
- Please read the readme for required bootrom setup: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Intv_MiSTer
Todo:
- PAL timings need some work

[edanuff]

New core: Interact Home Computer
- Available at: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Interact_MiSTer
- Supports HDMI, joysticks & keyboard, loads cassettes in popular emulator formats
- Todo: Sound support

[danielb]

New core: Compukit UK101
A port of Grant Searle's UK101 FPGA project.
- Available at: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/UK101_MiSTer.
- This is a reconstruction of a kit computer from the late 1970s, based on a 6502 CPU.
- Supports saving and loading via UART. Selectable colour schemes.
- Still to do: Make loading and saving more convenient.

[danielb]

Compukit UK101
- Screen size switchable between 64x32 and 48x16.
- ROM monitor switchable between Cegmon and MonUK02 (NewMon).

[macro]

Space Invaders

- SDRAM refresh fixed
- Sound fixes for :-

• 280 Zzap
  Balloon Bomber,
  Blue Shark,
  Boot Hill,
  Clowns
  Laguna Racer
  Lupin 3 (Set 1)
  Seawolf (Set 1)

- Remove debug options unless you do a DEBUG_MODE build

[danielb]

Compukit UK101

Added selectable baud rate: Setting baud rate to 300 solves an issue with 8K Super Invaders running too fast.

[Sorgelig]

Linux & Main

- Latest Kernel version v5.13.12 with all MiSTer fixes and tweaks. This time kernel is based on vanilla kernel from Torvalds (not socfpga branch as before).

- exFAT is now part of main kernel branch, but unfortunately it doesn't support symlinks. So i've ported good old exFAT version with symlinks support as it's quite common on MiSTer.

- Latest BlueZ version (v5.60 at time of porting) which provides BLE support and brings many fixes.

- More tested BT4/5 USB dongles. Now Realtek BT5 dongles (quite common today) with loadable firmware are supported. Tested on ASUS USB-BT500, Edimax BT8500, Avantree DG45, many CSR4 dongles, some BCM20702 dongles. Both BT4 and BT5 types of dongles support BLE.

- More modern WiFi 802.11ac dongles are supported. Currently supported AC chips: RTL8812AU/RTL8821AU/RTL8812BU/RTL8822BU/RTL8821CU. Tested: ASUS AC53, TPLink T2U-nano, DLink DWA-171.

- Supported some combo WiFi+BT dongles. Tested TOTOLink A600UB and noname black dongle with green text "WIFi5 BT+AC600 Driver-free". Both are using RTL8821CU chip.

- New BT pairing script (pairing dialog in Main). Since BlueZ 5.x uses very different interfaces, a whole pairing script has rewritten. Now it includes several important additions: 1) Support for BLE input devices pairing. 2) Dialog doesn't finish. It keeps waiting for new devices till user press "finish" (or short press of OSD button on I/O board). 3) You can delete all pairings (sometimes it's required to get successful pair) by pressing backspace key (or long press of OSD button on I/O board).

- Support for BLE input devices. Tested on Flydigi Vader 2 and iPega PG-9191. One important difference from classic BT devices is BLE device connects almost instantly. So BLE gamepad works like RF - you press the button and it's connected instantly. BLE devices usually can be paired with several hosts. So if you have several MiSTers then you can pair to *maybe* all of them.

- Both WiFi and BT dongles now fully plug-and-play, so you can insert/remove them at any time and they are ready after plug (However if you plug different WiFi dongles without rebooting, then probably only first one will be able to re-initialize - it's related to how linux enumerates WLAN devices). Some BT dongles get stuck on booting sequence, so Main will try to "kick" it to make it work.

- Now kernel uses loadable (.ko) modules for WiFi and BT devices, so be aware when you try to change the kernel as modules are inside linux.img and may be not compatible with other kernel! USB host devices is also in loadable module to reduce the "crowd" in booting process.

- bt_auto_disconnect INI option to disconnect BT gamepads/keyboards after some time so their battery won't dry (some gamepads have no built-in timeout). This option doesn't work for BLE devices.

- Support for joycon split/combine mode (press L1+L2+L3 and R1+R2+R3 to combine or split). In combined mode joycons use Switch Pro mapping. (You have to map gamepad in combined mode again). Note: while it's fun to try joycon in combined mode, it's not as good as normal Switch Pro gamepad by several aspects, so better to use Switch Pro controller.

- Mice with up to 8 buttons are supported now.

- Execute /media/fat/linux/user-startup.sh script upon boot if found. This is for additional user supplied customizations. Try to keep changes in linux.img minimal, so linux update won't affect your settings.

- Added more python modules such as curses, zlib and others.

- Many other tweaks and fixes in Kernel and Main.

[GreyRogue]

TI-99/4A Release
20210829
-Fix speech overflow
- From Flandango:
Disk Support
NTSC/PAL switch
Support for more cart types including Mega Cart
Larger SAM size support
Various improvements

***Note that adding support for more memory and larger carts means this core now requires the SDRAM module to function. ***

[Sorgelig]

Linux & Main:

- Update Linux (buildroot) to v2021.02. So pretty much all packages got updated. Actually i'm not a big fan of updating the whole OS as MiSTer is not a PC and doesn't need upgrade without a good reason. Anyway it's worth to upgrade after 4 years.

- Some optimisation in boot sequence: connman has been removed in favor of traditional dhcpcd. Connman was used only for ethernet configuration but caused some disruptions in WiFi and BT while booting. So disk statistics utils were added (dstat, iostat, iotop).

- BlueZ (bluetooth stack) update to v5.61.

- Fixed: disk LED in previous release showed false disk activity.

- Added USB WiFi drivers: RTL8188EU, RTL8188FU

- Input: removed use of motion sensor in DualShock/DualSense.

- C64: fixed T64 format handling.

- Menu: arrange status icons dynamically.

Note: Linux release now uses 7zip compression due to size restriction on github.

[Sorgelig]

Linux:

- Since MiSTer is not general PC, it should not include unused libraries. Thus, in order to free space for further useful apps, all libraries unused in current set of utilities are removed. Nothing changed for general user, just less unused files are in image now.

- ncFTP replaced by LFTP.

- Fixed broken unzip.

- Added SSL support to Python. Also added httplib2, pysocks, requests, urllib3 modules.

- Kernel updated to v5.14

- Ported USB host driver from socfpga-4.19 as more compatible and stable.

- Updated rtl8188eu driver.

- Replaced rtl8821cu BT firmware (used in WiFi+BT dongles) to more stable one.

- both 7zip (7zr) and unrar unpackers are added, so apps/scripts should check if it's available before downloading.

- added all paths from /media to samba

- Some other tweaks.

[danielb]

Compukit UK101:

Complete reimplementation of video to fix glitchy graphics in previous version.

[Sorgelig]

Linux & Main:

Mostly polishing release to fix remaining problems after big changes.

- Add support for Switch SNES and NES online controllers (lost at some point).

- Support for XBox Series S/X controller.

- Additional link to certificate (to fix some apps/python modules)

- input: default mapping to gamepad if it's not configured yet. Don't relay on default map anyway. It's minimal to be able to go to map settings and define more specific buttons mapping.

- Bluetooth: faster pairing if device wasn't paired before.