MiSTer FPGA Forum

MiSTer_Kirk wrote: ↑Sat Aug 14, 2021 5:29 pm What is the point of a DVD drive ?

Why not?

We could run CD-ROM based DOS games and have the audio tracks, MEGA CD, PCE CD-ROM-ROM and others - just needs some Linux and core support.

Cheers,

Richard.

You can already do all that with CD images. CD Media is starting to fail, as rot sets in, and magnetic integrity fails. It's not going to last forever, and we now have plenty of ways of preserving it.
I mean, why stop at DVD drives ? Let's have a built-in tape deck ? Or a built-in 5 1/4 " floppy drive, 3.5" floppy drive ? Where does it stop ?

And I agree with the guy above, the lack of a flat top makes this thing look silly.

multisystem wrote: ↑Sun Aug 15, 2021 1:10 pm

MiSTer_Kirk wrote: ↑Sat Aug 14, 2021 5:29 pm What is the point of a DVD drive ?

Why not?

We could run CD-ROM based DOS games and have the audio tracks, MEGA CD, PCE CD-ROM-ROM and others - just needs some Linux and core support.

Cheers,

Richard.

Personally, it would make much more sense to have a hard drive/solid state drive add-on for the bottom like this. CD's aren't supported yet and I'm not even sure if they could be supported to be honest. I doubt there is as much demand for that as something like a hard drive for the MiSTer. The MiSTer isn't much of a "original media" system anyways.

Well, the power of tower concept is nice.
I am no client for an optical add-on, but knowing it can be used for other things is a welcome feature.

If you have time to spare, some food for thought:

Reasons I am not into the optical add-on:
- optical medias are failing;
- I gave up collecting because of insane prices and storage room (I am not a museum, after all);
- compatibility issues (as old as it is, they never got it right for everybody).

Reasons I am into the add-on concept itself:
- can be used for more ports;
- can be used for storage;
- can be used for adding feature;

Concerns about the add-on:
- how it will connect to base will greatly condition it's expansion possiblities.

My truly MiSTer dream case:
- one can't do all I need;
- so one for consoles (the all-in-one seems great for that);
- one with customizable keyboard for computers (I would go as far as a universal case with swappable keyboards*);
- one industrial with good ventilation and many way to attach to go inside arcade cabinets.
* for the swappable keyboards, if you are serious, you use one computer at a time for long periods, so the swapping isn't an issue.

I'd be fine with the option to use optical media as a USB read-only drive. Allow the user to choose CD, DVD or Bluray, and you could switch cores/game collections by swapping disks.

Then just store your disks in a case from original systens and you'd perfectly emulate the feeling of using original physical media, without the hassle of having to support old disk formats.

My guess if we ever did get optical media support, is it might be handled through some sort of abstraction layer. Perhaps not too dissimilarly from how mt32 is handled, whether through the Linux subsystem (sort of like midilink), or an external device (e.g., raspberry pi). Cores then could, perhaps, only need to talk to that one interface, and the other side of that interface would handle talking to the actual optical drive.

"Raspberry Pi? Yeah, that's our sound card optical drive interface."

Assuming that add on is built with a simple SATA connector for the disc drive, it wold be trivial to just plug in a 2.5" SSD or HDD and print a cover for the front. Even better, make it a hair taller and have the front panel include a tty2oled.

I for one love the idea of be able to use an real optical drive, you can run from real media or rip your titles in retroarch....

Where can I pre-order this?

Slipard wrote: ↑Mon Aug 16, 2021 7:33 am Well, the power of tower concept is nice.
I am no client for an optical add-on, but knowing it can be used for other things is a welcome feature.

If you have time to spare, some food for thought:

Reasons I am not into the optical add-on:
- optical medias are failing;
- I gave up collecting because of insane prices and storage room (I am not a museum, after all);
- compatibility issues (as old as it is, they never got it right for everybody).

Reasons I am into the add-on concept itself:
- can be used for more ports;
- can be used for storage;
- can be used for adding feature;

Concerns about the add-on:
- how it will connect to base will greatly condition it's expansion possiblities.

My truly MiSTer dream case:
- one can't do all I need;
- so one for consoles (the all-in-one seems great for that);
- one with customizable keyboard for computers (I would go as far as a universal case with swappable keyboards*);
- one industrial with good ventilation and many way to attach to go inside arcade cabinets.
* for the swappable keyboards, if you are serious, you use one computer at a time for long periods, so the swapping isn't an issue.

I'll design up a few different base expansion units, the CD-ROM + M2.SATA was just one option to show the idea of a lower stacking bay.

The lower expansion sections could be multiple high if required as the 3D design has a set of four pins and four holes that alternate from the base of the Multisystem case into any other lower expansion add-on's. I'll leave it up to individuals to decide what expansion they need and if a single bay or multiple / higher bays work best for modular expansion.

There is also the 'cartridge' port expansion and that can handle a lot of neat options now and in the future too.

Single and dual SSD's are obviously going to be a good option for many, the question is if they would be better as quick-fit SATA drive bays or nicely hidden away under the Multisystem.

I fully agree with more USB and/or SSD+USB expansion as that seems to be the most useful for now.

I also want to see more enclosures and designs for this all-in-one motherboard - hopefully we will see wedge cases designs for the classic computer systems and more industrial for the Arcade side.

Check out Neil's YouTube channel on Thursday 26th Aug for some further details on the MiSTer Multisystem and systems we have produced in the recent past - Custom aluminium enclosures we have made for rugged industrial PC designs etc.

Thanks again for the feedback, it's great to hear what people would like to see developed now and in the future.

Richard.

the_importer wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 2:04 am Where can I pre-order this?

It'll be available via Neil at RMC Retro - at rmcretro.store

Neil is planning a pre-order system and manufacturing / component lead-time is currently indicating shipments should start in October 2021.

multisystem wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 1:32 pm Check out Neil's YouTube channel on Thursday 26th Aug for some further details on the MiSTer Multisystem and systems we have produced in the recent past - Custom aluminium enclosures we have made for rugged industrial PC designs etc.

I used to love Neil's videos on Youtube, but my Internet is currently so limited I can't watch them anymore; I'll stick to the thread for now.

Link to Neil´s channel please

Slipard wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 3:05 pm I used to love Neil's videos on Youtube, but my Internet is currently so limited I can't watch them anymore; I'll stick to the thread for now.

Neil is a co-host on the This Week in Retro podcast, if that's something you can do. The multisystem has a segment in episode 47.
https://www.rmcretro.com/this-week-in-retro

SegaMan wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 4:25 pm Link to Neil´s channel please

YouTube - https://youtube.com/RMCRetro

Twitter - https://twitter.com/RMCRetro

Neil from RMCRetro had added an overview video all about the MiSTer Multisystem over on his YouTube channel - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDIz8WY6zLE

User testing has been going well and we are producing another batch with the tweaks and fixes for production.

Please feel free to post any questions here or on the YouTube video comments, we will aim to answer them as soon as possible.

Cheers,

Richard.

Looks great. Will the £141 include the case? If not, how much extra will this be?

multisystem wrote: ↑Thu Aug 26, 2021 3:15 pm Please feel free to post any questions here or on the YouTube video comments, we will aim to answer them as soon as possible.

Hi. Will the analog audio out be fed by a proper DAC (that takes the data from the same source as the optical out)?
I am asking because the audio out on the MiSTer IO addon board has a very noisy output and this could be much improved.

did ask earlier but would a mic socket be possible to fit.. to save games out to tape or something

mapf wrote: ↑Thu Aug 26, 2021 6:06 pm

multisystem wrote: ↑Thu Aug 26, 2021 3:15 pm Please feel free to post any questions here or on the YouTube video comments, we will aim to answer them as soon as possible.

Hi. Will the analog audio out be fed by a proper DAC (that takes the data from the same source as the optical out)?
I am asking because the audio out on the MiSTer IO addon board has a very noisy output and this could be much improved.

The Multisystem has the standard analogue Audio out 3.5mm jack, and also the Digital TOSlink optical. We also have all the audio and video on the expansion header so that would be where a digital to DAC output could be made as a module if the community wants that option.

We have discussed various expansion modules, some could include a higher quality DAC, if anyone has any preference here do let us know -

Ideas were -
Use a DAC on the JAMMA expansion
Or have a combined MIDI interface and DAC for higher quality analogue audio
Or combine another desired video output like s-video and also include the option for a DAC

bazza_12 wrote: ↑Thu Aug 26, 2021 7:17 pm did ask earlier but would a mic socket be possible to fit.. to save games out to tape or something

The Multisystem has a 3.5mm jack input for audio in / Analogue 0 and 1 channels - so this is used to et tape games into the system or as an analogur controller etc.

The Analogue out could in theory 'save to tape' but I'm not expecting support in the cores for that any time soon.

pomegran wrote: ↑Thu Aug 26, 2021 5:17 pm Looks great. Will the £141 include the case? If not, how much extra will this be?

No, it's a print your own case (files will be supplied), or Neil is planning to have case options available to buy etc.

Hi Everyone,

We have a number of questions relating to contribution of sales profit back to the original creators / MiSTer Project / team etc. and general questions about open source etc.

Really happy to address this head on and open it up for further discussion (we are all standing on the shoulders of giants) -

We are not selling an existing open source hardware design. We have invested in new designs for MiSTer and have sunk costs for doing this, that’s fine and part of any new product development, just pointing out that our focus is to invest in the wider MiSTer project.

When/if we get to a break-even point then we could do a number of different things not limited to the following –

• Use any profit to design more interesting new hardware for MiSTer. – To be honest this is the initial preference as it’s the plan to support the community long-term and develop new hardware.

• Contribute some proportion of profit to the MiSTer project or/and individual creators or as part of a wider community funded ongoing development program for new hardware / software - This is similar to how the RepRap (open source 3D printer) project generated a design fund for ongoing research and development.

• Release the design as open source, that may or may not be a good thing, no strong view either way, but it becomes harder to justify giving away profits as it’s incredibly doubtful anyone just selling the board would do the same to us or anyone else. – We would much rather see people evolve the design further and sell that instead, that’s how open source hardware should work.

In short, we hope that in time we can be seen as a valued contributor to the MiSTer project, and we wish to continue to invest in what the community wants developed as new hardware and help generate ways to make it easier for more people to get involved. Please at least give us the chance to break even and make some cool products for people to enjoy.

The 3D print files will be released as soon as possible on a very usable open source license, not restricting use, do whatever you like with them etc.

And please don’t see these as and/or options, we can do multiple things such as release designs as open source and still do other things or contribute in various ways, it just gets more complicated. None of this is set in stone, we have not even released the product yet, so happy to keep the discussion ongoing and see where this takes us.

I hope that helps.

Richard.

multisystem wrote: ↑Thu Aug 12, 2021 6:34 pm And also an update on the development side -

The tweaks, fixes and production changes for manufacturing are all going well. We plan to have another batch built to the final production design during August after feedback from testers.

We also started sending out to beta test units to people in the UK, USA and Canada (* sorry no European / Japan testers quite yet)...

Will there be an option to have a case style or colour combination that is "Japanese Super Famicom" style? I was planning to gut a SNES and fit a MISTer + add-ons into it, but this seems like a better option when comparing time v money to do this.

Also would not open source your PCB design - you just know what will happen if you do that, and you'll basically lose all of your investment.

Another question: is the RAM going to be the "corrected" type that will work better with the Jotego cores?

question will this work with 2 ram modules or does this become junk if that happens

Pilot production all went well, all tested and no problems in the build process.


Small batch pilot production costs a small fortune, but proves that you can ramp up to volume manufacturing.


We have now frozen the design as no further design for manufacture changes need to be made.


The first volume batch is now being made.


The enclosure design has also had a few tweaks after all the great community feedback (Thank you all). I will post more about the enclosure and 3D printed files shortly.

Cheers,

Richard.

And the 3D print files for the enclosure design are now all uploaded - https://www.prusaprinters.org/prints/75 ... e-3d-print

It has a detailed 31 page PDF document for anyone who wants to print off a set or use it for any reason.


Open Source CC-BY-SA (Creative commons, Attribution, Share alike). Full commercial use allowed, so if anyone wants to print the enclosure and sell it, that's totally okay and encouraged !

Original design (Above - Case 'A')

Alternative design for SCART out the back and internal 2.5" SDD / M2 SSD


Do let me know what you think about the two different case options (I listened to the feedback on the SCART and made an alternative design for you).


Thanks,

Richard.

i must admit I prefer the design with the scart moved to the back instead of on top.. looks a lot better now.. IMO

CASE_B_with_Dust_cover.jpg (291.72 KiB) Viewed 130 times has my favor.
Also, 2,5" SSD is very nice.

How is the air flow (cooling) with case B?