NES -> MSX cartridge
Enrico Barbisan
Many years ago, I've read that there was a special cartridge to play NES
games on MSX2. That magazine said that in France was very popular.
It's true?
Regards,
Enrico
Asshen
"Enrico Barbisan" <enr...@tin.it> wrote in message
news:d5KO8.19503$Kt3.4...@twister2.libero.it...
Hans Otten
>
>Many years ago, I've read that there was a special cartridge to play NES
>games on MSX2. That magazine said that in France was very popular.
>
>It's true?
Its true. I have seen (not too good) pictures of the Nintendo adapter
in a MSX in teh dutch magazine MSX Computer Magazine.
Its a complete standalone system, only power is taken from the MSX.
NTSC, Japanese, so only those carts fit.
Hans
Enrico Barbisan
>
> Its true. I have seen (not too good) pictures of the Nintendo adapter
> in a MSX in teh dutch magazine MSX Computer Magazine.
> Its a complete standalone system, only power is taken from the MSX.
> NTSC, Japanese, so only those carts fit.
>
And today, how we can get informations about it?
Ciao,
Enrico
P.S.:Hans, your site is great! But I'd need some tutorials in assembler
programming, not only listings.
David Solomon
<snip>
> Its true. I have seen (not too good) pictures of the Nintendo adapter
> in a MSX in teh dutch magazine MSX Computer Magazine.
> Its a complete standalone system, only power is taken from the MSX.
> NTSC, Japanese, so only those carts fit.
>
> Hans
uhm.. wasn't this magazine dated 1 april??
robert wilting
David Solomon schreef:
No. The thing is real,
It uses just the MSX for power and for the Joysticks.
In the old days Club-gouda imported one but the problem was that it only
works for with Japanese cars and that it was to expensive (allmost the
same price as a NES at that time) so they didn't import any more of these.
But the thing is really out there. MC(C)M mentioned it 2 or 3 times and
none of these where published on 1 april. Also one article had the bad
pictures of it.
Hans Otten
>uhm.. wasn't this magazine dated 1 april??
It is called the Zemina NES converter, and it is real !
Ivan Latorre
Yes. The Spanish MSX-Club magazine also mentioned the existence of this
adapter.
Oh! I have a dead link about this converter in my bookmarks. Shit! I remember
that there, there
were detailed pictures of this converter:
Title of the bookmark: MCD Magazine - NES Converter
URL: http://members.nbci.com/ArjanS/magazine/26/26nescnv.htm
Greets
Gert de Boom
> It uses just the MSX for power and for the Joysticks.
> In the old days Club-gouda imported one but the problem was that it only
> works for with Japanese cars and that it was to expensive
If I remember correctly it also had a problem with the video out. NTSC
versus PAL I imagine. Anyway, we had it examined by one of the guys who did
the hardware for us at that time. It was a Zemina cartridge and yes, I've
seen only one. I think at that time we didn't really import ourselves from
Korea yet. It must have been Jaap Boomsma, I guess.
> But the thing is really out there. MC(C)M mentioned it 2 or 3 times and
> none of these where published on 1 april. Also one article had the bad
> pictures of it.
I recall having seen the real thing somewhere, but don't where it is right
now. Maybe it has gone back to Jaap Boomsma. Maybe it is still floating
around by one the former Club Gouda members (it might even be floating
around here at my place). By now I remember having made a Club Gouda
journaal with the Family Pac convertor on the cover. Let me take look....
And yes... I'm back: it was on the cover of the club magazine of Msx Club
Gouda: MSX Journaal, number 31, january 1992.
Here is a short version of text in that magazine (translated in a hurry, so
please don't mind the spelling errors):
"A long time ago there was some news from Korea: Zemina made Nintendo
convertor. Surely Jaap Boomsma, targeted at Korean importware, ordered one.
He handed it over to one of the Club Gouda members to find out whether it
was possible to change the video output to PAL.
Technical info:
The cartridge is suppose to be fed by an external 6 Volt adaptor. Further
you'll find three output channels:
- High frequency (TV signal)
- Video out
- Audio out
Some red buttons are found on the outside too: maybe a reset button and
button to start a program. On top of the converter you'll find an 60 pins
slot for the cartridges to be put in.
Commodore videochip:
* Videoprocessor: UA 6527
* Videoram 2k x 8 (10 ns)
* Processor UA 6528
* Ram 2k x 8 (10 ns)
* Eprom 2764 (firmware ?)
The UA 65** serie is also the Commodore homecomputer chip. It is not certain
whether these are the same.
Conversion to PAL:
The technical schema is unknown. Probably the videochip UA 6527 must be
replaced by a UA 6526 (has PAL output).
Another drawback:
The Dutch Nintendo cartdridges don't fit. A European Nintendo doesn't have
60 pins cartridges. According to Jaap Boomsma the cartridges should be of
type Family Pac. The Family Pac is a Korean Nintendo clone and used to be
very popular over there. For a moment we were quite lucky because he also
told there was a conversion tool for real Nintendo cartdridges. A number of
phonecalls later and a few months of waiting resulted in still not having
that piece of conversion hardware....
Conclusion:
This cartrtridge is useless, unless the Family Pac cartridges are imported
too. However, at this moment Zemina is delivering the best Nintendo
cartridges (Mario Bros) for MSX too, so there is no need to buy the
convertor.
Gert