[ATARI] Altirra 2.10 Test XXV

Altirra 2.1 test 25 [May 27, 2012]:

features added:

• Debugger: Added deref signed byte (dsb) expression operator.
• Debugger: Added %y formatting specifiers to .printf command.

bugs Fixed:

• Debugger: Fixed .tracecio off not working.
• Debugger: Fixed execution stopping on TRACE statements.
• Debugger: Breakpoint clear (bc) command no longer interprets breakpoint numbers as hex.
• Debugger: Fixed console entry window not always disabling properly.
• Display: Fixed crash on some XP systems on display mode change.
• Cheats: Fixed 16-bit option not being tracked properly for manually entered cheats.
• GTIA: Sprites are now triggered properly from within horizontal blank.
• GTIA: Fixed sprite image overlap result.

Author's Comment:

• Now includes the 64-bit build. There really isn't much point to this since the 32-bit build is faster, but someone asked for it and I'd had it building for a while anyway.
  
• Fix for the 16-bit cheat issue.
  
• Fixes for some sprite issues, including the one that masked the glitch in the diarrho Quantizator picture. Sprite overlap is now supported. Unfortunately these fixes do slow things down a little bit.
  
• BASIC is no longer shown on the caption bar for machines that don't support built-in BASIC.
  
• Fixed a mode switch related display crash on XP machines.
  
• Several updates to the debugger.
  
• Fixed long filename mangling issue in H: device (it was needlessly mangling some filenames between 6-8 chars).

Altirra 2.1 test 24 [April 13, 2012]:

features added:

• HDevice: Added support for H6-H9: text translation modes.
• HDevice: Implemented rename, get/set/create/remove directory, and get file length commands.
• HDevice/PCLink: Fixed lock command not setting read-only flag.

bugs Fixed:

• Display: Improved behavior of interlaced mode when frames
• HDevice: Fixed NOTE and POINT commands.

Altirra 2.1 test 23 [April 7, 2012]:

bugs Fixed:

• Cartridge: Fixed switchable XEGS cartridge modes.

Altirra 2.1 test 22 [April 7, 2012]:

features added:

• Debugger: Enter now repeats the last command.
• Debugger: .dumpdlist command now collapses runs of identical commands.
• Debugger: Unassemble and dump commands now support continuation from the last address.

bugs Fixed:

• Simulator: BASIC disable Option key hold is now released more quickly to reduce cartridge conflicts.
• Serial: Fixed incompatibility with Ice-T XE and the R: handler's STATUS handler.
• Misc: Fixed upper 4 bits for some R-Time 8 register reads.

Altirra 2.1 test 21 [April 2, 2012]:

features added:

• Cartridge: Added cartridge type autodetection.

bugs Fixed:

• VBXE: Fixed memory not being cleared on cold reset with randomize function disabled.

Altirra 2.1 test 20 [March 26, 2012]:

features added:

• Cartridge: Added MicroCalc 32K cartridge type support.

Altirra 2.1 test 19 [March 19, 2012]:

Author's Comment:

• Main new feature is 1200XL support. This includes the two LEDs -- keyboard disable (Ctrl+F1) and international character set (Ctrl+F4) -- and the self-test jumper. There is now also a 1200XL ROM entry, because that ROM is special (Atari logo, doesn't automatically go into self test, and is generally less compatible). The 1200XL does not have built-in BASIC so you will need to attach the BASIC cart.
• I've also decoupled the BASIC option for 400/800 mode so that you have to attach the BASIC cart manually instead. Remember that you have to hold Option on real Atari 600XL/800XL/XE hardware to disable BASIC, so that's where the issues come from with carts. The key is that Altirra doesn't necessarily know when it should hold this key when you say you don't want BASIC -- depending on how the cartridge is set up it may execute either before or after the OS checks this button, or you may be running a custom OS ROM that has this function inverted(...) I did some searching, and it doesn't look like there are significant differences between rev.2 and rev.3 of the XL/XE OS, so I don't think I'll be adding an XE ROM slot just yet. You can always use Other OS for now, though. The OS-A and OS-B ROMs are significant because of hardcoded addresses and the 1200XL OS is notable for its logo and incompatibility, but I haven't heard of compat issues between rev. 2 and rev. 3. Rev.4 has more significant changes, but there is already a slot for the XEGS.

Altirra 2.1 test 18 [March 18, 2012]:

features added

• 1200XL emulation support.

Author's Comment:

• Here's a version with 1050 Turbo support. It's currently set to use the stock 1050 timing parameters: 20ms/track, 982 cycles/byte, 91 cycles/bit.
• Gotta say, the load pattern involved here is pretty sketchy. Not only does the loader on that disk image lack a low-speed fallback and fails on all but a small fraction of drives, but it also sends a Read PERCOM Block request in high speed mode. I'm not ware of AUX2 being significant for that command -- it seems like the drive shouldn't allow this as it could cause false positives from other software that simply doesn't initialize the AUX2 byte.

 

Altirra 2.1 test 17 [March 13, 2012]:

features added

• HDevice: Added minimal support for SDX Get Current Directory command ($30).

Altirra 2.1 test 15 [March 8, 2012]:

Bugs Fixed:

• IDE: Fixed banking in KMK/JZ V1 mode and added 3K ROM support. 
• POKEY: Fixed asynchronous receive mode not resetting timers 3+4 that are already running.

Altirra 2.1 test 14 [February 27, 2012]:

features added

• Debugger: Added .basic_dumpline command.

Bugs Fixed:

• Disk: Fixed handling of XF551 high-speed sector skew format commands ($A1/$A2).
• Disk: Fixed error return for unsupported Write PERCOM Block requests.

Altirra 2.1 test 13 [February 21, 2012]:

features added

• BASIC programs can now be booted.
• Fast boot option now accelerates timeouts for powered down disk drives.
• Disk: Accurate disk timing prediction is now preserved when burst I/O transfers are enabled.
• Display: Added CIO intercept based enhanced text mode.

Bugs Fixed:

• Display: Added CIO intercept based enhanced text mode.

Author's Comment:

• This version has support for loading BASIC files, but note that it still goes through the boot process and therefore enabling Fast Boot is recommended. It also contains improvements to disk timing prediction so that more protected disks will boot in SIO patched or burst I/O mode, and a new CIO-based enhanced text mode that allows for text screens up to 255x255 and traditional command-line editing.

Altirra 2.1 test 12 [January 27, 2012]:

Bugs Fixed:

• Disk: Fixed inverted write protect bit status.
• Disk: Attempted writes to a write protected disk now return errors instead of a NAK.
• Disk: Fixed command response when accessing a drive with no disk.

Author's Comment:

• Fixes several disk drive issues, tunes the drive sounds a bit, and fixes the Dimension X regression.
• XEGS game ROM banking should be fixed now.
  
• DOS XE issue should be fixed now (was a problem with XF551 high speed I/O).
  
• Dimension X issue was due to a display list timing issue related to a jump instruction fix -- both cases should work now.
  
• CPU emulation speed should be cycle exact or very close to exact, certainly not off by an order of magnitude. The rule for performance is: anything done in a loop in BASIC is going to be dog slow, no exceptions. BASIC is itself an interpreter, and on top of that Atari BASIC is not a particularly fast one. The only way to get good performance for vertical sprite movement is to move the sprite data in assembly language, which means either calling an ML routine directly or aliasing the sprites on top of string buffers so you can move the sprites with Atari BASIC string commands.

Altirra 2.1 test 10 [January 27, 2012]:

Features Added:

• Disk: Added rotation and seek sound emulation.

Bugs Fixed:

• Disk: Fixed forced sector ordering (.diskorder) for .pro images.
• Disk: Step delays were not always reflected correctly in command delay time (only rotational position).
• Display: Fixed display mode matching when /f is specified on the command line.
• CPU: Fixed cycle behavior of ASL/LSR/ROL/ROR abs,X instructions in 65C02 mode.

Altirra Version 2.00 test IX [January 6, 2012]:

features added

• Debugger: Added heat map support.
• Display: Text can now be copied out of ANTIC modes 2, 3, 6, and 7 (GR.0, 1, and 2).

bugs fixed

• Disk: Adjusted step rate of 810 drive to 5.3ms.
• Input: Improved Caps Lock key support.
• Cartridge: An error is now thrown when attempting to save a cartridge image in .CAR format with an unsupported mapper.

Altirra Version 2.00 test VII [January 2, 2012]:

features added

• Display: Added scanline display mode.
• Display: Added integer-multiple version of preserve aspect ratio sizing mode.

bugs fixed

• Disk: Format command now sends back ACK+ERROR+buffer instead of NAK on a read-only disk.
• Input: Fixed bug in keyboard repeat detection code.

Altirra Version 2.00 test VI [December 31, 2011]:

• Switching to RAW keys would seem to solve the keyboard lag problem, but it also totally kills the auto-repeat on the cursor keys for some reason, so that solution is not really usable for me. ()
  

Figured it out -- turns out "repeat count" means something completely non-intuitive in the WM_KEYDOWN message, so Altirra wasn't detecting key repeat on the host side properly. This version should work better:

Altirra Version 2.00 test V[December 30, 2011]:

bugs fixed

• Fixed startup crash on Sandy Bridge CPUs on Windows XP.

Altirra Version 2.00 test IV [December 29, 2011]:

bugs fixed

• Disk: Fixed handling of XF551 high-speed sector skew format command ($A1).

Altirra Version 2.00 test III [December 28, 2011]:

features added

• Covox emulation support.

bugs fixed

• Increased paste keyboard timer to reduce dropped keys on line processing delays.
• Simulator: Inhibit FP math acceleration hooks when PBI ROM overlay is active.
• Debugger: "read" and "write" terms can now appear more than twice in a conditional breakpoint expression.
• POKEY: Fixed glitching in high-pass filtering.

Author's Comment:

• This version adds Covox support and also fixes a bug that was causing noise in high pass filtering (affected Nemesis demo). I did also do some heavy reorganization on the CPU hooking code, so watch out for SIO/CIO patch breakage.
• I'll have to look into the DOS XE issue. It may be another problem with PERCOM block support (grr).

Altirra Version 2.00 test II [December 25, 2011]:

features added

• SlightSID emulation support.
• Disk: Added support for format skewed ($66) command.
• Disk: Format commands ($21, $22) now support high-speed operation.
• Disk: Added emulation profile modes for various disk drives.
• Disk: Reduced ACK-to-complete delay when accurate sector timing is off.
• Debugger: Added .sum (sum memory area) command.
• Debugger: Added .warmstart command.
• Debugger: Added ap (alias pattern) command for adding aliases with patterns.
• Debugger: Added additional aliases to a8 command (set Atari800-compatible command aliases).
• Debugger: Added alternate L>addr syntax for setting an address range length based on an end address.
• Serial: 1030 Modem support.