NEW CORE: Robotron Z1013

[vebxenon]

4 days ago, a core of this East Germany computer has been released by boert/kcbert

https://github.com/mist-devel/mist-bina ... ores/z1013

Core source can be found here:

https://github.com/boert/Z1013-mist

[johey]

Interesting and very welcome in a preservation point of view!

[nightshadowpt]

Wow... I always find it fascinating to learn about a computer I never heard about.

Thanks

[vebxenon]

New updates by kcbert

https://github.com/mist-devel/mist-bina ... ores/z1013

[vebxenon]

Wow... I always find it fascinating to learn about a computer I never heard about.

Thanks

Hope kcbert will create more "obscure" computer cores from former GDR

[DrOG]

Very nice reimplementation!

Found some bugs:
1. Certain games don't run (i.e. Ladder).
2. In the menu the highlighted area disappears below the 'Autostart' funcion, but works (there's an invisible 'Reset' item). Someone mentioned earlier (perhaps Sorgelig) that only 7 rows fit to one page of the menu.
3. Couldn't use any of the games with joystick (tried all the joy and kb. settings combinations).
4. Some games use strange keysets to control the game, but if you know that the original machine had ABCDEF keyboard layout instead of the standard QWERTY, that's not a surprise.

Keep up the important work, I really like these Eastern European computers!

And some screenshots (nice ASCII arts):

[vebxenon]

https://github.com/boert/Z1013-mist/issues here you can write core author (boert/kcbert)

[Sorgelig]

2. In the menu the highlighted area disappears below the 'Autostart' funcion, but works (there's an invisible 'Reset' item).

Last row automatically changes to scrolling help string if no keys are pressed within some time. Press any key on keyboard and the last string will be changed back to option item.
Anyway, the OSD behavior is controlled by MCU, not by FPGA core. If you feel something wrong here, then bug should be addressed to firmware.

[Sorgelig]

delete

[DrOG]

https://github.com/boert/Z1013-mist/issues here you can write core author (boert/kcbert)

Done.

[DrOG]

Hi Guys!

Found a new, updated core in Gehstock's GITHUB repository, which is improved in aspect of memory (supports max. 32kB roms instead of 16 - Ladder now works!), more types of joystick supported (4 compared to the previous 2), and has a menu bugfix, Reset is visible on the bottom of the first page.

https://github.com/Gehstock/Mist_FPGA/t ... Z1013_MiST

Very impressive, thank for your work perfecting this unique core!

[vebxenon]

New update

https://github.com/mist-devel/mist-bina ... ores/z1013

[DrOG]

Hi!

Nice work, now compatible with my picky TV over VGA, and games which need more memory run fine (i.e. ladder).

But some games still cannot be controlled with joystick: tried the (default) practic 1/88 setting, and the rear DB-9 port, as suggested: auto+joystick, ladder_joy and super_ski+joyst works perfectly (see attached screenshots), but some others don't: tried galaktika+joy, galaxis(j), jumping_jack+joy and tetris(j) with no success.

Thanks for perfecting this core: Gábor

[DrOG]

Hi!
...
But some games still cannot be controlled with joystick:
...

I have to apologize: sometimes the core 'goes crazy', and no games can be controlled with joystick. But turning off and on again the MiST (reset does not help) makes things work again! I could play even games formerly known as defective i.e. miami+joy.z80. So the core is near perfect, but sometimes behaves eratically in aspect of joystick handling.