Victor Trucco announced MSX-SM

Hi Avkooi

https://youtu.be/h2RQ-0zdfQ8

https://youtu.be/F0Wecd8xxQ8

These two videos show how to make a SD card and get it working, it is in Portuguese but it has English subtitles. If you already got the SD card booting, you can skip the SD creation part.

HDMI is 640x480@60Hz if I'm not mistaken.

Regarding firmware changes, you need an USB Blaster and load a "fpga" core to the RAM. Without a USB Blaster it isn't possible to do that.

@ducasp: Thanks for the links to the tutorial videos!

Setting up the Wifi was very easy! But the HDMI output still isn't working. I tried different cables and different inputs on my tv and reciever, but still no picture at all...

Yeah, I thought it would be a 480p standard signal, I'm not sure whether Victor is looking at this forum, so I'll forward this to him. I'm not sure whether it changes the resolution on PAL/NTSC MSX settings, and as far as I know I don't remember HDMI having any settings at this moment.

I've just published a new video, short explanation on how to use SMXFLASH to update your SM-X, and then at 7 minutes I show the effect of using the undocumented R#1 bit 3 feature, setting it to 1 changes the clock source for the blink effect counter from VSYNC to HSYNC. The english subtitles contains a few corrections on my "on the fly calculations" that where really off the grid

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNom3F6vyYE

Victor is first releasing this firmware for people that have an USB Blaster, to make sure evertything goes smoothly with SMXFLASH, and once we get confidence that it is fine, it should be released for everyone. ;)

P.s.: NEVER, and I repeat, NEVER try using regular OCM / Zemmix Neo firmwares. It WON'T WORK, SM-X uses different FPGA, different flash memory, different pin connections! Doing so will likely brick your SM-X and you will need an USB Blaster to get a good firmware loaded again.

Ok, @ducasp, I think communication could be a little better. Of course Trucco is very kind and he usually replies to us in a very timely fashion, but I can't help but notice we could improve communication by setting up some kind of FAQ somewhere. There's a few outstanding questions right now, like these:

1. Where will we be getting official firmware versions? Will KdL continue to provide those like with all other OCM-based devices?
2. It's now clear that SM-X doesn't come with any particular KdL firmware, despite Trucco referring us to the Zemmix Neo BR user manual. What are the differences between both firmwares?
3. What kind of hardware is implemented in current firmware?
4. It's cumbersome to deal with the differences between the Zemmix Neo BR user manual and what Trucco told us via e-mail. Is there any chance for a new user manual, specific to SM-X, being released? If needed, I would be super happy to help with that.
5. This is related to the above question about implemented hardware, but how do we use dual SCC in SM-X? OCM/Zemmix Neo allows you to assign SCC+ to both external slots via DIP switches, but it's actually the same SCC+. Does this mean that SM-X is different from OCM/Zemmix Neo in this respect? Or is the second SCC+ somewhere else?
6. Is there any chance of you or Victor Trucco or KdL accepting requests or suggestions for features to use the remaining FPGA space?

As an amateur musician and MSX music enthusiast, i'd love for this last item to be seriously contemplated. @Grauw's VGMPlay already supports a slew of sound chips on MSX and it would be great if SM-X also had some of those which have open source FPGA implementations, like YM2151 (used on Yamaha's SFG modules) and SN76489 (this one could be a little bit extended in order to support both vanilla SN76489 and the Sega variation). MSX-Audio would also be great, if possible.