Prin-C is just decapping the Magic Pico

I did not rest the last couple of months.
Most of my time went to the CD/DVD preservation group redump.org for which i dumped over 300 discs so far. As i have a collection of more than 2000 CD's/DVD's, i still have work for the next few years.

The last couple of days some interesting stuff arrived here, these are the main reasons for this blog-entry:

Decapping another Quizard MCU

 Let's start with a new decapped 8751H MCU for the Quizard-System! I already knew that there exist at least two different Revisions of MCU-Program-Code. The Revisions are marked on each MCU with "A1" or "D1". The previously decapped MCU for Version 1 was "A1" and the decapped MCU's for Version 3 and 4 were "D1". You can clearly see, that the existing MCU-dumps for Version 3 and Version 4 are most likely identical...differences are only a couple of bytes. 

Yesterday i got a new MCU for Quizard 3 which was marked "A1", so i used my decapping-knowledge and decapped it.

1. 8751H MCU (DE = Language | 132 = for Version 3 | A1 = Code-Revision)

2. Heating the Top-Cover to about 340°Celsius and pop it up with a screwdriver

3. Cover the eprom-area with some sexy nail-polish of your wife. Put the chip into the UV-Eraser.

4. I always try the dump afterwards on a new written 89C51 with the original Hardware. Works perfectly!

 If you compare the existing dump of Version 1 with this new dump from Version 3, you can clearly see that these are also pretty much the same.

So while all these Quizard-MCU-dumps are currently not really used in MAME and we already had a working dump for Version 3. This new dump is just for pure preservation! On the real hardware it makes abssolutely no difference if you use MCU's with Revision "A1" or "D1".

IMPERA Magic Export PCB

I found another IMPERA board last week and dumped the eprom, flashrom and eeprom.

We already have dumps of identical boards of this in MAME:
Magic Lotto Export (5.03) [http://www.progettoemma.net/gioco.php?game=magicle]
Magic Card Jackpot (4.01) [http://www.progettoemma.net/gioco.php?game=magicardj]

The interesting part is most likely the Flashrom, as the two other dumps are missing these! As those flashroms were always soldered in, it would be possible that these boards always used the same Flashrom-Content...which would mean that this new dump would also complete the other two games and maybe get these to a playable state!

I sent the dumps to Roberto Fresca, who will look at it!

Sega Pico

Most Pico games are already dumped and  it's nearly impossible to get the few remaining undumped games.

But i got "HPC-6132 - Oryouri Daisuki! Kitchen Pico" at Yahoo Japan, a couple of month's ago!

Working in MAME and should get added to the Pico-Softlist soon...

Cartridges for the Prin-C

I dumped the System-Bios and some cartridges already some time ago, which already got included in MAME to a skeleton driver.

I got four new cartridges for this system:

 

All are dumped and get hopefully soon added to the existing softlist too.

Teamwork is the most needed part to secure history

here are a couple of things, which happened the last two months.

Leapfrog Leapster:

15 new dumps!
thx to the financial help of Tauwasser and Buddybenj, i could buy these 15 previously undumped US games for the Leapster!


500-01168 - Spongebob Squarepants - Saves the Day (US)
500-10093 - Learning with Leap (US)
500-10999 - Kindergarten (US)
500-11204-A - Thomas and Friends - Calling all Engines! (US)
500-11929-A - Scholastic I Spy - Challenger (US)
500-11993-A - Number Raiders (US)
500-12160-A - Scooby Doo! - Spooky Snacks! (US)
500-12293-A - Scholastic - Animal Genius (US)
500-12350-A - Letterpillar (US)
500-12677-A - Creature Create (US)
500-13272-A - Wall-E (US)
500-13445-A - Ratatouille (US)
500-13472-A - Star Wars - Jedi Reading (US)
500-13563-A - Up (US)
500-14005-A - Scooby Doo! (US)
500-14320-A - Cars 2 (US)


as with all other Leapster dumps! these roms contain alot of SWF files, which can get extracted with different tools...

     

V.Smile 

6 new french dumps!


Winnie Rourson - La Chasse Du Miel De Winnie (FR) (new REV)
Les Grandes Decouvertes D'Elmo (FR)
Thomas Et Ses Amis (FR)
Oui-Oui - Detective D'Un Jour (FR)
ABC Land Aventure (FR)
Le Roi Lion - Simba Decouvre La Jungle (FR)

all six games boot in MAME!

Radica Space Invaders 5-in-1 TV Game

Last year I sent a couple of things to Sean, as it was too difficult to dump the stuff myself and he has the better equipment for this.

This included the internal pcb of this TV Plug & Play console from RADICA.
 Sean dumped it and Haze did an amazing job in emulating it!






Read more about it here, at Haze's blog: https://mamedev.emulab.it/haze/2018/01/15/the-alternative-to-emulation/

A video of the current emulation status:

Sega Pico

two new dumps could get bought and dumped for the Pico.

+ HPC-6148 - Shichida Makoto Kanshuu Unou Image Training Sansuu Eigo de Mojars ni Chousen‏‎ [Best Selection](Japan)
+ HPC-6149 - Shichida Makoto Kanshuu Unou Image Training Hiragana Katakana Casino de Moja Vegas Dream! [Best Selection](Japan)
+ T-133250 - Soreike! Anpanman no Minna de Kyousou Anpanman! (Japan)

HPC6148 and HPC6149 are Best-Selection re-releases, where we already have the original dumps...HPC-6148 is exactly the same as T-075010! HPC-6149 is a 2mb dump....filled the second half with FF's, like on some other Best-Selection releases...the minimum romsize for such Best-Selection releases was 2mb.

T-133250 - Soreike! Anpanman no Minna de Kyousou Anpanman! (Japan) is a real new/previously undumped game:

Olivetti Quaderno

rfka01 sent me a couple of internal boards from various PC's, where i mostly dumped the keyboard-controllers from. Included was also a Olivetti Quaderno, where i the 2 internal roms got dumped from!

VTech Intelligence Advance E/R Lerncomputer

rfka01 sent me also a Vtech Learning Laptop, which i sent to Sean also. Sean dumped the internal 8mb rom from it!

 

 

Konami Picno

SSJ and Dustin sent me a undumped cartridge for the Konami Picno.

RX111 - Kiiroi Kyouryuu-kun Parasa no Obake Taiji

89 in 1 - NES Handheld

I bought this 89in1 handheld in China, for 5USD...and dumped the internal rom!
It's VT* based and as David Shah does currently some great work for the VT*-Emulation in MAME...it's working there.


   

Target Ball '96 (ARCADE)

Brian found an undumped version of Target Ball at ebay and offered to pay most the costs if someone in Europe wants to buy it for dumping. I bought it and covered the remaining amount.

Basically just a title hack of Target Ball (Nude) with an updated copyright year.

Conclusion

It's most times not possible to secure the games/software alone. A team with great people and alot of money is needed to get this all done the right way.