Robotron, lets start with the power

[ArcadEd]

Yeah, they are cheap enough and Bob has the good 150ns stuff so I am just getting a full set of 24 from him, plus the lithium battery upgrade.

I'm looking through all my other pcbs now just to see if there is 4116 chips on any of them to test LOL.

 

[joeycuda]

My Stargate had some issues with resetting and booting with inconsistent ROM? errors. I ended up replacing the main board to ROM board ribbon cable and it's been rock solid since. I'd also recommend you replace all the connectors. They're IDC type, but you can replace with Molex housings and crimp pins. Bob Roberts sells a kit that covers the most important of the connectors. Since I was in there, I went ahead and replaced the male headers on the PCBS, since some of the pins were dark or tarnished.

 

[D_Harris]

When it comes to the game play of Joust, StarGate, Robotron, etc., is there any detectable and significant difference between the 150ns and the 120ns 4164 chips? (Or even 100ns for that matter).

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[Dokert]

When it comes to the game play of Joust, StarGate, Robotron, etc., is there any detectable and significant difference between the 150ns and the 120ns 4164 chips? (Or even 100ns for that matter).

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

Darren: Yes, but this has nothing to do with this particular thread.

Ed : -12vdc is used for sound only IIRC. Your power supply is shot and needs to be rebuilt. The -5vdc BR #3 is probably bad, and it sounds like BR1 (+5vdc) is failing too.

 

[D_Harris]

Darren: Yes, but this has nothing to do with this particular thread.

Hows that?

The OP (ArcadEd) referred to "the good 150ns stuff", which was the reason for my question.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[Dokert]

Hows that?

The OP (ArcadEd) referred to "the good 150ns stuff", which was the reason for my question.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

The average joe user will not notice the difference, but the competitive gamer will notice the difference. In the higher levels with more shit on screen the slower RAM is a tad more glitchy than the faster RAM.

Does that answer your question Darren?

 

[D_Harris]

The average joe user will not notice the difference, but the competitive gamer will notice the difference. In the higher levels with more shit on screen the slower RAM is a tad more glitchy than the faster RAM.

Does that answer your question Darren?

Almost.

How fast are the original 4116 chips? (I'm thinking the closest match might be the 150ns 4164, correct?).

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[YellowDog]

The original RAMs were 450nS RAM, so the difference between 100nS, 120nS, 150nS and 250nS are moot. The RAM access is 500nS (2MHz) period. That is controlled by the clock derived from the 12MHz crystal. The speed of the RAM is just the rated speed, meaning that they were tested to be able to sustain that speed. A 68 Beetle, a Ford Taurus and a Porche all drive 55 when driving behind a cop car going 55. The fact that 2 of the 3 can go faster is immaterial. The cop car is gating their speed. The clock in this case is the cop car.

ken

 

[D_Harris]

The original RAMs were 450nS RAM, so the difference between 100nS, 120nS, 150nS and 250nS are moot. The RAM access is 500nS (2MHz) period. That is controlled by the clock derived from the 12MHz crystal. The speed of the RAM is just the rated speed, meaning that they were tested to be able to sustain that speed. A 68 Beetle, a Ford Taurus and a Porche all drive 55 when driving behind a cop car going 55. The fact that 2 of the 3 can go faster is immaterial. The cop car is gating their speed. The clock in this case is the cop car.

ken

Nice analogy

Ok, so how can a "competitive gamer" possibly notice any difference in game play between the above mentioned ram chips?

Thanks.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[Dokert]

Nice analogy

Ok, so how can a "competitive gamer" possibly notice any difference in game play between the above mentioned ram chips?

Thanks.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

Go with what Ken said and call it a day.

 

[D_Harris]

Go with what Ken said and call it a day.

Well, I understand what ken said.

I'm just wondering about what you said about a competitive gamer being able to tell the difference in game play when using ram chips of varying speeds.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[SanTe]

Well, I understand what ken said.

I'm just wondering about what you said about a competitive gamer being able to tell the difference in game play when using ram chips of varying speeds.

In the later stages of the game where there is too much crap on screen at once the game suffers some slow down. Purportedly the faster RAM causes this not to happen, but YellowDog's explanation of the game's RAM access speed should put that one to bed.

I've read speculation that newer, faster replacement RAM also causes the tanks to start firing sooner and their shots to travel faster. There is a thread on the TG forums discussing that. No proof that I know of. People are just trying to figure out the cause(s) of the perceived differences.

I do know that Ken House's Robotron seems to play harder than any other Robotron I've come across. When I mentioned this to Ken he told me that others have told him the same thing. I know Ken keeps his cab on the correct settings (difficulty 5 is used for both marathon and TGTS tracks), so it's a bit of a mystery. Someone on the CAGDC forums just the other day wondered if it's a difference of ROM set revisions; is one harder than the other even when they are set to the same difficulty setting, is the question.

 

[D_Harris]

In the later stages of the game where there is too much crap on screen at once the game suffers some slow down. Purportedly the faster RAM causes this not to happen, but YellowDog's explanation of the game's RAM access speed should put that one to bed.

I've read speculation that newer, faster replacement RAM also causes the tanks to start firing sooner and their shots to travel faster. There is a thread on the TG forums discussing that. No proof that I know of. People are just trying to figure out the cause(s) of the perceived differences.

I do know that Ken House's Robotron seems to play harder than any other Robotron I've come across. When I mentioned this to Ken he told me that others have told him the same thing. I know Ken keeps his cab on the correct settings (difficulty 5 is used for both marathon and TGTS tracks), so it's a bit of a mystery. Someone on the CAGDC forums just the other day wondered if it's a difference of ROM set revisions; is one harder than the other even when they are set to the same difficulty setting, is the question.

That is the case with Defender, so if it is that way with Robotron I wouldn't be surprised.

What are the ram specifics on Ken's board?

Anyway, there is a lot of speculation and no real proof of anything. So I'll just operate under the assumption that 150nS will result in no perceivable differences than using 100nS, because logically it shouldn't. (Unless ram access times are different from one ram speed to another, and there is no reason that would be the case).

Thanks.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[YellowDog]

The slowdown that occurs is the result of the object list processing. Because we are dealing with a 1MHz CPU, when there are a large number of objects on the screen only part of the object list will get processed on each screen display. The player and the the player shots are always the first items on the process list. Then come the objects that didn't get processed on the previous frame. Finally come the new objects that need processing.

So if there are 30 objects on screen and the processor can only handle 10 objects per frame, then there are 20 objects that don't get processed and will lag behind on every frame. But the player is always updated. That is why on most Williams games at the beginning of a new level there appears to be a momentary freeze of all of the enemies when the screen is loaded with objects. It is really noticible on Joust, but it works to the player's advantage in Robotron where you can really clear space for yourself right at the beginning.

In Robotron, having the joysticks tuned up makes a huge difference in how hard the game is. I try to keep my switches tuned up so that the slightest pressure will activate them. But you need to have them all set to the same distance or it will seem to move/shoot easier in one direction or diagonally which will throw the game off.

As far as I know, the major changes to Robotron were to fix some minor glitches. Most notably the quark in the corner bug.

ken

 

[D_Harris]

The slowdown that occurs is the result of the object list processing. Because we are dealing with a 1MHz CPU, when there are a large number of objects on the screen only part of the object list will get processed on each screen display. The player and the the player shots are always the first items on the process list. Then come the objects that didn't get processed on the previous frame. Finally come the new objects that need processing.

So if there are 30 objects on screen and the processor can only handle 10 objects per frame, then there are 20 objects that don't get processed and will lag behind on every frame. But the player is always updated. That is why on most Williams games at the beginning of a new level there appears to be a momentary freeze of all of the enemies when the screen is loaded with objects. It is really noticible on Joust, but it works to the player's advantage in Robotron where you can really clear space for yourself right at the beginning.

In Robotron, having the joysticks tuned up makes a huge difference in how hard the game is. I try to keep my switches tuned up so that the slightest pressure will activate them. But you need to have them all set to the same distance or it will seem to move/shoot easier in one direction or diagonally which will throw the game off.

As far as I know, the major changes to Robotron were to fix some minor glitches. Most notably the quark in the corner bug.

ken

There still seems to be a lot of debate on whether the corner bug was corrected.

BTW, Those processing slow downs were always a pain for me on a game like Defender. But from watching other players they don't seem to happen as much on Robotron.

When Dokert mentioned that competitive gamers would notice a difference I was looking for someone to say that there was definitely a perceivable difference in game slow-down depending on what ram chips are used. But I guess not.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

 

[YellowDog]

If I told you that I had put faster RAM in a machine, you would probably tell me that the game "felt" faster. That is a placebo effect. The actual list processing is controlled by the clock speeds which are in turn controlled by the crystal. The only way to speed up the game is to drop in a faster crystal.

Since the video is derived directly from the same crystal, if it was replaced by a slightly faster crystal, I would expect the video signals to be off. Especially the horizontal.

ken

 

[D_Harris]

If I told you that I had put faster RAM in a machine, you would probably tell me that the game "felt" faster. That is a placebo effect.

Nope. Only a change significant enough to be noted would cause one to make such an observation.

Since there would be no change manifested on screen there would be no way to know that one was using 100sN instead of 450sN.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.