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bobbydilley

bobbydilley

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* Posted in Naomi thread as thats the most similar machine I can think of, if there is a better thread please feel free to move.

Has anyone ever tried to mess about with getting games to run on the System SP?

I've attempted to Netboot it using a random ROM but it would reboot after about 30 seconds and not do anything. I however didn't have a zero key in there (so maybe it requires one of those to stop it rebooting) and I'm not sure I made the rom correctly.

Was just wondering if anyone has ever tried this, or tried getting any Naomi/SP games running on the SP which would be awesome seeing as they have built in I/O and are dirt cheap right now. Only game I can think of that would be fun and usable for the SP is the Tetris one, all the others require some strange I/O, and seeing as it doesn't have a JVS input I can't fake it :/
 
afaik you can't Netboot SP. but you can CF boot, this system was mainly designed for it.
there is also no "zero key", this systems uses PIC keys like in NAOMI 171-8346C "M4" type cartridges, different key type than keys for DIMM board games.
you will be unable to run NAOMI games on it, SP and N hardware is different, not much but enough to make them not-compatible.

btw, which game your SP PCB originally is/was ? quite strange to hear it reboots, normally it's expected to show some error message instead.
 
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> can't Netboot SP

The functionality for net booting is there, the reboot command through Ethernet works, and I can get it to start loading from the network, with text displaying on the screen to that effect. It loads a certain amount, and then reboots and goes to some error (which unfortunately I can't remember, but I'm pretty sure it's a game rom not correct for this system type one).

> no "zero key"

Ah thank you, that might be a big issue then. I'd have to work out how to burn the correct pic data for the game - I think it should be available in mame though?

> which game

The game inside was dino king, which when booted from the CF card will goto the error saying it can't find the management chip / IO or something to that affect. When I was netbooting however, I believe I removed the card, and changed the jumpers to make it boot from the network instead.
 
by "can't Netboot SP" I mean "there was attempts to do it but no any success". it is also expected to be slow as hell, because this system is not RAM-based like DIMM, but uses flash ROMs, which erase/program takes significant time, like half of hour (or hour ?) for whole game.

in MAME there is only "good" dinoking PIC dump. the rest was not properly dumped and not usable on real hardware.

which is your dino CF version ? what is written on the card ? usually "MDA-C"-something, or not, if it selfmade copy.
there was recently dumped and added to MAME JP DinoKing4, which doesn't require management chips, but it require Japanese region mobo.
 
Ah thank you, that makes more sense - you don't happen to know who was investigating it do you?

I'll have to have a look when I'm back home in the next few weeks, currently away for my job and all my arcade bits aren't with me unfortunately :( Would be super cool to get DinoKing4 running on there though, thank you for the tip!
 
MetalliC said:
it is also expected to be slow as hell, because this system is not RAM-based like DIMM, but uses flash ROMs, which erase/program takes significant time, like half of hour (or hour ?) for whole game.
Click to expand...
I mean, if "net booting" is figured out that might be ok since it presumably wouldn't need to be re-flashed on the next boot, no? Are there any blogs/posts on CF booting on System SP? I wouldn't mind playing around with this hardware myself.
 
Cool, I have one of these boards from my Dino King, so anything else I can do with it would be cool. I think these could also be converted to that Big Tetris game I think? Or am I mixing up my boards?
 
@Derick2k I'm wanting to use that Tetris game too, but apparently (if you look at the messages in this thread) the dumps for it aren't quite correct, and we don't have the key.

I've heard that only small games such as love + berry run in flash, so maybe those are the only ones that can be net-booted, and things that required SD cards won't support net booting?

But then again, I suppose we can write what we like to the CF card, so still could hopefully put other games on with the right dumps...
 
Yep I can confirm Love & Berry runs without a CF card inserted. I just thought it was on the boot-rom to be honest, but it does have a PIC inserted.
Dino King loads from CF, I have a few different card variations, up to v2.5, which I think was the 2006 variant?

Japan version was originally RFID check free, until (as I understand) Sega caught operators printing their own cards.


Other games on SP / Aurora? Other than Tetris Giant?
Well there's brick people.. but sadly you need the 'bricks' to play it. There's 'Future Police Patrol Chase' but it requires steering wheels,
as does 'Issyouni Turbo Drive'.
https://www.system16.com/hardware.php?id=732

I never seen any conversions yet.
 
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