Home Page Forums MAME MAME TMS-09xx/1xxx thread (was New Dumps)

I transcribed the ROM and ran it through a simple TMS1000 emulator I rigged up from Paul Robson's MicroVision emulator. It does something, but I didn't think to listen to any of the ports.
www.seanriddle.com/m32018a.bin

www.seanriddle.com/m32018araw.bin

It's easy to hear them if you bash random buttons. MESS 0.157 was released yesterday. Try it :-) you can also see R and O activity.

press s and x a bunch and you'll hear it.
I thought it might be mattel's football II since the jingle is similar to the touchdown sound, but am not certain. (also mattel supposedly used rockwell chips at least for football I and baseball?)
It could be 'long bomb' as well, but that was an early lcd handheld and the process used to make its lcd was crappy, so very few if any examples have the lcd functional anymore (most have died of 'tunnel vision', similar to the powerbook 170 lcds)

LN

OK, I got a preliminary file done. Here's the ROM pic and the raw and 0980-translated files. I used 0s for all the bits in the damaged area, and there are some bits of plastic obscuring some bits, so I did the best I can there. It's been too cold to play with hydrofluoric acid on the driveway, but when it gets warmer I'll do it and compare the transcriptions.

www.seanriddle.com/tmc0271nlrom1280.jpg

www.seanriddle.com/tmc0271nlrawpartial.bin

www.seanriddle.com/tmc0271nlpartial.bin

Just built it. Are the PLA files available anywhere?

Should be, but I don't know where people get download their roms nowadays (not to mention posting a link to a romsite is probably against forum rules).. I'll send you a mail

Hmm, I didn't think about the output PLA files being copyrighted, but I wouldn't put it past someone to try to copyright the equations for a 7-segment decoder! I guess they could have put the digits in a different sequence to make a unique file....

I don't believe it would be copyrightable in the US

"If a pictorial, graphic or sculptural work is a useful article, it is copyrighted only if its aesthetic features are separable from its utilitarian features. A useful article is an article having an intrinsic utilitarian function that is not merely to portray the appearance of the article or to convey information. They must be separable from the functional aspect to be copyrighted."

However it's probably safest to assume that all roms are copyrightable as it avoids getting involves with layers.

There's a cool interview with Mark Lesser (who created a lot of Mattel's early led handhelds) at digital press. It's a pretty good read.

http://www.digitpress.com/library/interviews/interview_mark_lesser.html

And one at Popular Mechanics too.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/tec...bering-the-first-handheld-games-15987495

I did a search for "vintage teardown" on youtube and got a few interesting hits. mr1968geek has several handheld game teardowns, including a couple that I've bought- Entex Space Invader and Coleco Quiz Wiz. My Space Invader has a National Semi COP444L, but his has a TI chip, likely a TMS1x00 (MP1211). The Quiz Wiz has completely different markings, but that's a custom chip, so I'm not surprised. He also has vids of Coleco Digits (like Comp IV) with a GI AY-3-8400, Entex Electronic Baseball with a TMS1000 (MP0914), Videomaster Colourscope TV Games with a National NS/743 MM57105N, and an Invicta Electronic Mastermind with a Rockwell MM75 (the smaller PPS-4/1). That's a nice selection of chips, but unfortunately no MP3403....