ROM / Firmware / DAT discussion

[ramon]

I was wondering, since the death of Romshepherd, I can't find Winuae DAT and firmware update anywhere. Anyone knows where to find them for 4.2.0? Could someone upload them both (DAT and firmweare) to the zone?

NOTE: I do have the full 4.1.0 set, if anyone is interested. Am I allowed to post a link here? Don't want to be banned over my generosity!

Thanks,
Ramon

[Ian]

No don't post it here as it's against the rules. I'm sure someone here knows where you can get it, but I have to say if you already have a set from 4.1.0, there is no particular rush getting the few more from 4.2.0.

Looks like you have the sickness though, Romwhoreitus. I'm just getting over my affliction. Deleted all my mame stuff that I never played.

[Viceroy]

Originally Posted by Ian

No don't post it here as it's against the rules. I'm sure someone here knows where you can get it, but I have to say if you already have a set from 4.1.0, there is no particular rush getting the few more from 4.2.0.

Looks like you have the sickness though, Romwhoreitus. I'm just getting over my affliction. Deleted all my mame stuff that I never played.

Ditto, I also deleted all my mame collection I just collected and never even looked at it, it became so big to store, plus back up, I saved a stack of HD space when I deleted it, I only kept Mooncresta ;-)

[E-Penguin]

Originally Posted by ramon

I do have the full 4.1.0 set, if anyone is interested.

Interested via PM - I have no problem with my rom addiction. Just one more won't hurt, I can stop any time I want...

[ramon]

Originally Posted by Ian

No don't post it here as it's against the rules. I'm sure someone here knows where you can get it, but I have to say if you already have a set from 4.1.0, there is no particular rush getting the few more from 4.2.0.

Looks like you have the sickness though, Romwhoreitus. I'm just getting over my affliction. Deleted all my mame stuff that I never played.

No rush indeed, except, bring them, NOW! LOL! Collecting is not a destination, it's a journey to software enlightenment. I'm only the temporary curator of this endless preservation effort. All those piece of software; app, games, ROMS, BIOS and Firmware, waiting to be saved from the oblivion of forgetfulness... Ahhhh..... The unparalleled joy of finding this unreleased game, this thought to be lost ROM, this version 1.00 of an emulator you were after for years, this last piece to complete your set to finally contemplate that elusive green check mark in CTRLMamePro... Only a select few can truly understand.

Just upgraded my server with 2 X 8TB Iron Wolf bringing the total capacity well over 30TB. If it's computer/console/devices, software/firmware related, from between 1945 and 2000, or any emulator running on DOS/Windows, I probably have it, in multiple versions. That's been going, daily, since 1995. As you can see, the terms "sickness" and 'Romwhoreitus" are probably a gross understatement in my case. I ascended to my final form, above level 9000, to the Parthenon of ROMS a long time ago.

Back on topic, there are quite a few new hardware emulated with 4.2.0 that would require their respective BIOS in order to use them: What's the point of new emulated hardware if you can't play, test, fool around or just nostalgically reminisce with them? That's not a rhetorical question, I want an answer!

If only I could get my hands on the WinUAE 4.2.0 DAT, that would be a start. DATs are not illegal yet, right? With CRC32, you can at least Google/pastebin hunt them down. It would be so great if CTRLMamePro could extract that XML DAT, just like it's possible with MAME, with command line "winuae64.exe -listxml". Just tried it, does not work.

So, I proceeded to import winuae64.exe into HxD to dissect the executable itself to look for some hints, and nothing. Then I went to github to scan the source and found rommgr.ccp at https://github.com/tonioni/WinUAE/bl...ter/rommgr.cpp. From there, I found the subsection at line 105 starting with "static struct romdata roms[] = {" and TADAAAA!!! All the firmware, up to number 249, their length and their CRC32, but no SHA1! Let's take Firmware 249 for example, It look like this:


{ _T("IVS Trumpcard v4.9"), 4, 9, 4, 9, _T("IVSTC\0"), 16384, 249, 0, 0, ROMTYPE_IVSTC, 0, 0, NULL,
0x5282febc, 0x9d69a534, 0x60529d66, 0x13b64723, 0xb0c8dfa5, 0x80274048, NULL, NULL },

Name: IVS Trumpcard v4.9
Length in byte: 16384
Firmware number: 249
CRC32: 5282febc

So I proceeded to Google that CRC immediately, and unfortunately, nothing. For now... Then I tried to manually build a DAT with the 4.1.0 DAT as a template, so I loaded it in Notepad++ and found something I was unaware of: The author's name of those DAT: Crashdisk! Another piece to Google hunt. It seems he could be hanging out on tradu-france forum. Will investigate later.

Then I simply searched for the names/rom number (245 to 249) of the new firmware in 4.2.0 in the source list, and replaced the values in DAT 4.1.0 with the new values. The specific entry for ROM 249 look like this, once recreated:

game (
name "[ROM 249] IVS Trumpcard v4.9 (16k)"
description "[ROM 249] IVS Trumpcard v4.9 (16k)"
rom ( name "[ROM 249] IVS Trumpcard v4.9 (16k).rom" size 16384 crc 5282febc )
)

Did the same for all 7 or 8, but unfortunately some of them are not listed, even in the source. For example, keywords like "Prelude", "Trifecta" and "Tandem" could not be found. Strange. So now I have a DAT, but only for some of the new 4.2.0 firmware. Better than nothing, until we get the real thing. So I scanned my pile of Amiga firmware update I got left and right along the years and was happy to find I already had 246, 247 and 249. So, those are the one still missing, plus those not even mentioned in the source:

[ROM 125] KS Velvet ROM v0.4 r24.061 (128k)
[ROM 125] KS Velvet ROM v0.4 r24.061 (4x32k)
[ROM 234] DraCo Boot ROM v1.3 (128k)
[ROM 245] Multi Evolution 500-2000 v2.2 (2x32k)
[ROM 245] Multi Evolution 500-2000 v2.2 (64k)
[ROM 248] Harms 3000 Professional (64k)


"I'm sure someone here knows where you can get it" Yeah, still need to reach completeness nirvana!

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by ramon

[ROM 245] Multi Evolution 500-2000 v2.2 (2x32k)
[ROM 245] Multi Evolution 500-2000 v2.2 (64k)
[ROM 248] Harms 3000 Professional (64k)

You can probably find these from the archive that Toni uploads to The Zone! i.e. expansion_boot_roms.zip.

[ramon]

Originally Posted by DamienD

You can probably find these from the archive that Toni uploads to The Zone! i.e. expansion_boot_roms.zip.

Been getting those Toni's update for a while now as many other sources simply vanished... Thanks for the recommendation.