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PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

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Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#21

Post by fomine3 »

Lerc wrote: post #4
mmastrac wrote: post #2

While this is interesting, the project page is a little light on what it can do. Can the RPi feed streams of instructions to the N64? Can it act as a co-processor? EDIT: more info on Twitter apparently: https://twitter.com/kbeckmann/status/1539738410063208454

There are a bunch of potential ways that could go with varying levels of interest to myself. The PIO of a Pico is quite fast and could theoretically be utilized to pretend to be a specific chip. The question is at what speed. That's what would interest me the most. It would be a fun project to make a Pico pretend to be an SRAM and measure what kind of access speeds it could support. If could be fast enough to hack in…

It even can output HDMI https://github.com/Wren6991/PicoDVI

Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#22

Post by geokon »

bschwindHN wrote: post #11

It might be worth your while to have JLCPCB (or another PCB fab) do all the surface mount assembly. They can even do USB C connectors these days, so you just place an order for the boards, receive them in the mail, take them out of the box, and plug them in. This would of course require laying out a circuit for the bare RP2040 chip instead of using an RP2040 stamp, but it's not a complicated design, and you'll save a…

If you made a 0.8mm board you don't even need a usb-c connector as the board fits into the cable.

Supposedly this works great (havent tried myself though)

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#23

Post by Bluecobra »

asveikau wrote: post #18
yomkippur wrote: post #10

I really think this is the best way to enjoy retro games. Original hardware + cart/cd emulation with games loaded on sd card. Access to every single game in every region for the entire console that runs flawlessly. The hiccups and bugs you experience with emulation totally ruins immersion. Also best played on CRT. I still remember there used to be a Hong Kong vendor that sold these flash carts and you could load N64…

I remember in the late 90s reading about a device that sat in the N64 cartridge slot and loaded games from a zip drive. I think it may have been called z64. I remember similar units for SNES that loaded from floppy disk.

When the network adapter came out on the PS2, you could stick a standard IDE hard drive into the console and use a special boot disc CD to FTP games to it and load it from the hard drive.

It’s pretty wild that in a span of ~10 years or so you had these devices go from floppy disks > CD drives > ZIP drives > hard drives.

Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#26

Post by [deleted] »

bri3d wrote: post #5
mmastrac wrote: post #2

While this is interesting, the project page is a little light on what it can do. Can the RPi feed streams of instructions to the N64? Can it act as a co-processor? EDIT: more info on Twitter apparently: https://twitter.com/kbeckmann/status/1539738410063208454

The N64 flash cartridge feeds data to the N64 on a 16 bit parallel bus. It's used to store the game ROM. I suppose by writing clever self-modifying "ROM" code, you could hack the Pi into acting as a coprocessor, but in this configuration, it's just feeding arbitrary game data to the N64 - emulating the ROM that would be seen in a normal N64 flash cart. Unlike in older consoles like the SNES where cartridges often con…

[deleted]

Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#27

Post by jeroenhd »

mmastrac wrote: post #2

While this is interesting, the project page is a little light on what it can do. Can the RPi feed streams of instructions to the N64? Can it act as a co-processor? EDIT: more info on Twitter apparently: https://twitter.com/kbeckmann/status/1539738410063208454

The RP2040 runs at 133MHz, with the capability to run even faster (supposedly 420MHz).

With a CPU and GPU running at 94 and 63MHz, the console this chip is driving is barely faster than the chip itself. Build your board right (the 420MHz clock) and it's not even much of a challenge.

So, which one is the coprocessor, really: the super fast chip processing and transmitting instructions to execute, or the N64's VR4300?

At this point, I'd argue that the entire console is just the graphics and sound coprocessor for the RP2040 instead of the other way around!

Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#28

Post by bschwindHN »

geokon wrote: post #22
bschwindHN wrote: post #11

It might be worth your while to have JLCPCB (or another PCB fab) do all the surface mount assembly. They can even do USB C connectors these days, so you just place an order for the boards, receive them in the mail, take them out of the box, and plug them in. This would of course require laying out a circuit for the bare RP2040 chip instead of using an RP2040 stamp, but it's not a complicated design, and you'll save a…

If you made a 0.8mm board you don't even need a usb-c connector as the board fits into the cable. Supposedly this works great (havent tried myself though) https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

For peace of mind I'd go with the connector, which should be sturdier and doesn't dictate a board thickness.

The one I use starts at $0.27 for 1, and goes down with bulk pricing:

https://lcsc.com/product-detail/USB-Connectors_Korean-Hropar...

Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#29

Post by moepstar »

Bluecobra wrote: post #23
asveikau wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember in the late 90s reading about a device that sat in the N64 cartridge slot and loaded games from a zip drive. I think it may have been called z64. I remember similar units for SNES that loaded from floppy disk.

When the network adapter came out on the PS2, you could stick a standard IDE hard drive into the console and use a special boot disc CD to FTP games to it and load it from the hard drive. It’s pretty wild that in a span of ~10 years or so you had these devices go from floppy disks > CD drives > ZIP drives > hard drives.

This was also done before on the Dreamcast - it had a "BBA" (broadband adapter) peripheral that could also be used to read / write disc images to / from network locations iirc... so that was around 22 years ago :)

Re: PicoCart64: Nintendo 64 flash cart using a Raspberry Pi RP2040

#30

Post by johnwalkr »

geokon wrote: post #22
bschwindHN wrote: post #11

It might be worth your while to have JLCPCB (or another PCB fab) do all the surface mount assembly. They can even do USB C connectors these days, so you just place an order for the boards, receive them in the mail, take them out of the box, and plug them in. This would of course require laying out a circuit for the bare RP2040 chip instead of using an RP2040 stamp, but it's not a complicated design, and you'll save a…

If you made a 0.8mm board you don't even need a usb-c connector as the board fits into the cable. Supposedly this works great (havent tried myself though) https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

It needs to be 1mm for the n64 cartridge edge connector.
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