Phil C's Raven build

[PhilC]

Managed to answer my own question once again.

So looking at the circuit diagram was what actually pointed me in the right direction.

Ignoring the MCLK & MCD as these are specific to if you've got an original ESS wavetable board fitted, which I don't have. My E-Wave is wired for standard wavetable interfaces.

Screenshot 2025-07-21 at 17.54.16.png

Screenshot 2025-07-21 at 18.01.12.png

The wavetable header does still have midi out and audio in in the shape of AUXB L & R which are controlled by Mixer register $3A

So to enable the midi background music in doom for instance, you need to run the MPU-401.PRG to enable MPU output, then also poke the following two addresses with the volume you require. I poked it with $FF for maximum volume. as below:

Code: Select all

pb $81000224 $3a    ; set mixer register to be altered to auxB mixer
pb $81000225 $FF     ; set auxB mixer to full volume for both L & R.

I may see if I can make a basic TOS command to set things like mixer volumes for this card.

[agranlund]

nice!!
it’s so much fun with all this old pc hardware and getting them to do things on Atari, right? :)

[PhilC]

Not having much luck tracking down Et400/W32i chips. Quite a few places say they have them, then even give you a price but then they can't get them.

I'll keep looking but will likely not send off the Excelgraph PCBs to those interested until I can find some chips.

[PhilC]

I've been wanting to get the Raven connected up properly to my case USB ports, rather than use a cable that I'd got to try and mount somewhere.

So I've gotten a couple of these and can confirm that they work just fine with my standard USB ports on the front of the case. You can also get adaptors so that you can use the USB-C ports as well but this one suits my needs just fine.

PXL_20250731_153342742.jpg

[agranlund]

Oh nice! I was hoping those kinds of adapters would work -- great to have it confirmed!

[PhilC]

I upgraded my Siig GD5429 to 2mb today with some interesting results.

The Diamond Speedstar Pro arrived as well. This card is also a Gd5429 but it looks to have the GD5426 bios as that's what it identified as. It does run slightly faster than the other card in 1mb mode as the memory clock on this one is set to 57.5 as opposed to 50mhz on the other.

Anyway,

Here's the interesting results I get on the Siig card when loading Tos. (Incidentally it now won't play Doom or Tyrian).

PXL_20250906_115410266.jpg

This should be a solid purple background. I've verified it's all soldered correctly as well.

Anyway, here's the debug info

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Coldboot
InitHeap
InitUart
InitIkbd
InitMfp
InitMidi
InitI2C
InitRtc
InitCfg
InitVbr
InitMonitor
IkbdConnect
CKBD.250619A1 1000000bps
InitAtari
InitVbr
InitMmu
InitVga
 32Kb VGA Bios at 800C0000
Starting Ñcirrus_identify 1
cirrus_identify 2
cirrus_identify 3
cirrus chipset: 19 : 08
cirrus vram: 2048
.ÇÇ≤.)   640, 400, 8 : 00 : 005e
   640, 480, 8 : 00 : 005f
   800, 600, 8 : 00 : 005c
  1024, 768, 8 : 00 : 0060
  1280,1024, 8 : 00 : 006d
   640, 480,16 : 00 : 0064
   800, 600,16 : 00 : 0065
  1024, 768,16 : 00 : 0074
   640, 480,24 : 00 : 0071
nv_init_vram 82200000 : 00200000 x 1
‚ cfg:  10 d8 1c
 dram: 50 mhz, 32¬
 

It will run with the Speedster bios chip installed but again, I get some bizarre results, ie deeper shades all colours but Doom and Tyrian still don't run, so it may be a driver issue. What do you think @agranlund?

[PhilC]

And for completeness, Here's the diagram info with the Speedster pro installed. Incidentally this won't load doom or Tyrian either. It gets stuck here:

PXL_20250906_121122371.jpg

Note the presence of the Desk & File menu appearing but then it crashed.

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RAVEN060
InitMonitor
IkbdConnect
 32Kb VGA Bios at 800C0000
  SpeedStar PRO1 MB display memory installed
Starting TOS
cirrus_identify 1
cirrus_identify 2
cirrus_identify 3
cirrus chipset: 15 : 06
cirrus vram: 1024
..“.ÇÇ.“.ÇÇ™.)  1024, 768, 8 : 00 : 0060
   320, 200,16 : 00 : 006f
   640, 480,16 : 00 : 0064
   800, 600,16 : 00 : 0065
   320, 200,24 : 00 : 0070
   640, 480,24 : 00 : 0071
nv_init_vram 82200000 : 00100000 x 1
bootres from emulator.bib
nova: p_changeres: 0005213c, 0 : 640x480x1
 cfg:  14 e9 a0
 dram: 50 mhz, 32bit, standard RAS
 fifo: 8, threshold: 1
 fpm:  on
 mclk: 20 : 57.3 mhz
size = 38400, pitch = 80

it also sometimes gives the following diagnosis info

Code: Select all

 32Kb VGA Bios at 800C0000
1 MB display memory installed
Starting TOS
cirrus_identify 1
cirrus_identify 2
cirrus_identify 3
cirrus chipset: 15 : 06
cirrus vram: 1024...≤¢Çb.ö™Çb.¢.“.ÇÇ.“.ÇÇäÇR   640, 480, 4 : 00 : 0012
   320, 200, 8 : 00 : 0013
   800, 600, 4 : 00 : 0058
  1024, 768, 4 : 00 : 005d
   640, 480, 8 : 00 : 005f
   800, 600, 8 : 00 : 005c
  1024, 768, 8 : 00 : 0060
   320, 200,16 : 00 : 006f
   640, 480,16 : 00 : 0064
   800, 600,16 : 00 : 0065
   320, 200,24 : 00 : 0070
   640, 480,24. cfg:  14 e9 a0
 dram: 50 mhz, 32bit, standard RAS
 fifo: 8, threshold: 1
 fpm:  on
 mclk: 20 : 57.3 mhz
size = 38400, pitch = 80

[PhilC]

Actually, PANIC OVER

It turns out that one of the files was corrupt, so I've replaced that and we are good to go once again.

And with the latest drivers and my memory clock set to 85 Mhz the GD5429 is faster than my non interleaved ET4000/W32i I do need to mess about with that card though and see why interleaving isn't working BUT for now, I'm leaving the GD5429 in the Raven.

[PhilC]

Oh and here's the mandatory Gembench compared to a standard STFM.

PXL_20250906_155143602.jpg

P.s. that's with the Ram set at 100mhz but it's now getting bottlenecked in the GPU as that runs around 80-86mhz if I remember correctly. As 85mhz gives a Blitter time of 0.45

[exxos]

Also with caches off ;)