CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Disk drives, Monitors, SuperCPU etc.
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by TMR »

motrucker wrote:So, where do we go from here? Can someone get the rights, and make the scpu again? Can some one make a clone?
Where do we go? Well, it's all possible in theory but the issue is going to be the large amount of work involved to rework the SuperCPU for more easily available parts or put together a clone is significant and probably wouldn't "pay out" at the end; the interested potential users are a subset of an already small group so anyone taking this on as a commercial venture doesn't have a market (and, if they're selling a complete solution, would either have to deal with the issue of licensing the SuperCPU ROM code or clearing use of the stand-in that VICE offers) and the people who do it for the joy of developing simply don't seem interested right now, presumably because there's almost nothing to take advantage of their hard work.

More software would possibly be an encouragement for the hardware folks to put the hours in, but very few of the SuperCPU's fans seem to be programmers... so have you considered learning 65816? =-)


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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by bjonte »

TMR wrote:More software would possibly be an encouragement for the hardware folks to put the hours in, but very few of the SuperCPU's fans seem to be programmers... so have you considered learning 65816? =-)
I agree completely. Software support is extremely lacking and the user base is tiny. Retro programmers are fueled by praise and hurrahs and a small user base means less of that so I would be very surprised if a SuperCPU release happened today. Maybe some can be convinced to support it, as in making sure the releases don't crash, but that would most likely mean turning it off more or less. Maybe some work could be done to fix existing releases, like the NTSC community is doing, but then again it will be a too small amount of praise and hurrahs to be worth the effort.
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by motrucker »

bjonte wrote:
TMR wrote:More software would possibly be an encouragement for the hardware folks to put the hours in, but very few of the SuperCPU's fans seem to be programmers... so have you considered learning 65816? =-)
I agree completely. Software support is extremely lacking and the user base is tiny. Retro programmers are fueled by praise and hurrahs and a small user base means less of that so I would be very surprised if a SuperCPU release happened today. Maybe some can be convinced to support it, as in making sure the releases don't crash, but that would most likely mean turning it off more or less. Maybe some work could be done to fix existing releases, like the NTSC community is doing, but then again it will be a too small amount of praise and hurrahs to be worth the effort.
A lot of people apparently haven't thought about the software aspect of this. It truly doesn't look good for any sort of Super CPU project, any time soon.
This has been discussed at other forums, and usually they come to the same conclusion:
http://www.REMOVED.com/forum/viewtopic. ... c&start=75
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

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motrucker wrote:A lot of people apparently haven't thought about the software aspect of this.
Software sells hardware, that's as true now as it's ever been and how many dedicated SuperCPU games are there? If a large percentage of the folks who wanted to see more SuperCPU hardware jumped on the bandwagon and developed software to demonstrate an interest it might get a hardware bod's attention but that's unlikely to happen...

And as far as pulling in coders goes, the SuperCPU has a couple of issues; the current emulation isn't trustworthy enough to do timing-critical code and getting real hardware is both difficult and painfully expensive whilst there are other, far more easily available options like the Chameleon or perhaps the Turbo Demo Card out there which do a similar job without requiring a second mortgage. And then you've got to build something that'll actually exercise the 20MHz CPU and 16Mb of RAM and that takes far more development time than pushing a stock or REU-armed C64.
Disclaimer: a message board post from this person shouldn't be seen as any kind of indication that a project has been started or is ongoing because as a programmer he has the attention span of... oh look, a squirrel!
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by motrucker »

TMR wrote:
motrucker wrote:A lot of people apparently haven't thought about the software aspect of this.
Software sells hardware, that's as true now as it's ever been and how many dedicated SuperCPU games are there? If a large percentage of the folks who wanted to see more SuperCPU hardware jumped on the bandwagon and developed software to demonstrate an interest it might get a hardware bod's attention but that's unlikely to happen...

And as far as pulling in coders goes, the SuperCPU has a couple of issues; the current emulation isn't trustworthy enough to do timing-critical code and getting real hardware is both difficult and painfully expensive whilst there are other, far more easily available options like the Chameleon or perhaps the Turbo Demo Card out there which do a similar job without requiring a second mortgage. And then you've got to build something that'll actually exercise the 20MHz CPU and 16Mb of RAM and that takes far more development time than pushing a stock or REU-armed C64.
This was an idea from another forum. Would this idea make any sense at all? Of course this idea doesn't take software into account, (again).
redrumloa wrote:I'd be interested in any drop in clone of the SuperCPU 128. I'd rather the system still be the host if possible.
With all the brilliant minds in the community, I am surprised there isn't an FPGA clone yet. The Thunderdrive is an example of a perfect CMD Hard Drive clone, despite what dastardly deeds the designer may have done. We need a SCPU128 clone!
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by TMR »

motrucker wrote:This was an idea from another forum. Would this idea make any sense at all? Of course this idea doesn't take software into account, (again).
redrumloa wrote:I'd be interested in any drop in clone of the SuperCPU 128. I'd rather the system still be the host if possible.
With all the brilliant minds in the community, I am surprised there isn't an FPGA clone yet.
An FPGA would probably be the best solution, the CPU is still available from WDC but finding equivalent parts to do a straight clone would be tricky; the task of getting a clone playing nice with the host C64, reacting like a real SuperCPU would under at least the majority of circumstances and arranging to use the official ROM to ensure software compatibility is Herculean so convincing someone to take that on for a tiny potential userbase and just handful of programs...

Again, software sells hardware. More software now might theoretically "sell" someone on the idea down the line but very few would be SuperCPU owners have ever been desperate enough to pick up an assembler.
Disclaimer: a message board post from this person shouldn't be seen as any kind of indication that a project has been started or is ongoing because as a programmer he has the attention span of... oh look, a squirrel!
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by dudz »

my advice would be to start making proper test program so the emulation can be fixed - without these even making a hardware clone is almost impossible (or fixing it for that matter)
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by TMR »

dudz wrote:my advice would be to start making proper test program so the emulation can be fixed - without these even making a hardware clone is almost impossible (or fixing it for that matter)
That makes sense... so owners of the real kit need to get coding. =-)
Disclaimer: a message board post from this person shouldn't be seen as any kind of indication that a project has been started or is ongoing because as a programmer he has the attention span of... oh look, a squirrel!
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by The_Other_Shaun_B »

If you are still interested in the CMD SuperCPU, there is a FB group that you may wish to join over at -> https://www.facebook.com/groups/611371042385599

And there is another group that is interested in all CMD products which may be found at -> https://www.facebook.com/groups/136107275225539

I am compiling a list of SCPU releases, articles and so on. If you can help out then let me know.

I must also pay a small tribute to TMR here - he was stricken by long Covid (in fact, he was the longest in-patient with Covid in England). He spent over 14 months in intensive care, and is a big loss. May he rest in peace.

As for Jason's last message here, I suppose as I own the real kit, I'd finally better get coding.
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Re: CMD SuperCPU - who's still interested?

Post by banman »

Please excuse any unwanted intrusion into this very interesting discussion. This sounds fascinating.

By the way have you seen this project?


https://github.com/frntc/Sidekick64/

Could this thing be of any use?

Just a thought.
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