Baud rate
---------



		There is a serial connection between the Black PlayStation and
	the PC; this is how data is downloaded from the PC to the Black
	PlayStation. The speed of this connection, called the baud rate,
	terminal speed or communication speed, is important in reducing
	delays in the downloading of data.

		The default baud rate is 9600 bps; that is what the Black
	PlayStation will use unless told otherwise. That is also the
	default setting for the console tool, siocons. However, it is quite
	easy to increase the baud rate by a factor of twenty, 
	to a value of 115200 bps. This is definitely worth doing given 
	the amount of data an average program needs to download.

		To change the baud rate up to 115200 bps, and to maintain it
	at that level, use the following procedure.



			
1. Insert a memory card into card slot 2 (right hand side).
	The memory card should be already formatted and empty.	

2. In `siocons' prompt, type:
        >> BAUD 115200
	This will cause a message to be displayed on screen:


3. Quit `siocons'
        F10, F2		 (or press ESCAPE)

4. Invoke siocons with
		siocons -B115200

5. Press return several times; wait for several seconds
	until the following message appears:

	Save the new baud rate into the memory card ? ( y/n )
		
		type 'y' in response to this;

	siocons will print 'Completed'.

6.	From then on, whenever the Black PlayStation is turned on 
	or reset with that memory card in slot 2 (the right hand slot),
	it will automatically detect the memory card and hence
	set itself to whatever baud rate was set (e.g. 115200).
	From then on, invoke siocons with the -B115200 option: 

	   siocons -B115200



	NOTE: doing steps 2-4 will alone change the baud rate,
	but each time the Black PlayStation is reset or turned on again,
	it will revert back to the 9600 bps rate. Allowing the Black
	PlayStation to save the new baud rate to a memory card allows
	it to stay at the highest baud rate without the user having
	to reset it each session; the Black PlayStation will auto-detect 
	the memory card at start-up, and set itself to the 
	higher baud rate automatically.


		After successfully setting the baud rate at 115200 bps, 
	the simplest course of action to keep it at this baud rate is 
	to leave the memory card in slot 2, and always invoke siocons
	with the -B115200 option. This option is strictly necessary, 
	since siocons default baud rate is 9600; if the siocons tool
	and the Black PlayStation are not in exact agreement about the
	baud rate, this will cause the Black PlayStation to become 
	totally unresponsive.
		
		The simplest way of doing this is to write a MS-DOS batch file
	which contains the command

		siocons -B115200

	If it is named 'blackpsx', then you can always use the command 
	'blackpsx' rather than 'siocons' to invoke the console tool.
	Later changes to the baud rate need only have one knock-on change,
	in the batch file, rather than affecting each subsequent
	invocation of the console tool.




Possible problems with baud rate
--------------------------------


	PROBLEM:
		The Black PlayStation becomes totally unresponsive: i.e. after
	invoking siocons, the prompt >> does not appear; the message
	[DTLH3000 not ready!] may appear.

	DIAGNOSIS:
		This is most likely to be due to a disagreement between
	the siocons tool and the Black PlayStation about the
	baud rate.


	PROBLEM:
		One of the toold supplied with the Black PlayStation
	does not work properly.

	DIAGNOSIS:
		Some of the tools supplied with the Black PlayStation 
	seem to work ONLY when the baud rate is 9600 bps :-

		timview.exe/timv.bat
		load.exe
		dload.exe
		go.exe

	This is unfortunate, but most if not all of the functionality of
	these tools is redundant, done already by siocons or by portions
	of the sample code.