The massive problem is making an interface for a Pioneer industrial player(LD 4200 most likely successful) and/or emulating the Pioneeer [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]DA-V1000 LD-ROM adapter with other hardware involved. Hell, if you found out whether or not they still hald the patents on that unit(it's abandonment was shortly after its release I believe) a copy could be made and instructions distributed without any worry(can that be done anyway ) Not sure if you ALSO had to connect the other RS-232 to the computer itself or if control could be done through the 15-pin via the [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]DA-V1000. The extent of my theory stops there, really. I think the fastest speed the resulting 'LD-ROM Drive' would reach is 3x, the fastest multi-speed search most LD players reach. However, since no sound is ever transmitted in multi-speed search mode, it may only be 1x. The big problem is this would ALSO require a computer with A/V-in hardware(analog video and music) attached and thus we have MASSIVE compatability issues and for the first time in years, speed of a 16-bit system becomes an issue. Best idea: start by building the interface soft or hardware, generate interest by 'emulating' the karaoke cart. Simple pitch shift of music incoming, CD-G compatability, and using the computer's mic in. Modifying Fusion to be transparent save the graphics and then re-sizing over an incoming video window would work until an all-in-one program existed. Issues come with PC-Engine TG-16 compatability. Another version? Massive amounts of increased coding? A plug-in/driver based system like MAME? My brain is now empty. This place is awesome. [/FONT]
How about using one of the Laserdisc players they use for MSX Laserdisc gaming........ Perhaps the Daphne emulator people have some idea with their attempts to use tha emulator with computer interfacing LD Players.
That may be a possible, but then, the MSX games store game data in audio, ala cassette memory. Those are fairly common early industrial players. The problem doesn't come with controlling the player, but rather getting the data from the disc. Daphne-type control would be possible if someone got an MPEG carefully time indexed of all video and also got the data off the disc. However, someone needs a DA-V1000 to get the data first! No ROM to control anything, it's all on the blamed disc! Frustrations galore, bordering on catch 22... Bit of trivia: in sheer production cost, LDs cost less to make than video cassettes, and possibly cartidges! 5 layers sandwiched together and 'burned.' Done. Nylon's not that pricey. High prices offset low demand and thus low sales. however, part of the cost of LD games can also be traced back to complicated game design. Synching analog video to digital graphics(two sources for graphics... can anyone say Saturn? I wonder why Sega couldn't see the problems coming there...) and retrieving both from the same disc, dealing with two sides...
