Saturn proof-of-concept bootloader Pseudo Saturn

Does your board is the VA15?
Seems we've found a bug...

 

I think I'll have to disassemble it completely to look at that. CyberWarriorX told me that Skeleton's hardware is quite different from others.

 

Wow, this is awesome. Can't believe someone finally made this.

 

x

 

Ok, Now, I'm quite sure security check is different (now software related). I knew from the very begining I tried the Skeleton that something went different while lens was reading security rings zone. I may upload a video to show it.

 

It looks like it can no longer use codes, which is sad. To use codes you gotta have the legit game and another action replay. But this is still a good thing.

 

Just curious but why is a chipped console required for testing, was meaning to ask over PM's actually but I can boot backups/CD-R's without a mod chip

Test results could also e captured via a direct capture device such as a very cheap ezcap USB device that takes composite connections directly to USB

by the way I'm still up for testing

 

It is not needed, because the purpose of my flasher utility is only to support standard Action Replay : typical Pseudo Saturn user doesn't resolder his Action Replay flash chips, so there's no need to test

Thank you in advance for testing on another Action Replay. It is like the inside of every cartridge is different, so it would help me a lot if you could test one more time.

If possible, but it is not an obligation.
I just keep a memo of the flash IDs, because they are the only way to differentiate flash chips on software side.

Memory area depends of cartridge type :
- Action Replay : CS0
- Genuine Backup Cartridge : CS1
- Memory Cart Plus : CS0
In fact Memory Cart Plus contains boot code that changes backup library stuff in order to read/write backup data on CS0 area.

Thank you for testing !
Your cartridge was a very interesting one, and I'm glad it could be flashed.
I changed utility source code a little in order to know when cartridge is recognized or not.
Flash chip vendor/device string color shows "flashability" status :
- Hopeless : red
- Maybe OK : yellow
- Recognized : green
Basically, moving cartridge until text color becomes green, reset Saturn and restart flasher should do the job without multiple retries

Thank you too
I sent you a PM about testing instructions.

I sent you a PM about testing instructions, but, I don't think flasher would support Brazilian Skeleton model.
Brazilian Skeleton donations are welcome for testing ^^ but honestly I prefer not to spend time in debugging particular cases, because there are a lot of other things to debug before

Do you mean by using swap trick ? If you are able to, then modchip is not needed.
Also, if your cartridge is already flashed with Pseudo Saturn, then modchip is not needed.

If possible, please capture, but it is not an obligation.
The most important for me is a picture showing flash IDs, and "write success" text displayed in green color

Yeah ! Thank you

I will send you a PM about testing instructions.


Here are the testing results until now :
- cafe-alpha BFBF/0707 SST29EE010 "Write Verification Success"
- TabajaraLabs 0101/2020 AM29F010 "Write Verification Success"
- A Murder of Crows 53BF/4707 Mix of counterfeit/SST29EE010 chips ? "Write Verification Success"

Anybody else OK for beta testing ?
Beta testing will be rewarded with your nickname written in the flasher's readme file

 

News from the front:
A local saturn group gives me reports of the pseudo saturn working on skeleton saturns. But seems to have a board difference between them. I asked for photos/videos/details, and I'll try to compile a list of what works and what not.

Digital arqueology

 

Just want to give you guys a heads up. You can flash this memory card. I saw a guy on youtube talk about flashing an AR, and I decided to try it with this. It came with my saturn and I saw a lot of people say it's junk, so if I broke it, it was no big loss. I think it has 340 blocks if that helps on how much memory it has. I've only had an issue with 2 games PDS and Scud, I doubt it's due to the card. But then again I'm not a coder or anything.

 

Success using cafealpha2's beta flasher on my memory card plus that I posted an image of earlier.

Vendor ID: 5345
Device ID: 4741

Here is the board:





Thanks!

 

Great !

Here is updated test report :
- cafe-alpha BFBF/0707 SST29EE010 "Write Verification Success"
- TabajaraLabs 0101/2020 AM29F010 "Write Verification Success"
- A Murder of Crows 53BF/4707 Mix of counterfeit/SST29EE010 chips ? "Write Verification Success"
- nastyvandal 5345/4741 SST29EE010 counterfeit ? "Write Verification Success"
- Zorlon & Bruno : BFBF/1010, write failure, maybe fixed in latest beta

 

Now I'm looking for a memory plus card with smaller FlashROM, to see if it is feasible to change it for a bigger flash, and load PS.

 

You should try with ST Key cartridge.
I didn't verified anything, but I don't think people at Datel lost their times to ground A16 pin, so resoldering flash memory is likely to work.
However, size > 256KB (128KB per chip) is not supported, because A17 and other "NC" pins are connected to GND.

 

Here is updated test report :
- cafe-alpha BFBF/0707 SST29EE010 "Write Verification Success"
- TabajaraLabs 0101/2020 AM29F010 "Write Verification Success"
- A Murder of Crows 53BF/4707 Mix of counterfeit/SST29EE010 chips ? "Write Verification Success"
- nastyvandal 5345/4741 SST29EE010 counterfeit ? "Write Verification Success"
- Zorlon & Bruno : BFBF/1010, write failure, fixed (need testing) in latest beta (3.751)
- A Murder of Crows 0101/2020 AM29F010 "Write Verification Success"
- A Murder of Crows : 1F1F/D5D5 AT29C010 write failure, fixed (need testing) in latest beta (3.751)
- cafe-alpha BFBF/0808 SST29LE010 (GameShark) "Write Verification Success"


It took something like 10 tries to flash this gameshark, but at least it worked :]
I put a old CD-R between the Saturn and the cartridge to help connection (like this) ^^

More people interested in beta testing ?

 

I'll do more as soon as I get the other ARs I bought. I'll buy a ST Key tomorrow and see how it works, I believe I can mod it to at least 256K.

 

If memory serves STKey had EPROM (you know with the UV quartz windows on top) and not EEPROM or FLASH so I am not sure you can actually re-flash it.
But that was long time ago and memory may have failed me, I did opened up one and have a fuzzy memory about the quartz window on the chip.

 

If I find an EPROM cart I can rework it to use flash rom devices. I just need to find (cheap) one of these ST-KEY cartridges

 

Why ? Just wait the final release of Pseudo and re-write it to the cart EPROM, erasing the now useless original ST-Key program.

 

Just for the fun of it, LeoNERD