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1998-09-22
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z26 -- An Atari 2600 Emulator (1.13) -- Sep 22, 1998
----------------------------------------------------
Copyright (C) 1997-1998 by John Saeger
Home Page: http://www.whimsey.com/z26
Send EMAIL to: john@whimsey.com
What's New in this version?
---------------------------
1. Fixed column blanking. (broken in 1.12).
2. Fixed icehocky. (broken in 1.10).
For a complete history of the versions please visit:
http://www.whimsey.com/z26/z26FAQ.html
Introduction
------------
z26 is a small, fast, easy to use Atari 2600 emulator that runs on a DOS
platform, including Windows 95 and Windows 98 DOS boxes. z26 supports
full Atari 2600 sound emulation using a Sound Blaster.
System Requirements
-------------------
z26 will run at full speed on virtually any Pentium class platform with
a reasonable (PCI or better) video subsystem. It also runs fine on most
AMD 5x86 or Cyrix 5x86 machines (with VLB video), and even on some fast
486's.
z26 supports the use of a Sound Blaster card. It requires a Sound
Blaster with at least version 2.00 DSP. This includes SB 2.0, SB-PRO,
SB-16, and SOME older Sound Blasters. It should also run on more recent
models of Sound Blaster, and many clones as well. I've heard it works on
an Ensoniq PCI sound card.
If you don't have a Sound Blaster or a compatible sound card, z26 will
make an attempt to use the PC speaker to generate sounds. Try not to
expect too much from the speaker though.
Newbies
-------
Now that you have z26, the next thing you need to do is find the ROM images.
These are the actual games. z26 is not a game, z26 just lets you play them.
So go to my links page:
http://www.whimsey.com/z26/z26Links.html
and follow some of the links that have (ROMS) next to them. I can't say
exactly where on these sites you'll find them but I've found them
on these sites in the past. After you get them you'll need to unzip them.
They'll be in a file with a .ZIP extension. So you'll need PKUNZIP or some
other unzipping utility to extract the ROM images from the .ZIP file. The
actual ROM images have a .bin extension. So after you get the .bin files
into the same directory as z26, open a DOS box (if you're not already
in one or running DOS) and follow the next step... Startup.
Startup
-------
At the command line prompt type:
>z26 filename
where filename is the name of a "standard" Atari 2600 .bin file. For
example:
>z26 demonatk.bin
will run Demon Attack. You're on your own finding the .bin files. But if
you follow the links on the z26 links page, eventually you may get lucky.
Getting Help
------------
If you type
>z26
without a filename you get a short help screen describing the available
controls and some command line options. The screen currently looks like this:
z26 -- An Atari 2600 emulator (1.12)
Copyright (C) 1997-1998 by John Saeger
Home Page: http://www.whimsey.com/z26
F1 -- reset F2 -- select F3 -- B/W F4 -- Color
F5 -- P0 easy F6 -- P0 hard F7 -- P1 easy F8 -- P1 hard
p -- pause ENTER -- resume ESC -- quit = -- PCX screen capture
PgUp -- scroll screen up PgDn -- scroll screen down
Home -- scroll screen to default position
Player 0 controls: CTRL -- fire, Use arrow keys to move.
Player 1 controls: n -- fire, s -- left, e -- up, f -- right, d -- down
Command Line Switches (put before filename)
-0 -- player 0 hard, -1 -- player 1 hard
-r -- run game at maximum speed
-r<n> -- run game at <n> frames per second (<n> = 1 - 254 inclusive)
-q -- quiet (no sound)
-v<n> -- video mode (0=70Hz, 1=60Hz, 2=60Hz narrow, 3=60Hz 204 scan lines)
-j<n> -- joystick (0=joystick off, 1=normal, 2=players reversed)
More options and credits may be found in readme.txt.
Joystick
--------
z26 automatically detects a PC joystick and uses it to emulate an Atari
joystick if one is present. Calibration is not required. Just make sure
the joystick is centered when the emulator is started. Button 1 is the
fire button. The keyboard controls still work even if a joystick is
present. To force keyboard only mode use the -j0 command line switch.
Some games like raiders.bin use the "wrong" joystick. To reverse the
joysticks use the -j2 command line switch.
Video Modes (correct play speed)
--------------------------------
In order to provide good emulation of some of the Atari's more subtle
graphics effects, z26 synchronizes game play with the refresh of the VGA
screen. The original VGA video mode refreshes at 70Hz which makes game
play slightly faster than a real Atari. By default, z26 uses a video
mode that refreshes at 60Hz (Video Mode 3) to provide correct play
speed. If you have a problem with this mode you may select the original
70Hz mode or one of the other modes with the -v<n> command line switch.
Video Mode 0
------------
This is the original 70Hz mode 13 VGA mode.
Video Mode 1
------------
This mode is full size on older fixed-frequency monitors but is usually
somewhat shorter than normal on modern multi-frequency monitors.
However, you may be able to adjust the controls of the monitor to get
the correct height.
Video Mode 2
------------
This mode is shorter and narrower than normal. If you can't, or don't
wish to make an adjustment to your monitor to get Mode 1 looking right,
or if you just like the smaller size better, you can use this mode to
get the correct aspect ratio.
Video Mode 3 (default)
----------------------
This mode is just like mode 2 except it has 4 additional scan lines for
a total of 204. PCX screen capture will still only capture the first
200 scan lines.
Are these video modes safe?
---------------------------
Of course I make no guarantees. But as far as I know they work almost
everywhere that the original 70Hz mode 13 video mode works. If you find
an exception please let me know. In any case, monitor damage seems
unlikely. If you suspect a problem, press <esc> to restore your monitor
to text mode, or just turn the monitor off.
Adjusting Your Monitor
----------------------
If you have a modern multi-frequency monitor, one or more of these modes
may require some adjustment to achieve a good appearance. Modern
monitors often have the ability to save multiple settings for multiple
video modes. So it MAY be possible to adjust these modes without
disturbing the adjustments for your other display modes.
Adjusting Vertical Position
---------------------------
You can scroll games up and down on the display with the <PgUp> and <PgDn>
keys. You can return to the default display position by pressing the
<Home> key. You can force the game to start displaying from a particular
display line from the command line with the -u<n> command line option.
The default starting line is 39. So adjust from there.
Note that the <PgUp> and <PgDn> scrolling doesn't work for frogpond.bin
or pharhcrs.bin.
Forcing Black and White mode
----------------------------
You can force a game to start in black and white mode with the -b command
line switch.
Adjusting Game Speed
--------------------
By default, games run at monitor speed. If for some reason this doesn't
work, or you want to try other speeds you can use the -r<n> command
line switch.
If you don't specify a number <n> (-r) the game runs as fast as possible.
Otherwise, it runs at <n> frames per second. Normal speed is 60 frames
per second. Note that <n> must be between 1 and 254 inclusive.
Measuring Emulator Performance
------------------------------
With the -f<n> option, you can run the emulator for <n> frames and the number
of frames per second that the emulator ran at is printed out. If you also
specify the -r option to run at maximum speed you can see the maximum frame
rate that the emulator can run a particular game at. You can also do things
like turning off joystick support and sound for maximum performance.
Troubleshooting Sound Setup
---------------------------
If you run z26 and don't hear sound when you think you should, the first
thing to check is to make sure the volume is turned up. If you're
running under Windows 95, use the system volume control and make sure
the Mute box is not checked. Also make sure the Wave Balance volume is
turned up and that its Mute box is not checked. If you're running under
DOS, use the volume control (mixer) program that came with your sound
card.
Failing that, try running z26 with the -s (show sound diagnostic messages)
command line option. Note that you must specify a filename with this option.
If you get the message "Sound Blaster too old!", maybe it's too old. You
need a Sound Blaster with at least version 2.00 DSP to run z26.
If you get the message "Sound Blaster not found." then either you don't
have a Sound Blaster, or there's a problem with the environment string.
z26 expects you to have an environment string set with the configuration
of your Sound Blaster. If you're running under Windows 95, this usually
is not a problem because Windows 95 seems to set up the environment
string automatically. If you're running under DOS, the environment
string is usually set up during the Sound Blaster installation
procedure.
To find out if your environment string has been set, type
>set
at the command line prompt. Or type
>set | more
if there's too much information to display on a single screen.
You should see an entry something like this somewhere in the output:
BLASTER=A220 I10 D1 H7 P330 T6
If you don't, that's the problem. Otherwise the information in the
environment string may not match the actual settings on your Sound
Blaster. In either case, re-do the installation procedure for your sound
card to correct the problem, or set up the environment string manually.
More About Sound
----------------
z26 sound generation is based on the TIASound library by Ron Fries.
According to Ron, the optimum playback sample rate is 31400 samples per
second. This is the "natural frequency" of the Atari, the frequency at
which the sound generator in the Atari originally ran. So if your
Sound Blaster is capable of playing sound at this rate (and most modern
Sound Blasters are), we use this rate. There are a few older Sound
Blasters that z26 supports that won't run at this rate. These Sound
Blasters are run at a rate of 15700 samples per second. This causes
only a small degradation in the quality of the sound.
We also generate sound in real time. This means we can use very small
sound buffers. This allows z26 to be more responsive to rapid changes
in the sound that some games call for. z26 currently uses a sound buffer
of 256 bytes divided into two parts, giving it an effective buffer size
of 128 bytes.
Digital Signal Processing
-------------------------
z26 supports digital signal processing (DSP) on the sound. This is to
reduce distortion on some clone sound cards, but also causes the sound
to more closely approximate the sound of an old TV set for those users
that prefer a more "classic" sound. To turn on DSP use the -d<n> command
line switch. If n=1 the setting is low, if n=2 the setting is high.
Offbeat Cartridge Formats (Bank Switching)
------------------------------------------
z26 currently supports the following schemes:
1. Standard 8K bank switching.
2. Standard 16K bank switching.
3. Atari Super-Chip.
4. CBS Ram Plus.
5. Parker Brothers 8K.
6. TigerVision 8K.
7. Activision FE 8K.
8. Atari 32K.
9. M-Network 16K.
Support is automatic. z26 knows how to recognize cartridges.
PCX Screen Capture
------------------
Pressing the = key during game play causes a .pcx file with a screen
image to be placed in your directory. Filenames are z26p0000.pcx,
z26p0001.pcx etc. The filename restarts at z26p0000.pcx causing old
versions to be replaced each time you restart the emulator.
Warranty
--------
z26 is provided without a warranty of any kind, either express or
implied. Neither John Saeger nor anyone who has worked on the code may
be held responsible for any damages, either direct or consequential,
caused by the use of z26.
Freeware
--------
z26 is copyrighted freeware and may not be sold. Please keep all
copyright notices and other acknowledgements intact. Thanks.
Credits
-------
z26 is based on A26 version 0.15 (C) 1996 by Paul Robson (autismuk@aol.com).
PCX screen capture is (C) 1997 by Ronnie Greene (ender@abts.net).
Atari 2600 sound emulation is based on TIASound (C) 1996 by Ron Fries.
(rfries@tcmail.frco.com)
60Hz chained video modes courtesy of Jim Leonard (Trixter / Hornet).
(trixter@hornet.org)
Sound drivers are based on Asteroids v3.02 (C) 1997 by Chris Pile.
(pegasus@enterprise.net)
6507 CPU emulation based in part on 6510core.c by Ettore Perazzoli.
(ettore@comm2000.it)
Support for special cartridge formats based on information found in
sizes.txt by Kevin Horton (khorton@iquest.net).
Thanks to everyone who has helped with comments, suggestions, bug
reports, information, supplies and testing:
Junky, Kevin White, The Boatwrights, Miguel Guzman Centeno,
Peter, Jay C. Heil, Zoop, Rob Anderson, Zophar, Peter Vogels,
Stephan, Xahji, Ricardo Martinez Garza, Stephano Camarri,
Peter Betz, Piero Cavina (Oystron! Helped find multiple missile bug.),
Nick S. Bensema, Erik Mooney, Glenn Saunders, Abraham Velazquez,
Christian Schaefers (Z-Type), Freirias, Brian Deuel, Chris Platt,
Israel Geron T., jose roberto rodrigues, Dan Meyer, Martin Schaefer,
Ummagumma, Digitoxin, Michael Walden Jr. (The most elaborate suggestion
list!), Gilamonster, Gerald Gorman, Francisco Athens, Lex Nesta, Ben,
Gerald Gray, Jose Pedro, Tadd Underhill, Ejber Ozkan, Lord Mhath,
Larry Scott, Brad Komgenick, Michael J. Mika, Ettore Perazzoli (VICE),
Stephan Eder, Andreas Boose (VICE), David Gray, jimnav,
Dr. Simone Zanella, Brad Thomas, Jeff Cockayne, Sam Miller, EmrldSword,
justin martin, Justin Scott, Jason Berk, Luis Graterol, Ricardo Soto,
Brian Smith, Sam Hard, Keith Merizalde, Nate Marigoni, Kurt Woloch,
GreenImp, M. C. Silvius, Matthew Conte (Nofrendo), Jason Barisoff,
Rick Vasquez, Marco Turconi, Kalik, Christopher Warren, Curt Vendel,
Roberto Sidney Teixeira, raverpup, iCeFiRe, Chism, Sascha Reuter,
Craig Tildesley, Michael Prentler, Cody B, Thom Rechak, Cam, Jason,
Keith Weisshar, Robin Gravel, Thom Bone, Mrfriend, Edwin Helsloot,
C J Biro, Michael Monson, Justin Rodriguez, Francesco Azzurri,
Greg Bendokus, Bruce Clarke, John Dullea (PCAE), Tim Boston,
Chris Ainsley, Ricardo Henrique Tabone, and Seth Kintigh.
And thanks to Len Shikowitz for *complaining* well beyond the call of duty.
Definitely "the most obstinate, yet sincere, tester." :)
And thanks to anyone I may have missed.
Thanks!!!