Hi, everybody,
I'm quite new to MSX, although I played lots of MSX games when I was a kid. Now 20 years later, I decided to get back to this great platform...
I've finally found me an MSX2 computer - a fine Daewoo CPC-400s, took me very long time to find, and I already run into problem.
I can run only very few games of the machine. So far I was able to run only Druid, GallForce and Samurai (Ganbare Goemon), while such great games as Knightmare, Vampire Killer and Zanac 2 cannot run. Sometimes it crashes after title screen, sometimes it says "Out of memory in 1", sometimes jusst hangs up...
I've done some research, and some people said that maybe they could help me on a Russian forum (thanks to dhau), but I also want to ask the community here:

It seems that my Daewoo CPC-400s has RAM in slot that is different from other MSX machines. This is what The Ultimate MSX FAQ says:
www.faq.msxnet.org/msx2.html#msx2spec

Quote:

Daewoo 400S 128kB RAM/128kB VRAM Superimposing capabilities Separate keyboard 2 diskdrives RAM in slot 0-0, which means lots of software will not work

Well, I have to correct on above that it has 1 diskdrive only and 1 cart slot...


Also, here's what The Machine Room says about my computer's RAM:
http://www.machine-room.org/computers/516/technical.html?MachineRoomSessionID=69a750f65a38e991606bb1ffac396b3e

My question is - do you think I would be able to run original ROM carts? And can anything be done to get my computer to run all MSX/MSX2 software??
I wouldnt want to give up this great computer, it's just so slick

Thank you in advance,
Austin

ram in slot 0-0? where is the ROM?

weird.....

Quote:

ram in slot 0-0? where is the ROM? weird.....

I don't know where's ROM, I just quoted MSXFAQ beleiving they know what they write... In reality, my MSX knowledge is near to zero. I have original Daewoo manual, but it doesnt say much about where memory is. I'll try to look up if it mentions anything about memory addresses, (I know it discusses something about memory mapper) don't know it it helps, though...
There is bound to be someone familiar with this machine, I guess, Russia, for one, had thousands and thousands imported back in 80-s...

Here's the intern structure of this machine :

Daewoo X-II CPC-400S (MSX2) (Made in 1987)


*ROM : Total 240KB

MSX2.ROM -->> MSX BIOS&BASIC Version 2.0
(Slot No.00 : 0000-7FFF, 32KB)

MSX2EXT.ROM -->> MSX Extended BASIC Version 2.0&Hangul BIOS Version 3.0
(Slot No.03 : 0000-7FFF, 32KB)

MSX2HAN.ROM -->> MSX Hangul Input Software Version 3.0&MSX-Tutor
(Slot No.01 : 4000-BFFF, 32KB)

DISK.ROM -->> MSX Disk BASIC Version 1.0
(Slot No. 2 : 4000-7FFF, 16KB)

KANJI.ROM -->> MSX Kanji&Hangul Font
(I/O Address : &HD8-&HDF, 128KB)


*RAM : Total 256KB

Main : 128KB (Main Program) (Slot No.02 : 0000-FFFF)

Video : 128KB (Video Screen) (I/O Address : &H98-&H9F)


*Cartridge Slot : 1 Slot (Slot No. 1)&1 Extension Bus Slot (No. 3)

So the FAQ is completely wrong regarding this machine? 1 diskdrive, RAM not in slot 0-0 (that would be madness anyway)...
That leaves the question as why so many software doesn't work. :/

Some programs (games or demos) were badly written, because at the time of their creation, the programmers only knew machines with RAM generally in slot 3.

This is not the only example. Brazilian MSX 1 machines have the RAM in slot 2, what's source of trouble for some games.

Can I switch the RAM into slot 3? Or does it sound very stupid?

You can insert an external memory mapper in the extension bus slot, but you'll probably need an adapter to turn it into a regular cartridge slot. (Which possibly came with the system already)

Quote:

Can I switch the RAM into slot 3? Or does it sound very stupid?

Not at all, but in worst case you need to modify the ROM's as well. This should be anyway easy to test with OpenMSX.

To get best compatibility, I would put RAM to slot 3, Disk ROM to slot 0-2 and expancion bus to slot 2.

Without service manual this might anyway be very hard...

Quote:

This is not the only example. Brazilian MSX 1 machines have the RAM in slot 2, what's source of trouble for some games.

Or even more weird solution used in SVI-738... 64K RAM in slot 1!

There's no poke that will solve this?

well my machine has the RAM at slot 1....

so, i normally hacks each european game to run in slot 1.

all konami's works perfect...

Quote:

There's no poke that will solve this?

Ah, you are right... No one has yet posted here Universal slot select poke. It does not solve all the problems, but anyway worth of trying, when RAM is in sub-slot:

POKE -1,(15-PEEK(-1)\16)*17

Austin: the idea is that you type that before running some kind of game that won't work otherwise. It won't always help, but there might be some games that will run after that. Ofcourse it doesn't help much if you are playing a game from ROM...

I did some testing with OpenMSX. Gosh, this computer is weird. :-) No MSX logo, No BASIC copyright notices etc. but it has SCREEN 9

Anyway, back to the point. It seems, that you can safely place RAM to slot 3. Disk-ROM seems a lot more problematic. It does not like to work in sub-slot. I anyway managed to get disk drive working in slot 0-2, by copying a better disk ROM from National FS-5500. That way you can get second cartridge port free and you can use expander on that one as well. Good thing is also, that when you have non expanded slot 3, you don't need to worry about wrong sub-slot selections.

Maybe someone can now help you hardware vice (?) I think, that you just need to cut few foils, solder few jumper wires and change new ROM. After that you have an extremely good MSX2.

I just realized that Daewoo machines are pretty widespread in ex-USSR, so by helping owners of such a machine you can boost MSX usage and community growth on this territory...

I get more and more questions from Daewoo owners about how to run at least small ROMs on it.

After some checks I see I can easily run 8K and 16K roms on it (I test on BlueMSX), but 32K ROMs does not work neither via LoadROM, nor with ExecROM.

Can anybody help ?
If I remember correctly, the author of ExecROM is still active. If you read me, please answer !

By the way, magic poke just freezes this machine.

Any advice is welcome !