> eeep. I thought this at first too, but then I found some binaries that
> had real data there. When I read there with my carts on my dumper, I
> got the same data, so I assume reading there is "more correct" than
> substituting $ff or $00.
I don't think there are any games that rely on the data at the
hotspot addresses. All games that I have seen have some filler
data there, like $00, $ff or a copy of the reset vector. The
binaries that have something else there have most likely been
read with one of the older cartridge dumpers, that leave out
the hotspots, but don't clear their file buffer between games.
So if a 4K game has been read and then a 8K game, the hotspots
would contain the data from the 4K game even in the 8K binary.
While I agree that it is safer to read the data at the hotspots
if possible, it's probably not nessessary.
If there were games that rely on that data, they probably wouldn't
work in Chris' F8/F6 boards. He recently said that his board first
switches the bank before it reads the data, while Atari's board seem
to read the data first before they switch the banks. At least that
is what the binaries with the reset vector data at the hotspot addresses
seem to be indicating. And so far there haven't been any problems with
Chris' boards, right?
BTW, there are other bad dumps out there that should be replaced.
Some of the early F8 dumps were done by hitting one of the hotspots
and then reading the entire 4K bank. This of course would trigger
both hotspots again, so that both banks contain the system vectors of
the second bank.
Ciao, Eckhard Stolberg
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