> I briefly experiminted with this sort of thing. Although I was trying to
> dump the binary using sound, which was dumb because I could never get the
> sound timing right and it certainly wouldn't fit in 128 bytes of RAM.
>
> http://www.biglist.com/lists/stella/archives/200402/msg00041.html
>
> Brief summary: It could work, but sometimes the RAM program would loose
> control when a cartridge was removed or inserted. And I was afraid there
> might be a slight chance of damaging the cartridge if the connection to +5
> V
> were established before the connection to ground was established. (As was
> mentioned in one of the replies to my original post).
>
> Dusty
I wonder if certain console models are more prone to these problems than
others. I didn't experience weirdness on my four-switcher with the small
test program I wrote... but then I wouldn't consider those tests to be at
all scientific.
The +5 volt thing is a bit scary. Depending on where that pin is, maybe
inserting a cart slightly crooked would help... Just to ensure ground
connects first.
I'll keep playing with it. (I won't mind too much if I zap a cart or two.)
There's also potential for this type of code to be used for creating game
cheats... But the execution code would have to be microscopic, probably
something like:
checkRom lda someRomAddress ; Poll some non-zero value
in ROM
beq checkRom ; If zero, loop
jmp romEntryPoint ; Else, jump into
game
But I'm not sure what affect accessing a ROM address will have when there's
no cartridge present.
-Lee
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