Psion and ROM cartridges

[Pr0f]

I think you are somewhat missing the point of ROM images and and cartridges and why they were a good idea back when storage was expensive and memory in short supply. For the Q68 and most expanded QL's and for all emulators - none of these things are an issue any more - so having a ROM catridge for PSION packages is not necessary - and if you want a combination of all 4 - you'd run the xchange application - it will load in one or two seconds from an SD card, or CF card or disk

[Wicksy]

On the clones, the Q68 with 96k is only going to fit one package. I don't know what the pc emulators can do, other than Qemulator which is too small for the task.

How would you produce a ROM image from one of the Psion 4, as it's not the same as getting your system rom is it?

I do not understand this part, can you explain what you going to with thd Q68?

Using EPROM_LOAD to store say, Archive to load with the O/S at start up.
Archive is something I intend to use a lot, addresses, family tree, etc.

[Wicksy]

I think you are somewhat missing the point of ROM images and and cartridges and why they were a good idea back when storage was expensive and memory in short supply. For the Q68 and most expanded QL's and for all emulators - none of these things are an issue any more - so having a ROM catridge for PSION packages is not necessary - and if you want a combination of all 4 - you'd run the xchange application - it will load in one or two seconds from an SD card, or CF card or disk

What you and Derek have said is correct, SD, etc is very quick, why bother.

But some people want to recreate / revisit aspects of the original system. For instance, why do some Spectrum owners bother going out and get a vDrive? Microdrive software was limited to a very few programs, mainly utilities. The DivMMC sd gives all the speed and storage you'd need, but people want to explore a vDrive.
The same with Spectrum ROM cartridges that people recreate, there's no apparent reason other than to explore.

[bwinkel67]

But some people want to recreate / revisit aspects of the original system....

I think it would have been cool to have a Psion Exchange ROM cartridge back in the day. It would have required some clever design to get it to work and be affordable, but cool to be able to plug it in and run the suite without getting in the way of expansion.

I personally would love a switchable ROM cartridge that could give me TK2 at times, ICE at other times, and any other 16K ROM that could be added, all selectable via some sort of keyword like NEXT_ROM or SET_ROM 1 or something like that, keeping its memory footprint small and not adding any other feature. I mostly use ICE and soft-load TK2, but would be nice if I could just switch via a keyword.

[Derek_Stewart]

But some people want to recreate / revisit aspects of the original system....

I think it would have been cool to have a Psion Exchange ROM cartridge back in the day. It would have required some clever design to get it to work and be affordable, but cool to be able to plug it in and run the suite without getting in the way of expansion.

I personally would love a switchable ROM cartridge that could give me TK2 at times, ICE at other times, and any other 16K ROM that could be added, all selectable via some sort of keyword like NEXT_ROM or SET_ROM 1 or something like that, keeping its memory footprint small and not adding any other feature. I mostly use ICE and soft-load TK2, but would be nice if I could just switch via a keyword.

Multi ROM boards have been available for the QL for many years, though, a little thin on the ground, maybe a candidate for cloning the hardware.

What if the Psion suite is required to be extended, if it is in ROM, it is harder to extend.

The design of the Spectrum is a paged memory system into the Z80 CPU memory. Whereas the QL has allocated extension ROM areas, available with the correct hardware addressing. But the Trump and Card uses these areas as useable Ram. The Gold Card deselects them.

The EPROM_LOAD attempts to emulate the ROM storage method of load loading ROMs, from a file.

The Q68 96K memory indicated in the memory thread, is for system ROMs, I do not know how to load application ROMs into this area and register it with the operating system, use EPROM_LOAD, there is 32Mb of usage Ram.

[bwinkel67]

Multi ROM boards have been available for the QL for many years, though, a little thin on the ground, maybe a candidate for cloning the hardware.

Oh cool...can you point me to some information/documentation on them even if they aren't available.

[Wicksy]

Multi ROM boards have been available for the QL for many years, though, a little thin on the ground, maybe a candidate for cloning the hardware.

Oh cool...can you point me to some information/documentation on them even if they aren't available.

Using the rom port or expansion port. The last one is a software based solution.

https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... 8kbyte_rom
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... :ultracard
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... st_ramplus
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... ulti_eprom
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... eprom_card
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... s_multirom

If you look down the right hand side of this page it mentions Tetriod was selling a multi Rom board "recently".
https://dilwyn.theqlforum.com/

[Wicksy]

I see Derek, the 96k on the Q68 is where SMSQE normally resides and not additional. My project ended before it even began!

[bwinkel67]

Using the rom port or expansion port. The last one is a software based solution.

https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... 8kbyte_rom
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... :ultracard
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... st_ramplus
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... ulti_eprom
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... eprom_card
https://qlwiki.theqlforum.com/doku.php?i ... s_multirom

The only one that seems to fit the bill of what I was talking about is the ULtraCard (or QCard as the Wiki calls it). But I haven't been able to get more info on that.

Except for the last one, the rest use the internal expansion slot, which is not what I was looking for. The last one is more in the form of what I was thinking about except that it's only software based (as you pointed out), requiring ROM images to be loaded, defeating the point (I think it said it was for development/testing).

If you look down the right hand side of this page it mentions Tetriod was selling a multi Rom board "recently".
https://dilwyn.theqlforum.com/

I don't see it, can you point me to it?

[Pr0f]

The tetroid multirom - is that the ROM Switcher - which allows upto 8 different ROM images (versions of QL OS if you like) together with an optional switched 16K ROM image (occupying the ROM Slot address).

This device allows for relatively easy switching between ROM versions and anything you like in the ROM slot area (if you program the device yourself). By default it comes with Toolkit II in the ROM slot area for all the different OS versions it supports.