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Slartibartfast
Account closed
Registered: Jul 2002
Posts: 230 |
Turbo Chameleon enhanced graphics modes
I'm planning to get a Turbo Chameleon when the next batch is released. I read "Special software can use more colours or higher resolutions" on a sales page. Does anyone here know what these enhanced graphics modes are and where I can get further information?
Thanks! |
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Slartibartfast
Account closed
Registered: Jul 2002
Posts: 230 |
I'm getting a lot of crap on a FB c64 group about it being a waste of time to develop anything for the Turbo Chameleon after nearly 4 years. I disagree, the TC is an enduring piece of tech that will surely be around for the long term, and it has more practical use than the Mega65.
I, for one, would love to have a hack at making stuff for the Turbo Chameleon, even if no-one else does. |
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MagerValp
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 1074 |
Sometimes people forget that everything we do on these old computers is pointless, and really only for our own enjoyment. Want to make TC enhanced stuff? Go for it, and add a youtube capture for those of us who don't have the hardware. |
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enthusi
Registered: May 2004
Posts: 677 |
I believe the TC has at least a tripple-blending buffer so you can bring back the 'beauty of trilace'. |
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chatGPZ
Registered: Dec 2001
Posts: 11357 |
there is not much regarding "enhanced gfx modes.... you probably read a page that copypasted the text from how it was ages ago, when enhanced gfx stuff was still on the "wantlist" :)
what you can do is disable the VICII writes to VGA, and then write to the framebuffer directly via CPU. that gives you sort-of direct VGA mode, however its still always the 16 C64 colors, and it wont be a higher resolution than what the VICII would put out (which will then be scaled up according to whatever actual VGA mode you have set up in the menu)
no idea how useful that stuff is in practise... for plain hires stuff (vector gfx or so) its probably an advantage, because the address calculation of pixels is much easier, and you dont have to mask the neighbour pixels. |
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Slartibartfast
Account closed
Registered: Jul 2002
Posts: 230 |
Damn, that's a shame. I guess flicker free interlace is something tho... If it can do that with it's triple buffer. |
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algorithm
Registered: May 2002
Posts: 705 |
What's more interesting (if you are planning on using turbo chameleon only features) is that you can toggle cpu speed >20mhz when required which would make the possibility of many cpu consuming effects to run at a feasible speed. |
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Count Zero
Registered: Jan 2003
Posts: 1926 |
Really >20MHz ? Heard TC64 is about 5-7 times speed up only.
Where/how is that speedup measured (if at all) ? |
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algorithm
Registered: May 2002
Posts: 705 |
Will have a look at the settings but there are some benchmarks here http://wiki.icomp.de/wiki/Chameleon#Turbo_Chameleon_64_FPGA_Core
which show some considerable speedups. |
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Slartibartfast
Account closed
Registered: Jul 2002
Posts: 230 |
So this is out of date info on the Syntiax page?
"Is the VGA reprogrammable for more colors or higher resolutions?
Yes, Chameleon supports upto 8 bit/pixel color-depth (256 different colors arranged as 1 byte/pixel) and screen resolutions upto 1024x768. The VGA controller supports multiple layers of bitmaps of different resolution, sizes and color-depth. Each object can be positioned freely on the screen and supports smooth-scroll in all 4 directions. Each object can have a transparent color (index 0) so they can function as sprites (MOBs) too. There are a total of 256 slots to put objects in. The size and total number of objects that can actually be displayed at the same time is limited by the memory bandwidth." |
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Slartibartfast
Account closed
Registered: Jul 2002
Posts: 230 |
Man, too bad they left these features out, those specs sound amazing... |
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Style
Registered: Jun 2004
Posts: 498 |
yeh, I dunno. At what point does it stop being a c64?
Maybe the TC can help reduce the FLI bug, or even possibly allow some new modes (you should be able to produce some pretty neat splits to add more colour at the very least). |
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hedning
Registered: Mar 2009
Posts: 4723 |
Quote: Really >20MHz ? Heard TC64 is about 5-7 times speed up only.
Where/how is that speedup measured (if at all) ?
On the TC FAQ you can read: "Between 10 to 14 times faster for tight loops that only access memory (e.g. decrunchers) and between 4 and 6 times for I/O heavy apps. Basic programs run about 12 times faster on average. Look at some Benchmarks !" And the link to the benchmarks: http://wiki.icomp.de/wiki/C64_Benchmarks |
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AmiDog
Registered: Mar 2003
Posts: 97 |
And remember that those benchmarks are tweaked in order to make the Chameleon look good.
After I told Jens that the SuperCPU ratings would be much higher if one enabled the proper optimization mode, he refused to publish the results, and instead added the "all writes must go directly to C64 memory" text on the page, which is totally not true for Chameleon which never write to C64 memory and instead tricks the VIC into fetching all its graphics from the Chameleon. |
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Slartibartfast
Account closed
Registered: Jul 2002
Posts: 230 |
Quote: yeh, I dunno. At what point does it stop being a c64?
Maybe the TC can help reduce the FLI bug, or even possibly allow some new modes (you should be able to produce some pretty neat splits to add more colour at the very least).
Yeah it eliminates interlace flicker, and with the extra speed probably eliminate the FLI bug and do some clever raster tricks. |
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algorithm
Registered: May 2002
Posts: 705 |
Quote: yeh, I dunno. At what point does it stop being a c64?
Maybe the TC can help reduce the FLI bug, or even possibly allow some new modes (you should be able to produce some pretty neat splits to add more colour at the very least).
It stops becoming a c64 when it does something that is impossible on a stock c64 :-) aka using supercpu, turbo chameleon turbo, reu, etc.. |
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Slartibartfast
Account closed
Registered: Jul 2002
Posts: 230 |
I don't care, I wanna tinker with the latest c64 tech ;) |
