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So Rufus asked me to do a writeup on the X68K for this thread. I hope you like it! The Sharp X68000 was a computer released in 1987 and sold only in Japan. Back in the day it was "seriously" used as a graphics/video/music workstation and a game development system, sort of like a Japanese Amiga. Like the Amiga in Europe, the X68K became a favorite of hardcore game fans. It's architecture and specs were close to actual arcade hardware of the time and the machine was host to many amazing arcade ports, but it also saw many original games and my focus in the games post will mostly be on those. Hardware  The original X68000 was a 10mhz machine with 1mb of RAM. Most X68000 games don't need specs beyond these to run well. Later machines bumped the clock speed up to 16mhz, but allowed you to limit the processor's speed to 10mhz, as some games react badly to the faster processor. While 10mhz/1mb is the bare minimum to run most games, a good all-round setup would be a 16mhz machine (XVI) with 4mb of RAM. Avoid the X68030, there are reports of incompatibilities with the '030 processor. The X68K has seven LEDs on it's keyboard, which some games take advantage of. If you don't have a keyboard, you can get PS2/USB adapters here. You can get mouse adapters here too, but there's next to nothing on the system games-wise that actually requires one. Most X68Ks have dual 5.25 floppy drives and this is the medium 99% of retail games came in. The XVI Compact has 3.5 inch drives, to run original games from disk you can try to find the Sharp CZ-6FD5 external 5.25 floppy drive (impossible!), or write the disk images to 3.5 floppies. You can also use a SCSI hard drive or use a CF card. My XVI Compact has an external Sun SCSI enclosure containing a CF AztecMonster adapter with a 2gb CF card loaded with eidis v3. Running Games  Eidis is a nice way to have a great majority of the good X68K games at your fingertips, but some games require being run from floppies. If you don't have a way to write floppies, you can do it on the X68K itself if you can get the disk images onto the machine, I use a SCSI CD-ROM (Panasonic KXL-D740) but you can also use a null modem cable. Here's an example of how to write a disk image using a SCSI CD-ROM on a machine with the eidis image booting from a HDD or CF card (because this information is nowhere to be found in English online): Write any X68K XDF disk image to a CD-ROM on your PC. I just use Nero with standard settings and it works fine. our example will be anime_porn.xdf. Put the CD in your X68K's CD-ROM and boot the machine. Once in LHES, press "K" to create a directory called "XDF" (or whatever) on the root of your HDD. Navigate to that directory and press "X" to enter a command. Type code: This screenshot is from an emulator, normally there would be a directory tree here instead of this error message. Insert a blank floppy disk into either drive, then press "X" in LHES and type code: On your PC, download 2HDSIM. Extract it and burn the contents to a CD. Use the steps above to make a directory on your X68K called "2HDSIM" and copy the entire contents of the archive to it. Quit the CD navigator again and put the formatted floppy disk in a drive, then use LHES to select MKIMG.X in the 2HDSIM folder. Press Enter to bring up the command line, and edit it so it has the following arguments: code:MIDI   First off: The X68K'S internal Yamaha FM sound chip is awesome. Your games aren't going to sound bad if you don't buy a bunch of expensive sound hardware, but sometimes people prefer LA or GS over FM, so this is for them. This is also gonna be really, really simplified so if you're a huge MIDI nerd please don't kill me! Your X68K will need a MIDI interface board to use an external MIDI controller. I have no idea where to get one of these, mine came with one already installed. I have a feeling a lot of X68Ks out there already have one. Once you have this board installed you need a MIDI module. 90% of MIDI compatible X68K games will expect either a Roland MT-32 or a Roland SC-55. There are other modules that are functionally similar/the same but in the interest of simplicity I'm gonna stick with these two. The MT-32 is an LA synthesis module, which means it can sound like anything the programmer wants it to . The SC-55 is a GS module, so it's sounds are limited to the built in instruments. This doesn't make the SC-55 bad, just different. In many ways it is a more advanced unit than the MT-32 and can sound even better. Typically, older games want the MT-32 and newer games want the SC-55. Lots of people get both. Another option is to find a Roland CM-500 which is like having an MT-32 and SC-55 in the same (ugly) box with no cool display or anything but two LEDs and a volume knob. Use the rear selector to choose "B" mode for LA and "C" mode for GS. Remember to reset the unit so the change takes effect. Here's a list of some games and MIDI information. Display  Chances are, you don't have an original X68000 monitor. The system can be attached to a VGA monitor with an adapter. The problem is, most modern VGA monitors want a 31khz signal and won't display a 15khz signal at all. Most of what you'll be doing on the X68K will be 31khz by default. The OS, most of the games and software, etc. There are just enough games that boot in 15khz to be annoying. Sometimes you can blindly navigate the menus to find the option to switch to 31khz (use an emulator to find out what to do). A tiny minority of games don't run in 31khz at all. The best way to get an X68000 to display everything on a modern monitor is to use a Micomsoft XPC-4. This ridiculously expensive box is explicitly designed to make old computers work with new displays, and according to it's users it does the job wonderfully. You can also just find an older VGA multisync monitor, many support 15khz mode. Here's an incomplete list. Controller  The X68K has two DB9 Atari type controller ports. Any Atari/Amiga/MSX/FM-Towns/etc controllers will work. Sega controllers will not work without an adapter. Capcom made an adapter to use it's CPS Fighter with the X68K. Micomsoft made several excellent sticks that work with the X68K. The XE-1 Pro is the best of the bunch, with fully adjustable turbo fire and trigger hold, and an awesome Knight Rider-esque row of LEDs to display the trigger speed. The XE-1 ST and ST2 will also work, but if you want turbo you have to hunt down a XO-1 or similar device. ASCII's excellent Stick II Turbo is another great choice. I'm pretty tired of writing all these words, my next post will be all about the X68K's games! d0s fucked around with this message at 01:34 on Feb 8, 2014 |
| ← # ? Feb 5, 2014 11:49 |
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