The 'What You've Bought Recently' thread

[Lios]

There isn't a point on the player coming my way, but I thought I'd just mention the possibility. But you are absolutely right, looking at the docs on teh motorola chip, you need to swap a crystal oscillator (from like 30 mhz to 30.2something), and set a certain bit or 3 in a register to a 1 or 0, which means a custom bios/software. If one were to swap the bios out on their system, and change the crystal, then they'd be set on the 50hz/60hz problem by installing a switch for this pin.

Any reason why I'm out of luck on progressive? The only reason I thought it may be possible is that in both the documentation for the motorola and video decoder chips, there is mention of a "non interlaced" mode. Of course I don't know all the details, I figure at the very least it will require a hacked bios/kernel or something to set bits in certain registers to a 1 or 0. I was hoping it might not be necessary with the bt chip, but it's looking more and more like it will require some extensive disassembly of the code in the bios, or a custom bios to be built from scratch. I may be a computer scientist (or will be in about 2 months ), but this is over my head/beyond the time I am willing to invest at this point. Kinda sucks, as it seems like literally 1 bit needs to be changed.

[cdifan]

The interlace / non-interlace, AFAIK, refers to the way that the video lines are filled, not the way they are sent out and timed. But I could be wrong, if you can find a loophole in the chips docs (you're talking about the MCD 212, right) it could be made to work.

A modified BIOS/ROM is not necessarily necessary, you could set the bit from any piece of software (assuming the BIOS leaves it alone, but I'd guess your chances are high). I haven't studied the ROM enough to know if it supports the download protocol used by CD-i Link, if so you could download a piece or even a modified driver on startup.

If it doesn't support the protocol, it could be done with a special "startup" disc that you'd run to set the bit after each reset, before starting your "real" disc.

Devin, have you tested your DVE-200 with CD-i Link?

[Lios]

Yes the MCD212. Straight from the doc:

"The VDSC supports NTSC monitor, NTSC TV, and PAL TV formats as well as providing a means to
display images in one format that were created in the other. This compatibility feature allows this part
to be used throughout the world. Also, interlace and non–interlace displays are supported."

Nevermind, I just realized non-interlaced mode is essentially 240p, basically only one of the even/odd frames are displayed. The only real advantage is it would reduce flicker, but you essentially have half the resolution. A lot of game systems displayed in this mode or had a video mode for this like the nes and snes.:

[Devin]

Devin, have you tested your DVE-200 with CD-i Link?

Yes, downloaded the players ROM through your software.

Same goes for the GDI700, although the ROM is only 512KB in both instances with an extra 1KB file, presumably for the DVC aspect?