The Cuttle Cart 3. The Intellivision Customizable Menu Cartridge. from. Chad Schell of Schell s Electronics. Copyright 2007 Schell s Electronics

Transcription

1 The Cuttle Cart 3 The Intellivision Customizable Menu Cartridge from Chad Schell of Schell s Electronics Copyright 2007 Schell s Electronics

2 Setting up the MicroSD Card To use the Cuttle Cart 3 (CC3) to its full potential requires a properly formatted and setup MicroSD card, also referred to as a Transflash card. (Note that the Micro part of MicroSD is very important. This is a physically much smaller card than a standard SD card. Be sure you buy the correct one.) If you do not have a MicroSD card you can only use the CC3 Development Mode, at which point the CC3 acts essentially like the older Intellicart product also released by Schell s Electronics. You will not have access to a menu and will only be able to load a single game into the CC3 at one time, using the serial port on your computer. The MicroSD card is used to hold all of the games, manuals, and user menus and settings used by the CC3. All of the customization that makes the CC3 act how you want to use it is stored on the MicroSD card, not inside the CC3 itself. If you swap MicroSD cards between two CC3s, the two CC3s will behave identically. But if you use two MicroSD cards with different files and settings in the same CC3, the CC3 will act differently with each MicroSD card. The CC3 requires that the MicroSD card be formatted with either the FAT16 or FAT32 file system. If you bought a new MicroSD card for use with the CC3, it is probably already formatted correctly. If your MicroSD card has been formatted by another device such as a digital camera or cell phone it may or may not be formatted correctly. If it is not, use your computer s operating system to format the MicroSD card to either FAT16 or FAT32. The CC3 does not provide a means of writing user files or formatting MicroSD cards. You must have access to a computer with the necessary hardware and software to read and write MicroSD cards in order to use the CC3 in anything other than CC3 Development Mode. USB based SD card writers are cheaply available at most stores which sell MicroSD cards, and most MicroSD cards come with an adapter to let them be read and written in standard SD card devices. The easiest way to setup your MicroSD card is to use the CC3 Editor program available from This program provides a straightforward interface to preparing your games and configuring your menus, and is available for use on Windows32, Mac-OS X, and Linux computers. This section will assume you are using the CC3 Editor program to prepare your MicroSD card. The best source of games for use on your CC3 is the Intellivision Lives and Intellivision Rocks CDs for sale from Intellivision Productions, Inc. at This section will detail how to use these CDs with the CC3.

3 Using the CC3 Editor The CC3 Editor is a Graphical User Interface (GUI) for setting up the MicroSD card of your CC3. This section describes how to use the CC3 Editor by walking your through a simple example. 1) Download the CC3 Editor from 2) Unzip/Untar the editor in the folder/directory of your choice (from here on out, directory shall be used to refer to folder/directory). There is no install program, simply uncompress the editor where you want it. 3) Run the cc3editor program. You will be presented with something that looks like Figure 1: CC3 Editor initial screen. (Note, all figures are shown running on Windows 2000, the program may look slightly different depending on your operating system, but the functionality is the same. Figure 1: CC3 Editor initial screen.

4 4) Start by specifying the location of your MicroSD card. This can be the actual location of your MicroSD card, or you can create a directory on your hard disk for the CC3 Editor to create the contents of your MicroSD card. The first option is the most simple and direct, but if anything happens to your MicroSD card all your work will be lost. If you create a separate directory on your hard disk, when the CC3 Editor is finished you will have to copy all of the files from the directory on the hard disk into the root directory of your MicroSD card, but you will have the advantage of having a backup copy of the contents of your MicroSD card should you ever need them. For this example, we will create a folder/directory on the hard disk and work there. The directory we created was H:\CC3SD. You can create the directory anywhere you wish. You must use your operating system s create directory commands to do this; the CC3 Editor will not create the directory for you. 5) Having created the directory on our hard disk, we now select this directory as our SD Card Directory using the Browse button at the top of the CC3 Editor window. See Figure 2: CC3 Editor = Selecting the SD Card Directory. Simply navigate to the location of the directory you just created (or the root directory of your MicroSD card if working directly on the card.) Alternatively you can type the path to the directory into the SD Card Directory Box. When we select the directory the CC3 Editor prompts us that the directory is not formatted for the CC3 (because we just created it) and asks us if it is ok for it to prepare the directory for the CC3. Answer yes and the CC3 editor will create the subdirectories and files required by the CC3. 6) When the CC3 Editor is done initializing the directory, a row will appear in the Menu box in the upper left corner of the CC3 editor. The row lists Name = Main Menu and File = MENU. See Figure 3: CC3 Editor - After SD card initialization, Main Menu has been created. Before proceeding with the example, an explanation of the CC3 s Menu system is required. The CC3 Menu system is the main user interface through which you select the game you wish to play. The CC3 allows you to create menus from which to select either games or other menus. These menus are specially formatted text files that the CC3 understands how to read. Inside the specially formatted file each menu entry consists of three parts, a displayed name, a file name, and a field to indicate whether the entry is a game or a menu. The displayed name is what you will see when you use the CC3. It is the exact text that will appear on screen when that line of the menu is displayed. This field can be up to 20 characters long and can contain upper and lower case letters, numbers, and punctuation marks.

5 Figure 2: CC3 Editor = Selecting the SD Card Directory. The file name is the base name of the file the CC3 will load when you select that line from the menu. This field can be up to 8 characters long, and consist of uppercase letters, numbers, and any of the following characters:!, #, $, %, &,, (, ), _. If the entry is a menu (as specified by the third field), the file will end in the extension.cc3 and will be located in the root directory of the MicroSD card. If the entry is game, the base name will be used to form the file name for the game itself, as well as the game s manual. The game file name is formed by adding the extension.rom to the base name, and looking in the GAMES subdirectory. The manual file name is formed by adding the extension.txt to the base name and looking in the MANUALS subdirectory. Don t worry much about the details of file naming or location. The CC3 editor will take care of most of it for you, and guide you through it where need be. Also don t worry about the third field as the CC3 Editor will handle that as well. To configure your CC3 you can sort your games among a series of menus, or you can go the easy route and just throw them all in the Main Menu that the CC3 Editor just created. If you prefer the latter option, you can skip the rest of this step and jump ahead to step 7).

6 Figure 3: CC3 Editor - After SD card initialization, Main Menu has been created. If you prefer the first option, here are the details on how menus work. Each menu line is a link to a game or another menu. You add lines to a menu to point to the games and menus you want to appear in the menu you are currently building. The displayed name is what you will see on the screen, and the file name is what the CC3 will look up. So think of it as the displayed name is for you, and can be whatever you want it to be, and the file name is for the CC3 and must match the files contained on your MicroSD card. To move from one menu to another, you must include a line in the current menu that links to the menu you want to go to. There are NO DEFAULT MENU LINKS. Let s illustrate this with an example. You want to sort your games into menus representing each letter of the alphabet, and have a main menu that lets you select the 26 different menus representing each letter of the alphabet. We ll assume that you ll use the Main Menu just created as the launching point to select the submenus. To do this, you create 26 new menus (details on how to do all of these steps will be given later) named A through Z. You then enter a line in the Main Menu for each of the 26 menus you just created. That s it for the Main Menu; it contains no games, only links to other menus.

7 Next you edit the 26 new menus, and add entries for all the games that begin with the appropriate letter of the alphabet to them. But here s the important note about menu to menu links. You want to be able to get back to the Main Menu in order to select a different letter. In order to do this, you must add a line into each of the 26 new menus that points to the Main Menu. Again, there are no default menu to menu links, not even back to the Main Menu. Any menu can link to any other menu. So if you wanted to, you could have a line in menu A to take you back to the Main Menu, and another line to take you to Menu B. Then in Menu B you would have lines to take you to the Main Menu and to Menu C, and so on through the rest of the alphabet. A few more notes about menus and menu lines. A) You can edit the displayed name of any item in any menu. It is ok to have different displayed names point to the same file. Remember the displayed name is just for you; the CC3 does not care what it says. B) The Main Menu / MENU.CC3 file is a special menu. You must have a MENU.CC3 file regardless of what other menus you have. This will be the default file which the CC3 starts with if you have Remember Menu Pos set to No in the Options Mode, and the menu it falls back on if any edits you make to your menus cause the CC3 to be unable to find the last saved position if Remember Menu Pos is set to Yes. (Note, only the file name MENU.CC3 is special, the displayed name of Main Menu is not special, again displayed names are just for you.) 7) Continuing with the example, before building menus let s import all of our games onto the MicroSD card. The CC3 editor is designed to search for files ending with.bin,.rom,.int, and.itv extensions, compare them against a list of known games, and import them onto the MicroSD card (or the hard disk directory in this case) while properly formatting them for use with the CC3. It will also provide default display names as a convenience for any games it recognizes. It is strongly recommended that you use the CC3 Editor to import your games for its auto-formatting abilities, even if your games are already in.rom format, as the CC3 Editor will verify the integrity of.rom files. The CC3 requires that games be in the Intellicart.ROM file format (or in the slightly updated CC3.ROM format, but that doesn t matter at this point.) While most of the new games that have been created for the Intellivision are distributed in this file format, the vintage Intellivision games on the Intellivision Lives and Intellivision Rocks CDs are not. Instead they are stored as.bin files, with an optional.cfg file explaining any special handling required to use the game. The CC3 Editor will take care of finding and converting these games to the proper format for you! In this example, we will use the Intellivision Lives CD as our source of games.

8 To import the games from the Intellivision Lives CD, insert the Intellivision Lives CD in your computer, click on the Scan Dir for Games button and select the drive containing your Intellivision Lives CD. See Figure 4: CC3 Editor Adding games using Scan Dir for Games. This will search the entire CD for any games that it recognizes, format them for the CC3, and copy them into the working directory. Figure 4: CC3 Editor Adding games using Scan Dir for Games. After the import is completed, any games found will be listed in the Games box in the lower left corner of the CC3 Editor. (When editing your CC3 setup in the future, this window will list whatever games are currently in the GAMES subdirectory, that is games that were previously imported.) If the CC3 finds any files that seem like valid games, but not recognized in its list (such as any new games or demos that come out after the list was last updated), you will be prompted to provide a default display name and file name for the game. 8) If you have Intellivision Rocks as well as Intellivision Lives, when you are done importing the games from Intellivision Lives, insert the Intellivision Rocks CD and repeat the process outlined in step 7. This will add the new games found on the

9 Intellivision Rocks CD to the list of games in the Games box, as well as adding them to your GAMES subdirectory. 9) If you have any other sources of games use Scan Dir for Games again and point to the directory containing the games you wish to import. You can keep adding new games for as many sources of games as you have. Games already imported will be skipped when you add new games, so you don t have to worry about which games are new and which are already in your GAMES subdirectory. 10) If you wish to add a single game, and know the file, you can use Add Game instead of Scan Dir for Games to select the single file. 11) Now it s time to build the menus. For those of you who aren t interested in submenus and just want a quick single alphabetical menu, here s how to do it. Click the mouse on one of the games in the Games box in the lower left hand corner of CC3 Editor. Use the Select-All keyboard shortcut appropriate for your operating system (Ctrl-A for Windows/Linux), then press the Add Games -> button. This will add all the games to the Main Menu. Click Save Menu, and you re done. See Figure 5: CC3 Editor - Quick Start, adding all games to the Main Menu. If you re only interested in this simple menu, skip to step 21). For those interested in building multiple menus and arranging things in particular ways the following steps will walk you through adding a second menu and moving things around. (And will reveal some of the less than elegant aspects of the CC3 Editor Alas.)

10 Figure 5: CC3 Editor - Quick Start, adding all games to the Main Menu. 12) Let s make the second menu a menu to hold our favorite games. Click on the New Menu button in the Menu box in the upper left corner of CC3 Editor. A New Menu dialog box will appear. See Figure 6: CC3 Editor - Creating a new menu. Fill in the Display Name ( Favorites in this case) and the Menu File Name (FAVRTS), note that the file name must be 8 or fewer characters, so we have to choose a shorter name than the display name in this case. CC3 Editor will capitalize the file name for you if you don t do it your self. Note that the display name we enter here is just the default display name. You can change the actual display name for this menu in any menu in which you insert a line linking to the FAVRTS menu. It is the file name the uniquely identifies a menu, not the display name.

11 Figure 6: CC3 Editor - Creating a new menu. 13) Add the Favorites menu we just created to the Main Menu, otherwise we would never be able to get to the new Favorites menu we just created. We want to place it at the top of the Main Menu. First click on the Favorites line in the Menus box in the upper left hand corner of CC3 Editor. This will select and highlight the Favorites menu. Next click on the ABPA Backgammon box in the Edit Menu box on the right hand side of CC3 Editor. See Figure 7: CC3 Editor - Inserting a menu link into the Main Menu. We select this box because when you insert games or menus into an existing menu they will be added directly below the currently selected item in the Edit Menu box, or at the very end of the menu if no items are selected in the Edit Menu box. Since we want the menu at the top, we choose the first item in the Edit Menu box. Next press Add Menus ->. This adds the Favorites Menu to the Main Menu, right below the ABPA Backgammon entry.

12 Figure 7: CC3 Editor - Inserting a menu link into the Main Menu. 14) We wanted the Favorites line to be at the top of the Main Menu, but we can t insert above the top item, so this is as close as we could get. Now we can move the Favorites line to the position we really want. Click on the #2 beside the Favorites line in the Edit Menu box. Then while holding down the mouse button drag the Favorites line above ABPA Backgammon line and release the mouse button. Favorites becomes the top position, and ABPA gets moved down one entry to #2. See Figure 8: CC3 Editor - Rearranging the order of items in a menu. You can move any menu entry on the screen this way to any other visible position. So if you wanted to move Adventure (proto) down below B-17 Bomber, you could select the #3 beside Adventure (proto) and drag it down below #10 B-17 Bomber. Adventure (proto) would become entry #10, and everything below its old position and above its new position would move up one slot. (B-17 Bomber would now be #9.) This brings us to the first clunky limitation I just couldn t get around in the GUI toolkit used to build CC3 Editor. You can only drag items within the current visible area. If you want to move an item farther than that, you have two options. You can drag it in chunks to the top or bottom of the visible area, move the visible area up or

13 down, and then drag again over and over until you reach the spot you re trying to reach, or you can Remove Items the item (or items) you want to move, select the entry in the Edit Menu box that you wish the items to appear below, and then Add the items back into the Menu using either Add Menus -> or Add Games ->, as both add buttons insert below the last selected item. Figure 8: CC3 Editor - Rearranging the order of items in a menu. 15) After dragging the Favorites line to the top location, we re done editing the Main Menu for this example. Click Save Menu. Answer yes when it asks you to overwrite the existing menu. 16) Now that the Menu is saved, let s edit our Favorites menu. Select FAVRTS from the drop down Menu: list at the top of the Edit Menu box. You have to select by file name instead of displayed name because displayed names do not have to be unique, but file names do. The Favorites menu appears in the Edit Menu box (it s blank because we haven t added any items to it yet.) See Figure 9: CC3 Editor - Selecting a different menu to edit.

14 Figure 9: CC3 Editor - Selecting a different menu to edit. 17) Now we re ready to add entries to the Favorites menu. Before we add games, let s add a link back to the Main Menu, otherwise we won t be able to get back there once we select the Favorites menu on the CC3. This is done just like adding the Favorites menu to the Main Menu. First select Main Menu in the Menu box in the upper left corner, then click Add Menus ->. Since there are no entries in the Edit Menu box at this time, letting it add to the end of the menu (which is the first entry in this case) does what we need. 18) Let s say we re not happy with the default display name of Main Menu, and would rather have it appear as Other Games (as in those other games that aren t our favorites). We can change the display name in the Favorites menu to something other than the default display name listed in the Menu box. To do this, double click on the displayed name entry Favorites in the Edit Menu box. Delete the old name and type in the new name. See Figure 10: CC3 Editor - Editing the Displayed Name of a menu entry. This changes the displayed name ONLY in the Favorites menu. If we created another menu later, and added a link back to the Main Menu again, the default

15 display name of Main Menu would again be used. (Although we could change it to Other Games in the new menu as well, or to something else entirely.) Figure 10: CC3 Editor - Editing the Displayed Name of a menu entry. 19) Now let s add our favorite games to the Favorites menu, below the Other Games entry at the top. Just scroll to find the games you like in the Games box in the lower left corner, click on the game s entry, and click Add Games ->. Repeat this for each game you wish to add. You can also use any multiple selection options provided by your operating system, such as holding down ctrl or shift while clicking to select more than one game at a time. When you click add games all selected games will be added. (The same applies to the Add Menus -> button.) You could also add menus to the Favorites menu, but we won t in this example. For this example we ll say our favorite games are Frog Bog and Astrosmash and add them to the menu. You can add as many or as few games as you want, and place them in any order.

16 Figure 11: CC3 Editor - Finished adding games to a custom Favorites menu. 20) When you re done adding games to the Favorites menu, the screen should like the one shown in Figure 11: CC3 Editor - Finished adding games to a custom Favorites menu. You can now save your menu and quit the CC3 Editor (you will be prompted to save an edited menu if you quit before saving). 21) Having imported all our games and made them available from the Main Menu (and if you ve followed the whole example created a Favorites menu as well), we are done setting up the MicroSD Card except for one thing. In this example we chose to do all of our work in a directory on the hard disk instead of directly on the MicroSD card. To finish things we close the CC3 Editor, and then copy the contents of the directory we listed as our SD Card Directory (H:\CC3SD in this example) into the root directory of the MicroSD card. Make sure you copy things to the right level. When you open the MicroSD card s directory, you should see a few.cc3 files, GAMES and MANUALS directories, and a few other files. You should not see a directory whose name matches the name of the directory used on the hard disk. (In this case, if we saw CC3SD on the MicroSD card it means we accidentally copied the CC3SD directory itself to the MicroSD card rather than the contents of the directory.)

17 If you chose to work directly on the MicroSD card, this step does not apply to you. That ends this example. The only other feature not discussed is the Remove Items button on the CC3 Editor. Use this button to remove items from a menu. To do so select the items you wish to remove from the Menu in the Edit Menu box and then press Remove Items. Note that this only removes the entries from that Menu. IT DOES NOT DELETE ANY GAMES OR MENUS. Your menus and games are still there, and can still be used in other menus, or added back in at a later time. Setting up the Cuttle Cart 3 Figure 12: Cuttle Cart 3 and MicroSD Card A picture of the Cuttle Cart 3 along side a MicroSD card is shown in Figure 12, with labels identifying the MicroSD Card socket and the serial jack used with the CC3 Development Mode. In order to use the CC3 in Main Menu Mode a properly setup MicroSD Card must be inserted in the MicroSD Card socket. Figure 13 shows what the CC3 should look like with the MicroSD card installed in the socket.

18 Figure 13: CC3 with MicroSD Card installed It is recommended, but not required, that you install your CC3 inside a standard Mattel Intellivision cartridge case to keep it safe and make it easier to insert and remove from the Intellivision. Once installed inside a cartridge case the MicroSD card and serial jack will not be accessible without reopening the case and removing the CC3. In this way the CC3 looks just like a normal Intellivision cartridge once placed inside a cartridge case. To insert or remove the CC3 from a cartridge case, start by removing the two screws from the back of a standard Mattel Intellvision cartridge case as shown in Figure 14, then remove the plastic back panel of the cartridge case itself. Insert the CC3 into the cartridge case with the gold fingers going through the slot at the bottom of the case. You should be able to see the large Cuttle Cart 3 logo and the text This side visible when inserted into cartridge case before you close the case back up. It is very important that you insert the CC3 in the correct orientation, or it will not work. See Figure 15 for a photograph of the CC3 installed in a cartridge case before the case back is reinstalled. After installing CC3 replace the cartridge back and the two screws. The Cuttle Cart 3 is now ready for use. If you choose not to install the CC3 inside a case (such as to use the serial port) be sure to insert it into the Intellivision such that the side with the large Cuttle Cart 3 logo and the text This sides towards bottom of Intellivision is facing towards the bottom of the Intellivision. The Cuttle Cart 3 will not function if inserted into the Intellivision upside down.

19 Figure 14: Back of standard Intellivision case Figure 15: CC3 Installed in Cartridge Case

20 Using the Cuttle Cart 3 This section describes how to use the CC3 in its menu mode. For information on using the CC3 in development mode, see the section CC3 Development Mode. This section assumes that you already have a MicroSD card properly loaded with all the appropriate files. Figure 16: Cuttle Cart 3 Main Menu Mode The Basic Steps 1) Setup your Intellivision just as you would to play standard games. 2) Insert the MicroSD Card into the Cuttle Cart 3 and insert the Cuttle Cart 3 into the Intellivision. See Setting up the Cuttle Cart 3 for details on this step. 3) Turn on the Intellivision. After a brief boot period the CC3 will be initialized and ready to run. It starts out in the Main Menu Mode (unless you select otherwise, see the section on User Settings in the Options Mode). Cuttle Cart 3 Modes The CC3 is operated from a series of modes, each of which lets you perform different actions. All of the modes on the CC3 can be operated using either controller. The controller discs are used to scroll the screen or move a pointer. In scrolling situations if you hold a direction down continuously, the CC3 will begin to automatically scroll until you release the direction. The ENTER and CLEAR buttons are used to select items and enter or exit screens. Specific details of what each button does in each mode are listed in that mode s description, but it is all really quite easy. If you forget the details of how the buttons work in each mode, a little experimentation should make it obvious how things work.

21 Main Menu Mode A picture of the Main Menu Mode is shown in Figure 16. From the Main Menu Mode one can go to the Game Select Mode or the Options Mode, or one can load and start the currently selected game or view the currently selected game's manual. Actions are selected by moving the pointer along the top of the menu to the desired choice and pressing either ENTER. The pointer appears as two hyphens "-" (see Figure 16), one on each side of the current selection. To move the pointer to the left, press LEFT or DOWN on the disc. To move it right press RIGHT or UP on the disc. Game Select Mode Pressing ENTER while the pointer is on the -SEL- entry in Main Menu Mode takes you to the Game Select Mode. In this mode, you can scroll through the menu of games to select the game you wish to play or the game whose manual you wish to view. As a visual aid to determine when you are in the Game Select Mode, the Main Menu entries on the top of the screen will be replaced with the phrase Enter Selects. Figure 17: Game Select Mode When in the Game Select Mode, move the bar that appears in the menu to select the game. The game whose name is highlighted by the bar is the selected game. Press disc to scroll the bar up one line. Press disc DOWN to scroll the bar down one line. If the bar is already at the top or bottom of the menu, the menu itself will scroll one line in the appropriate direction. Press disc LEFT or RIGHT to scroll the menu one full page at a time backwards or forwards respectively. The selection bar itself will not move when you press LEFT or RIGHT. To confirm your game selection, press ENTER once. This will return you to the Main Menu Mode with the -PLY- option selected. To play the selected game press ENTER a second time. (Pressing CLEAR in the Game Select Mode will return you to Main Menu Mode with the SEL- option selected.) Play Game Mode Pressing ENTER while the pointer is on the PLY- entry in the Main Menu Mode loads and starts the selected game. As a shortcut for quickly starting games from the menu, the pointer will always be set to -PLY- after leaving the Game Select Mode using the ENTER button. This means that pressing ENTER twice from the Game Select Mode will load and play the selected game.

22 To return to the Main Menu Mode (or CC3 Development Mode if you loaded the game from that mode) after loading a game, hold CLEAR on either controller while pressing reset, or cycle power on the Intellivision. View Manual Mode Pressing ENTER while the pointer is on the -MAN- entry in the Main Menu Mode will load and display the currently selected game's manual. In this mode, pressing disc DOWN will scroll the manual down one line. Pressing disc UP will scroll the manual up one line. Pressing disc LEFT or RIGHT will scroll the manual backwards or forwards one full page respectively. To exit the View Manual Mode press CLEAR. This will return you to the Main Menu Mode. A Note About Manuals: For proper display on the CC3, manuals need to be formatted a specific way. They should be ASCII text files that are 20 columns wide and have every line, including the final line, terminated by either a line feed, or a carriage return/linefeed combination. If manuals are used that are not formatted this way, the CC3 will autowrap the text lines. However, this will create a poorly formatted display and will cause some artifacts in the scrolling of the screen where scrolling down and then back up the same number of lines may not return you to the same position in the file and the screen formatting will be slightly different. However the text will remain readable. Options Mode Pressing ENTER while the pointer is on the -OPT- entry in the Main Menu Mode enters the Options Mode. From this mode you can update the CC3's operating system, modify user settings, and gain access to the Select Colors Mode and CC3 Development Mode. Figure 18: View Manual Mode In the Options Mode you select an item by Figure 19: Options Mode moving the menu bar around the screen to highlight the desired item. Press disc UP to move the bar up one line. Press disc DOWN to move the bar down one line. The bar will wrap from top to bottom or bottom to top if you scroll past either end. To toggle a user setting press disc LEFT or RIGHT. To perform an action, press ENTER while the action is highlighted. (User Settings have a Y

23 for Yes or N for No to as the left most character. Actions are those lines that do not end in Y or N.) The configurable user settings are as follows. Remember Menu Pos - Set this to Yes to have the CC3 remember the menu, menu page, and bar location of the last game played or manual viewed the next time you start the CC3. The CC3 will restore the menu display to this location when you turn it on if the setting is Yes. If the setting is No, the CC3 will always display the menu starting from the first entry of the root menu. Note that if you update the active menu file, the CC3 will start at the first line of the root menu the next time you star the CC3. Start in Sel Mode - Set this to Yes to have the CC3 boot directly into Game Select Mode. Set it to No to have the CC3 boot into Main Menu Mode. Enter Dev Mode - If this is set to Yes, the next time the CC3 is started it will come up in CC3 Development Mode rather than Main Menu Mode. The available Actions are as follows. Select Colors - Selecting this action takes you to the Select Colors Mode, where you can adjust the colors of the CC3 display. See the Select Colors Mode section for more details. Update OS - Select this action takes you to the Update OS Mode, where you can update the operating system stored inside the CC3. Exit Save Changes Select this action to confirm any changes you have made to the user settings and return to the Main Menu Mode if Enter Dev Mode is No, or to enter CC3 Development Mode if Enter Dev Mode is Yes. Exit Discard Changes Select this action to cancel any changes you have made to the user settings and return to the Main Menu Mode. Select Colors Mode The Select Colors Mode allows you to adjust the color settings used by the CC3 to suit your personal tastes. To select the color you wish to change, use disc UP and DOWN to move the highlight bar over the line describing the color you wish to change. To change the highlighted color Figure 20: Select Colors Mode

24 use disc LEFT and RIGHT to decrement and increment the color s value. Each background (BG) color can be selected from one of sixteen values (0 15). Each foreground (FG) color can be selected from one of eight values (0 7). When you are satisfied with the colors you have selected, move the highlight bar to "Exist Save Colors" and press ENTER. This will return you to the Options Mode and store your color settings on the CC3 s MicroSD card. If you do not like the changes you have made, you can choose "Exit Discard Colors" to restore the colors to their settings before you entered the Select Colors Mode and return to the Options Mode. Selecting "Load Defaults" will load the original CC3 colors, but will not save them. To save them you must select "Exit Save Colors" after you have loaded the default values. Update OS Mode Updates to add new features or fix problems may become available on the Schell's Electronics website at To install the updates into your CC3 use the Update OS Mode. You can also enter Update OS Mode to see the version numbers of the OS currently installed in your CC3. These are displayed at the bottom of the screen in Update OS Mode. Figure 21: Update OS Mode There are actually two separate operating systems stored inside the CC3, the Main OS, which is what you normally use, and the Emergency Boot OS that is provided as a backup in case some goes wrong when updating the Main OS. To perform an update use disc UP and DOWN to move the highlight bar onto the desired action, and then press ENTER to select that action. The following actions are available in Update OS Mode. Return to Options Select this action to exit Update OS Mode and return to Options Mode. Update Main OS Select this action to update the Main operating system stored inside the CC3. Updates to the Main OS are distributed as files named BOOTROM.CCC. To update the Main OS, copy the latest version of BOOTROM.CCC into the root directory of your MicroSD card. Then select the Update Main OS Action. Selecting the Update Main OS action will bring up a series of two informational screens before beginning the update. The first informs you that the CC3 must switch to the Emergency Boot OS in order to update the Main OS. This also serves to ensure that the

25 Emergency Boot OS is valid before allowing you to update the Main OS. Press ENTER to switch to the Emergency Boot OS. The second screen is a final confirmation that you wish to install an update to your OS. Press ENTER again to perform the update. Once the update begins a screen showing the progress of the update will appear. If everything goes well the update process will end with the message Update Successful! At this point press ENTER to boot the updated OS. If a problem occurs while updating your Main OS, such as a power failure, you can still recover the use of your CC3 by use of the Emergency Boot feature. For more details see the Emergency Boot OS Explained section. Update Emg Boot - Select this action to update the Emergency Boot OS stored inside the CC3. Updates to Emergency Boot OS are distributed as files named EMGBOOT.CCC. To update the Emergency Boot OS, copy the latest version of EMGBOOT.CCC into the root directory of your MicroSD card. Then select the Update Emg Boot Action. Selecting the Update Emg Boot Action will bring up a screen confirming that you wish to update the Emergency Boot OS. Press ENTER to begin the actual update process. Once the update begins a screen showing the progress of the update will appear. If everything goes well the update process will end with the message Update Successful! At this point ENTER to return to the Update OS Mode. If a problem occurs while updating your Emergency Boot OS, such as a power failure, simply restart the CC3 and attempt the update again. If it fails for another reason, check to make sure that you have the latest EMGBOOT.CC3 file on the MicroSD card and try the update again. Emergency Boot OS Explained The CC3 is equipped with a backup operating system referred to as the Emergency Boot OS. The purpose of this backup system is to provide a means of recovering from a failed Main OS update, or any other failure of the Main OS Flash ROM. Every time you turn on the Intellivision with the CC3 inserted, the CC3 performs a check on the integrity of the Main OS. If this check fails, the CC3 boots into the Emergency Boot OS. The only action possible from the Emergency Boot OS is to restore the Main OS. IMPORTANT NOTES ABOUT EMERGENCY BOOT If your CC3 boots into Emergency Boot mode unexpectedly, don t panic! The solution may be as simple as turning off your Intellivision and turning it back on. Always try this before performing a restore operation on the Main OS. The Intellivision is rather old piece of equipment, and can sometimes be a little flakey on power on. This can cause the

26 CC3 to think the Main OS has failed when nothing is actually wrong. So it s always worth a quick power cycle to see if the problem goes away. Doing this will not harm your Intellivision or the CC3. Also make sure you are not holding down any buttons on either controller. You can force the CC3 to boot into Emergency Boot mode by holding down the number 2 on either controller when you turn on the Intellivision. (Alternatively you can force it to boot the Main OS by holding down the number 1. Of course if the Main OS is really corrupted the CC3 will fail to boot.) Restoring the Main OS from Emergency Boot Restoring the Main OS from Emergency Boot works almost exactly like updating the Main OS from the Update OS Mode menu. To restore the Main OS, obtain the latest BOOTROM.CC3 file from and copy the file into the root directory of your MicroSD card. Once the BOOTROM.CC3 file is loaded onto the MicroSD card, power up the CC3, and press ENTER when the Emergency Boot OS startup screen appears. This will install a new copy of the Main OS onto the CC3. If all goes well, the update will end with the message Update Successful! When you press ENTER after this message the CC3 should reboot into the Main OS. If the update fails, or the CC3 continues to enter the Emergency Boot OS after the update, something has gone wrong. Erase the BOOTROM.CC3 from your MicroSD card, obtain a new copy of BOOTROM.CC3 from recopy it onto your MicroSD card and try again. If the update still fails, contact support@schells.com for assistance. CC3 Development Mode Development mode is just a fancy name for the mode that allows games to be loaded into the CC3 by means of the RS-232 serial cable rather than through the MicroSD card interface. This makes it easy to try out new code while developing new games. No need to keep swapping the MicroSD card in and out of the CC3 and the computer. To load games via the serial port, you need a Figure 22: Dev Mode 2.5 mm Stereo Jack to DB-9 converter cable to connect the CC3 to an RS-232 compatible serial port. A schematic diagram for the cable is provided in Figure 23. You can enter CC3 Development Mode two ways. The first way is to set Enter Dev Mode to Yes in the Options Mode, and then select Exit Save Changes. The second is to use the CC3 with no MicroSD Card inserted.

27 If you enter development mode using the Options Mode, the CC3 will continue to boot into development mode until you choose to exit development mode by pressing ENTER on the development mode screen (which will take you back to Main Menu Mode). If you enter development mode by using the CC3 without a MicroSD card, the settings stored on the MicroSD card will take precedence as soon as you start the CC3 with one inserted. Development mode is very simple mode in which the CC3 acts just like an Intellicart (if you re familiar with that product.) While in development mode the CC3 will monitor the serial port for a download to begin, displaying the message >>> Load Image <<<. Once a download begins the message will change to >>> Loading <<<, or to an error message if an error is detected during the download. Once the download is complete the CC3 will run the ROM just downloaded. The serial port is auto baud rate detecting from 300 to baud, No parity, 8 data bits, 1 stop bit. The download protocol for talking to the CC3 is detailed in Appendix I CC3 Download protocol.

28 Figure 23: CC3 Serial Cable Schematic

29 Appendix I CC3 Download protocol The following text describes the protocol used to send a binary file to the CC3. It is almost identical to the download protocol used for the Intellicart. There are only two differences. The first is that the first byte used for baud rate detection has changed. On the Intellicart the first byte transmitted was 0xA8. On the Cuttle Cart 3 it is 0x41. The second is that the CC3 uses Bit 2 of the Enable tables to signal 8-bit RAM emulation. The Intellicart only support 16-bit RAM, and it ignores this bit. CC3 Download Protocol: 1. Send Byte 0x61, used for auto baud rate detection 2. Send number of ROM segments This is the number of non-contiguous ROM segments that will follow. For example, a cart that occupied memory from 0x5000-0x6FFF and 0xD000-0xDFFF would send the number 0x02. (The actually binary value, not its ASCII equivalent.) 3. Send the ones complement of the number of ROM segments. 4. Send high byte of start address of first segment, 0x50 for above example. 5. Send high byte of stop address of first segment, 0x6F for above example. 6. Send the ROM segment itself. 7. Send the high byte of the CRC-16 for the first ROM segment. 8. Send the low byte of the CRC-16 for the first ROM segment. 9. Repeat steps 4-8 for each additional ROM segment. 10.Send the Enable Tables defined later. 11.Send high byte of CRC-16 for the tables. 12.Send low byte of CRC-16 for the tables. 13.Done Enable Tables: Access Table - Instructs the CC3 whether or not to respond to read and/or write accesses in each of the 2K word segments of the CC3 memory map. Also sets whether or not bankswitching is enabled for each 2K window. Format: 16 Bytes treated as 32 4-bit nibbles each holding permission for a given 2K region. Intellivision address bits <15:12> index into table. (Zero relative.) Upper nibble contains permissions for upper 2K, lower nibble for lower 2K. If the nibble is clear CC3 ignores this address space.

30 If bit zero of a nibble is set CC3 responds to read commands (ROM/RAM). If bit one of a nibble is set CC3 responds to write commands.(ram) If bit two of a nibble is set CC3 only writes the lower 8 bits of write operations to this window. The upper 8 always respond with whatever was downloaded. Used to emulate 8 bit RAM. The upper 8 bits should be loaded with 0 s at download time. If bit three of a nibble is set CC3 allows this window to be bankswitched. Example: C array format, ROM at 0x5000-0x5FFF, RAM at 0xD000-0xD7FF unsigned char read_write[16]; int i; for(i = 0; i < 16; i++) read_write[i] = 0; /*Set read permission for 0x5000-0x57FF and 0x5800-0x5FFF First 1 sets permission for 0x5800-0x5FFF Second 1 sets permission for 0x5000-0x57FF*/ read_write[5] = 0x11; /*Set read/write permission for 0xD000-0xD7FF A value of 3 in a nibble is read/write (both lower bits set.) Only enable the LOWER 2K in this example*/ read_write[0xd] = 0x03; End of Example Fine Address Restriction Table - Used to restricted access to a smaller portion inside a 2K window, for working around memory holes in the Intellivision, predominantly the STIC registers. Format: 32 Bytes treated as 64 4-bit nibbles. All lower 2K windows (0x0000-0x07FF 0xF000-0xF7FF) are in the first 32 bytes. All upper 2K windows (0x0800-0x0FFF 0xF800-0xFFFF) are in the second 32 bytes. Intellivision address bit 11 (zero relative) determines which half of the table. ADDR <11> == 0 -> table[0] to table[15] ADDR <11> == 1 -> table[16] to table[31]. Intellivision address bits <15:12> index into the appropriate table half. Each byte has the following format: [0xxx 0yyy], where 0xxx is the 3 bit LOWER bound (yes, placed in the upper nibble) and 0yyy is the 3 bit UPPER bound. The bounds are inclusive, i.e. 1-7 only restricts access to 0. Note, for the upper half of the table, xxx and yyy are still limited to be between 0 and 7. For example, in the lower 2K 0x5xxx block, a value of [ ] would restrict access to 0x5100-0x53FF. In the upper 2K block, the same byte would restrict access to 0x5900-0x5B00.

31 Example: Restrict RAM from Access Table example to only occupy 0xD000-0xD3FF unsigned char fine_restrict[32]; /*Note the default value for this table must be 0x07 to allow access to the entire range opened by the Enable table.*/ for(i =0; i < 32; i++) fine_restrict[i] = [0x07]; /*Limit range 0xD000-0xD7FF to be 0xD000-0xD3FF Note this is a lower 2K boundary, so it used the first half of the table.*/ fine_restrict[0xd] = [0x03]; End of Example CRC-16 Format: The CC3 CRC is a 16 bit CRC with polynomial 0x1021 with the register initialized to a value of 0xFFFF. The C code below provides a table driven implementation of the CRC algorithm. Table driven CC3 CRC-16 algorithm: unsigned short crctable[256] = { 0x0000, 0x1021, 0x2042, 0x3063, 0x4084, 0x50A5, 0x60C6, 0x70E7, 0x8108, 0x9129, 0xA14A, 0xB16B, 0xC18C, 0xD1AD, 0xE1CE, 0xF1EF, 0x1231, 0x0210, 0x3273, 0x2252, 0x52B5, 0x4294, 0x72F7, 0x62D6, 0x9339, 0x8318, 0xB37B, 0xA35A, 0xD3BD, 0xC39C, 0xF3FF, 0xE3DE, 0x2462, 0x3443, 0x0420, 0x1401, 0x64E6, 0x74C7, 0x44A4, 0x5485, 0xA56A, 0xB54B, 0x8528, 0x9509, 0xE5EE, 0xF5CF, 0xC5AC, 0xD58D, 0x3653, 0x2672, 0x1611, 0x0630, 0x76D7, 0x66F6, 0x5695, 0x46B4, 0xB75B, 0xA77A, 0x9719, 0x8738, 0xF7DF, 0xE7FE, 0xD79D, 0xC7BC, 0x48C4, 0x58E5, 0x6886, 0x78A7, 0x0840, 0x1861, 0x2802, 0x3823, 0xC9CC, 0xD9ED, 0xE98E, 0xF9AF, 0x8948, 0x9969, 0xA90A, 0xB92B, 0x5AF5, 0x4AD4, 0x7AB7, 0x6A96, 0x1A71, 0x0A50, 0x3A33, 0x2A12, 0xDBFD, 0xCBDC, 0xFBBF, 0xEB9E, 0x9B79, 0x8B58, 0xBB3B, 0xAB1A, 0x6CA6, 0x7C87, 0x4CE4, 0x5CC5, 0x2C22, 0x3C03, 0x0C60, 0x1C41, 0xEDAE, 0xFD8F, 0xCDEC, 0xDDCD, 0xAD2A, 0xBD0B, 0x8D68, 0x9D49, 0x7E97, 0x6EB6, 0x5ED5, 0x4EF4, 0x3E13, 0x2E32, 0x1E51, 0x0E70, 0xFF9F, 0xEFBE, 0xDFDD, 0xCFFC, 0xBF1B, 0xAF3A, 0x9F59, 0x8F78, 0x9188, 0x81A9, 0xB1CA, 0xA1EB, 0xD10C, 0xC12D, 0xF14E, 0xE16F, 0x1080, 0x00A1, 0x30C2, 0x20E3, 0x5004, 0x4025, 0x7046, 0x6067, 0x83B9, 0x9398, 0xA3FB, 0xB3DA, 0xC33D, 0xD31C, 0xE37F, 0xF35E, 0x02B1, 0x1290, 0x22F3, 0x32D2, 0x4235, 0x5214, 0x6277, 0x7256, 0xB5EA, 0xA5CB, 0x95A8, 0x8589, 0xF56E, 0xE54F, 0xD52C, 0xC50D, 0x34E2, 0x24C3, 0x14A0, 0x0481, 0x7466, 0x6447, 0x5424, 0x4405, 0xA7DB, 0xB7FA, 0x8799, 0x97B8, 0xE75F, 0xF77E, 0xC71D, 0xD73C, 0x26D3, 0x36F2, 0x0691, 0x16B0, 0x6657, 0x7676, 0x4615, 0x5634, 0xD94C, 0xC96D, 0xF90E, 0xE92F, 0x99C8, 0x89E9, 0xB98A, 0xA9AB, 0x5844, 0x4865, 0x7806, 0x6827, 0x18C0, 0x08E1, 0x3882, 0x28A3, 0xCB7D, 0xDB5C, 0xEB3F, 0xFB1E, 0x8BF9, 0x9BD8, 0xABBB, 0xBB9A, 0x4A75, 0x5A54, 0x6A37, 0x7A16, 0x0AF1, 0x1AD0, 0x2AB3, 0x3A92, 0xFD2E, 0xED0F, 0xDD6C, 0xCD4D, 0xBDAA, 0xAD8B, 0x9DE8, 0x8DC9, 0x7C26, 0x6C07, 0x5C64, 0x4C45, 0x3CA2, 0x2C83, 0x1CE0, 0x0CC1, 0xEF1F, 0xFF3E, 0xCF5D, 0xDF7C, 0xAF9B, 0xBFBA, 0x8FD9, 0x9FF8, 0x6E17, 0x7E36, 0x4E55, 0x5E74, 0x2E93, 0x3EB2, 0x0ED1, 0x1EF0 }; /*Intialize the CRC to the starting value*/ void crc_init(unsigned short *reg) { *reg = 0xFFFF;

32 } /*Update the CRC calculation with the latest data*/ void crc_calc(unsigned short *reg, unsigned char x) { *reg = (*reg<<8) ^ crctable[(*reg >> 8) ^ x]; } /*This code would be used to implement the CRC algorithm, say in main()*/ void crc_calculation_sample { /*Variable to store the CRC as it is calculated*/ unsigned short crc; /*Sample Data array, assume this was generated by reading the ROM section from a.bin file, and that the number of bytes of data is data_length*/ unsigned char data[]; unsigned int data_length; /*A counter variable*/ unsigned int i; /*Initialize the CRC this would be done at the start of each ROM segment and at the start of the Enable Tables*/ crc_init(&crc); /*Compute the CRC for the data segment*/ for(i=0; i < data_length; i++) crc_calc(&crc,data[i]); /*After this loop, the value stored in CRC is correct, and would be sent to the CC3 after the data[] was sent, represented by the dummy function write_data().*/ } write_data(data[]); write_crc(outfile, crc);

33 License and Warranty Information LICENSE TO USE. Schell s Electronics grants to you a non-exclusive license for the use of the Cuttle Cart 3, and the software contained therein. The Cuttle Cart 3 software is copyrighted, and title to the software and all intellectual property rights are retained by its author. You may not disassemble or otherwise reverse engineer the software. You may not make any copies of the cartridge hardware. LIMITED WARRANTY. Schell s Electronics warrants to you that for a period of ninety (90) days from the date of purchase, as evidenced by a copy of the receipt, the Cuttle Cart 3 will be free from defects in materials and workmanship under normal use. If during this period the Cuttle Cart 3 should require warranty service, Schell s Electronics will, at its option, either replace or repair your Cuttle Cart 3 or refund your purchase price. Schell s Electronics total liability under this warranty shall in no event exceed the purchase price of the Cuttle Cart 3. All software distributed with the Cuttle Cart 3, but not actually contained in the Cuttle Cart 3 is provided AS-IS with absolutely no warranty of any kind. To obtain warranty service, contact Schell s Electronics via at support@schells.com. If your Cuttle Cart 3 requires service, you will be required to ship the Cuttle Cart 3 to Schell s Electronics, and you will pay the initial shipping charges. Schell s Electronics will pay any return shipping charges if applicable. THIS WARRANTY IS EXPRESSLY MADE IN LIEU OF ALL OTHER WARRANTIES, EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION, WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. TO THE EXTENT NOT PROHIBITED BY APPLICABLE LAW, SCHELL S ELECTRONICS LIABILITY IS LIMITED TO, AT SCHELL S ELECTRONICS OPTION, EITHER THE REPAIR OR REPLACEMENT OF THE CUTTLE CART OR THE REFUND OF THE PURCHASE PRICE, AND SHALL IN NO EVENT INCLUDE INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING FROM OR RELATED TO THE USE OR MISUSE OF THE CUTTLE CART, EVEN IF SCHELL S ELECTRONICS HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. IN NO EVENT SHALL SCHELL S ELECTRONICS LIABILITY TO YOU, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE) OR OTHERWISE, EXCEED THE AMOUNT PAID BY YOU FOR THE CUTTLE CART 3 UNDER THIS AGREEMENT. The above limitations will apply even if the above stated warranty fails of its essential purpose. This agreement is effective until terminated. You may terminate this agreement at any time by returning the Cuttle Cart 3 to Schell s Electronics and destroying all copies of the accompanying software in your possession. This agreement will terminate immediately without notice from Schell s Electronics if you fail to comply with any provision of this agreement. Upon termination you must return the Cuttle Cart 3 to Schell s Electronics and destroy all copies of the accompanying software in your possession.