Minstrel 3 with some 1K games

[willinliv]

Hi All,

I built one of the excellent Minstrel 3. Very nice to use, very reliable, and a very nice package with integrated keyboard and ZXpand. However, reviewing some of the games on Villordsutch's Youtube channel I've come across a section of games that I can't seem to get to load from the SD card - these are some but not all of Dr Beep's 1K games. I'm guessing it's something to do with the hires graphics. Most of them display a picture after loading which looks like polkadots or snow (not static). For example 'Iron ZXlider', 'painter', 'father time' or 'mine 1k' dont work. I don't suppose I'll be able to get them to run but I was curious to know what the reason might be?

Thanks, Will

[willinliv]

Hmm, just referred to the ZXpand manual and apparently config "m=L" should help with WRX games, but I can't see mention of this within the manual Minstrel3 version of the ZXpand, and doesn't seem to help with the promlematic games anyway

[dr beep]

Mine1K (do you mean minesweeper)

is not hires but uses hidden data on the screen with bit 6 set.

You must see spaces but on the screen commands like ld d.b and so on are executed.

Many of my games use this trick, also Lode Runner, Pathmaze and Snake

[dr beep]

what all games might have in common is that during display code is executed, that is upper memory is called for display and opcodes with bit 6 set are executed.

[willinliv]

Mine1K (do you mean minesweeper)

Hi Dr Beep, yes sorry I meant your JK Minesweeper. With this game I took some further attempts last night at loading it with the Minstrel 3. Via the ZXpand it will load as far as defining the keys, and then after entering the final key for 'Mark', it either resets or goes to a blank screen. However I found that if I disabled the ZXpand via a CONFIG "x" command, then it will load from the tape input (from my PC). I noted that you said it was a low res game, and it must not load for the reason you gave here which I guesss is how the memory is laid out.

I tried to do the same thing with the other games of yours that had not worked so far, but alas these did not start working. Noting that you indicate that some of these use WRX I tried to use the ZXpand command CONFIG “M=L”, but again no joy. The games that I found didnt work are here, indicating if they worked on Minstel y/n compared to ZX81: https://pastebin.com/KNurLQdu

I do have a second machine which is a ZX81, so I will be able to get my fix for IronZXlider there instead! (which loads fine with ZXpand). Thanks for your help anyway, and thanks once again for sharing your excellent games.

[dr beep]

the problem that still occurs is that the game stores invisible data on the screen. This data executes commands during display. This is what might go wrong on a minstrel. Same happens in 1K hires games.