VICE 1.20 released

[Blacklord]

Version 1.20 of VICE, the Versatile Commodore Emulator, has been
released.

VICE emulates the Commodore C64, C128, VIC20, PET 8-bit computers,
PLUS4 and the CBM-II (aka C610) and is completely written in C/C++; it
runs on Unix, Win32, MS-DOS, RiscOS, OS/2, BeOS, QNX, AmigaOS and GP2X
systems.

VICE is *free* software released under the GNU General Public License,
and as such it comes with full source code.


Most important changes since the last version include:

* Changes in VICE 1.20
======================

** General
----------

- New GP2X port.

- New AmigaOS3, AmigaOS4, MorphOS and AROS (x86/ppc) ports.

- Mac OSX X11 port is included in the main distribution now.

- Fixed some unusual CPU opcodes.

** C64 changes
--------------

- Fixed some longstanding RMW to IO area VIC-II DMA timing bug.

- Added Mikro Assembler, Dela EP7x8, Dela EP256 and Rex EP256
  cart support.

- Fixed the KCS cart emulation.

- Added swiftlink and turbo232 support.

- Added +256k memory expansion support.

- Added I/O source read collision detection support, making
  simultanious use of multiple expansions possible, like on
  the real machine.

- Fixed the RR-net address decoding and REU compatibility.

- Fixed a problem with traps using the SX Kernal ROM.

- Some IDE64 ultimax bug has been fixed.

** PET changes
--------------

- Added 128kb REU memory expansion support.

** PLUS4 changes
----------------

- Added 256k csory memory expansion support.

- Added 256k, 1024k and 4096k hannes memory expansion support.

** Unix changes
---------------

- Gnome1 is no longer supported.

- Gnome2 is now supported - everthing except the Image preview with
  CBM font should work.

- Gnome 2 port supports dimmable drive LED now.

- Added experimental ParSID support.

- Added support for minix3.

- Fixed some compile problems with the ffmpeg library.

** MS-Windows changes
---------------------

- Added experimental ParSID support.

** MS-DOS changes
-----------------

- Added experimental ParSID support.

** Mac OSX X11 changes
----------------------

- Added support for Intel build.

- Added USB joystick support.

** Miscellaneous changes
------------------------

- Added support for more 3rd party basic extenders to petcat.

- Added a c64/c128 cartridge conversion program (cartconv).

- Added binary distribution (package) creation functionality.

- Fixed a bug in the trap emulation with caused programs probing
  devices on the IEC bus to fail.

- Lots of small fixes to the monitor.


The VICE 1.20 source archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/vice-1.20.tar.gz

The VICE 1.20 MSDOS binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/vice120.zip

The VICE 1.20 WIN32 binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/WinVICE-1.20.zip

The VICE 1.20 RiscOS binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/vice-riscos1_20.zip

The VICE 1.20 OS/2 binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/vice2-1.20.zip

The VICE 1.20 BeOS binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/BeVICE-1.20x86.zip

The VICE 1.20 QNX 6.X binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/VICE-1.20-x86-public.qpr

The VICE 1.20 Mac OS X binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/vice-macosx-x11-ub-1.20.dmg

The VICE 1.20 GP2X binary archive is available at:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/crossplatform/emulators/VICE/vice-gp2x-120.zip

Notice: Some ports may not be available at the release date.


Solaris and AmigaOS ports will be announced by Marco van den Heuvel.


For more information check out the VICE home page at:

   http://www.viceteam.org

[Stephane Richard]

I suspect there will be a 1.21 release probably soon, I just (2 days ago) sent a bug report to the VICE team.  

I'm on Windows XP maybe people with other versions of windows can give it a try.  But here's what I did (and I did that test with different types of emulated drives too).  

1. Open the emulator, write a few lines of BASIC code.  DSAVE that to an empty disk image (1541 seems to work, but for soem reason , not all the time).  so far, should work fine.  now, do a NEW to clear your memory, DLOAD your program from the disk image once again, it loads fine...now, add a few lines of code again.  And DSAVE again using the same file name to overwrite the old version.  do a NEW, DLOAD the "new" version back in memory, and you'll notice you have the old version of the file, before you added your lines of code. problem overwriting...I believe saving under a new name won't cause a problem, but I haven't tried that yet.  Anyway, bug is sent and I got confirmation that it's being worked on.  :-).

Anyone happen to know some of the specifics of why FAST mode doesn't work?  I mean, basically, what's keeping them from implementing it?  is there some wizard's special secret that's missing here?  Just curious. :-).

[nikoniko]

When I had my 128, I learned to avoid save-with-replace after ending up with a number of corrupted files that way. I've met some other people who had the same problem, so I think it was something buggy in the ROM code for either the 1571 or BASIC 7. VICE's problem sounds like a separate issue related to their own code and I'm sure they'll fix it, but assuming that the 128/1571's own bugs are still present in emulation, I wouldn't trust save-with-replace for anything.

I''d also like to see FAST mode in VICE, but I imagine it must be tricky getting the timing right. I've seen and sometimes employed the suggestion to use Warp mode at 200%, but that's not really equivalent since it makes everything about the machine twice as fast whereas FAST mode wouldn't. I quickly gave up on that approach when I started doing some VDC programming, as I don't want the VDC itself running at double its normal speed.

[Guest]

Never use save with replace on a 1541 without JiffyDOS, it's broken.  It works fine on 1571 (but not 1541 mode) and 1581 drives.  Since Vice uses the 1541 ROMs, it has the same bug as a real 1541.