The ESP32 SoftCard for the Apple II

stevemac wrote:

Hi, have you got any further with IIe emulation being able to use the serial port? I only ask as a IIe Platinum has been tempting me lately and I don't really want to part with a thousand bucks.

Absolutely, I am just putting the final touches. The new firmware with all the Internet additions to the Apple II emulator should be out by the end of this week.

I added a Telnet modem for the Super Serial card, so you can dial BBS domain names and IP addresses as you would phone numbers. Here is Gazelle in Viewdata mode connected to the Retrocampus BBS in Prestel mode:

Gazelle in Viewdata mode.JPG

I also added an HTTPS to HTTP proxy running on the ESP32 for the Uthernet II card, so every site that only supports HTTPS (like this one) can be viewed on Contiki's Web browser:

Applefritter Latest.JPG

jeffmazur wrote:

stevemac wrote:

Is there any way to emulate the open apple key from a IIe on a II+?

Gazelle uses lots.

Yes of course. Connect a set of paddles or joystick and use button 0. 

Actually I was just looking into this and it turns out if you don't have a joystick on you Apple II+, Gazelle is also very easy to control with a mouse. Unfortunately there is a bug in v7.00 of the firmware that causes the Gazelle menus to go all over the place if you try to move the mouse. I already fixed it and the fix will be in the upcoming v7.01, which will be posted here just like all the previous firmware updates.

Firmware Update:

This update adds some Internet features to the Apple II emulator: a Super Serial card with a Telnet modem in slot 2 and a Uthernet II card in slot 3 capable of TCP/IP.

Also the update contains other new features, major performance improvements and lots of bug fixes:

    ESP32 SoftCard FW v.7.01.zip

To update, place the BIN file found inside the ZIP archive in the /Firmware folder of the SD card and then run the UPDATE command. Also place TelnetHosts.txt in the root of the SD card, if you have not done that in one of the previous updates.

These Apple II disk images showcase the new functionality. Please simply add them to the /Apple2 folder on the SD card:

    Apple2DiskImagesToAdd.zip

And these Sega Genesis ROMs showcase the new features and fixes. Please add those to the /SG folder on the SD card:

    SGROMsToAdd.zip

Version History: (Continued)

v7.01

    - Apple II emulator: added a Super Serial card in slot 2 with a Telnet modem over the Wi-Fi connection.

    - Apple II emulator: added a Uthernet II card in slot 3 with a TCP/IP stack over the Wi-Fi connection.

    - Apple II emulator: added a HTTPS to HTTP proxy for the Uthernet II card with HTML simplification.

    - Command prompt: added the DATE (or TIME) command to show the current date and time or fetch it from the Internet.

    - Apple II emulator: changed the No-Slot Clock to display the local time instead of UTC, since time zones now work.

    - Apple II emulator: fixed an omission causing the volume level not to have any effect on the sound.

    - Apple II emulator: fixed a bug causing the Mockingboard not to turn silent when the emulator speed exceeds 270%.

    - Apple II emulator: fixed a bug causing RAMWerks to flash while testing the RAMWorks 4 card.

    - Apple II emulator: fixed a bug that was making it impossible to control the menus in Gazelle.

    - Apple II emulator: improved the RAMWorks 4 card's bank switching performance by 300% matching the real card.

    - Apple II emulator: improved the double high-res rendering performance for programs like A2Desktop by 200% percent.

    - Apple II emulator: fixed a bug causing enabling the RGB Color option in A2Desktop not to switch to color mode.

    - Apple II emulator: fixed a bug causing 800K disk images with a DSK file extension not to start.

    - Sega Genesis emulator: removed the 3.2MB ROM size limit. Even the largest Sega Genesis ROMs will work now.

    - Sega Genesis emulator: added support for save to cartridge EEPROM or battery RAM, used by most RPG games.

    - Sega Genesis emulator: added support for Super Magic Drive (.smd) ROM images.

    - Sega Genesis emulator: fixed a bug causing the sound in Syndicate to be completely broken.

    - Sega Genesis emulator: fixed a bug causing the language selection screen in Syndicate to become unusable.

    - Sega Genesis emulator: fixed a bug causing Magic Pockets to show a black screen and freeze at the start.

    - Sega Genesis emulator: fixed the rendering of the 2-player split screen mode in Sonic the Hedgehog 2.

    - UI for all emulators: ROM and disk image files will no longer show in the list if they start with a dot.

    - Doom: converted the codebase from C to C++ in order to free up 12K of internal RAM and 75K of PSRAM.

    - Doom: improved the frame rate by 41%. The average frame rate of the Doom demo went up from 18.4 to 26 FPS.

    - Doom: fixed a bug causing random restarts in demo mode before completing the loop of the 3 distinct demos.

    - Firmware: did some compacting. As a result v7.01 is under 4MB, even though many new features were added.

New Features + Service Update for the Apple II emulator:

The two new features appear as a Super Serial card in slot 2 and an Uthernet II card in slot 3. There is a Telnet modem attached to the Super Serial card, which allow any terminal program to dial domain name or IP addresses as if they were telephone numbers. In addition to the standard AT commands like ATD/ATDT, it also supports CONNECT and TELNET. The ATI command lists the full set of supported commands.

The Uthernet II card allows running programs like Contiki and IP65 when connected to a Wi-Fi hotspot. It also provides an HTTPS to HTTP proxy, so sites that only support HTTPS can be viewed in the Contiki browser. The rest is a large number of performance improvements and bug fixes that are listed in the version history.

Service Update for the Sega Genesis emulator:

Perhaps the most important update is the support for large ROM images. Even though only 1% of all ROMs are larger than 3.2MB, they include some of the most important titles, like Super Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat 3, Sonic 3D Blast, etc. Another feature that was added is the ability to save to cartridge battery RAM or EEPROM - a must for RPG games. The rest of the bug fixes affect individual ROM images and are listed in the version history.

Service Update for Doom:

The large performance increase in Doom comes directly from fixing a bunch of bugs that were preventing it from running at 300 MHz. With these bugs now fixed, Doom joins most emulators, as well as the Video player at the now proven-to-be-stable overclock frequency of 300 MHz. The conversion to C++ is more of a housekeeping work in preparation for what’s coming next.

lemonherb wrote: I keep getting an MD5 checksum error when attempting the update. I've downloaded and tried again and got the same results. Can anyone assist?

Make sure the filename you are updating with is called:

ESP32 SoftCard FW v.7.01.E1AD588910D0CD58C43AE5F0E2DA73E9.bin

This should be also what is displayed on the screen when it asks you if you are sure to proceed:

v7.01 MD5.png

If you are using MacOS, make sure there are no Time Machine files in the /Firmware folder of the SD card that are either hidden or starting with a dot.

stevemac wrote:

Hi Guys,

I'm having trouble with ftp file transfers to the esp32, I can see the directories but when i file transfer this error message pops up and resets the connection:-

Insecure server, it does not support FTP over TLS.

Any ideas?

Thanks

Steve.

You are trying to use FTP over TSL, a.k.a. FTPS. The ESP32 SoftCard’s FTP Server only supports unencrypted FTP. I don’t plan to add FTPS, since most clients that support FTPS also support FTP. This option usually appears as a checkbox in the UI of the FTP client under Encryption, labeled something similar to "Only use plain FTP". I don't really see it as a security issue, because I don't see anyone running a public FTP server using the ESP32 SoftCard.