Veronica: Turbo card for Atari 8-bit computers
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After four years of silence, new developments in the development of the Veronica accelerator card for Atari XL/XE computers have recently been announced.
The project, initiatedin mid-2010by the AtariansMarek "DIA" Konopka and Markek "Zenon" Grzbiett, comprises aexpansion with a 65C816S micro CPU operating at 15MHzand with 64 KB of RAM.
The card connectsthrough the cartridge port; that is, its installationNo changes requiredon the original plate (as in the case ofLotharek's Rapidus) nor does it require adapters.
"We thankSimiusfor making it possible (the card) in areduced version"Konopka said on the AtariAge forum, where he shared a video of the gamegraphics performance comparison videoof an Atari machine without the expansion (left) and another equipped with Veronica (right).
"Thescreenis divided intotwo sections. (The native processor)6502 generates the top(smaller) and (the CPU of)65C816 on the Veronica makes the bottom-in a ratio of 1/4 and 3/4 screen, respectively.Calculations are performed in parallelon both CPUs. There is no need to copy anything due to the cartridge port's bank-switching capabilities. Since Veronica contains two switchable banks of 16KB RAM, we get twice as muchbuffering", Konopka explains.
The authors highlight that thewide possibilities of the card. "You can use Veronica for any kind of calculation: graphics-oriented, sounds, math problems, etc. It is ageneral purpose coprocessor", added "DIA".
Although it is awork in progress, its creators estimate that the commercial version will have aprice of 200 polish zlotys-something likeUSD 63
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