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Warp2063
Joined: 03 Mar 2008
Posts: 971
Location: Rochester, NY
NetLink: Yes
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 Posted: Tue Feb 02, 2010 3:59 pm Post subject: |
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| Auto-Fox wrote: | | Maybe inspire the mod community to develop NetLink patches for Saturn game ROMs. |
I don't think you'll find too many takers on that. There are few enough people who want to develop for the Saturn, let alone reverse-engineer someone else's Saturn binaries, figure out how to modify them, and then create a working CD that only people using a swap trick or who owns a modchip and who also owns a NetLink and analog phone lines can take advantage of.
The NetLink games back in the day were probably developed in collaboration with the teams who made the original games - none of the crazy reverse-engineering that went on with most of the XBAND games.
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Silence the Fallen
Joined: 02 Mar 2008
Posts: 29
Location: Oklahoma
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 3:41 pm Post subject: |
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| Auto-Fox wrote: | Phone-line simulator, huh? Y'know, that would be a GREAT way to demo the NetLink at cons and stuff like that... raise awareness of the little black box.
Maybe inspire the mod community to develop NetLink patches for Saturn game ROMs. |
That's one of the reasons I would like to try this. I used to go to several cons a year and there would always be a game room. It would be so cool to set up a couple of Saturns and do some Netlink matches!
As for Netlink patches... well... like Warp said, realistically it's not gonna happen. But it would be awesome if it did. I would LOVE to be prooved wrong! 
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Silence the Fallen
Joined: 02 Mar 2008
Posts: 29
Location: Oklahoma
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 3:51 pm Post subject: |
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Hey Warp! I wanted to let you know that I'm bidding on an Ebay auction of the VIKING DLE-200B PHONE LINE SIMULATOR that you linked to.
It's almost half the price that the website had it for. I'm sure after a few bids the price will go up but *hopefully* I can score it for under $75. The auction ends in 6 days but I already bid and i'll keep a close eye on it.
Hopefully in another week and a half, I'll have it and I can try it out. I'll keep you all posted.
I brought up this topic at the Digital Press forums and it seems we are in relatively uncharted territory here! Everyone is saying that it sounds like it will work but no one has actually tried it before! This is all pretty exciting! 
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Warp2063
Joined: 03 Mar 2008
Posts: 971
Location: Rochester, NY
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Wed Feb 03, 2010 11:11 pm Post subject: |
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Sweet! I want to know how it works out. I've been trying to design my own phone line simulator, but I need the help of an electrical engineer to make sure it won't burn itself out spectacularly. I can build circuits; I just don't have any training at designing them. Really, programming is my specialty.
Anyway, if I can buy one cheaply enough, it would really help me out! So let me know how it goes!
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Silence the Fallen
Joined: 02 Mar 2008
Posts: 29
Location: Oklahoma
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 3:31 am Post subject: |
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Just wanted to update everyone and post a few pictures. My Viking Phone Line Simulator finally arrived! It was new and after shipping it ran me $89.00 on Ebay.
Everything worked perfectly the first try. There was no lag when the game ran and my girlfriend and I played several matches and the connection never dropped. It's a stable hassle-free way to play Saturn Netlink matches without a phone line!
Also, Thanks for all the help Warp. Seriously, without you suggesting this I probably never would have accomplished this!
Here is the PLS in action. Once it starts to dial out it has a small internal speaker so you can hear it dial and the red "Busy" light comes on.
Here are some shots of the Saturn Hooked up to the PLS. The rooms were across from each other.
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Isaac [GER]
Joined: 04 Nov 2009
Posts: 154
Location: Germany
NetLink: No
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Warp2063
Joined: 03 Mar 2008
Posts: 971
Location: Rochester, NY
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 4:22 pm Post subject: |
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Nice! Glad to know it works! I may be getting one of these, then!
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JerryTerrifying
Joined: 19 Dec 2008
Posts: 396
Location: Dayton, OH
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 5:40 pm Post subject: |
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Wait so that set up is just each Saturn's netlink plugged into that magical box?
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Warp2063
Joined: 03 Mar 2008
Posts: 971
Location: Rochester, NY
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 6:31 pm Post subject: |
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| JerryTerrifying wrote: | | Wait so that set up is just each Saturn's netlink plugged into that magical box? |
Yup. It's a phone line simulator. It simulates the dial tone and the ring signal, and provides power to the line. Really, that's all the Netlinks need - once it's started and the Netlinks are convinced that they've successfully connected, they can just go and do their thing. The box doesn't have to do any more than that. It just acts like a regular, analog phone line, which is passive - no encoding or decoding like a digital line. And since the effective distance between the Netlinks is mere feet rather than miles, the latency is effectively nil. As long as you have no crazy EM interference going on (I babysat at one house years ago that did), it should work fine.
I knew it would work as long as it worked as advertised. I just didn't want to risk all that money on something that I didn't know for sure would work as advertised.
The only things that keep it from working by just plugging a phone cable between the two are the things that were listed above - power, a dial tone, and a ring signal. The dialing Saturn needs to know that it's connected to a working phone line, so it listens for that dial tone. The power is needed because oftentimes modems don't have the power to push the data along the lines themselves - having the power there gives them the oomph they need. And the receiving Saturn waits for the ring signal from the first, indicating that there's a connection to be established.
Theoretically, you could build two Netlink modems that wouldn't need a dial tone or a ring tone, and could provide enough power to a line that they wouldn't need the line to be powered. However, your systems would have to be right next to each other - a situation that really didn't happen often back when the Netlink was built. It was built to work on analog phone lines, because that's what was readily available, and almost everyone had.
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JerryTerrifying
Joined: 19 Dec 2008
Posts: 396
Location: Dayton, OH
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 7:05 pm Post subject: |
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I googled some schematics for a phone line simulator. Man I need to learn to read schematics and understand crap like that. 
I would love to buy one if they weren't so damn expensive. I have everything else I'd need in this room. Two Saturns, two netlinks and two TVs, 4/5 netlink games and the ability to play burnt games on one of my Saturns.
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Manji
Joined: 29 Apr 2008
Posts: 242
Location: Indianapolis
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Mon Feb 22, 2010 7:31 pm Post subject: |
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nice! those are some good pictures of everything in action. the Netlink is such an underrated accessory.
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Isaac [GER]
Joined: 04 Nov 2009
Posts: 154
Location: Germany
NetLink: No
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Warp2063
Joined: 03 Mar 2008
Posts: 971
Location: Rochester, NY
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Tue Feb 23, 2010 11:58 am Post subject: |
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| JerryTerrifying wrote: | | I googled some schematics for a phone line simulator. Man I need to learn to read schematics and understand crap like that. |
I could build one, but there're so many components involved. I designed a simpler (and much cheaper!) version, but I still want an electrical engineer to take a look at it before I build it, just so nothing catches on fire. There are some fairly high voltages involved...
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JerryTerrifying
Joined: 19 Dec 2008
Posts: 396
Location: Dayton, OH
NetLink: Yes
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| Posted: Tue Feb 23, 2010 1:55 pm Post subject: |
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Well get on that! When you build yours you should make a video of the entire process for youtube so I can follow along and build one too. Find that electronic engineer!
I'd love love love to have that set up.
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Isaac [GER]
Joined: 04 Nov 2009
Posts: 154
Location: Germany
NetLink: No
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| Posted: Tue Feb 23, 2010 2:10 pm Post subject: |
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If I tried to build something like that, I would surely fail ^^ (Hopefuly it wouldnt burn again  )
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