Beyond The Scanlines Extra #010: Exploring Alternate FPGA Cores of the Spectrum Next
196The Spectrum Next is one piece of amazing kit. Whether you're exploring the library of classics released for the original hardware, enjoying modern titles designed to take full advantage of its capabilities, or perhaps taking some to get acquainted with its dialect of BASIC… I'm sure you'll agree it's quite the special piece of hardware.
But there's one feature which isn't discussed all that much: taking advantage of its FPGA to load alternate cores, transforming your Next into a variety of other microcomputers, consoles and even arcade machines. This video helps to clear out some of what it takes to get these up and running (at least at the time of recording in September 2020), showing what you need to do, how to install them… along with showing some of the cores in action as well.
Obtaining Cores:
● Victor Trucco's Gitlab repository is the main hub for them: https://gitlab.com/victor.trucco/zx-spectrum-next-cores/-/tree/master/
● The BBC Micro/Master core (and the MMB image) can be fetched from Hoglet's Github repository: https://github.com/hoglet67/BeebFpga
Support Pages & Groups:
● The official multicore docs on Spectrum Next homepage: https://www.specnext.com/multicore/
● The Spectrum Next "Unofficial" FPGA Cores group on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/203350050750409
More about the Spectrum Next
● Issue 2 Kickstarter (which ends Thursday, September 10): https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/spectrumnext/zx-spectrum-next-issue-2
● My previous video talking about the Next a few months in: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXqAH3XCSBg
Gameplay recorded from a Spectrum Next - BBC Micro and Arcade cores are direct capture from HDMI, with the Intellivision Core captured from the Next's RGB output in an XRGB-Mini. The Colecovision core footage was filmed from the screen from the Next in HDMI mode.
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