Date   : Wed, 03 Jan 2001 15:19:38 +0000
From   : Ben Newsam <ben@...>
Subject: Re: VFS: (BBC Video Disk) : Doomsday Project

In message <3A532EDF.6239714B@...>, Paul Wheatley
<p.r.wheatley@...> writes
>I'm fortunate enough to have a working BBC Domesday system in the office and am 
>actually working on a long term digital preservation project at the University 
>of Leeds called CAMiLEON (a little more info can be found at the URL in
my sig). 
>We're looking specifically at emulation as a preservation strategy and our plan 
>is to produce an emulation solution to run the BBC Domesday software.

Is it unfeasible to transfer the data onto CD-ROM and run new software
from Windows?

>I believe there is only one Domesday specific ROM inside the system (the VFS), 
>although we do have a cartridge (for insertion in one of the slots on the front 
>of the machine) that contains one chip. Apparently this came with the original 
>Domesday kit (I have seen an identical cartridge with another, non-functioning 
>Domesday kit). Our guess is that its some kind of video chip.

It would have to be a standard FS, language, or service ROM, of course.
Can you not extract the chip and try it in one of the internal slots?

> Another part to 
>the puzzle is that our Domesday system won't start up with the cartridge in 
>place (not sure if its faulty or not). Does anyone have any idea what this may 
>be?

Maybe (a long shot, I know) it is another VFS chip, and is attempting to
communicate with the video player at the same time as the existing chip.
-- 
Ben