Blu (+?) Light Software Based??


The interesting thing is that if you flash a BLU (not BLU+) to old firmware, the toggle still works, so either the software is in the old firmware too (unlikely) or it is indeed hardware, but there's some way you can reset the timer by using software.
 
Oh wow, the light blinks. oooh aaah. ;)

So apparently no one intentionally found out how to disable the select button toggle... it was just discovered that it happened somehow.

This IS interesting...

Maybe it's the fact that you changed the clockspeed mid-program that disables the toggle, like not which clockspeed it's running at, but the fact that the clockspeed was changed. I don't have a blu+, so I can't test anything. Someone's going to have to experiment. Anyone up for it?

Oh! try the clockspeed tester thingy! :) We know for a fact that no intentional code was added to disable the toggle in there.
 
Squidge Posted Today, 12:17 PM
The interesting thing is that if you flash a BLU (not BLU+) to old firmware, the toggle still works, so either the software is in the old firmware too (unlikely) or it is indeed hardware, but there's some way you can reset the timer by using software.
Click to expand...



I tested this out last night ... my select button always toggles the light on/off ... no matter what emu/program I'm using.

I have a regular BLU, and have flashed to Mr Spiv's MF 2. Also, I launch all my stuff via Windups 1.0 ... if any of this helps :unsure:
 
Well, tried some more:

Apparently, using DrMD, you can switch the light on / off BEFORE you run a rom.
After that, it's completely disabled (maybe that part of the software crashes somehow).

Then I tried Castaway. I tried all the different clockspeeds, from 66 MHz to 166 MHz - but the light switch doesn't get disabled.
So it can't only be the clockspeed.

But fiddling around with Castaway, I stumbled across one thing:
Playing with 66 MHz does not only make the emulation speed slower - it also lenghtens the time you need to press the SELECT button to turn the light on / off.

So it HAS something to do with timing.

Maybe it uses a specific timer to determine how long you press the SELECT button, which can somehow be accidentally disturbed. Both DrMD and Rlyehs Betas use very optimized timings, so this could be a reason...

Also, this "bug" only appears on BLU+, which is the same as a BLU - except for some LCD timings...
 
Weird... since both BLU and BLU+ use the same toggling technique, you´d expect them to have the same bugs (i think it´s a bug, not a feature). I can´t imagine another LCD could affect this. That leads to the conclusion that there are more differences between BLU and BLU+ than the different display. Hmmm...
 
Just talked with Rlyeh about it.

DrMD initializes Timer3 after you load a rom and Rlyeh's emus initialize Timer3 on first run, so it seems like Timer3 is the BLU+ Light-Timer.

This means: Every coder could disable the BLU+ light on / off switch.
 
I've also noticed that increased clock speeds decrease the amount of time you need to hold the Select button to turn the light on or off.
 
The fact that one of the timers is being used for the light toggle switch...

this doesn't mess up the usage of the timer, does it? The blu probably would disable the toggle switch when the timer gets initialized, in order to keep normal operation of the timer.

Alright then, I'll keep this in mind. :)
 
Nope, doesn't mess up the timer, otherwise DrMD wouldn't work on BLU+.

Keep in mind that this switch disabling only happens on BLU+!

I get some test-files from Rlyeh later, so we'll know for sure if it's timer3 :)
 
Well, all the more reasons to get a blu+. :p

So why does this only work on blu+? Does the blu use a different timer? If it even uses a timer, that is.

Is there any way to re-enable the backlight timer once its been disabled?

And I assume that doing ANYTHING to timer 3 will disable the light toggle timer, right?
 
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