Getting Started
Getting Powered Up
Powering your F256K
The F256K is powered via a standard 2.5mm DC Connector, which takes a centre-positive 12V 2A capable Power Supply.
This type of power supply is quite common. Example 12V 2A capable power supply (#)
(#) This specific power supply has not been verified (by the author) for use with the F256K. Please update this page with verified options!
Powering your F256Jr
The F256Jr is supplied as a Mini-ITX form factor mainboard, with a standard 24 pin ATX power supply connector for power connectivity.
Since the F256Jr needs relatively little power, compared to a mini-ATX PC, a popular DC 12V 24pin Pico ATX PSU works well and is a compact solution.
- Pico PSU - You power the Pico PSU via a 12V DC center-positive Power Supply source.
- 12V DC center-positive A/C Adapter - Commonly used to power the Pico PSU.
Getting programs onto the F256
SD Card
Both the F256K and F256JR have an SD card slot. The device software to read the SD card is a bit touchy (it's inherited from the Commander X16 project) and doesn't work with all SD cards
- Cards should support the V2 protocol (HC or XC); older cards that only support the V1 protocol (typically 2GB or less) won't work. By contrast, the kernels for the C256 machines generally only work with V1 cards. Note that, in both cases, this is a software limitation -- all of the Foenix machines are electrically capable of using both kinds of cards.
- Cards *MUST* be formatted FAT32 -- **NOT: FAT, FAT12, FAT16, or exFAT**. Note that while MacOS will read a FAT32 formatted card, the included disk utility won't format FAT32. Windows 10/11 works fine, but make sure to force FAT32 (or use the command line:
format /FS:FAT32 H:) - Some folks have had luck formatting cards with the Official SD Association formatter for Windows.
Demos Archive
- Download the most recent demos archive and expand it to the root of the flash card.
Debug USB port
- This is what most developers use as it's the most convenient. Connect the debug USB port to your PC or Mac
- You can use:
- FoenixMgr - works on Windows, Mac, Linux
- A Python script to manage the Foenix series of retro style computers through their USB debug ports. This tool allows uploading files of various formats to system RAM, and displaying memory through various means.
- FoenixMgr - works on Windows, Mac, Linux
- FoenixIDE (Windows only)
- Development and Debugging Suite for the C256 Foenix Family of Computers.
- FoenixIDE (Windows only)
wget
If you have the wifi configured, you can use wget to pull programs and data right off the web!
SuperBASIC
The machine boots to SuperBASIC. SuperBASIC is inspired by BBC BASIC but offers quite a bit more.
- Read the SuperBASIC Reference Manual.
- Watch EMWhite's excellent intro series on Youtube:
- Full Playlist here: EMWhite's Intro Series - Full Playlist.
- Part 1 can be viewed here:
To get started, you can type in a sample program at the command prompt:
10 for i=1 to 5 20 print "Hello world" 30 next run
SuperBASIC is similar to CBM (Microsoft) BASIC but has some differences. For example, note in the sample above it's just next not next i.
The first 15 or so pages of the SuperBASIC Reference Manual are quite instructive.
SuperBASIC is actually much more powerful and supports structured programming (procedures, blocks etc.)
dir - Run this to display directory of SD card
Loading & running programs off of the SD card is similarly easy:
load "JrWordl.bas" run
Similar to the C64, you can save time in loading programs from the dir listing by using your cursor keys to go up to the entry, typing load " (insert mode is active by default) etc. You can use CTRL+E to jump to the end of the line and use CTRL+K to delete any text from the cursor to the end of the line. Correctly place the closing " and hit ENTER.
CTRL+C acts as a "break" command and stops any running SuperBASIC program or LIST command.
Read built-in help/reference:
/help : But NOTE, this erases BASIC memory! Use Backspace key to go back in menus and to exit.
Explore the included demo SuperBASIC programs:
| Program | Notes | Source |
|---|---|---|
JrWordl.bas |
Wordle game, guess 5 letter word | |
mandel.bas |
Draws Mandlebrot set in graphics mode, takes between 2 and 3 hours | @Mu0n |
rpg-demo.bas |
UI sample that shows Zelda like RPG game. Control the character with an Atari-joystick connected to JoyPort1 | @econtrerasd |
Problematic_Code.bas |
Displays scrolling starfield | |
noelrl.bas |
Simple integer BASIC bench mark from Noel's retro lab. Completes < 3.5 seconds, compares very favourably to other retro systems! | Youtube |
dance.bas |
Animates sprite of dancer | @Mu0n |
luna.bas |
Displays simple scene | |
blink.bas |
Blinks drive access light | @Mu0n |
piano.bas |
Play some notes with the PSG | @Mu0n |
Memory Map under BASIC
| Initial Address | End Address | Description | Bytes |
|---|---|---|---|
| $0000 | - | MMU Control Register | 1 |
| $0001 | - | I/O Control Register | 1 |
| $0002 | $0007 | Free Zero Page Addresses | 6 |
| $0008 | $000F | MMU Control Addresses | 8 |
| $0010 | $002F | Free Zero Page Addresses | 32 |
| $0030 | $003F | Used Zero Page Addresses for (xx),Y Addressing | 16 |
| $0040 | $0041 | Current Address on screen of start of line | 2 |
| $0042 | $004F | Avaliable Zero Page Addresses | 14 |
| $0050 | $00AF | Number / Floating Point Stack for 16 numbers | 96 |
| $00B0 | $00EF | Available Zero Page | 64 |
| $00F0 | $00FF | Kernel Arguments in Zero Page | 16 |
| $0100 | $01FF | Hardware Stack of 6502 | 256 |
| $0200 | $0228 | Basic mini-Kernel memory | 40 |
| $0229 | $03FF | Also used by Sound Command in BASIC | 470 |
| $0400 | $041F | Control Storage first 8 bytes control syntax highlighting | 32 |
| $0420 | $0814 | Memory Storage | 1012 |
| $0814 | $0FFF | Available Low Memory | 2028 |
| $1000 | $1FFF | SuperBASIC Identifier Tables, allocated memory, string vars, stack | 4kb |
| $2000 | $77FF | SuperBASIC Program Tokenized Code (grows Upward) | 22kb |
| $7800 | $7FFF | Top 2k of SuperBASIC Program tokenize code or used for ML routines in low memory | 2kb |
| $8000 | $BFFF | SUPERBASIC CODE | 16kb |
| $C000 | $DFFF | I/O Memory Pages / Underlying Kernel Code (Selectable with I/O control Register) | 8kb |
| $E000 | $FFEF | KERNEL CODE | 8176 |
| $FFF0 | $FFFF | Reset Vectors and NMI / IRQ / BRK Vectors | 16 |
| $01:0000 | $02:2BFF | Default Memory used by BASIC bitmap graphics | 75kb |
| $02:2C00 | $02:7FFF | Available High Memory | 21kb |
| $02:8000 | $02:F000 | Used for BASIC Cross Development w/PC or MAC | 32k |
| $03:0000 | $03:7FFF | Used for Sprite Data in BASIC | 32kb |
| $03:8000 | $03:FFFF | Unless not running from Flash, Used for ROM Images | 32k |
| $04:0000 | $07:DFFF | Available High Memory | 248kb |
| $07:E000 | $07:FFFF | Being considered to be Reserved for Environmental Variables | 8Kb |
| $10:0000 | $13:FFFF | Cartridge Expansion Memory (addresable only by CPU) | 256kb |
| $14:0000 | $1F:FFFF | Future Expansions? | 768kb |
More Resources
This Wiki
Explore all of the content of this Wiki, to expand your F256 series knowledge!
Discord
The Foenix Retro Systems Discord is the primary place to get questions answered.
Also, if you resolve your question, and you didn't find the answer here on the Wiki, please consider contributing to the Wiki, for the benefit of others with the same question!
Foenix Retro Systems Newletter
Read back issues here (also a great source for sample programs).
Issues starting at #4 cover the F256 line. Issues 1-3 cover the previous version of the hardware (C256), although there are still many salient points.
