Z64

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You have new messages (last change).

The Z64 was a Nintendo 64 backup unit designed to use a zip drive for data storage.

This black unit, unlike the CD64 or the Doctor V64 did not attach to the bottom of the N64 unit, but instead, it was placed in the top loading cartridge slot of the unit. On the left side a boot cart was inserted into the unit to load the units GUI. The right side of the unit was dedicated to a zip drive that faced out the right side and an LCD display that showed the progress of a game being dumped or loaded.

The hardware is basically a complete 386SX PC. It had the capability to create backups of the cartridge ROM as well as load the resulting file into the onboard RAM in order for the N64 to run the software, provided the size of the ROM file wasn't larger than the amount of RAM built into the unit (128Mb or 16MB in version 1 hardware, 256Mb or 32 MB in version 2 units). However, only a few games ever released were larger than the 32MB limit. This system was arguably designed only for piracy and not for N64 development, given that there was no parallel port interface to load software binaries and debug during development as featured on the Doctor V64 and CD64 (a non-standard connector on the Z64 motherboard offered parallel port interface, but a hardware interface and software hack was never developed). For consumers the Z64 was probably the easiest backup system to use, since savegames could write directly to the zip disk. The Z64 suffered from only a few minor flaws. The most troublesome of these flaws presented itself in the third hardware revision, although it was fixable through a fairly simple modification to the mainboard of the unit and was virtually absent from the first and second versions of the hardware. Another notable flaw existed in the DC power supply jack and plug. The connection was somewhat loose and could result in the unit switching off and on and rebooting if bumped, although during normal use was not usually a problem. Overall the Z64 was arguably the highest quality and most versatile N64 backup device available.

Throughout its lifespan, members of the community had hoped for hard disk support to take the place of the notorious Zip drive storage medium. Eventually, thanks to a 3rd party BIOS the request was fulfilled and allowed for mass storage of software on a 2.5" (laptop) hard disk drive. The rewritablity of the Zip drive or hard drive allowed for easy and efficient backup and storage of save data.


[edit] External links

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../z/6/4/Z64.html"