A DAI just for you – Jamel Tayeb

Last week, I shared a YouTube video that showcased some of the graphic capabilities of the InData DAI (here). For a computer from the early 80s, these features were quite impressive. I’ve mentioned this Belgian computer several times over the years because it was one of my first computers when I was a kid. Since the DAI is no longer available for purchase – and is unobtainium for many -, I thought I would share how you can emulate it. In the remainder of this post, I will provide a step-by-step guide to setting up a virtual DAI on your Windows PC!

I assume you are starting from scratch: Windows installed, no MAME experience, and no prior knowledge of the DAI. You will need the following:

A recent version of MAME for Windows. Download it here.
The DAI ROM set, dai.zip. One convenient MAME-ready source is here.
Optionally, DAI cassette/software archives. A good starting point is here.

The DAI ROM ZIP must be placed in MAME’s roms directory. Do not unzip dai.zip!

For example:

D:\MAME\
├── mame.exe
├── roms\
│ └── dai.zip
└── …

As for the setup, install MAME, download the DAI ROMs, and copy them into the folder as described above. You are now ready to start your DAI! Open a Command Prompt and change to your MAME directory. From there, you will launch DAI in MAME (mame.exe dai). If everything is installed correctly, the DAI will boot, display the iconic green title, and eventually present its BASIC prompt. At this point, congratulations: you are running a Belgian home computer from 1978.

After some experimentation, I found the following command line provides a much better experience: mame.exe dai -window -natural -snapsize 683x512. The -natural option is particularly important. Without it, keyboard mappings can be confusing, and many keys will not behave as expected. Don’t forget that the commands are uppercase. Once you see the BASIC prompt, enter:

10 PRINT "HELLO DE LU"
20 GOTO 10
RUN

To stop execution, use the DAI break key or the MAME-mapped break key. Ah, by the way, backspace is DEL.

One of the easiest ways to explore the DAI is to load software from a WAV cassette image. Launch MAME with the cassette attached: mame.exe dai -window -natural -snapsize 683x512 -cass1 "demo.wav" (replace demo.wav with one of the images you downloaded from the web). Once the DAI reaches the BASIC prompt, enter: LOAD. Then start cassette playback using the MAME cassette controls (if it doesn’t do it automatically). After the cassette has loaded, simply type RUN. Many programs distributed in the DAI community archives are available as .wav files, or as .dai files that can be converted to .wav.

The DAI community provides conversion tools called dai2wav.exe and wav2dai.exe. The software archive is here. The converter package is listed there as wav2dai et dai2wav. To convert a .dai file into a WAV cassette image: dai2wav.exe myprogram.dai. Then load the resulting .wav file in MAME.

To save a BASIC program type SAVE. The DAI will ask you to start recording. Using MAME’s cassette controls, create or mount a WAV cassette image, set the cassette to record, and allow the save to complete. One important point: the WAV file may remain at zero bytes in the explorer until the emulator exits. If the recording appears successful but the file size remains zero, close MAME cleanly and check again. For some computer systems in MAME, the menu may require the MAME UI mode key to be pressed first. On my setup, Scroll Lock + Tab opened the MAME menu. Scroll Lock also locks MAME into a mode where commands are executed immediately. Beware, in this mode ESC ends the session, no questions asked! A little bit like a power outage back in the 80s. Last, F10 switches MAME between 100% speed and as-fast-as-possible. This latter mode is practical when you list long programs or simply get bored by the 80s’ computer performance 🙂