*New* Helpful Links : http://pastebin.com/UdmipND6
Welcome to the 70s to early 90s Computer Gaming General. We talk about games and the hardware they were made for, either micro, mini or mainframe computers, desktop, tower or all in keyboard package, from the USA, Europe, Japan, or anywhere, if the platform came out before 1995.
Don't hesitate to share tips, your past (or present) experiences, your new machines, your already existing collection, emulation & hardware advises, as well as shots, ads & flyers, videos, interviews, musics, photos, that kind of stuff.
Allowed : Computers made from the 70s to Windows 3.x and their games (of course), peripherals for these computers from any time period (MIDI expanders included)
Tolerated : Unknown, unsupported or not really popular post-95 stuff (BeOS, old Linux, stuff like this)
Not allowed : Late 90s games and computers, Pentium PCs or more, PPC Macs and up, Windows 95 and later
IRC Channel : #/g/retro @ irc.rizon.net
Random music:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKEBIM1NDHY
Random gameplay:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-cxOrymaKc
Talks about Princess Maker 2 made me finally install that game.
I am amazed how the game is rich on such limited CPU.
I am now in posession of a 1040STF, and I have no idea what I'm doing.
Any software recommendations, particularly in music and publishing software?
And can you reliably format a standard PC disk as a 720KB DS disk to use with these boxes? I can't seem to find a conclusive answer anywhere, I've got fdrawcmd and FloImg already.
>>3207408
The format used on the 1040STF drives is the same as a PC except for a different file system. Also you can't use 1.44MB disks, you'll need 720k disks.
>>3207419
Damnit. I don't know where the fuck I'm going to find those. I guess I'll go try anyway, fuck it.
>>3207454
Ebay's usually got plenty of 'em and I think you can get new disks from China or something but the quality is probably not as good as the stuff from the 80s.
>>3207468
Hmm, no blank disks so far but they seem to have more software than I expected on there, lots of games for $10 a pop, might be worth looking into. Thanks.
There's also this thing http://www.ebay.com/itm/Amiga-Atari-ST-Amstrad-USB-Floppy-Disk-Emulator-GOTEK-HxC-w-8GB-USB-key-/172081411589?hash=item2810d9f605:g:OeYAAOSwtO5XIrLp on there but other than violating my purist/aesthetic autism it's still a little expensive, plus I trust the compatibility about as far as I can throw it.
>>3207419
Also you'll need an older PC with an internal 3.5" drive to write the disks with. USB floppy drives won't work.
>>3207492
>I'm a total retard, I always thought PC 720K disks were single-sided. Nevermind.
No. They're always double sided.
The original 520ST has single sided disks but the 1040STF has double sided ones, so they're identical to PC 720k at the low level.
One important note about ST disks is that the first version of its OS (TOS 1.0) writes data sequentially rather than in parallel as a PC does. What this means is that each track on a PC floppy is considered to occupy both sides of the disk. Therefore you have Track 1/Side 1, Track 1/Side 2, Track 2/Side 1, etc, etc.
On ST disks, Track 1 occupies only the first side of the disk and the track on the opposite side from it is considered Track 40, not the back side of Track 1. The reason for this was mostly compatibility between double and single sided drives; if you had only a single sided drive in your ST, you can still read one side of a DS disk.
TOS 1.2 changed to writing parallel tracks, but it was not perfect. If you format a disk on the ST, you can write files with a PC drive fine, but formatting the disk with a PC will result in a disk the ST can't read due to the slightly different track/sector geometry that a PC puts on the disk. TOS 1.4 is the first one that can completely write disks to or from a PC.
Also you may want to ask on AtariAge for help on additional technical details I'm not familiar with.
>>3207370
>yfw you realize you can just rename the files in Strip Poker so the nude pics come up first
http://lotharek.pl/product.php?pid=13
>>3207370
I always wondered who those two models were in that Strip Poker game.
and if they did more nudity, or maybe even porn.
The original version of this game was for the Apple II in 1982, the other ports came years later. Also the Amiga was the first computer that could actually do decent, photo-real images.
>>3207743
I wonder why someone just doesn't make new floppy mechanisms to replace shot ones. It shouldn't cost any more than all the Flash floppy emulators you can get now.
>>3207781
You could do that, sure, but the attraction of the Flash thingies is reliability, convenience, and ease of storage.
>>3207475
http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-5-DS-DD-Floppy-Disk-720K-Unformatted-DSDD-New-Sealed-Box-of-10-/201227860235?hash=item2eda1d790b:g:9woAAOSwD0lUdsx9
That was hard.
>>3207387
It's not the CPU that tells if you can or not make great games with a lot of content, it's the overall capabilities of the machine -- storage capabilities, graphic capabilities, and sound capabilities are what's more important for menu-driven simulation games. The CPU, for this kind of game, just need to be fast enough not to bottleneck the whole system. Anyway, PM2 need PC-9801 models with at least a NEC V30 to run well though (they need the right graphic modes available) which is almost as fast as a 80286. The PC version might need at least a PC-AT with a 286 and a VGA card. But this kind of game is also possible on Z80 machines (the first princess maker was released for the MSX2 too).
>>3207281
>it's impressive that gainax probably coded the game from scratch for every platform, though
Well I don't think it's from scratch -- they must have made some kind of internal documentation and analysis so they could rewrite the game engine for each platforms efficiently. Also, the graphics are usually the same from platform to platform, you just need to convert them while considering the various platforms capabilities.
>>3207791
And some people just want to use their original cubase copy though.
>>3207719
My father had the Atari 8-bit version when I was a kid.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjqzOC0FD2s
>>3208229
My dad said he remembers this game but he thought the whole idea was completely retarded.
>320x200 four color cheesecake
That's...real fappable.
And the Apple II version shown above was much worse.
>>3207781
There's millions of 1.44MB drives around and since the life expectancy of a floppy drive is something like 30 years, I don't think we're likely to run out of replacement drives in my lifetime.
>>3208396
Many of them are chinese ones though, which life expectancy isn't really 30 years old, and need some tweaking to be compatible with anything else.
>>3208396
>There's millions of 1.44MB drives around and since the life expectancy of a floppy drive is something like 30 years
Also depends on the usage and whether you're feeding it dirty disks. I assume most retro computer hobbyists only take their machine out for a Sunday drive once in a while to play an old game instead of using it hard as a daily driver like they would have done in the 80s.
>and need some tweaking to be compatible with anything else
You probably mean how some of those drives don't have the jumper to set the drive number (ie. they're hard-wired to Drive 1). This isn't an issue for PCs of course though it would be if you wanted to use the drive in a non-PC machine like a TRS-80 or an Atari ST. You can also modify the things to force a drive number other than 1 (some cutting/soldering required); I read on an Atari ST forum of people doing it.
>>3208424
>You can also modify the things to force a drive number other than 1 (some cutting/soldering required)
That's what they used to do on Commodore 1541s since they're hard wired to Device 8 although you can send a software command to temporarily change the drive number (1571 and 81 have DIP switches to select the device #).
>>3208431
Taken care of by Flash emulators. Besides it makes getting files on them easier given that Apple/Commodore disks are completely and totally non-readable in a PC. The more standard stuff like a TRS-80 you can just stick a 1.44MB drive in.
>>3208431
>standard MFM/Shugart interface
Do you know how much weird, fucked-up stuff different manufacturers did with floppy controllers? Example the IBM cable twist.
>>3208440
It's all the same at the floppy end. Any floppy that has the Shugart 34 pin interface will work on any controller that also has it. The differences usually have to do with cabling/jumpering/installing terminating resistor packs.
For example, PC floppy controllers use the cable twist to switch the drive motors and each drive is jumpered to Drive 1. A TRS-80 controller doesn't do that, so you have to set the jumpers to whatever number the drive is supposed to be. Also when IBM introduced the high density controller on the AT, they added disk change and density selector lines. The main weirdness of the Atari ST controller is that it pulls the write protect detector line to ground for the disk change signal.
Other machines like the Kaypro 2 have a controller that turns on the drive light for whatever the most recently accessed drive was, so the drive lights are on continuously even if it's not in use.
>>3208445
8" drives I think had a 50 pin interface (the 34 pin connector was introduced on the Shugart SA-400) but you can make a homemade adapter.
>>3208424
>Also depends on the usage and whether you're feeding it dirty disks.
How can I tell if my floppies are dirty and how do I clean dirty floppies and drives dirtied by them?
>>3209089
Check this out: http://www.retrotechnology.com/herbs_stuff/clean_disks.html
Havnt played in a long time, made a quick favorite list, did I miss anything essential?
>>3208424
>I assume most retro computer hobbyists only take their machine out for a Sunday drive once in a while to play an old game instead of using it hard as a daily driver like they would have done in the 80s.
Unless you mean those guys on Lemon 64 who wear out their 30 year old disk drives archiving hundreds of disks worth of crap like old type in magazine programs and homemade Lode Runner levels (bbbbut I made these levels when I was 10 mmmmmuh childhood)
>>3208424
>have Gateway XP box from the early 2000s
>just out of curiosity, pull the cover off and check the floppy
>called it - no drive select jumpers
You cheap, cheap bastards.
>>3209651
Hope you like input lag.
I've lost two floppy drives in the two decades of computing I have under my belt. One was a drive in a 386 laptop that the head broke off the mount and the other was a shit Chinese drive without the drive select jumpers that one day just wouldn't read disks anymore (I really didn't even have it that long or use all that much).
>>3209689
Remove yourself back to the CRT general.
>>3208424
http://www.trs-80.com/wordpress/hardware-replacement-hard-drive/
Nice Flash hard disk emulator.
Anyway, this bird has also been modded with 3.5" drives. As far as the issue of drive select jumpers, remember that you only need a 3.5" with them for Drive A (since it has to be jumpered to 0). You can use a jumperless drive for B since it's fixed to Drive 1.
>>3209762
"TRS-80 Model I’s require an adapter board to adapt the 40-pin connector on the Model I Expansion Interface to a 50-pin connector for hard drives.
Since these boards are virtually impossible to find today, Ian Mavric has created an adapter board, so those with Model I’s can connect to a real TRS-80 hard drive or a FreHD Hard Drive emulator."
He's probably talking about the hard disks produced for the Model II which used the 50 pin external floppy port on the computer. Apparently there did used to exist adapters to connect these to a M1/3/4.
For vintage computing I have 2 old TI 99-4a computers and some cartridge based games and business software. Got one years ago and couldn't get it to work with an old CRT using the two prong RF signal so I assumed the unit was borked. Got a second much later and same problem. Last month I just ordered a composite cable and they both work swimmingly.
Trouble is I have no idea how to use the joysticks since plugging them in doesn't seem to be all that's necessary.
I found a TI-99/4A in a Salvation Army once. Plugged it into a TV they had there and the power light came on, but no picture. Nothing. Not even a flash of light on the TV when powered on/off.
>>3210726
When I plugged it into my other TV via RF, that's the same response I got as in a light on the unit and nothing onscreen. My units actually work fine through composite though, but I can't vouch for any other units.
>>3209770
Actually though, they did have a hard disk for the M1/3/4 (adapter required to use it with a M1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0HfzY2IzCo
The original Thunder Force only has a top-down multidirectionnal shooting phases compared to the other Thunder Force games (phases which have been gotten rid by Thunder Force III and isn't present in the later games). It seems to be a bit faster than the top-down missions in Thunder Force 2 too.
There's also another game called thunderforce on C=64 that has no link to the original X1/PC-88/FM-7 (I don't know which one of it) game :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqXA3AvniOA
Some nice FM tunes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Lt519gpHUM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXeHDcA09Ts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09F1bNdlzb8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biY_CpsLf-k
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Tandy-1000-TX-model-25-1600-/322094463467?hash=item4afe5379eb:g:9F0AAOSwX~dWp346
Oh but they want juuuust a little too much for it.
>>3207370
good games?
>>3213246
Whut.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAFWGcPNAzw
Music mode of Wingman Special on PC-8801mkIISR. The MSX 2 version sound a bit different, but I kinda like both version of the main theme equally.
>>3213267
I meant that the games he linked (New Zealand Story and Frogger) are shit. Go link vids of some better ones.
>>3214593
Then what games would you rather see instead?
>>3214605
You know exactly what games he wants to see.
Softporn Adventure was written in BASIC (it's not machine language). How much work would it take to convert this for a Commodore 64?
>>3215106
Depends. How big and complicated is it? I guess pretty. And it also does disk access which would have to be completely rewritten for the Commie.
>>3215106
Apparently this game requires DOS 3.2 and the old 13 sector disk formats; it doesn't like the DOS 3.3 16 sector disks.
>>3215106
>wanting to actually do this shit on an 8-bit machine
Protip: Programming actual retro platforms is annoying af and you'll want to headbang a coffee table dealing with the assorted limitations of them. It's a lot better to do a retro-style game in Flash with modern tools and file formats.
>>3215118
It's a text adventure. Can't be too bad. The biggest challenge would mostly be adapting the disk access stuff.
>>3215106
Do it for the PC-8801 and change a few things around to be more /jap/.
>>3215129
>implying anyone here actually knows shit about PC-8801 programming
>implying any docs available for it aren't written in moonrunes and you can't read them anyway
>>3215118
Petcat exists for the C64.
>>3215132
Doesn't fix the assorted technical limitations of the hardware.
>>3215145
I had more fun learning assembly on the 64 than learning C on Windows and UNIX to be honest.
>>3215106
This was on both the Apple II and Atari 800, however the Apple version is probably better to use since it's standard Microsoft BASIC and will be a bit easier to convert.
>>3215193
Atari BASIC doesn't support string variables, which is annoying. At least if you're used to how Microsoft BASIC handles strings. Atari BASIC does them more like C or Fortran.
From 101 BASIC Computer Games (modded for Commodore BASIC)
>>3215238
This should work on the Apple II as well; just change the first line to 5 HOME.
>>3214621
Naah, you can't use the "he's a weeb" excuse when he says these games are shit, as these games are a classic Taito and Konami titles, and that frogger was available on almost every computer of the time, even PC-88 and PC-98 computers.
I don't know how the C=64 port of New Zealand story holds, but saying that the Atari 800 port of Frogger is shit is either having outright shit taste, or just shitposting.
>>3215118
Except it can be a nice challenge and end up being more fun than using hundreds of C structures to use the slightest hardware-related stuff like in any modern OS. Also, messing with hardware stuff is usually easier in assembly language.
>>3215106
You'd have to locate PEEKs and POKEs try to understand what they means (by checking the memory map of the computer it's supposed to run on) in order to modify them, as well as try to see what instructions aren't available on the C=64 and try to replace them.
Anyway, some pretty damn good soundtrack:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXiF88UL_bo
>>3215510
A text mode game probably doesn't have that many PEEK/POKE commands in it since all I/O can be done with INPUT/PRINT. Like I said earlier, the disk access routines are the most likely part of SPA that would need to be rewritten.
>>3215510
>I don't know how the C=64 port of New Zealand story holds
It was ported by Ocean. I'll let you guess.
>>3215546
oh really?
most taito ports were surprisingly competent, i wonder how they did it
>>3215575
ok yeah i see
rainbow islands had amazing ports though
All Ocean did was scoop up as many licences as they could and shit out rubbish ports of arcade games in two weeks.
>>3215575
SMS and Megadrive versions are better
>>3215584
Yes but Americans never got to see those.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feH_bz-PwRA
He has Diversi DOS on here; this was one of many 3rd party DOSes for the Apple II which improved on the functionality of DOS 3.3, especially in speeding up disk access which was cripplingly slow with Apple's DOS.
Somewhat like the TRS-80 where Radio Shack's in-house DOSes were ass and they needed third parties to make a better one.
>>3215593
First party OSes always suck for some reason.
Atari DOS was innovative for its time. It was the first personal computer OS to incorporate device names for the console input, printer, modem, etc, a feature that would become a standard part of the IBM PC world with DOS device names like LPT1 and COM1.
>>3215593
Apple DOS was mostly designed to support BASIC; it wasn't that great at running applications, nor was it very adaptable for a lot of tasks. And every disk you format has a copy of DOS loaded onto it and a boot program (mandatory) which waste space.
>>3215636
wow really?
>>3215638
Yes. In DOS 3.3, you format disks with INIT filename, the file being placed first in the disk directory. If you reset the computer, it will boot that program, which can be either a BASIC program or a machine language one. When formatting a disk intended for data storage, it's typical to just write a small BASIC program like 5 PRINT"HELLO" which INIT places as the first program in the directory.
>>3215651
The graphics are good and the music decent (okay compared to the arcade, but still better than the megadrive version, which is close to garbage-tier), but the enemies seems pretty dumb compared to the arcade or PC Engine version, and their movement are a bit jerky. Also is it a 25 FPS slugfest like Atomic Robo Kid?
>>3215665
The Amiga version of TNZS is mostly notable for the fact that you get 25 lives if you type MOTHERFUCKINGKIWIBASTARDS on the title screen.
>>3215193
Yeah my father had it for our Atari 800 along with Sultan's Palace.
>>3215845
The Atari version of SPA had some quite ridiculous encryption tricks so you couldn't LIST the code in BASIC.
>>3207370
Anyone speaks moon here?
I seriously fell in love with the game but had problems with the framrate few months back and gave up.
So today i went through the menus and fond that you need to change the CPU type from z80 to r800.
I would appreciate if someone can translate the rest
>>3216126
You've got taste anon, Pleasure Heart is a pretty good shoot em up. Unfortunately i can't really help you, I don't understand moonrunes either and alway go straight for the game itself.
>>3216145
>pretty good shoot em up
It is indeed,not so much forced on avoiding endless bullet hell and small but interesting cut scenes with bright colors and simple shapes won me over.
I fell happy while playing it
>>3216126
I h-hope the mix of my entry level Japanese and Google Translate could help you, anon-kun.
>>3216229
Thanks man
>>3216243
NO FUCK STOP
I INVERTED YES AND NO, I'M SUCH A DORK.
That said, the final message makes zero sense if you clicked on no.
Thhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dj9D7AUT2g
The intro of the PC-8801mkIISR version of Emerald Dragon.
>>3216889
Gotta love that dithering.
>>3216248
>>3216229
I'm not sure if that's some sort of elaborate practical joke or what.
>>3216126
Speaking of Heart('s) schmups, I've got a Win 95 copy of Steam Heart's coming in the mail. That should be fun trying to get running. I feel like I ought to get myself a proper early 90s computer since I got rid of my original so many years ago.
I'm not sure if it would be best to go for a win 98 and go backwards compatible or get a win 95/3.1. Anybody got an opinion on that? If a 98 can easily run 95 and 3.1 stuff then that would seem to be the best bet.
>>3208229
>tfw the C64 version of this was the first video game you ever played
>>3217820
A Win98 setup should do the thing. Also,Win 9x discussion is off-topic.
Anyway, some more nice computer game tunes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dyn5490BPJM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2w79mLxosqw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFdsjIML1Cc
Does anyoen have a download link to the latest ykhwong Dosbox build? The one on his site seems to be down.
>>3219835
The question is mainly for running 3.1 stuff while still having the flexibility to run 32 bit applications. And 95 just barely doesn't make the 1995 cut by 8 months.
Since I'm such a newbie with old Windows (since the last time I used a retro windows was when they were still in normal use), is there any value for using NT? Since the codebase is different I don't imagine it has a lot of compatibility with other Windows applications.
>>3221664
NT versions pre-2000/XP are worthless at running games. Don't bother.
>>3221664
No, not NT, just stick with Windows 98SE, it'll be better for that task. Also, Windows 95 IS the outer limit of the scope of this thread when it comes to PC stuff.
I'm pretty happy -- if everything goes right, i'll be getting an atari mega ST 2 + monochrome hi-res monitor + Steinberg Cubase by next week.
Unlike the all-in-keyboard ST models that came out before the STe, the mega ST has a blitter, as well as a socket for a 68881/68882 FPU.
>>3223792
The Mega ST is the model with 1.44MB floppies, right? Good for you; you won't be limited to 720k disks and the drive will be easier to replace if it breaks.
>>3223795
No, they still use 720kB floppies. Also, I still have 2DD 3"1/2 floppies (and the previous owner is giving me blank ones too).
>>3223795
Mega STE is the one with 1.44MB drives.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrRVQNYy19I
>>3215106
>download Atari800Win to try it out
>find that the Break key is done by (literally) pressing on your PC's keyboard
>realize that my laptop doesn't have a Break key for some schizophrenic reason
>well fuck, I have to plug an external USB keyboard in for this?
>set up everything, get Atari800Win into BASIC
>try out a few type-in programs from 101 BASIC Games
>oh yeah...this is Atari BASIC, meaning I can't use string arrays
>what? I have to dimension string variables before I can use them?
>and I can't use the TAB function?
>screw you
>go find ROMs of Microsoft Disk BASIC for the Atari
>that's much better
>>3226285
What model laptop is it?
>>3226291
A Pavilion g7.
>>3226285
>not appreciating the challenge of trying a completely different BASIC than what you're used to
>>3226285
String handling in Atari BASIC works more like C or Fortran.
Atari DOS works more like TRS-80 DOS in that it has a menu you use to select different disk operations and you can jump out of BASIC or jump back into it. It's completely different from CP/M and MS-DOS (command line) or the Apple II/Commodore approach (disk commands are integrated into BASIC).
Not a bad approach though in terms of user friendliness instead of the myriad of stupid/cryptic commands you have to memorize in DOS or on the Commodore machines or whatever.
>>3226309
One reason why I've always loved Commodore machines is that you can just plug the shit in and use it. There's no OS disks or anything like that to bother with. Plug in the disk drive and turn on the power.
>>3226314
You ain't seen nothing until you've dealt with Apple II shit.
>two completely different disk formats (13 and 16 sector)
>two completely different and incompatible OSes (DOS 3.3 and ProDOS)
>plus you need both to run the full gamut of Apple II software
>this means half your disks need to be formatted for DOS 3.3 and the other half for ProDOS
>>3226335
The compatibility break with ProDOS is particularly enervating because Atari managed to retain compatibility with older 810 single density disks when they introduced the 1050 drives. Tandy also didn't break compatibility between the single density Model I and double density Model III disks.
>>3226346
That's probably more because the Apple II controlled its disk drives entirely in software; this extreme degree of low-level control made it harder to retain compatibility.
>>3226285
>what? I have to dimension string variables before I can use them?
Even if you just want to use a string variable as a prompt (eg. INPUT A$), you have to precede it with DIM A$(1). Whole lotta bullshit if you ask me.
http://www.atariarchives.org/c3ba/page031.php
This shows a l33t hax0r trick you can use to get around the string array problem in Atari BASIC.
Can anyone explain the difference between different Atari computer models to me? Not familiar with the shit.
>>3226790
There's the original 400/800, then the 1200XL, 600XL/800XL, then the 65XE/130XE.
The 400/800 were produced from 1979-83 and have 16k or 48k of RAM. BASIC is on cartridge. 400s also have a shitty membrane keyboard. Early models of the 400/800 have four joystick ports.
The 1200XL was a short-lived successor to the 400/800 in 1982-83 that proved a design nightmare and soon discontinued.
The 600XL/800XL were produced in 1983-85; these are generally considered the best model to have as they can run almost all 8-bit software. They have 64k of RAM and BASIC now on a ROM on the main system board instead of a cartridge.
The 65XE/130XE was a cost-reduced 800XL with 64 or 128k of RAM. Though it attracted little attention in the US due to the disappearance of Atari as a relevant hardware manufacturer, it was quite popular in Europe until being retired in 1991.
>>3226285
Use Altirra; Atari800Win is terrible and hasn't been updated in years.
By 1985, the amount of new software for the Atari 8-bit was dwindling fast; many software devs claimed that excessive piracy made it unviable to develop for although this was most likely just an excuse for the fact that there wasn't enough of an installed user base anymore.
>>3226809
>it was quite popular in Europe until being retired in 1991.
Maybe it still sold in some European countries, but it's not what I'd call a popular machine though. The ST was way more popular (even more popular than the Amiga up until the 90s).
>>3226830
The 8-bits' attraction was mainly price if you just wanted a low-cost computer to play cassette games with. Obviously the ST was much more useful for productivity and other such tasks.
>>3226825
One magazine at that time noted that it had been six years since the Atari 8-bits first came out and they were looking pretty outdated by the mid-80s.
Then again, the C64 was six years old in 1988 and still a major platform with lots of games coming out for it.
>>3226840
It's true that the C64 remained viable in North America up to the end of the 80s although by 88-89 an increasingly large amount of its games were being developed in Europe and simply converted to NTSC for the US market. Also not much productivity software was still being released for the C64 by 1988, the bulk of it had shifted to the C128.
The ANTIC wasn't really suited for NES kinds of games; it was fundamentally hardware that belonged to the pre-crash era. With only four monochrome sprites, you're not gonna be doing decent side scrollers.
Ah, the poor TI. Everything that could go wrong did.
>crap keyboard
>Texas Instruments was so obsessed with controlling all software development that they refused to publish any tech specs for the thing
>slow af BASIC
>stupid architecture that made it extremely annoying to program for
>nonstandard CPU that nobody knows how to program
>stupid expansion system
>>3226832
Like I said, it depends on the European country.
>>3226853
Not only that, it was popular among musicians with a home studio because it had MIDI support while still being cheaper than the Mac and the Amiga (neither of which had MIDI support without external serial modules or expansion). There was also desktop publishers that used the ST because an ST + an atari laser printer + desktop publishing software was cheaper than the macintosh alone.
Also, before the late 80s, Amiga games weren't that better than their ST counterpart, and were basically ST ports.
On top of that, it came out before the Amiga, there were multiple revisions and models for various targets (520ST, 1040ST, Mega ST1,2,4, 520STf, 520STfm, 1040STf, 1040STfm etc...) while Commodore just sat there with the Amiga 1000 being too pricey for most households, until 1987 when they decided to release the Amiga 500 and 2000.
It's not just because it was cheaper that the ST was popular, but because it was cheaper AND was able to be more useful than many other more expansive computers at the same time, all the while having various models for every kind of target market (low-end with the 520, mid-end with the 1040, professionals with the Mega and so on)
>The ANTIC wasn't really suited for NES kinds of games
Well no shit, it's a late 70s evolution of mid-70s hardware, a time where even arcade games hardly had any scrolling, while the Famicom was made with early 1980s arcade games in mind. You could still make some pretty good looking still pictures with it though.
>>3226895
>nonstandard CPU that nobody knows how to program
What the fuck, I've already read people on /vr/ call DIN plugs "non-standard" or "proprietary", but now fucking CPUs? Dude, there's NO "standard" CPU, it's just that most computer manufacturers just bought CPUs from a 3rd party supplier. TI just happened to make their own, so they used one of their.
>>3226895
As for the architecture, the TI-99-4A's 16-bit 9900 CPU had the potential to wipe the floor with 8-bit machines, but it had a crippled memory layout. Specifically...
>the 9900's 16-bit data bus required higher speed and thus more expensive RAM
>so to keep prices down, Texas Instruments decided to use the 9918's VRAM as main system RAM
>since you can only access the VRAM during the vertical retrace, it meant that the CPU had to pause and wait for that, in addition you only have a limited amount of clock cycles in which to do anything
>>3226912
>but now fucking CPUs? Dude, there's NO "standard" CPU, it's just that most computer manufacturers just bought CPUs from a 3rd party supplier. TI just happened to make their own, so they used one of their.
Commodore also made all their CPUs themselves since they owned the company that designed the 6502. :^)
What I mean by nonstandard is that nothing else used the 9900 and nobody knew how to program the goddamn thing. The reason the TI's BASIC was so slow? It's double interpreted because Microsoft didn't have any programmers that knew 9900 asm so TI gave them a high level interface to program BASIC with instead.
Result? TI BASIC first converts everything to the intermediate language that the interpreter layer uses which then turns it to machine language. This double interpreted BASIC combined with the computer's already clunky memory layout made it almost excruciatingly slow.
There was also the issue of TI trying to sell a 16-bit computer at 8-bit prices which made it impossible to turn a profit on the TI-99/4A. In addition, they manufactured the computers with high quality components unlike the numerous shortcuts Commodore took to keep prices down.
After realizing their initial mistake in excluding third party devs, Texas Instruments then announced that they would accept outside software development, but only if they had exclusive publishing rights and a percentage of the profit from software sales. Naturally, most devs balked at these extreme conditions. As a final blow, Texas Instruments installed a lockout check in the computer's OS ROM to prevent unauthorized third party cartridges from running, however this only affected the last run of "white case" TI-99/4As.
With the home computer market in meltdown mode and facing $110 million in losses, Texas Instruments pulled the plug on the TI-99/4A in the autumn of 1983. The massive loss of money the company sustained belies the fact that the computer was hardly a loser sales-wise as over 2 million were sold in its four-year run.
>>3226912
>atari laser printer
I forgot all about that dirt cheap laser printer.
They did it by having the computer control it directly with hardly any intelligence in the printer, I think it was?
>>3226928
Yup, and they bough MOS Technology so that they wouldn't be dependent to another company for something as important as CPUs (because of previous experiences when they were making calculators). It was also a mean to get their revenge on TI.
>>3226943
If nobody knew how to program the damn thing, it's because of TI's dumb policies, not because of some hypotetic "standardisation" bullshit or something. They wanted it the developpers to use their mini-computers (some models of TI990 also use the TMS9900) to develop for the TI-99. There were documentations about this CPU though, it's jsut that it was a TI mini-computer thing, not something as widespread as other micro processors:
http://datasheets.chipdb.org/TI/9900/TMS9900_DataManual.pdf
>>3226970
Yes, it used the DMA port or something like that if I recall correctly.
>>3226984
Here's the funny thing. Despite owning a chip fab, Texas Instruments still bought ICs from outside suppliers; only the core CPU and sound/graphics chips were made in-house.
>>3226984
All the same, this is back when all programmers knew 6502 and Z80 asm; hardly anybody knew how to code for the 9900.
Even the IBM PC had issues in the beginning because people weren't used to the x86 yet and they didn't know how to write efficient, optimized code.
TI weren't alone in this necessarily; Tandy also were not very encouraging of third party devs. Company-owned Radio Shacks could not sell third-party software, only franchises, and Radio Shack catalogs and other advertising did not acknowledge the existence of third party products at all.
Of course unlike the TI-99/4A, the TRS-80s used an utterly bog standard CPU and system architecture so they had more than ample software. They do seem to be ignored to a large extent by the Apple/PC/Commodore-centric retro computer community though.
>>3227001
>standard CPU
Here it is again. "widespread" would be more of an appropriate term.
>>3226995
The programmers who knew TMS9900 asm weren't the ones that were eager to write utilities or games for micro-computers, those were mostly the ones making atomic bomb simulations and other scientific programs for mini-computers.
>>3226995
>Even the IBM PC had issues in the beginning because people weren't used to the x86 yet and they didn't know how to write efficient, optimized code.
Off the record, this isn't exactly true either. There were plenty of good x86 coders in the 80s, except they were all employed by Lotus and Borland and weren't in the gaming business. Phillipe Kahn was a god; when Turbo Pascal first came out, it absolutely smoked Microsoft Pascal for its compact size and fast speed compared to the bloated, bug-infested, and expensive mess that Redmond were pulling out of their butts.
>>3227015
Microsoft have always had a reputation for sloppy, bloated coding ever since the 70s. I don't know what it is. Either they don't hire the best programmers or they don't train them or encourage good coding practices.
>>3227001
>They do seem to be ignored
My father called them "Trash-80s" and I grew up with kind of a negative image of them, but I don't really know much about them.
>>3226824
I should have guessed that when the "newest" version still didn't have a 64 bit Windows executable.
>>3227034
Perfectly fine computers and the Trash nickname is undeserved (well maybe a little bit for the Model I because they're so cheaply made that they die if you look at them funny). They are pretty boring compared with Apple or Commodore machines because they just have B&W character graphics and no sound.
i haven't had much experience with Apple II emulation, but based on my limited experience with Apple2Win, I was not impressed not in the least because I could only run it 15 minutes before it would freeze and demand I get a registered copy.
>>3227046
Apple II emulation has stagnated. The A2 community is one of the bigger advocates of using real (and now expensive as shit) hardware, so sadly there isn't much work done on the emulation front. Maybe try a IIGS emulator like KEGS? I haven't tried it so dunno if it works with plain II stuff, but I don't see why it should.
>>3227056
*don't see why it sholudn't, dammit autocorrect.
>>3227056
That's too bad because the Apple II is a really really simple computer compared to the Atari 8-bit or C64 so it should be a lot easier to emulate.
>>3227070
I found something called Agat, looks pretty good, better than AppleWin at least.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/agatemulator/
It's from Russia and it was made to emulate the Agat series of Soviet clone computers, but does Apple II as well. The interface works like VirtualBox or VMWare, where you have multiple virtual machines with savestates that you can start and pause at any time. Even comes with a few games like Ghostbusters and Ultima IV.
Reminder to report and ignore.
>>3227158
It's more likely they don't have access to NTSC hardware to know how to emulate it properly.
>>3227195
Don't respond to him.
For some reason, I've never had much luck encountering Commodore hardware in thrift stores/flea markets over the years despite multiple encounters with Apple IIs, Atari 8-bits, and TI-99/4As. At least two times I've seen entire Apple II systems complete with a monitor, disk drives, and printers, I've seen TI-99/4As and Timex Sinclair 1000s still in their original box, but never once a Commodore machine of any kind.
>>3227218
Could depend on what was popular in your area as well. Maybe you didn't live in a Commodore hotspot.
Why do people love retro computers? My guess is nostalgia for some people, interest in how the hardware is so simple that software can be easily written by one person, the fact that everything is self-contained and not reliant on online services, maybe interest in the history of computer...
>>3227307
For me it's a bit of an odd thing because I was born in 1988 so my conscious memory of computers basically starts with the Windows 3.x era. The first computer I used actually was a Commodore 64 because my dad didn't get a new computer until 95 when he finally entered the 90s and got a 486, but I was in the first grade and barely knew how to do anything except play Kickman by plugging in the cartridge.
Commodores are my first love because of nostalgia to an extent, but I love them all from Apple IIs to TRS-80s to Amigas. Every machine back then was unique and had its own peculiar set of quirks/features one had to get used to. Though most of my childhood was spent on 90s PCs, and certainly there's nostalgia there, I've never quite had the same interest or found as much romance in them as the era when the 6502 and 5.25" disk were king. Maybe the Windows 9x era isn't as interesting because I lived through it and I have a been-there-done-that feeling. IDK.
>>3227307
Part of what I like about them is their design idiosyncrasies; before the IBM PC-compatible standard ultimately killed off almost everything else except for Apple machines, everyone had their own designs doing either what they thought was best, or what was most economical for them, or whatever.
And it's not just the inner workings either, there's also the fact that a lot of the early PCs had such amazing and sometimes outlandish design aesthetics (compared to today). Even today, when the machines themselves are beyond obsolete, many of them have designs that are still incredibly evocative of a sense of the untapped future potential of technology. They seem wonderful and mysterious compared to the minimalist and utilitarian designs of today.
>>3207408
Time Bandits is an awesome 2 player joystick game.
Bratacaas is ridiculously weird, hard to play, inscrutable, and yet, unlike anything you've ever played. If you can figure out how to play, yer a god. It's also known as Bandersnatch.
Hacker and Hacker 2 are both inscrutable and require an in-depth FAQ, but they're also super different from what you've come to expect from videogames. Landmark stuff.
Mudpies is a hoot.
Major Motion is a fun Spy Hunter clone which, in my opinion, is better.
I'd recommend the creepy ass Speller Bee, but it requires a dongle. It talks. So fucking scary. Worth getting it running again just for the voice synth.
I am basically just naming the games I had growing up.
>>3207408
For music, Cubase, pro24 and Notator are the most well-known sequencers for this machine. There are also other softwares like MIDI synth patch editors and the like (there's that Roland SoundCanvas utility for example).
As for publishing, there's Calamus, Pagestream, Publishing Partner and other softs.
Anyway, a few PC-8801 music disks:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOuDHPaOXLM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owqDY0MAFPM
The second one is nicer than the first one (better overall sound, better interface, a few pictures too), but both of them are mostly arcade game music arranges.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSMcqGOCmU0
This one's mostly computer games arranges (though some sound so close to the original that you might think they're rips). Too bad the guy who recorded the video left that ugly scanline filter on, because that last picture is pretty good looking, and those black lines are kinda ruining it's brightness.
>>3228035
>but both of them are mostly arcade game music arranges.
Well forget what I said about the first one, it's a mix of both computer game and arcade game musics. The second is still mostly arcade games though (with maybe a few console titles like Hector '87 that are represented).
>>3227343
>this level of Hallmark Greeting Card smarm
Seriously, dude?
One thing I notice that's difference about Atari800Win versus VICE is the it makes you format disk images before using them, also it doesn't let you set different drive types. If you mount a 90k image, it treats the thing as an 810 drive and if you mount a 130k image, it treats it as a 1050 drive.
http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/showpage.php?page=35
Prints a Playboy Bunny (I assume that's what it is) on the screen. This is formatted for an 80 column display so doesn't necessarily work the best on 40 column displays.
Also some tweaking has to be done for Atari BASIC firstly because of the TAB thingie, but also because...guess what? You can't use subscripted arrays with the READ statement.
120 FOR I=1 TO 4:READ B(I):NEXT I
Instead you'd have to do this.
120 FOR I=1 TO 4
130 READ C
140 B(I)=C
150 NEXT I
Instead of the TAB function, Atari BASIC has a register at memory location 201 ($C9) which controls tab positions. The default value is 10, which gives tab positions of 0, 11, 21, and 31.
So you set tab positions with a statement like 10 PRINT "","HELLO!". The null string followed by a comma substitutes for the TAB function in Atari BASIC, each of them advancing the cursor position 10 spaces. If you modify the value in 201, you can set different tab positions, but if you want mixed values (eg. move the cursor 5 spaces and then 11), you'll have to change 201 repeatedly, otherwise it will always move the cursor a fixed number of spaces according to 201.
The minimum tab position you can set is 3, setting it to 1 and 2 gives two and four spaces respectively and 0 causes BASIC to lock up, requiring a reset.
http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/showpage.php?page=57
I love dice roller programs. It's not a BASIC book without them.
Also the example shows 10,000 rolls. On most 8-bit computers, this would be incredibly slow, possibly taking a couple of minutes to execute. I also tried running it with QBASIC and DOSBox set to the default 3000 cycles and rolling 10,000 numbers clocked it at 27 seconds. However, if I included a DEFINT statement to turn all variables to integers instead of floating point, then it took only 20 seconds.
Keep in mind that Applesoft, Commodore, and Atari BASIC lack proper integer support while Z80 and x86 versions of Microsoft BASIC do support them (on the Apple II however, you can just boot up Integer BASIC).
http://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/showpage.php?page=56
Would be a horrible snarled mess in Atari BASIC.
Another thing: Atari BASIC makes you dimension all arrays prior to use while Microsoft BASICs have a "grace" mode whereby you don't have to do it if the array is 10 or fewer elements.
>>3229226
That's because MS creates arrays that are always at least 10 elements long, wasting memory.
>>3231174
/vr/ is a slow board, you don't need to bump a thread when it's only in page 7.
>>3226912
>>3226864
>>3226850
The C64 was only a year older than the Famicom while the Atari 8-bit was four years older. By the time SMB was out, the Atari 8-bit chipset just couldn't keep up with the new generation of games.
ANTIC had its strengths, especially in the large color palette and being able to do raster effects. For example, when they tried porting Ballblazer to the tile-based C64 and Famicom, it was a disaster. On the other hand, with only four monochrome sprites, it didn't have what it took for NES kinds of games even though the Atari 8-bit was actually clocked at the same speed as the NES (1.79Mhz) and a good 75% faster than the 1.33Mhz C64.
>>3230475
While true, in Atari BASIC it's common to dimension arrays larger than what you're going to use to allow a little extra headroom.
>>3231191
>1.33Mhz C64
By that logic the resulting pixel clock must been 10.66Mhz instead of 8Mhz.
However, the CPU clock was around a 1Mhz and keep in mind that "badlines" (CPU halted to allow fetching tile numbers) reduces the speed even further.
>>3231203
Example: The VIC-20 is only clocked at 1.2Mhz, but is actually faster than the C64 because of the system architecture.
Also keep in mind that the VIC-II chip can be set to use any of the four 16k quarters of system RAM ($2000-$7FFF being the power-on default). Any code in the VIC-II window will run slower due to contention between the CPU and the VIC-II, but code not in the window will run at normal speed.
The VIC-II can also be disabled via a register write; this is commonly used by fastloaders and the kernel cassette routines even do this when accessing the Datasette.
>>3228693
I never understood why 6502 Microsoft BASICs didn't have double precision numbers but maybe it was too hard to implement with the 6502?
>>3231216
Probably. The Z80 does actually have 16-bit registers so it's easier to perform mathematical stuff with it, one reason why it was the preferred CPU for business computers while the 6502 was the gaming CPU (Colecovision and Gameboy notwithstanding).
Arthur C. Clarke famously used a Kaypro II to write novels which he sent over the phone lines to the publisher from his home in Sri Lanka.
>>3231257
The original disk drives were Tandon TM-100-1s, but you can replace them with 3.5" 1.44MB drives. Main problem being you need drives that actually let you jumper select the drive number while a lot of the bastards are hard-wired to Drive 1. Keep in mind that you only need a jumperable 3.5" unit for the A: drive since it has to be set to Drive 0. The B: drive will be Drive 1, so it doesn't matter in that case.
There was an enhanced BIOS available for the Kaypro II which supports 720k floppies; if you want, you could grab an image of that and burn it to a ROM. Otherwise you'll be limited to single-sided 180k formatting which is a gross under-utilization of a 1.44MB drive's capabilities.
Also it's recommended you use real 720k disks instead of taping over the hole on 1.44MB disks.
>>3223792
Well, it looks like only the Mega STe has an empty FPU socket, not the Mega ST2. Well at least I can still solder a few RAM chip to have the full 4MB of RAM, and maybe updgrade the TOS in ROM (though I guess some games might not run as a result).
Had one of these once, then I got rid of it because the floppy drive and the A key on the keyboard broke.
Any recommendations for action games that would run on a 4MB Macintosh SE with System 6? I've got one with dual 800k floppies and a Zip drive as the boot disk and a good amount of software, but more recommendations are always welcome.
D-Side on Sharp X1 :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8d6ni4flvOw
Also, the PC-8801 version of Firehawk have a nice intro that isn't present on the IBM & clone port of the game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1BzPb5hlgg
>>3226895
Really about the keyboard? Personally I don't think it's that bad. Still feels nicer than using many modern dome keyboards.
Now the joysticks on the other hand...
Got this for £35. Waiting on the PSU + scart cable to arrive. Not sure whether or not to retrobrite. It's gud shit tho. Games/program recs?
>>3232467
>Really about the keyboard? Personally I don't think it's that bad. Still feels nicer than using many modern dome keyboards.
Not the construction/feel of the keyboard, the layout.
>>3232613
Oh yeah, I forgot that is pretty frustrating. Makes touch typing a pain, but then again, there's not much to do productivity-wise on a 40-year-old piece of technology.
>>3232778
Well, on some other machines there is though.
>>3232594
Do you have the Extra 1.3 floppy with it? Because PC drives can't read or write Amiga floppies, so unless you have another terminal program, you'd better have some kind of way to transfer stuff through the serial port (and with all these floppies it would be a waste to replace your floppy drive with an emulator).
What kind of software did the previous owner give you (I see Powerplay on top of the rest of the floppies)? As for useful software, you might as well check for Transwarp, it helps you recreate floppies from .adf files sent via a serial null-modem cable. And for games, if you don't already have it, give Hybris a try, it's a pretty good UFO Robo Dangar tribute imo.
>>3232778
>Makes touch typing a pain, but then again, there's not much to do productivity-wise on a 40-year-old piece of technology
>people didn't use computers for productivity in 1982
>Wordstar and Visicalc are just a bedtime story IT employees tell their children
>>3233725
>Do you have the Extra 1.3 floppy with it? Because PC drives can't read or write Amiga floppies
The specific problem lays in the fact that the Amiga floppy controller works much more like an Apple II controller than the IBM/Shugart standard on PCs. Although it's MFM, you can have variable speeds/bit rates which is not allowed on the IBM/Shugart standard controllers where there's only two fixed rotation speeds/bit rates for double and high density media.
Most importantly though, the Amiga doesn't use index sensing to find tracks, so even if you wrote an Amiga disk to be identical to a PC format, it would still be unreadable as a PC floppy controller can't find where the tracks are. Although this part is a mystery to me because Amigas only use 3.5" disks which don't have an index sensor anyway.
>>3234159
Actually there are 5"1/4 drives for the Amiga (external for the Amiga 1000 and 500, and internal for the Amiga 2000), and some utilities for the Workbench to read and write DOS-formatted 360kB floppies (that's why the Amiga 2000 have a 5"1/4 bay despite being released way before the democratization of CD-ROM drives, though the possibility to use an internal tape/cartridge drive could have been an argument too).
>>3234176
But see, that's because Amigas let you have a degree of low-level disk controller that's impossible on a PC. Thus an Amiga can be programmed to read PC disks, but not vice versa.
>>3234191
I know that, there were some suites to allow you to read and write DOS-Formatted 3"1/2 2DD floppies too. All I pointed out is that the Amiga DID have 5"1/4 drives (or else these PC emulators they were selling would have gone to waste in the late 1980s).
>>3234206
Sort of doesn't answer my question though about 3.5" drives and index sensors (Amiga doesn't use them, but 3.5" disks don't have an index hole anyway).
https://cortexamigafloppydrive.wordpress.com/
This guy installed a Gotex floppy emulator in his Amiga and had to totally reprogram the firmware which was designed for PC floppies.
>>3234210
Maybe because I didn't address that point, but the "Amigas only use 3.5" disks" one.
>>3232594
>Waiting on the PSU + scart cable to arrive
You do know an Amiga will work on VGA displays with a line doubler.
>>3231210
>Any code in the VIC-II window will run slower due to contention between the CPU and the VIC-II, but code not in the window will run at normal speed.
Explain me how the BA signal at the expansion slot works.
It's supposed to be high if the VIC uses the bus including the badlines and also there are eight 64kbit DRAM (called 4164) each for bit of an byte but each chip covers to whole 64kbyte area.
I simply don't get it how the DRAM is supposed to in/output the byte requested by CPU and the VIC (during the badline) at the exact same time.
>>3234159
>>3234176
>>3234191
>>3234206
It wouldn't make much sense to wire the index signal to one of the VIAs (where it could trigger an interrupt) if the Amiga would been fully incapable to use it. The other VIA has the ACK pin of the parallel port which can generate interrupts not only on Amigas but PCs too.
Is there something I don't know at all or is everybody forced to use the routines in the kickstart and not allowed to use their own?
>>3234210
>3.5" disks don't have an index hole anyway
The index signal is generated by the drive.
There are some drives where you can see a tiny magnet glued at the side of an disc attached to the spindle motor and a sensor that would sense the that magnet.
This is not only for keeping the drive running at "exactly" 300RPM but also to generate the INDEX signal.
I could take a pic of such a drive if you want.
>>3234256
>This is not only for keeping the drive running at "exactly" 300RPM
Important because 8" and 5.25" drives have a habit of drifting over time and requiring adjustment to run at the correct speed. A common symptom of this is that disks written with the drive will not be readable on other drives due to the slight speed difference.
>>3234256
>Is there something I don't know at all or is everybody forced to use the routines in the kickstart and not allowed to use their own?
If you couldn't use anything but the Kickstart routines, it would not have been possible to have the many bizarre copy protections found on Amiga disks.
I know PPC isn't strictly allowed, but I read that the Power Mac is MS-DOS compatible. Does this mean that my G3 Beige could play DOS games?
>>3234326
>but I read that the Power Mac is MS-DOS compatible
Well unless you're using a PC emulator it wont, you've been told bullshit. Even the PowerPC versions of Windows NT don't run on powermacs, so don't expect an x86-only OS to run on one.
>>3234349
Ah, OK. Sorry for stupid question. Are there any PC emulators?
>>3234358
There's VirtualPC for MacOS 9.
>>3234371
Ah thanks.
>>3234326
>I read that the Power Mac is MS-DOS compatible
Not natively. What they did was install a DOS compatibility card, which has an actual x86 CPU on board for running DOS 6.x and Windows 3.x.
>>3234593
Oh? So is it possible?
>>3234597
With a PC board he said, not a stock PowerMac.
>>3234326
>>3234597
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OcORkw2rJI
>>3234246
I wasn't too sure about video cables desu. I know I can get a VGA cable, but apparently it won't work with most games due to frequency differences or something. Is a line doubler really all I'd need? I was planning to get the OSSC but that isn't out for a while longer.
>>3234597
The "DOS Compatible" machines do have a dedicated x86 processor, but there were software PC emulators available, if you're into that sort of masochism.
>>3234141
I'm talking about currently. The context is that typing is a pain, but there's not much typing to be done on a TI-99/4A these days. What am I gonna do, settle my accounts with a copy of TI Home Financial Decisions?
>>3233725
Yeah, came off a bit too general there. Some 40 year old machines still have their uses, it's just hard to imagine a TI-99/4A being among them.
>>3235005
>I'm talking about currently. The context is that typing is a pain, but there's not much typing to be done on a TI-99/4A these days
If you're typing in lengthy BASIC program listings, then yeah, you'll regret that keyboard layout.
>>3234893
Amiga's video output is identical to VGA aside from scanning at 15Khz instead of 31Khz; fortunately the sync is also separated as opposed to SCART or old Macs which have composite sync.
Some Amstrad CPC demos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rp3T9k42_-o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pe8dislZkUQ
For those wondering why the picture is filled weirdly, it's because when Amstrad designed the CPC, they decided that in the memory, the first pixel line would be followed by the 9th (!!!) one, then by the 17th one, and so on and so on, then when we would hit the 193th one, it would go all the way back to the second line, then the 10th one etc...
They did that to make vertical text scrolling easier, but at the same time made bitmapped graphic scrolling harder. But with a well designed set of scrolling routines this weird video memory layout wont be cause any problem though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy2IvtAFgcQ
>>3235286
So what does that mean for me? Which cable should I be getting or does it really not matter?
I'd much rather use vga, but if I'd need a line doubler to use it on a modern screen then it's a bit too expensive for my liking.
>>3235349
Have you considered using a commodore monitor?
>>3235361
>30 year old monitor with a shot CRT and probably screen burn
>not to mention the whole peril of buying one online and having it shipped
There's reasons for things, anon.
>>3235362
The Amiga monitors use the same CRT as a 13" colour TV though, do they not? Seems like it shouldn't be hard to find a replacement tube if need me.
>>3235005
>not deciding your financial future on a 20+ year old computer
pleb
>>3235362
>30 year old monitor with a shot CRT and probably screen burn
You're getting these out of your ass anon. Mine's still in a really good shape, and is big enough (14") to view things correctly in all of the video modes available on an Amiga 500. And it's one of the worst Amiga monitor models that came out (Daewoo-made), Toshiba-made ones are great quality monitors with a pretty high dot-pitch. Hell, even C64 monitors are still good today most of the time.
Not wanting to risk shipping is a good reason not wanting to purchase one though.
>>3235370
More-or-less. Except TV CRTs have a lot coarser dot pitch. Assuming it's the same size, deflection angle, and electron gun arrangement (horizontal) it should work, but will be too fuzzy to be usable in 640x200 mode (not generally an issue for games, but could make Workbench hard to read.
>>3235393
I'm not though. I have a Dell Ultrascan 17" monitor that's noticeably less bright than it used to be and it also has the Windows task bar burned into the bottom of the screen. I have another CRT, an ADI Microscan 14" that was used as a daily driver for 10 years and it has a bad flyback transformer. Use any CRT as your daily driver and the thing will start degrading in about 7 years.
Generally speaking, computer monitors aren't as durable or able to last as long as a TV for a couple of reasons.
>>3235429
>Generally speaking, computer monitors aren't as durable or able to last as long as a TV for a couple of reasons.
Those being?
>>3235473
Displaying static images rather than the constantly changing picture of a TV is generally not the best thing for a CRT, also CRT computer monitors generally were not built as well because they assumed it only had to last the lifespan of the computer, ie. five or so years.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Radio-Shack-TRS-80-Model-III-Micro-computer-16K-Ram-Software-Manuals-Cover-Tandy-/222121632789?hash=item33b77b2415:g:xSsAAOSw74FXPAU3
Wait, what's this thing doing with a disk drive manual and a bunch of business software on disk if it's the _cassette_ model?
>>3235429
>Use any CRT as your daily driver and the thing will start degrading in about 7 years.
That's what I've been doing for like 10 years with an HP UltraVGA 1280 monitor, and today I still have no problem with it. Yes, it's less bright (though a good rejuvenation process could make it almost as bright as in it's early days), but I don't have no screenburn nor does it have any Flyback issues. My only monitor that really had flyback problems was my Amstrad CPC one which is waiting for a new one (but that's a 1980's korean piece of shit, so it's not that big of a surprise).
And anyway, yes, you're taking these out of your ass when it comes to Amiga monitors. The monitors that had that kind of treatment usually found their way to the trash, and most of the one that are sold are still fine. Also, I don't think you'll be using your Amiga as your daily driver will you?
>>3235493
>also CRT computer monitors generally were not built as well because they assumed it only had to last the lifespan of the computer, ie. five or so years.
That's a 1990s PC clone manufacturer's logic, not a 80s computer & monitor manufacturer one though.
>>3236598
>That's a 1990s PC clone manufacturer's logic, not a 80s computer & monitor manufacturer one though.
Clearly he's never seen an IBM 5151 monitor with Lotus 123 burned into it.
>>3237150
The phosphor they used on these is totally different though. IBM 5151 easy burn-ins are more of a side effect of using more persistent (thus phosphor that's excited for a long time) than something that was intended. Also, it's kind of the exception that confirm the rule -- compared to most other computer monitor of the time, the 5151 wasn't reliable (caught fire when turned on without the computer already running, stuff like that) though it's picture is pretty good (according to the 5151 anon who posted pictures of his monitor).
Most other monitor manufacturers used way less persistent phosphor and an alluminum coating to protect said phosphor from burn-ins. Not all of them were great monitors (Tandy CGA and Amstrad CPC monitors aren't that great picture-wise) but it's still really easy to find perfectly working 80s computer monitor, with little to no issue.
Ad for TRS-80 Electric Pencil, also notable for being the first word processing program ever written on the Altair 8800. There were almost 80 different versions of this.
>>3237218
At first I though it was about some kind of lightpen.
>>3237208
The 5151 actually started life as the display for the IBM DisplayWriter word processing machine. It's somewhat unique in a number of ways, one of them being that it lacks a horizontal oscillator and depends completely on the video signal to drive the electron gun. This is why as you said, they can be damaged when powered on without a signal present and also why the monitor is designed to plug into the pass-through on the IBM XT power supply and lacks a power switch; the idea being that this would ensure the monitor can't be powered on without a video signal.
5151s are quite easily damaged through erroneous programming; if thrown out of sync, the flyback transformer can destroy itself. The various design shortcuts in the monitor can be explained by its original use on the DisplayWriter; since that was a dedicated word processing machine with no ability for the user to program the video circuitry, there was no possibility of accidentally damaging it.
Apparently IBM used the 5151 on the PC because of the limited time and budget available to design the computer; using a readily available component made things easier and cheaper.
The flyback transformer on the 5151 also is mounted in such a way that taking the cover off with the monitor sitting upright will result in the flyback falling off its mount and onto the CRT. If servicing a 5151, you must place it upside down when removing the cover.
The long persistence green phosphor is actually impossible to capture correctly in photos because it lays outside the RGB spectrum.
>>3237218
That ad is as 80s as it gets. It makes you want to listen to The Number of The Beast.
>>3237218
EP became a standard word processor for 8080/Z80 machines until being replaced by Wordstar. There was also an IBM PC port.
>>3237208
>>3236598
>>3235429
This is the model I have (pic isn't mine though). The CRT seems ok, but the flyback is shot. I think it has a leaking cap in it.
A lot of consumer TVs from the 90s would be factory set with the brightness/contrast jacked way up (so they'd look brighter in a store display) and stupid people often never adjusted them with the result that the CRT would weaken in only a few years. Even worse were some TV manufacturers that intentionally increased the high voltage in the CRT for a brighter picture.
>>3237304
Wow, look like some cheap made in korea/thailand/china stuff, no wonder it didn't last.
Computer monitors overall did get cheaper and less well-made in the 90s in response to consumer demands for lower prices (some color monitors in the 80s could cost several hundred dollars).
>>3237328
>didn't last
I'll have you know that thing was used hard as a daily driver for 10 years with a couple different PCs before it started developing problems. I more than got my money's worth out of it, especially for a low-end 14" Taiwanese monitor.
I can't find any info about the IBM version of Electric Pencil beyond some mentions in scanned magazines. There's not any screenshots of it anywhere either.
>>3237332
>10 years
Which is the bare minimum for a low end CRT monitor. Good monitors can take more beating than that, and I'm not even talking about really high-end Sony tubes that basically use the same components as broadcast monitors, designed to years with 24/7 uses (though they do have proper servicing during their lifetime).
You used your low end monitors as an example to why you wouldn't get a Commodore monitor for your Amiga 500, which are mid-end early 90s Daewoo at worst and high-end Made in Japan Toshiba rebrands at best, that mostly didn't see the kind of use of your monitors.
Not wanting to risk shipping is a good argument in favor of you decision, muh old and busted CRT based on your experience with low end Taiwanese tubes isn't really though.
