Most liked posts in thread: What's new Pussycat too?

Awesome find Matt, I'm sure you will have lots of fun with it!

It is a bit disturbing that Andy sent you some 'seaman' (sic) in the post though

 

Hell, mate, I barely know where to start with the posts you've made in the past 24hrs or so. Quickly, we're fresh back from a torturous trip to watch our beloved Mackems get mashed up by the Geordie Maggots in the Tyne Wear FA Cup football derby. 3-0 sounds like a disaster but the lads actually did as well as they could given the fact they were playing against a team assembled on the back of Saudi Arabian oil money to the tune of hundreds of millions of £s rather than the more modest sums Sunderland were put together with... a handful of millions (still a lot of money but nowt compared to the BILLIONS now being mentioned and spent in the Prem league). Anyhow, we gave em 3 goals - an o.g., a defensive howler and a penalty, were never overawed by them and the home fans were in magnificent voice and mostly blew the Mags away off the pitch if not on it (mind, Pritch went close twice to reducing the deficit but a cup shock was sadly never on the cards so our long 5hr round trip journey was in vain in the rain coming back last night). The sad summary is that Sunderland were outSPENT all over the park and 2-3 of the home players didn't really turn up and had off-days which you can't afford to have against elite-division opponents.

ANYHOW, Jeez, Matt, you've had some good news and some sad, bad bad news mate... god, you don't half suffer at times out there in the wilds and your love of your dogs comes shining through - again through good and bad times. Hell, our hearts just about overloaded reading about some of the stories regarding the pups and your lovely loyal Beaux. God, you must have wept buckets over his sad demise in that terrible accident. Christ almighty, you must've been beside yersen with grief and probably still are. So, so sorry, fella - I know we all love animals on here so can totally empathise with the terrible sense of grief and loss over this shocking event.

Your superb reel to reel tape machine new addition is wonderful to see - this hi-fi component couldn't have gone to a better new home as you will properly treasure it, look after it and, essentially, USE IT!

As regards my old retro Christmas cards and the odd (very odd) gift, hey, if I can spread a little joy and humour once a year to you guys then that's cool with me. I've hesitated once or twice (esp this year) when the overseas quotes to post from the post office were ASTRONOMICAL so have told them to stuff their charges and I'll look at cheaper options wherever possible but the way it's going - ever skyward the postal rates - I probably won't be able to continue indefinitely but will try and keep going another few years if I can. To be honest, I get a lot of joy out of knocking out some ridiculous retro retard image or 3 and then sending it off to be made into a card and then freaking you guys out with the results that come crashing through your doors. IF I can find/afford some small gift which fits into a small/medium envelope or slim parcel then all well and good.

So, many thanks to you, Matt, and the other guys on here who make me smile and make me realise what a treasured little community of help, expert advice, good humour, bonhomie and comradeship we have on here. It's a rare thing and I think a lot of this is mutual in that we seem to be kindred spirits who all get on effortlessly as we understand each other's situations and each other's love of things retro from our golden days which we managed to accidently spend together - albeit miles and miles apart... if ONLY we could get us all together for just one day/evening/hour, but I know these things only happen in the movies as we are all separated by so many miles and miles and miles and we haven't all got the capability of easily doing this - in fact few of us have due to family, life, work, circumstance and health etc etc. Never mind. We are all here on this forum and we keep on going - for each other as well as ourselves.

Reet - 1-2 pics of my new acquisitions and funnily enough these THORN EMI sporting titles from way back arrive the week that in the UK we had the excitement of the 16yr old KID Luke Littler take on his opponent in the PDC World Darts Tournament and push the guy all the way and in fact led during the final putting the other Luke under enormous pressure - it was an amazing match and now, Atarians, you can recreate some of this thrilling experience on your Atari 8bit!!! LOL Here we go, guys - the last main point here is that you can see you get plenty of "extras" with these titles and the whole lot came to a fiver plus post... I am so pleased with this little bargain as I know Matt was with his acquisitions from his thrift store - it's MAGIC when this happens and don't we like to share the good news! Excellent, have a good rest of the weekend and take care, guys - all the best for more bargains like ours - and of course health and happiness to you and your families - for the rest of 2024.







A bargain for a fiver - the only thing they are missing are the "Betamax" size video boxes that they would originally have come in, ie. this case:



They are not the world's greatest Atari classic games but they are interesting in that they are quite collectable and some quite rare (never seen the jigsaw titles etc).

Do you own any of these?

I already have Soccer, Submarine Commander and I think I did have Jumbo Jet Pilot... somewhere!

LOL, like Matt, my Atari storage/collection areas need a ruddy good spring clean and sort out.

Check you later, fellas.

 

So sorry re the animals, Matt, heart-rending reading...

Non pet people don't get the bond that you develop with these wonderful creatures, when they go it's a family member going, a beloved one. Try and take your mind off of it with all that lovely kit you have, sink yourself into another project.

Me, Cindy Serena and Felix send our best wishes..

 

I find the microphone that comes with 'seaman' is a bit suspect as well with the green foam ball. It looks much better when removed.

The one peripheral that I'd never heard of for the Dreamcast is the dual stick controller. I must find one of those! though I may change my mind once I see the price...

 

The trouble with my lot was that we shipped in very few new titles (also remember that what the UK got as new had been out for quite some time in the US) and never any US versions. And after that they would buy bulk el cheapo deals from the usual suppliers of gear that they themselves wanted rid of, so Maplin brought it for next to nothing and tried to use the shops as an outlet for them. As I've said before, I moaned like hell about it and sent 99% of our stock back to the head office as it was just taking up space.As you say, nothing wrong with the games when they first came out, but a couple of year old stuff was pointless.

As for Matt, I sort of guessed he had an 8-track setup, I'd not seen / remembered the pictures. And like him, I hate things with bits missing, it's like an OCD nightmare..

 

First time back on here for a while so only just catching up with events. Really,really sorry to hear about your Dogs Matt, don't really know what to say mate. We lost our Merlin just before Christmas due to a brain hemorrhage which was upsetting to deal with but not a patch on what you went through.

 

Sorry to hear about the dog / family member Richie..

 

My Atari 7800 console eBay purchase arrived the other day so I managed to get a sit down earlier and have a proper play. The joypads were a bit stiff to start with but seem to have loosened up, and the power button is a little bit iffy but just needs a firm press. I was most impressed by the picture quality though, compared to a couple of previous 7800's I've had the RF output on this one is pretty strong. Now all I need to do is decide if I'm going to try and track down a couple of the 7800 carts I want, or save up lots of pennies for an SD Gamedrive for it instead. So if anyone see's a reasonably prized Ballbazer or Galaga on the console please let me know!

 

Thanks Andy. I've messaged about Ballblazer.

 

I received my DIN connector for connecting L/R lines in/out on my reel-to-reel, so I'm ready to start using it today. This is also the same type of cable that Atari 8-bits and C64's use for audio/video monitor ports too, if you want it cheaper that the computer dealers sell it. Only $8 from Amazon.

Though pinouts are slightly different between A8 & C64, so RCA colors may not match. IIRC they are right colors for C64 (for plugging into a Commodore monitor) but Atari uses, IIRC, yellow for composite video but any one of the other three could be audio out and luma/chroma outs, so a bit of experimenting is required.

For my reel-to-reel red/white are lines in and yellow/black are lines out to my amplifier.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00M0FXP64?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details&th=1

 

Someone is going to have fun with the good old equipment...Good on you Matt...Have great fun..

 

I have put my C128 outside in the summer, not last year but 2022 and it did lighten up a bit

 

Depends on if you own an ST or not?

 

Apologies for the delay in posting, but Royal Mail managed to lose my delivery for a few days so only got a chance to have a play with it this evening. So what is it?

Well, the item in question is SidecarT. It's a cartridge for the Atari ST that uses a Raspberry Pi Pico to not only emulate other cartridges but to let you load your own floppy images from an sd card and best of all, download games over a wifi connection!

Excuse the quality of the pictures but I couldn't get any decent photo's of my crt display.

This is the SidecarT flashing it's little lcd heart while downloading a game


It boots to a configuration screen that lets you choose the various options


This is part of the games database you can download from over wifi. Pretty comprehensive list of titles.



If you have a working floppy drive it can still be booted from as normal as well.

Future updates they're looking at being able to network machines and use as a hard drive so worth keeping an eye on if you are fan of the ST. Price worked out at £51 including postage from Spain.

 

Aye, good luck and enjoy, Al.
Thanks for posting those images and giving us a little explanation as to how it works/what goes on and the capabilities etc.
NOT an ST fan but I am sure others here will be interested and might even have a dabble themselves.
These screen resolution/fonts/desktop/GUI shots do bring back a whole lot of memories for me but largely I was left disappointed with the ST but some games and apps were neat and did give me pleasure, eg. Carrier Command, Kick Off and a buggy racing game...Buggy Boy?








Thanks for the memories, Al.

 

Ah Buggy Boy. Great game that I must have a play at again soon. So far the SidecarT has ran everything I've tried, but for any software it doesn't then I have an STFM with a Gotek drive installed as well. The ST has always been one of my favourites (if not favourite) computer as it was my main computer during my teenage years. It was also the computer that I ran a public domain library for and started my own business selling and installing them for new users. I even became part of the cracking scene for a good while and made lots of friends, some of whom I still keep in touch with to this day.

Of course, the Amiga is the more powerful of the two 16bit systems and games that weren't just simple ports always played and sounded better on the Commodore system. But deep down I'm really an Atari guy at heart

What is pretty crazy is that all these years later I can now buy a new 2600 console and games are being released for it. And then we have the 400 Mini to look forward to at the end of March! What a time to be an Atariain.

 

Great posts, Al and Paul.
I totally get both - both of you are passionate about your memories, experiences and retro loves and I get a buzz just outta reading em.
I can way understand how exciting it must have been running a PD library, back in the day, supporting any of our beloved machines, and cos yours happened to be the ST I can see why you are so still in lurve and that reason alone rocks for me, Al - your enthusiasm, passion and devotion is carved in stone and it's great that ST guys are still in touch and vice versa.
You know what, Paul, some of your aches and pains now find "pride of place" in my ageing person too... achilles tendon (of late following hard on heels of tooth and root extraction) and now overnight my bloody neck has a crick or pull which is causing me to have to turn my whole body at the mo (also denying me much-needed kip too) so I too can sympathise with the amount of restricted time you now can spend in front of your system(s) before your body screams out ENOUGH but once again, your great enthusiasm carries you on as you relive, replay and reminisce on all the great consoles/platformers and superb graphical creations that you recommend to us Atari Owners.
It truly is a case of we've never had it so good and thanks to you fellas, there are still fresh recommendations and reviews to enjoy - cheers, fellas.

 

PD Force (I know it was a really original name) was great fun, it started off in a market stall confusing everyone who was looking for pirated games instead . I ran it for a good while and used to attend the computer fairs that were a regular occurence back in the 80's/90's. Also have some great memories of reading ST Format from cover to cover every month and maybe that's going to be next on my list, to see what back issues I can possibly find to add to my collection. Ah yes, them were the days alright lads!

It's always good coming on here and talking to you guys about our micro past and now present pains amongst other things. Did I tell you how sore my left knee gets in the bad weather.....

 

Hi, Al.
Hull Boots also had Beebs, Electrons, Dragons and definitely Ataris but our "goto" area, once we'd done the 10 PRINT "BOOTS ARE BASTARDS and DIXONS IS CHEAPER" 20 GOTO 10 routine, and run off laughing, was the Hifi's... especially those music centres with a timer on like say this one...

Look just to the right of the PYE badge (left hand side) - many models had a digital clock... with alarm/wake up functions that were dead easy to set to go off say in a few mins... once you and your mates had had chance to leave the HIFI department and depart the store...

Why would we do that?

Because several of these radios would be programmed by us around the store whilst in "stand by" mode tuned into say Radio 1 with the VOLUME TURNED UP TO 10 ready to go off like ticking time bombs!

It took us all our composure to rush out down the stairs/escalators and not to burst out laughing as we headed out the store in Hull Prospect Centre whilst behind us, coming from upstairs, was one HELLUVA HULLABALOO as the fekkers all turned on at once - in several different areas of the dept - which would take the assistants some time to run around and sort out and switch em off (whilst being simultaneously deafened)!!

Needless to say the store assistants/detectives got to recognise us and in the end we used to get unceremoniously booted out the store so we had to leave it for months at a time before we dared re-try it again but it was such a laugh to 14-15yr old yoofs for at least a year of our teenage loungeabout lives!

 

My old mate and me brought those watches that you could use as remote controls. In my case it was simply to do that and it was a bit of tech, i'm partial to that. Kev on the other hand had demonic plans for the watches, I got this call with Kev in hysterics asking me to bring my watch.. Similar to the radio's on standby but far worse. We went the length of Walthamstow market at about 11:30pm and the market is the longest in Europe (or was then). he got to every hifi shop or place with TV's in and set them all to full blast (well the one's we could see the brand of) with the watches...

Probably the most childish thing I've done as a grown bloke, BUT it was hilarious to us..

Needless to say, after it was done a few times the shops just unplugged the TV's to ruin our fun..

Jez, I was such a pillock at times..

Bit of a one-trick pony though, the watches were huge and ugly, so never got worn after that. Casio tat

 

I wonder why I thought I was the only person in the world to do the goto 10 leaving "Matt Baker rules" on every computer I ever came across. I'd space it just right to get the scrolling to fill the screen looking like it was all scrolling diagonal too, instead of the straight line of text down the left side of the screen. Any of you do that or just the straight scroll on the left?

Kids today have no idea the fun they are missing out on these days with no BASIC interpreter built in with the one blinking cursor in the upper right once a machine is booted without peripherals. It's all about the simple pleasures, isn't it mates? I guess that's why we stick to our old machines and the simple smiles of joy.

But no heads in the sand lads, we can still enjoy newer tech, but the joy certainly doesn't last a life time like ours and our being the luckiest kids in the world during the time of the first computers, imagining the great electronic future unfold.

No generation before or since has such an opportunity of experience like ours, the golden age of tech and gaming and the pleasures of mixed analog and digital tech and using them together in harmony on our little micros and taped decks! The joy of entering text out of a magazine for hours, then as much time debugging what we typed to get it to run properly. From text on paper to a new world to behold on are analog CRT's displaying the inner secrets of the unseen digital worlds we created ourselves.

All of that is also now gone forever except for us proud few who can still choose to grab that 40-year old yellowing magazine, flip on the 40-year old micro and relive for only ourselves, should we choose. Hold tight to your vintage micros until they pull your lifeless body up that is slumped over a beeping machine because your body lay on the keyboard as it entered random text until ram ran out...end of line...

 

Yup, I did the same across the screen idea, I wanted to fill the whole screen because that made me a master of the computer...LOL

Anyway, the straight down the left is BORING...

Was a tad silly as I was a young man, not some 10yr old being daft...A child at heart

 

I still do it to this day on rare occasion at events if a micro is left alone with the cursor blinking in the top left. Even I was about 13 before I did my first "goto 10" program and 16 before I laid my hands on my first micro, as most of you, the eternal ZX81! Though disappointed the first time I did "goto 10" on it and it didn't scroll, but just filled the screen once and stopped, as I recall.

It would take a bit more than a "goto 10" on the ZX to create the slow, jumpy, software scroll...quickly gotten over disappointment though, as I finally had my very own computer, no matter how tiny and primitive, it was my most prized possession...for a year anyway, until I got the 128K Atari 130XE when my friends all had the mere 64K C64, and the feeling of ram superiority it gave, and wonderful sound and colors that made me forget the ZX81 until the 21st century and first occurrence of micro nostalgia.

 

My favourite prank was at a word processing class we got sent to from school. It took place in the local college who had an entire suite of BBC Micro B's with floppy drives and CUB monitors. I created a file called virus.txt and copied it on to everyone's disks. You should have seen the look on the face of the lecturer when he opened one of them to be greeted with the message that if you tried to delete the file it would format the floppy then erase any eproms in the computer. We ended up getting the rest of the day off while the poor sod tried to figure it out. I'm guessing the technicians had a right laugh at him when they eventually got called in

 

A couple of weeks ago I picked up a very basic digital camera (https://www.campsnapphoto.com/) and have been having some fun playing around with it. It has no screen, no menu's, nothing more than a basic LED flash and a button to press when you want to take a photo. Basically like an old point and shoot where you don't know how crap your pictures turned out until you get them back from the local Boots, or in this case copy them to your PC.

In order to take these pictures in black and white I had to change the firmware on the camera (yes, it's that basic a camera you need to change the firmware to change from colour to B&W snaps).