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

Someone is going to be retro brighting...

 

Hi all,

hope you are all well?

Does anyone have a complete collection of the Page 6 issue disks that came with the magazine?

regards

Andy

 

What exactly the FujiNet is for? I mean, what services does it provide? Loading cartridges, disks or cassette images? Network connectivity? Thanks.

 

Matt is your man for a full breakdown but yes, all of the things you said...And more..

 

Great result, Graham.

Hope you have many happy hours with the old fruit!

Richie, as ever, thank you for assisting in this repair and we have one new happy Oric user!

Thanks, Graham.

Very kind to look over the microdisc to see what you can do.

No rush as ever.

 

That's great news about Bev... I'm sure I can speak for us all in wishing her a speedy recovery back to normal.

As you may have realised my post code is one that's affected by the South African varient of Covid. very strange to me knowing our local area and its inhabitents and we are between two larger Urban area's .. Good news (maybe) is that we can get tested every 10 days even if not showing any symptoms, so may catch it much earlier if we do become infected in some way ( really can only be Pam's children she looks after) I've had to cut off visiting Mum, puts the onus on my sister.

It's also given me a little more time to try and tidy my workshop.. well thats what I thought anyway.
That and Ian from 'retro computers' was on holiday the whole of Jan, and I was to lazy to make my own video cable..

@Vyper68 Thank you for the heads up on the negative rail voltage regulators, last time I searched for something similar were over £20 pound, nearer £10 now. good to know about the reset circuit capacitor as well.
@Andy Barr if you havn't had one fitted by Richie ... it's something I'd recomend to any oric owner. & works exactly the same way as the two regulators I replaced in the microdrive...

Last thing for this morning, the XEGS I'm building is now running. used a XEGS MMU & an EPROM ,, not sure why the U1MB boards not working, as installed correctly and are pretested in other computers, but that was all thats wrong.
if peeps need any MMU'S either XL/XE or XEGS I know I can now program these

 

@M.D.Baker
I think I've found away of turning something like these :- https://uk.banggood.com/Geekcreit-E...MIi-2x6JvV7gIVWPhRCh0ZHw5pEAQYAyABEgL6ZPD_BwE
and replacing the modual with one of these
https://www.digikey.co.uk/product-d...16MB/1965-ESP32-WROVER-IE-16MB-CT-ND/11613179
a few small capacitors to change plus a daughter board with three leds buttons and a few 74ls07 buffers two fets and some resistors..
into a fuji net.

This will save me having to try and solder this https://www.digikey.co.uk/product-detail/en/silicon-labs/CP2102N-A02-GQFN24/336-5887-ND/9863476
it has 6 legs on each side and is 4mm square they do one thats 3mm square and stopped production of the larger varients

 

It certainly looks like it would work to me too, though you are much more knowledgeable than I with my measly associates degree and lack of experience in really ever designing my own stuff from the ground up. But I see it has the integrated SD slot, so I guess you could avoid the CP210. But would the CP210x driver still be used or would it require another driver?

 

I'm home now @M.D.Baker .. Matt I'll add that I don't hold a degree of any sort, so don't knock your education..
My eldest Daughter has a B.Sc and in her 2nd year of an M.Sc. so the genes passed something on
Your mention of the device driver has lead me to possiably rethink the CP2102, I mention this as you can easily purchase just the USB to TTL UART boards. I wonder If I just designed something with the ESP32, SD card, lights and buttons and buffers but left the USB port to be plugged in when needed when needed.
Hmm. As I've not read through all the documentation you have so kindly linked, apart from programming new software into it, is the USB used for anything else, maybe it see's the mSD card as a plug in memory.
I could use something like this thats ready made :-
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/USB-to-T...081201&hash=item3d1b1fcca5:g:lhMAAOSwokVdMdA3

Or better still this :- https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/6-Pin-CP...452357?hash=item48ed1884c5:g:RSsAAOSwUvFfW5zS

@Vyper68 Richie any thoughts at all, this would get round trying to solder the CP2102 directly?

 

@Graham I guess I'm lost a bit myself here, as I don't know what 500 series you speak of.

Oh, I just realized, you mean my Oscilloscope! No, I haven't yet, I did open her up when I noticed there were a few wires hanging out that were apparently meant to go to something else to make up for a missing board in it that must have died at some point, but I've no idea what is now missing and need to do more research on it. But I intend to look over everything thoroughly before I do power it up.

Also, the power cord had been cut, and as I mentioned I think it was salvaged from a Good Will charity store dumpster as I worked at one for a while (while attending school for electronics actually) and they didn't keep and sell electronics in my region because the idiot woman regional manager heard that electronics contained "PCB's" and so were dangerous (wrong kind of "PCB's of course, which is why I refer to her as an idiot) and they made us cut cords and throw them out. As if that would have been better, going to landfills IF the type of "PCB's" (polychlorinated biphenyls), the idiot woman thought were in them actually were! I tried to have it stopped but I was a lowly part-time worker so no one listened, and I actually salvaged a few computers including two TI=99/4A's from the dumpster while I worked there; something I would have been fired for doing if caught. Apparently the idiotic idea has spread since that time. It's really amazing the morons that get put in charge of things in this world; The U.S. elected officials being a prime example of pure idiocy.

 

That's awful, Daz.

So, so sorry - is there anyone amongst us who hasn't had a crap 2020-21?

Sometimes it feels like one awful thing after another. I've known of two other fellas living within 2mins of us here who were hit whilst out on their bikes. One smashed his face (aged 70) and the other his collar bone (guy in his 40s so he's got age on his side in terms of recovery) when vehicles have driven too close to them and then they've hit a sudden / hidden pothole and.... yeah, come off and had a bad impact with the ruddy road tarmac/concrete.

Your poor, poor dad. The same leg as Bev and you do worry at that age, Daz, and also what else he might get in hospitals right now and are they giving the same priority to such patients as opposed to those being treated for the virus...? You just wonder and so it's natural to be worried.

I truly and sincerely hope you get some better news soon, mate.
You take good care of you, your family and see what you can do to help your dear dad.
Tough times indeed all round.

 

Sorry to hear Daz, best wishes for a speedy recovery...

He's in the right place although as hospitals are full of COVID people its a worry but those places get sanitised 24hrs a day..

 

Today my 3 SRAM chargers for Indus GT and CA-2001 finally arrived. Sent out to me by tf_hh in early December. The only difference betweed GT and 2001 versions is the orientation of the pin-header socket. Also tha latest version 1.2 OS roms as he said he could include them and I've no idea what version I have and it saves me the time of burning my own, though I could. I think he only charged me the cost of the eproms.

So once installed, all three of those drives will have full CP/M capability and SIO speed with Super Synchromesh up to divisor 6 (68K; compared to 57K Happy Ultra Speed on my two 1050's (and eventually my 810). Even though Fujinet is able to go up to divisor 0 (126K), I have also been using divisor 6 on it as that seems the fastest stable speed to guarantee most things load and run properly. It's fast enough for me. I have MyIDE II and Incognito Side, The!Cart and battery-backed ramdisk on Turbo Freezer if I need faster loading for stuff.

 

I received a belated Christmas present this week, a FujiNet
Only had time for a quick play so far, but what an awesome little device. Apart from using it to play games on my 130XE I plan on using the PDF print feature to do some old school certificates from the like of Printmaster (or Printshop, can't remember the name).

It'll keep me going while I save up the pennies to get an AVG Cart from RetroLemon. Once that's done my 8bit Atari collection will be complete. I say that now, until something else catches my eye!

 

Done my first printout today with FujiNet. It even gives the PDF an authentic dot matrix look

Really impressed with it so far and straight forward to use as well. Just need to look for more servers to add to it. Tend not to use the 130XE much but I can see it getting a fair bit more action with this plugged in now. I'd love to see something similar for the Amiga and ST as well. Who would have guessed that after 40 years our little 8-bit computers would still be going strong?

 

Very cool @nysavant ! I really haven't had an interest in using the PDF's to print from my deskjet printouts that look identical to my real dot-matrix printer, and I'd missed it's classic noises too. But if you don't have a classic printer, Fujinet is definitely one good answer.

I've been spending time with Platoterm (Platoterm is the software for Atari and other 8/16-bit systems, the server/network is known as Plato) through Fujinet, starting with the 1.4 version made for Fujinet, but it's a Fujinet version of 1.3 which is "Platoterm lite" and there are some features missing, including my favorite, choosing a controller option to use with it. For me it's mouse, trak-ball or touch tablet, all of which work very fast and smooth, unlike the joystick with Platoterm which crawls across the screen like a snail and make Platoterm a pain to use. Platoterm 1.0 has all the features and controller options, so I've been working on getting it installed on my CF HD and running it through SDX with the traditional R: handler. But so far when I try to load Platoterm 1.0 I'm getting a "not enough memory" error, on my 1MB Atari! So obviously I must have something else in memory that Platoterm 1.0 is trying to use, so I have to see if I can figure it out. It should work without the special Fujinet 1.4 edition since Fujinet is supposed to be 100% compatible with R:handlers and all the legacy software that uses it. I'm sure it is, but I am also brand new to the entire Fujinet wifi/BT/N: handler as well as the R: handler.

But anyway, Platoterm is something to marvel at. It plays vintage multi-player games, including probably the first ever MMO RPG! But also chat rooms and development and my favorite part so far; thousands and thousands of archived high-school and college level academic lessons and series with real working "lab" programs to go along with them, under the menu option 'catalog.' Yesterday I studied a lesson on astronomy regarding astronomical bodies and gravitational forces show animated examples of orbits and crashing bodies! Next, I jumped to a lesson on the Atom and it's structure with electrons, neutrons and positrons and their orbit energy levels around the nucleus and how many electrons can orbit in the same "planes" and then went through examples of most of the elements and how many electrons they have, what energy orbits they occupy and how many electrons per energy orbit level makes a given element. I've already forgotten all the terms and whatnot but I've actually learned new things.

There are courses/lessons on Plato that range the entire spectrum of academics and everyone can find lessons and courses of interest. It's amazing, archived stuff from high schools and universities from the last 55 years, finally going obsolete completely in 2015, then revived in 2018 with Cyber1.net server and in 2019/20 with Irataonline.net where there is apparently a growing 8-bit community including most 8-bit machines that has a membership of about 600 people now, and new programs and lessons, tutorials, whatever being entered now by all of them! It's all done in an incredibly legible 80-column font with text and graphics freely interacting in the system, programmed with a language similar to BASIC known as TUTOR. You can become a member of Irata.Online and also ask for "developer/teacher" level member access so you can program your own stuff for it.

I'll be learning a lot for my 8-bit Atari robot project from courses and lessons about robots and A.I. right on Plato!

 

My AVG Cart arrived first thing this morning. Pretty excellent service considering I only ordered it on Sunday from RetroLemon

Been able to load some .car files on real hardware for the first time and also got the SIO mod so have been trying out multigame .atr images with no problems.

I know the AVG can also emulate Side2 which I don't have any experience of or what it actually does, so that might be next to explore. Between this and the FujiNet my Atari's have never had it so good!

 

Nice one, Andy.

Which ones are your stand out ones, so far, any decent utils or demos?

I've got quite a few of these too and I do give them a run out from time to time...

Once more, time is something that is completely tied-up this end with either f/t work or f/t further house demolition.

Here's a view tonight of our landing as the walls come down and we prepare to put up a new staircase to the attic:



I'll be in touch soon, fellas.

Up to our (dusty) eyeballs here.

 

Fraid not, Al.

It's currently all in boxes up there but it's the spare bedroom in case Alan Sugar or any of you retronauts ever drop by, mate.

The room that's earmarked for my retro bits is at the back of the house and currently has an exercise bike in there so I'm already battling for space.

All being well, I'm getting some new "modern" display units to stick my bits in for display purposes... I should maybe rephrase that(!)

Will update you when we get that far, fella.

Hope you're all keeping well on here.

PS. Got my Covid 1st jab date for this coming Friday 4:25 at a pharmacy not 2 miles from here - not bad considering I only booked it 30mins ago and the only other option was some place in Grimsby some 20+ miles away.

I'm just bracing myself now for the extra limbs, gills and antennae I'm bound to grow following the blessed needed needle.

 

Not a man cave, a nursery

Better start now, after the jab your bits may explode...

Finally getting a side effect from my jab, my arm is very tender around the injection point..

So far that's it and I hope it stays that way..

I'll let thee get back to the never ending house, must feel like groundhog day at times..

 

Tough of the track I remember that
I also had Hotspur annuals and Commando magazines as well...
I used to play Subbuteo back in the 70’s/80’s and I used to have England and Aston Villa. I don’t think they ever made a Darlington set did they?

 

I picked up an issue one ZX81 last week with the RAM pack so I scratch built a Back Porch/Composite mod based on JasperColoumb’s circuit.
The transformer had dry solder joints which needed attention and was the cause of the resets listed in the listing. Easy fix though and one a new membrane later it works fine.

 

It is a clone of the SuperSnapshot V5 which is the US cart the Action Replay was based on. So poke finder, sprite killer, machine code monitor etc.

 

The Pi1541 lets you run JiffyDOS for it’s 1541 and 1581 emulation and it works 100% I bought the ROM image set rather than physical so I could burn my own and make some dual OS versions.

 

As ever, Rich, you are so very welcome.
I'm not sure if the York Fruits are Atari compatible but you never know as they are juicy and cool schmule and as you say, loaded with vitamins so they may constitute a contribution to your retro 5-a-day!
Do enjoy those carts, mate.
I am so glad you are already get stuck in and giving them a good run out.
Those lights are more a back burner project if you get time and run out of things to play with/fix.
Thanking you.
The ZX81 backdoor porch video mod wotist sounds intriguing...I might have a donor that could do with a mod to improve its output.
Once more, once we get settled and sorted out here in the next month or two, I am gonna give some of my more "exotic" rarer micros out like the old ded-ex, give em a once over again with the old 3D Monster Maze, Flight Simulator, Mazogs and original Kevin Toms Footie manager and then report back as I believe I may well have an 81 with video issues, bud, so please reserve one for me.
Cheers Rich and all at Atari Owner.
Have a relaxing Easter break and if anyone fancies an hour either tomorrow avvy or tomorrow evening for a vid meet up then just holler.