Is anyone into "retro-computing"?

[coloumb]

LUXURY!!!! I had to use my C-64 (my parents sprung for the extra $$$$ over the Vic20) on a 13" B&W TV!

I remember typing 10000 lines of machine code to get a Red Baron game to work. I had to code the compiler called MLC (out of a Commadore magazine), and then they had games you could program into it. The coding consisted of:

23423: 4353534 234234 534345 232456 234242 234233
23424: 5642343 234644 234677 456456 345345 745645....

1000's of times over, typed by hand. One line of code typed incorrectly would cause a crash. We REALLY wanted to play games back then. The game consisted of a red biplane that you could fly through barns and shoot other random planes.

You kids and yer fancy DVD's playing 3D dual monitor high def video---you don't know what it's like to WORK to play a game I tells ya!

Did you ever enter the code before MLC? THAT was extremely painful and time consuming....but definitely worth it. I use to tinker around with the code to see what kind of small modifications I could make...

 

[JohnnyRebel]

As you can probably tell by my signature, I have been getting into it big time. I am in the process of restoring a Commodore Amiga 2000, which was my high school graduation present way back in 1989. I swapped out the motherboard (mine was damaged by a battery leak and I haven't had time to fix it) and amazingly, the 18 year-old Quantum 52 MB (yes, MB) booted right into Workbench 2.0 without any issues. I've got an "accelerator card" on the way with a SCREAMING 68030 chip on it ( ). I think the next addition will be a flicker fixer so I can hook it to the analog VGA port of one of the monitors in my sig and place the system under my desk.

Anyone else into this hobby and want to share stories? Any other Commodore fans? I am still shocked that most of my 25 year old C64 floppies STILL seem to work. The Amiga was a revolutionary machine, and even booting it up today, I am still surprised at fast it feels and am amazed by some of the software. An incredible, incredible machine.

I recently purchased a refurb Amiga 1200 from AmigaKit.

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/?currency=USD&currency=USD

I sold all my old Amiga stuff on Ebay years ago just prior to moving back into campus housing for my Masters. It came in a new Amiga Magic box and seems more like it's NIB than refurb. I still have the old 1080 (have used it as a TV monitor over the years) and am having fun playing Empire, TV Sports Football and Warlords with my kids. They can't help but laugh at the music even as they are lovin' the games.

JR

 

[Linflas]

Ah yes, the best use of electronics. Crystal filter? CW yea or nay?

I learned Morse back when I was a kid in Boy Scouts, couldn't decode anything now to save my life. I do have a Vibroplex code key inherited from my father sitting around though. The receiver I was jokingly referring to is a Heathkit GR-64 I built when I was a kid. Closest thing I had to a crystal filter for it was a Heathkit GD-125 Q multiplier to hook up to it.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Somewhere in a box or two

I still have an Atari 800

I'll be amazed if any of the floppy's are still readable

If she still starts up, those boxes should have some ROM games.

You will probably be surprised. I had my floppies stored in places ranging from basements to garages which had no real climate control, and most still work after 20-25 years. I was always told that you could reasonably expect no more than a lifespan of 15 years for 5.25" floppies, so I am impressed.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I am a huge Commodore fan with a huge collection of stuff.

Please, do tell! Maybe we should form an official AT Commodore fan club. :awe:

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Did you ever enter the code before MLC? THAT was extremely painful and time consuming....but definitely worth it. I use to tinker around with the code to see what kind of small modifications I could make...

I think my first word processor (Speedscript, IIRC) was one I typed out of the back of Compute's Gazette in the early 80s. I remember all of that typing -- it was PAINFUL.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I recently purchased a refurb Amiga 1200 from AmigaKit.

http://amigakit.leamancomputing.com/catalog/?currency=USD&currency=USD

I sold all my old Amiga stuff on Ebay years ago just prior to moving back into campus housing for my Masters. It came in a new Amiga Magic box and seems more like it's NIB than refurb. I still have the old 1080 (have used it as a TV monitor over the years) and am having fun playing Empire, TV Sports Football and Warlords with my kids. They can't help but laugh at the music even as they are lovin' the games.

JR

Cool. Amigakit has a couple of components I've been eyeing as well -- the Indivision flicker fixer and I thought they had the Buddha IDE controller, but it looks like they aren't advertising it now.

I'd really like to add an A1000 or A3000 to my collection, but I think maybe I should think about an A1200 or A4000 instead.

 

[NuclearNed]

LUXURY!!!! I had to use my C-64 (my parents sprung for the extra $$$$ over the Vic20) on a 13" B&W TV!

I remember typing 10000 lines of machine code to get a Red Baron game to work. I had to code the compiler called MLC (out of a Commadore magazine), and then they had games you could program into it. The coding consisted of:

23423: 4353534 234234 534345 232456 234242 234233
23424: 5642343 234644 234677 456456 345345 745645....

1000's of times over, typed by hand. One line of code typed incorrectly would cause a crash. We REALLY wanted to play games back then. The game consisted of a red biplane that you could fly through barns and shoot other random planes.

You kids and yer fancy DVD's playing 3D dual monitor high def video---you don't know what it's like to WORK to play a game I tells ya!

Compute!'s Gazette
Every month I typed in every single program that was in that month's issue... including Red Baron. As bad as MLC was, I think the non-machine code programs were even worse. All those stupid ASCII escape codes were hard to get in correctly.

 

[JeepinEd]

Compute!'s Gazette
Every month I typed in every single program that was in that month's issue... including Red Baron. As bad as MLC was, I think the non-machine code programs were even worse. All those stupid ASCII escape codes were hard to get in correctly.

I still have a stack of those magazines in my garage, along with the first issue of Amiga magazine.

 

[Homerboy]

I'd kill to get my Amiga 500 back.

 

[Homerboy]

My hands are likely deformed do to these:

I can't tell you how many of these I went through and the pain it caused my hand.

 

[Chaotic42]

Does having a Pentium 3 laptop count?

I used to be, but it was too much stuff to keep up with. I've tried to cut down on the amount of clutter I have.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I'd kill to get my Amiga 500 back.

You can get an A500 pretty reasonably on eBay now.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Does having a Pentium 3 laptop count?

I used to be, but it was too much stuff to keep up with. I've tried to cut down on the amount of clutter I have.

As someone else said in the thread, I think it is hard to consider any PC compatible machine "retro" outside of maybe the oddballs like the PS/2 series. Amiga, Atari, Apple, Commodore, Timex, Acorn, Radio Shack -- those are retro.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

My hands are likely deformed do to these:

I can't tell you how many of these I went through and the pain it caused my hand.

That's an Epyx 500XJ! I used to have a few of these and I could swear I found at least one of them when I moved into my current home in 2008, but I don't remember where I saw it. I've seen a few of these on eBay, including a new one that I forgot to bid on.

 

[Homerboy]

You can get an A500 pretty reasonably on eBay now.

MY Amiga 500!

 

[Homerboy]

That's an Epyx 500XJ! I used to have a few of these and I could swear I found at least one of them when I moved into my current home in 2008, but I don't remember where I saw it. I've seen a few of these on eBay, including a new one that I forgot to bid on.

Yeap. ALL_TIME_CLASSIC

 

[Iron Woode]

Please, do tell! Maybe we should form an official AT Commodore fan club. :awe:

I have:

2 c64
2 C128
1 C128D
1 vic20
1 mouse (can't remember the number)
3 CBM 8050 drives
2 1702 monitors
2 1084 monitors
1 4040 drive
1 1531 drive
4 1541 drives
numerous rs232 to parallel adapters
2 printers - one is a StarMicronics NLQ colour printer
1 Bus Card II parallel adapter

and about 100 floppies.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I have:

2 c64
2 C128
1 C128D
1 vic20
1 mouse (can't remember the number)
3 CBM 8050 drives
2 1702 monitors
2 1084 monitors
1 4040 drive
1 1531 drive
4 1541 drives
numerous rs232 to parallel adapters
2 printers - one is a StarMicronics NLQ colour printer
1 Bus Card II parallel adapter

and about 100 floppies.

I have a couple of the Star printers, one of which is color. I think it might be in my attic.

The mouse is probably a 1350 or 1351 mouse.

 

[bobdole369]

When I had my c128 - it wasn't long before I found one of these - it was great pickings dumpster diving in a lot of schools, cpu stores, after computer shows, etc when I was a lad.

The "Electric Crayon" they call it now, Okimate 10. This thing ate ribbon for breakfast if you wanted full page prints. But ZOMG COLOR! IN 1987!!!!

Did anyone actually follow instructions to "increase memory on 1541" that was widely circulated on text files on the bbs's?

I tried to mod my 1700 128k cartridge to 512k but it didn't work.

I also had a MASSIVE daisy wheel printer that I got for $1 from a PC show. It was awesome, worked perfectly, but only 1 font and it was slower than a typewriter would have been. (type up, then print and wait for the thing to slowly hammer out each character?)

 

[IndyColtsFan]

When I had my c128 - it wasn't long before I found one of these - it was great pickings dumpster diving in a lot of schools, cpu stores, after computer shows, etc when I was a lad.

The "Electric Crayon" they call it now, Okimate 10. This thing ate ribbon for breakfast if you wanted full page prints. But ZOMG COLOR! IN 1987!!!!

You know, I had one of those and I don't remember whatever happened to it. I don't remember ever throwing it out, so I suppose it could be boxed in my attic or my mom's basement somewhere.

 

[Koing]

First computer I had was a 25mhz 486/SX with 4 MB of RAM. I feel zero nostalgia for that thing, I can't count how many hours I wasted screwing around with bootdisks trying to get some games to run. Wing Commander 2 was a freaking nightmare...

OMG me getting the f0cking sound drivers to work on my P133, 16MB, 1GB BEAST at the time...dam Fifta97 would not work due to 16MB of ram FAIL the dam MS control pad wouldn't work either?!

Duke Nukem 3D in dos as my windows 95 wasn't cutting it FAIL so many hrs spend working on the thing lol. But alas it's all paid off and I'm reaping the rewards of the pc sh!t from back in the day.

Koing

 

[ElFenix]

I miss me some wang!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Laboratories

my father worked for them between when they acquired i-net (late 1997?) and then continued to work for getronics for about 4 years after getronics bought wang.

The oldest thing I own is a Mac SE with an addon 40MB Mirror (that's the company name) SCSI drive.

It still works, but there's little reason to actually power it on.

had one of those with a scsi drive (10MB? 20?). it also had a radius accelerator board in it. probably an 020 processor.

then had a mac ii, which probably was only better in resolution and hard drive space (40MB!). not sure if it was color.

then had a ii si. 80 MB!

 

[manimal]

I remember losing my life to the game montezuma's revenge on the C64



I was just telling the wife I wish we still had dot matrix printers in the house for kids projects..

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I remember losing my life to the game montezuma's revenge on the C64



I was just telling the wife I wish we still had dot matrix printers in the house for kids projects..

I have that game on floppy and it still works.