Dutch Atari day in Dordrecht (13 februari 2005)

[+rdemming]

Hi Dutch Atari Fans,

 

On sunday 13 februari 2005 there will be an Atari day in Dordrecht in The Netherlands. Everbody is welkom, even non Dutch. It will be a general Atari meeting with Atari 8bit, Atari ST and game machines like 2600, 7800, Lynx and Jaguar.

 

For more information, read the messgages on Yahoo groups (Dutch language):

- atari-nederland

- atari-nl

 

 

The location of the Atari day will be:

 

Stedelijk Dalton lokatie Titus

Kapteynweg 3

3318 EC Dordrecht.

 

 

The entrance for the Atari day is at the backside of the building. Possibly it will be marked with a blue Atari flag.

The main entrance of the building is closed.

 

See you there,

 

Robert

[analmux]

aah, it's a shame I'm in the swamp that weekend, also on sunday (a swamp not very far from Dordrecht: the Biesbosch)

 

maybe I can leave a little earlier.

[+rdemming]

aah, it's a shame I'm in the swamp that weekend, also on sunday (a swamp not very far from Dordrecht: the Biesbosch)  

 

maybe I can leave a little earlier.

 

Hi Analmux,

 

The day last till about 17:00-17:30 I believe.

I hope to see you there.

 

Robert

[analmux]

No, unfortunately I can't come.

 

I've got some responsibilities on the swamp (Biesbosch) trip (I'm the oldest participant (24) and the rest of us is around 16 years old).

[+rdemming]

Here a small report of the Dutch Atari Day.

 

While driving to Dordrecht it was snowing. This caused the road to be slippery but we arrived safely. The event was held in the sport hall of a school. Unfortunately this was probably the last time we can use this location. It won’t be allowed anymore to use the school for “private” purposes.

 

It was not as busy as last year but still more than enough to make the day a success. A few people were selling games for Atari 8bit, 2600, Lynx and Jaguar. Myself picked up some difficult to get 8bit games from Eastern Europe.

 

It seems that the 8bit users are most active here. Symen (Mr. Atari) showed his MyIDE interface for the 8bit. This makes it possible to play digitized movies on an Atari 8bit. Very impressive.

Guus demonstrated a prototype of an improved version of the Turbo Freezer for the 8bit. This makes it possible to freeze every game and then saving the state to (ram)disk and disassembling and changing the memory contents to poke unlimited lives for example. Saved states can at a later stage be loaded, continuing the game where you left. On board there is room for, I believe, a 512KB ram chip and a 512KB rom disk. The device can also emulate (bankswitched) cartridges.

Also Guus had brought his tools to help people upgrade their Atari ST memory and help with repairs.

 

Also shown was an Atari Panther prototype development system. Unfortunately the owner does not have any software for it, so there was not much to see. If somebody knows where to find software for it. Let me know.

 

I showed my 7800 with CuttleCart 2, a 7800 cart where you could load and play almost every 2600/7800 from MMCart. At least two people were considering buying one too after my demonstration. Luckily Chad is preparing a second production run now.

 

Another guy had brought a bunch of 7800 computers to sell. He gave me a broken one (no picture) for spare parts. When I got home it turned out that it was easily fixed so I now have another spare 7800. Thanks.

And finally there were a few Jaguars to play networked games.

 

Pictures of the event can be found at: http://www.mr-atari.com/dordrecht2005fotos.htm[/url]

 

Concluding, it was again a great event and I’m looking forward to next year.

 

Robert