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Admiral Irony

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    St. Paul, MN

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  1. As a Trekkie, I find myself throwing this game on for a few minutes at a time fairly regularly. I've never been able to get the joysticks to work as the manual says they're supposed to work, so I wind up switching to the keyboard and maybe getting to Sector 3.1 before getting the Enterprise blown up!
  2. Thanks! MST3K's one of my favorite shows, and Crow and Servo make perfect computing companions.
  3. Thanks for the links! I hadn't come across the latter one yet, and the good news is I have nothing that looks like any of those examples. So I think I can safely rule out Video RAM issues. I've been debating a second power unit for awhile, and still think it's the most likely culprit (if there is one). I have the giant brick that plugs directly into the outlet, but have been thinking one like this may be more conducive to my setup. That is, if there are no voltage issues that would make that variety unusable or otherwise affect my system. Edit: Reading up some more, I'm realizing it's possible the one I linked to might be for the original TI-99, not the 4a. Is there a way to tell them apart?
  4. As a bit of a caveat, I'll admit I'm a bit neurotic, and I've had a run of bad luck with tech lately. So it's entirely possible there's nothing wrong with my TI at all and that what I'm seeing is normal--I just have no prior experience with the TI and have only seen this one in operation. Since taking my TI out for more sustained use the past several weeks, I've periodically noticed some screen flickering that doesn't seem to be related to the four-sprite-per-scanline limitation I've read about. I can best describe it as a partial line of dark shadow that comes and goes on different parts of the screen. It's most noticeable when the screen is mostly still, like when I'm idling in BASIC or playing Video Chess. While playing games with more movement on the screen (i.e. Parsec or Alpiner), I haven't noticed this phenomenon as much. I have an aftermarket 5-pin to RCA connector cable for video display. My power supply seems to be in decent shape, though after three decades in storage the cord is looking slightly worn (but not frayed) right next to the part that connects to the TI. This has led me to think it could also possibly be power-related (if there's even a problem), but again, I'm not sure. I know it's difficult to diagnose something like this with a brief description. As you all know, we've all become accustomed to the way modern screens and refresh rates work, so while I know the TI displays differently, I'm just not exactly sure how, if you know what I mean. I suppose my question is not so much "Do I have a problem?" as it is "How do I know if I have a problem?" Apologies if I'm worrying about nothing! I'm really wanting to get into using my TI, and for me a part of that is just getting familiar with how it functions under normal circumstances.
  5. My wife and I have been doing some summertime rearranging around the house, and I finally managed to carve out a spot for the TI:
  6. Admiral Irony

    Admiral Irony

    My TI-99 and other retro computing photos.
  7. Sparkdrummer, thanks for putting this out each month! I'm just getting started with the TI-99, and I've been finding myself digging through the old newsletters and supplementary disks archived on whtech, as I completely missed out on that scene growing up (my family didn't get a computer until '96, and dialup didn't come until after that). I'll echo what the others have already said, the retro xeroxed newsletter look is the perfect touch! Also, great timing with the Adventureland article, as I've been exploring that adventure (loaded onto the TI via cassette) lately. I keep trying to avoid too many spoilers, just to see how far I can get, but we'll see how far my willpower takes me...
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