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About oracle_jedi
- Birthday 01/06/1971
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Seattle, WA
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Atari 8bit, 7800, Jaguar, ST, PC1, Falcon; Commodore VIC-20, Max, C64, C128, Plus/4; Amiga 500, 1200; TI-99/4A; Sord M5; Camputers Lynx; Mattel Aquarius
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Omega Race on the C64
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Boulderdash 2600
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I went to a 286 PC with a colour VGA monitor and a small hard disk. It was 1991 so probably Windows 3.0 or 3.1. But I had to sell the ST to afford the new system, and it took a while to scrape together the funds, so I actually moved back to my 800XL, 1050 drive, 1027 printer for occasional correspondence, and got distracted for a brief time by a cheap and nasty used Advance 86B which was an awful 8086 PC clone.
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Alice Sisters for Atari Falcon
oracle_jedi replied to Orion_'s topic in Atari ST/TT/Falcon Computers
Thank you porting these games to the Falcon! My dog loved "Alice's Mom's Rescue" on the Jaguar, and she approves of these ports too 😀 One question - is the lack of support for the Jagpad on the Falcon a deliberate design decision? If not, is it hard to add? -
It does switch just fine on every other ST - 1040ST (US-spec), 1040STE (UK-spec), 1040STE (US-spec), Falcon (US-spec). On this 520ST (US-spec) the 50/60Hz switch program causes the screen to offset to the upper right of the screen. I am guessing maybe something with the older video hardware? Was hoping there might be a "swap this IC for a later revision...." type of known fix.
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Would you be excited for an Atari ST mini ?
oracle_jedi replied to JPF997's topic in Atari ST/TT/Falcon Computers
For me, not really. The mini-reproduction machines are mainly of interest for gaming. For almost every successful ST game, there is an almost identical Amiga version but with better sound. An ST Mini would just be an A500 mini but without the cool audio. A mini STE would be better, and if they do make that it might get my interest. Now a mini-Falcon? oh yes, now I'm interested! -
I missed this auction completely. I have enough ST machines already so I probably would not have bid on it, but I would still have expected it to go for a bit more. The completed auction link is here. I copied the images for posterity for when Ebay clears the auction. Did one of our members win this? An interesting machine.
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How can one tell which version of the PCB you have? The github repo still shows the need for a bodge wire. If a revision was made to address a mislabelled CAS1L/CAS1H, then why not also fix the bodge wire issue? I don't see any evidence in github of project revisions. There looks to be just one with bare minimum instructions. I do see a question from a user describing the similar corrupted menu items. That user had to disable the RAS line to get a stable 2MB, so it sounds like perhaps the same issue? The question is unanswered. Had it not been for Adrian's Basement, I would have had no idea to try swapping CAS1L/CAS1H. But the fact that another reported NOT having to do so makes me wonder if it is the ST Rev H motherboard that is mislabelled for the CAS1L/CAS1H tap points, and had I soldered directly to the MMU, I might not have had any such issue. I do see that Exxos has a similar 4MB expansion for the 520ST, and I like that his version uses a more elegant PCB design that leaves access to most of the RAM chip locations, meaning that in the event of problems you have an easier task of visually verifying that the board is installed correctly, and there are not bridged solder joints.
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I bought an "agranlund" 4MB RAM expansion for my 520ST. Its an open-source project that you can order up and make yourself. I bought a ready-assembled one from an Ebay seller. It seemed an easy way to add some functionality to the old 520ST. You can download the project here: https://github.com/agranlund/STRam The Youtube channel "Adrian's Digital Basement" featured the same expansion, although Adrian made the mistake of adding sockets to the install which meant it did not fit with the keyboard. The install is not for the faint-hearted. The instructions on the github page are scant. Removing 16 RAM chips is not a trivial operation. The 520ST motherboard is better made than much of the Tramiel era Atari PCBs, but it is still easily damaged. Note: Leave the bypass caps in place. These are still needed for the RAM expansion. With the RAM chips removed and the expansion board installed, I followed Adrian's example and tied CAS1L, CAS1H and RAS1 to ground, and A9 to +5V. This allowed the ST to boot up with 512K RAM. Rather than run the lines under the board, I simply used pin 8 of U16 for ground, and pin 16 for +5V. With the initial install done, next I had to connect the CAS1L, CAS1H and RAS1 lines. Rather than solder lines directly to the MMU, I ran the lines to the pads on the top side of the motherboard using this guide from the Exxos forum: https://exxosforum.co.uk/atari/last/STM4MB/index.htm. User Verault on the atari-forum.com reported that the CAS1L and CAS1H lines did NOT need to be swapped (https://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?t=43064), however on my install I absolutely did have to swap these. Failing to do so resulted in a GEM desktop with corrupted menu items. Note: I don't know if the silk screen on the expansion board is wrong, or the guide on exxosforum, but the picture is of my working install. This boosted the ST to 1MB. The A9 line needs to be run to MMU pin 64. I liked Adrian's idea of a switch to set the A9 to +5V which limits the ST to 1MB for compatibility with some software that objects to 4MB of RAM. I placed a small switch next to the cartridge port which is held in place with hot-glue. When reassembled, the switch can only be accessed with tweezers or a pen tip, but that's fine to me, as I do not want to accidentally knock it when the machine is running. Cartridges can still be inserted with the switch in the 1MB position. Switched to 4MB it can prevent some cartridges to be inserted, but I don't have many so that's not really a concern. The +5V (force 1MB) is taken from the cartridge port. With 4MB of RAM, booting from the Satan hard disk would be nice. But TOS 1.0 does not seem to support this, so I replaced the ROM with TOS 1.4. It took a couple of attempts to get the ROM chips in the right order: With the case reassembled the ST would not even power up. I eventually tracked this down to the top shield shorting on the RAM chips on the expansion board. Since I like having the top shield in place, as it adds some support for the keyboard, I had to add a strip of Kapton tape to the underside of the shield. The MMU had to be re-seated after the install, and all socketed ICs had to be firmly inserted several times before achieving a reliable boot. Finally with everything reassembled, I can play Frontier off of a hard disk on the 520ST I posted this here as I found the install guide frustratingly light on details. I hope this might help others considering this upgrade.
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zx spectrum line Any American Speccy fans around?
oracle_jedi replied to r_chase's topic in Classic Computing Discussion
Mine just arrived! Ordered Sept 2020 with an expected delivery date of Aug 2021. So happy it has finally arrived! -
Question on the colors of the ST Desktop
oracle_jedi replied to thedocbwarren's topic in Atari ST/TT/Falcon Computers
Interesting, If you have the old ST boot ROMs that display the rainbow logo and prompt for a TOS boot disk... GEM boots up to a pale green desktop, which I think is actually a green/white pattern effect. It looks decidedly more soothing that the garish kelly-green of TOS-in-ROM GEM desktops. Of course these early STs only had RGB out. I am wondering if composite artifacting might have been a reason behind switching to the solid green color on the later units that included RF out? Personally I with they had chosen a more subdued color scheme like they used on the Falcon. -
zx spectrum line Any American Speccy fans around?
oracle_jedi replied to r_chase's topic in Classic Computing Discussion
I now live in Seattle, but grew up in the UK in the 80s, and a lot of kids at school had the ZX Spectrum. Even though, as a Commodore, and then an Atari kid, I was obligated to heap childish scorn on the little rubber-keyed micro, I actually found many of the games amazingly cool. Psion Flight Simulator, Jetpac, Attic Attack, The Hobbit, Knightlore, so so many more. I backed Spectrum Next KS2, and of course I am still waiting for it to show up. So I also bought a Harlequin kit from Byte Delight, and a remanufactured case from Retro Radionics, as ZX Renew were out of stock at the time. (Retro Radionics were also out of stock, but they just didn't admit it, nor offered any updates on the delayed order until prompted, and so I had to wait months for their stock to be refreshed from wherever in China is actually making this stuff). The Harlequin was a lot to assemble but the instructions were pretty good. The finished machine can be switched from PAL to NTSC if needed, but also outputs RGB. It can also be set as either a 48K Spectrum or a 128K Spectrum. I use a 2A 9V DC power supply, center negative. I also have a DivMMC device to load games from an SD card, and to use a joystick as the keyboard still sucks. The Spectrum is a fun 8-bit computer with lots of games and applications and on-going enthusiastic support from a great community. I am very eager to finally get my hands on the Spectrum Next so I hope they work out their "RotW" shipping issues soon. -
I assume this is all obvious to people who've been around the Vectrex a while, but a few things had me confused trying to get Elite running on the Pitrex, so I figured I'd add this note to help out any other newbies. First, to run Elite you need to be able to plug in a keyboard to your Raspberry Pi Zero. Since in the normal configuration the USB jacks are right up against the Vectrex housing, I replaced my 40 GPIO connector with a right-angled one. This is really a benefit in a number of ways. I can now easily remove the MicroSD card without having to prize the Pi off the Pitrex. And I can also connect a keyboard to the USB jack. Second. I tried a genuine Raspberry Pi keyboard since I like the small desk footprint. But this caused Elite to hang on startup, even though the code does recognize it as a keyboard. A standard Dell USB Windows keyboard did work. Third. External power. For a while I was assuming my keyboard problem was that the Vectrex powered Pi could not handle the extra load of the USB keyboard. The Pitrex documentation says you can add a 2.1mm centre-positive DC power jack and remove the "Power from VEC" jumper. That approach however would also mean removing or hacking the Pitrex case. I removed the "Power from VEC" jumper and added a two-pin dupont connector. It fits easily inside the plastic casing. Later I will add a small switch. With that done I can power the Pitrex externally using a Raspberry Pi regulated USB power supply. As it turns out I did not need to do this. Switching back to Vectrex power with the generic Windows USB keyboard seems to work fine.
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Huge thanks to @mikesk8 and everyone in this thread - been playing Star Wars on the Vectrex just now and it looks and sounds great! I only recently acquired a Vectrex so missed out on the whole Fecfever thing, but the PiTrex seems a very capable device and I have been impressed so far.