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Mr.Amiga500

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Posts posted by Mr.Amiga500

  1. Posted · Edited by Mr.Amiga500

    If there is a relatively easy way to do this, I would be very interested as I am looking to put a laptop into an 800XL case at some point in the future.

     

    That is exactly what I was thinking of doing a couple years ago with my dead 800XL. I also wanted to have one of those video cards capable of output to TV so I could just hook it up to any TV - just like in the old days.

     

    Eventually I gave up the idea as an exercise in futility. After all the pain and effort, it would just be a boring Windows or Linux PC in a nice case.

     

     

    Edit: But now that I think about it again, maybe it would be a neat idea. You could have a whole bunch of different emulators on the thing (MAME, Atari, C64, Amiga, etc) and play the games on TV like they were meant to be seen (well at least better than VGA monitor). You could use USB joysticks like the Competition PRO USB. And you could always switch back to Linux (or..ug..Windows) and download more games. (or use it like a boring PC if you must)

     

    I think a problem is lack of function keys/control keys on the 800XL keyboard. There would be some OS functions you couldn't access.

  2. Posted

    Who made that rule, you?

     

    Uh... yeah... I guess I did. I suppose I was thinking that way because on every OS I played DOOM - Windows, MS-DOS, BeOS, Linux, Amiga - I used the exact same set of wad files. I briefly forgot the hundreds of other game conversions which don't use a single similar file across platforms. So yeah, I guess my rule is stupid. :)

  3. Posted

    Wolf3D and DOOM really requires 256 colors on at least a 16bit cpu running much faster than a 6502.

     

    Well, DOOM still looks pretty good with 64 colours (as in Amiga Halfbright mode) - even 32 would be OK. Low-res 16 colour would look very crappy (especially in those levels with lots of browns, greens and reds). Even if that crappy mode was possible, it's still not really DOOM unless it uses the official DOOM wads right? The original DOOM wad is 12Mb. Is is possible to page parts of that wad into RAM when playing and still run the thing at a reasonable speed - on a 6502 with 64k/128k?? Yeah, you can make a "DOOM-like" game that doesn't use the DOOM wads, but then it's not really DOOM. So the impressive statement "I've got DOOM on my A8!!!!1" is really an impossibility.

     

    Still, if somebody ever did make even a single-level A8 DOOM (with stripped-down wad), I'd be very impressed and congratulate them as a hero of mankind. (...then I'd ask them to make Half-life for my Amiga 500 ;))

  5. Posted

    I admire the insanity of trying to get DOOM on an A8, but is it really worth all the work? I think there's a point where the effort required far surpasses the usefulness. Sure... after a few hundred hours work you could say, "I've got DOOM on my Atari 800!!!1" but what you've really got is just an unplayable (or barely playable) DOOM-like demo. It's not really DOOM.

     

    I play DOOM regularly on my Amiga 500 (with 68020), and I think it's impressive to say, "I've got DOOM on my Amiga 500!!!1", but when you really think about it - so what? If I didn't have DOOM on my A500, I could just dig an old PC out of the trash and install DOOM on it.

  6. Posted

    Did you keep your other 1084 that died recently? Seems like an obvious source for parts if the connector is the problem.

     

    Yes, I kept it and that's what I was going to use to replace the connector. It looks like a bastard of a job though. I'd have to unsolder the huge metal shield (covers half the monitor's circuitry) from both monitors, unsolder both connectors, then resolder the "good" connector and pray that I didn't screw anything up and that it was actually the connector that was defective.

     

    I do not know of any "jam the metal" type of fixes that you could do. Seems kinda dangerous. :D

     

    What if I ran wires from the cable to the connector pins and swapped red and blue to confirm that it is actually the connector that is defective? (...is that any less dangerous? :D)

     

    Damn. I wouldn't have to go through all this if I could just buy another monitor. These monitors were pretty common just a few years ago. Now if I want one I have to get into a bidding war on eBay, then pay $150 to ship it.

     

    Maybe I'll just live without the blue. (and get yellow "burn in" on my eyeballs)

  7. Posted

    Thanks for your response. As I said, in composite mode there is no problem. I'm sure if it was a problem with the blue gun it wouldn't work for composite either. Because the problem is with RGB mode, I'd have to take my whole Amiga setup with me to demonstrate the problem to a TV repair guy. That's assuming there are still TV repair guys out there. I've noticed that these days people don't take TVs to get repaired. They just trash it and get a new one.

     

    I don't have any TV repair knowledge, but my theory is that the blue pin on the RGB connector has lost contact from wear. Visibly, the pins look fine, but I think internally it lost contact. If I move the cable up and down, I can make green disappear too and display only red (cable worked fine on other 1084, so cable is not the problem). Unfortunately there's no way to open the connector to check or repair. And it's blocked by a shield on the bottom of the circuit board, so it'd be a pain in the ass to solder in a replacement. Is there a way to repair broken connectors without replacing it? (cram some metal in there to repair connection?)

     

    (reminds me of the Airplane 2 quote: "Where am I going to find a piece of metal? Here? In Space? ... At this hour?)

  8. Posted

    In RGB mode (connected to Amiga), no blue is displayed. It is not a problem with the Amiga or the RGB cable - both worked fine with my other 1084 (which unfortunately died recently).

     

    I confirmed there is no blue at all by looking at the monitor screen with a magnifying glsss while displaying a palette. No blue elements were on. I tried opening the monitor and adjusting the knob for blue, but nothing happened. (red and green knobs work)

     

    In composite mode, there is no problem. This makes me think there is a problem with the RGB connector (or some circuitry related to RGB display only).

     

    My question is: what can I do to fix it? Is there a simple thing I missed? Is there any easy fix or am I just screwed?

     

    (Or is there anybody in Canada that has a 1084, 2002, 1080 or 2080 monitor they can sell me?)

  11. Posted · Edited by Mr.Amiga500

    I don't think there was an Atari version. If there is one out there, I definitely want it too!

     

    I first heard Synth Sample in 1986 in my first computer class ("computer lab" was just a bunch of C64s). Synth Sample was the first computer music I became "obsessed" with. I listened to it over and over again (especially the first tune). It was the only thing that impressed me on the C64. Everything else I preferred on the Atari. I didn't hear any computer music that good until Shadow of the Beast came out in 1989.

     

    I searched for years for that Synth_Sample.sid and only just found it in 2005 (mainly because at the time I didn't know it was called Synth Sample and I had no idea who the author was). I'm totally surprised to see a thread here about it because I've only ever seen two other web pages mention it.

  12. Posted

    You know, you're using an Amiga 500 and dial-up for the internet? Kudos, but it's time for an upgrade man... :roll:

     

    Yes, I know. I've been waiting for a computer worth buying but I haven't seen one yet. I was waiting to get the new iMac, but I tried it out at an Apple store and it felt slow. (...and I should know what slow feels like)

     

    Maybe when the next new iMac comes out...

  14. Posted

    Is your printer an Epson or a printer with cartridges with built-in chips. If so there may be hope for you. You can print with black only again if you reset the color cartridge(s) and make them look like they are full. There are chip resetters out there that do the job.

     

    The big ripoff with the inkjet technology (and particularly with Epson printers) is the requirement for cleaning the heads often. Every time you clean the heads the printer consumes expensive ink. If you don't clean them regularly and if you don't use your printer often the printheads will be clogged with dried ink and cleaning them so they perform like before will require several head cleaning cycles. This way your ink gets consumed very fast and often you don't get the same quality back.

     

    How'd you guess? Yes, it's an Epson printer (C62). And yes, I constantly had to "clean the heads". What a piece of crap. I thought it was great that my Amiga print software could support such a modern printer. Now I think it's probably better if I just get a 1982 dot matrix printer and print from my Atari 800 XL.

     

    Back in the early '80s I thought future technology would be amazing. Instead, we have technology that had the potential to be amazing, but has been severely crippled and limited by corporate greed. Companies now constantly search for ways to lock in users, limit their freedom, control their actions and milk them for every penny they've got.

  15. Posted · Edited by Mr.Amiga500

    I'd love it if the Atari 8-bit could do email. It's mostly just text, so should be easily doable on an Atari. The problem is connecting to and compatibility with email servers. (also stripping out text from stupid html mail)

     

    Does anybody use Atari 8-bit for email? Is it possible?

     

    heck yeah! I have a box of paper that I bought almost 10 years ago and I still have some left. i use a dot matrix printer that hasn't failed either. I'm very tempted to do all my papers on the dot matrix :)

     

    Nathan

     

    Ahh... I love the days of dot matrix printing. Printing was so easy and cheap then. There weren't overpriced ink cartridges with stupid chips in them telling the computer you're out of ink when it's still half full. Leave the printer for a couple weeks without printing and the chips insist you've run out of ink (deliberate timed ripoff!). I've got a printer now that I never use because when I run out of one colour, it refuses to work until I replace the colour cartridge. It won't even print damn plain black text (brand new black cartridge) until I replace the colour! Also, with the old printers you could add the ink youself (whatever brand), not be forced to buy proprietory cartridges.

  16. Posted

    @mos6507

     

    Sorry to hear about your unstable Toaster setup, but my experience is completely different. In fact, the way you descibe bad drivers and buggy code reminds me much more of my Windows experiences. I've always found Amiga problems incredibly easy to diagnose. There are so many ways to test that are impossible on modern OSes - like booting backup partitions, booting the OS without harddrive or loading the entire OS into RAM. If you saw my setup in action, I'm sure you'd change your mind. :)

     

    @themrfreeze

     

    Amiga 4.0 only runs on expensive (and unavailable) PPC hardware and doesn't run "classic" Amiga software. There's not much OS 4.0 software available. I don't see much point to it then. Imagine if somebody made a "Atari 800-like" OS that didn't run Atari programs. It doesn't matter if the OS works the same if there's nothing to run on it.

  17. Posted

    Amiga is great but very crash-prone if you put a lot of expansions and extra software on it due to lack of memory protection. Takes all the joy out of the fast multitasking. It really runs best stripped bare off floppies, like the game console it was intended to be.

     

    I admit that the lack of memory protection is a bad thing, but like with most computers, if you use reliable expansions and software, it rarely crashes. It certainly isn't "best stripped bare off floppies". I use my Amiga every day 4-5 hours/day and haven't used a floppy in years - except for the odd backup. I also rarely play games anymore. It's perfectly useable for internet as long as you don't expect all sites to have flashy animations. The latest browser was updated in late 2006. (but unfortunately still no CSS)

     

    Back to Atari: I'm interested in hearing about people doing useful Atari-8bit stuff. I'd like to put my Ataris to good use. It would be awesome if I could somehow link them all to my Amiga in some kind of network.

  18. Posted

    Really! I know next to nothing about the Amiga. You can really do all of that with one? Where can you get one, and what do you need to do the above? Sounds like a fun project.

     

    Take a look at the link in my signature to see a few screenshot examples. In that thread you can also read about lots of the things I've done.

     

    Amiga 500s are plentiful and cheap. The accelerators needed to do what I do are damn rare. You should check out the Amiga 1200. A1200 accelerators are much easier to find and you can do much more than is possible with an A500. With add-ons, you can do broadband with an A1200 and connect USB devices.

     

    Browsing with an Amiga isn't as fun as it was just a couple years ago because everybody is converting to pages filled with video (YouTube), CSS, javascript and tons of images. As long as the pages you view don't contain much of these, you'll have no problem.

     

    A well set-up Amiga is fun and relaxing to use. The OS is simple and easy to understand and use. Unlike Windows, nothing is hidden from the user and there's nothing actively preventing the user from doing things. It's designed the way a computer should be designed. It's just too bad that all the best computer companies died and only the crap survived.

  19. Posted · Edited by Mr.Amiga500

    Unfortunately, the Atari 8-bit isn't useful for much more than games. I wish it was, but I'd have to be insane not to think otherwise.

     

    My Amiga 500, however, is used as my primary computer - for browsing, email, wordprocessing, music, graphics, emulation (Mac, Atari), games and everything else. I've never ever bought a PC or a Mac. I consider the Amiga as the true successor of the Atari 8-bit (both designed by Jay Miner).

     

    Sadly, with more and more internet sites loaded with video and incompatible MS-only crap and with more and more stupid SPAM-blockers blocking "suspicious" emails from "unknown mailers", the time is coming when even my Amiga has reached the end of useful life.

  22. Posted

    But then again, do we really appreciate and enjoy our machines and games as much as we did in the 80's now that nearly everything is so easily available to us?

     

    Good point. Usually something easily obtained is not as treasured. Also, the mystery is gone. Once you see all there is to get, there's nothing more to strive for. So, in the case of the Atari 8-bit, I don't really enjoy it as much as back in 1984. (but at least, I satisfied my craving)

     

    For my Amiga though, I actually enjoy it much more today. Having only limited software back then, I only used a small fraction of its potential. With the motherlode of software I have now, I've been able to do some amazing things that impress the hell out of me. Eventually, that'll probably wear off too though.

  23. Posted

    I must say, the internet is awesome! Every bit of Atari hardware and software I have now is because of the internet. Not only that, but I got lots of nice free stuff from extremely generous people who I couldn't possibly have known if it wasn't for the internet. Pre-internet, I spent years searching the classified ads for Atari stuff without success.

     

    The sheer amount of classic software available on the internet is mind boggling. I remember I stopped using my Amiga in 1991 because computer stores stopped selling Amiga stuff and I only had about 20 floppies of software. Now I have nearly 4Gb, over 100,000 files - and that's only the "best of the best". If I wanted, I could have 10x that or more.

     

    Then there are the awesome die-hard coders still making great software for our beloved old computers. Without the internet, would they even have the incentive to continue? (...or our constant pestering for them to continue? ;))

  24. Posted

    So, did you find the game? I'm a bit curious! ;)

     

    Nope, I still haven't found it. It's none of the games mentioned so far.

     

    I think I'll give up. It's probably a crappy game anyway. Around 90% of the things from my past that I spent years seraching for ended up being a disappointment anyway. Even the 10% that are as good as or better than I remembered still don't do much more than stop my desire of obtaining them.

     

    Thanks everybody for your help. :)

  25. Posted · Edited by Mr.Amiga500

    For about six years,it was a HOOT! to connect directly to the Internet with only Atari 8 bit hardware!

     

    It would blow people's minds to receive an E-mail on their PC from an Atari 800XL!

     

    That would blow my mind. An Atari 800 would be even more impressive because it was made in 1979. Just thinking about using a 1970's computer to access the internet boggles my mind.

     

    Wow, now I feel like a wimpy "modern" loser for using a 1987 Amiga 500 for internet for the last 5 years.

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