Do you Nostalgic feel the same as me about 80's?

[emkay]

Nostalgy sometimes is a good thing, because it help to find a resume of one's own thought, helps clearing some things....

 

 

Particular when it comes to music, nostalgy isn't mine

 

 

This tune will be released next week. To me it is a marvellous combination of Elektro, plus nicely used orchestral synths, and all is topped with the very good singing of german lyrics.

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OL3coGBQtVU

 

 

btw. The drums are not from a Drumcomputer. They use some trick for recording the real played drums to sound a bit like a drum computer.

 

 

Such song hasn't been there in the 80s.... so Im lucky, that things change time by time.

 

[Keatah]

Anyways I have no definitive exact precise reason why I hated the machine as much as I did.

 

Show us on the doll where the Amiga touched you...

 

I still don't get how people can prefer a 'framebuffer strapped to a <insert CPU type here>' computer over an Amiga. I was a jealous Acorn Archimedes owner but I got over it

 

The Amiga has a framebuffer doesn't it??

Never mind, I'm thinking of some of the add-on cards specifically to do just that!

Edited September 23, 2011 by Keatah

[sack-c0s]

it does have a framebuffer (wherever in chipmem you decide to put one), but I was referring to machine which *only* have one that you have to manually fill from the CPU

[Keatah]

it does have a framebuffer (wherever in chipmem you decide to put one), but I was referring to machine which *only* have one that you have to manually fill from the CPU

 

Then you must mean systems like the Apple II Series! That's a system I'm intimately familiar with. The 6502 puts the bits in the main memory and a dedicated handful of basic logic gates would scan the data and dump it to composite out. Hell, if your Applesoft program got too big it could overwrite the 'framebuffer' memory, or the other way around; .. if you cleared your hi-res page you might overwrite your basic program! How's that for memory management!?!?!

 

What other computers are you thinking of? I'm sure there are many from the era, but probably only a few became popular.

[sack-c0s]

the ST has no supporting hardware, the archimedes didn't, the mac neither.

 

on the 8-bit from the spectrum and CPC were built this way

[Mr.Amiga500]

I can appreciate the Amiga for its technical merits. And I so much wanted it to make it big-time. I guess I didn't have the patience to watch it develop. Or perhaps I was already indoctrinated too deeply with the Apple II way of things to switch sides or anything.

 

It was really frustrating to know and understand the true "potential" of the machine and not see it fully utilized. Having some good arcade game ports would have gone a long way toward "helping" me "like" the Amiga all that much more.

 

To be fair I learned a lot about digitizing video and some of the basics of Photoshop-like operations via Deluxe Paint III & PhotonPaint.. Operations and ways of working I would not again really do till 2002 on the PC. The few games I jammed on were JET and FLIGHT SIMULATOR II, F/A -18 INTERCEPTOR. Cool. And despite the tediousness I explored some of the more "sophisticated xfer protocols like Z-Modem and others.

 

Anyways I have no definitive exact precise reason why I hated the machine as much as I did. Perhaps it was the advertisements, cool in their own right, but pretty much out of my full grasp.

 

Come to think of it I truly disliked a lot of the 16-bit era. The machines did not seem as crisp and snappy as the 8-bits that came before.

 

Maybe there wasn't an established network of warez distribution.. I really don't precisely know!!!

 

See, now this post makes much more sense. I can understand this post.

 

I too initially disliked the jump from quick command line to relatively slow GUI. I absolutely hated Microsoft BASIC on the Amiga - and that shit program completely killed my enthusiasm for programming (I had already written programs on 7 different 8-bits before getting the Amiga). I also understand the lack of software problem - although that was nothing new to me, having the same problem with my CoCo II.

 

But... I stuck with the Amiga and kept tinkering and upgrading and customizing and pushing it as far as I could. It still blows my mind how flexible and configurable an 80's computer can get - to a point where I could do all this with my 1987 Amiga 500:

 

Connected to my work's Microsoft Outlook Web Access through browser and sent office emails using A500 (connected browser with 128-bit secure HTTPS, javascript and images)

Logged on to eBay with 256-bit HTTPS, bid & won items (with 1-second accuracy - one "snipe" in the final second!)

Emulated MacOS 8.1, ran Mac software ClarisWorks, WriteNow3 and games (also emulated 7.5.5 and ran Mathematica, and 3D game Vette! at full speed)

Digitized and converted images from DVD/VCR/Video Camera in 24-bit colour

Sampled and converted music from DVD/Compact Disc/Cassette Tape

Converted & created MP3s

Played audio files > 50Mb (16bit 44100Hz AIFF - in 14bit stereo, absolutely no skip or stutter)

Created and printed PDF documents (PDFs displayed perfectly in Adobe Acrobat)

Sent and received Faxes

Sent and received MSN instant messages

Processed huge images 8800x6800 in size - in original 24-bit depth!

Scanned and printed 24-bit images at 720dpi

Uploaded/downloaded files from the internet larger than 100Mb

Played DOOM, DOOM II, Plutonia and TNT, custom and patch wads with music and sound

Sent and received emails with large multiple attachments >5Mb

Sent and received over 2Gb of files through serial at 115200 baud (original A500 serial)

 

Then there's the more ordinary things like creating web pages and relational databases, playing Windows MIDI files, creating 24-bit 3D rendered animations, multimedia presentations and emulating 6 different 8-bit computers. I would have been able to do more if I had more than 8Mb RAM.

 

 

Take a look at my signature link for some screenshots. (but view in original size - automatic scaling screws them up)

Edited September 23, 2011 by Mr.Amiga500

[UNIXcoffee928]

Good, the Recanting has been noted.

 

= )

 

 

The Targa boards for PCs, with TIPS/Lumina software are probably what he's referring to. They were around by the late 80s & early 90s, and were very expensive, but could produce some very nice graphics. A Targa equipped PC, in addition to an Amiga with a Toaster would have been a very kickass professional graphics studio, back then.

 

Before all of this, though, (serious Archeology follows..., ha) there were the DEC 11/73s & 11/83s, with Genigraphics subsystems...

 

These were the systems that were used to design the Space Shuttle.They were amazing graphics systems, and could produce high resolution full color images on the screen, or Film-Resolution graphics (but not in real-time, and the data had to go to a "film recorder, or be sent to a "Service Center" to make it to film or photographic slides), the user-interface was well-implemented, but often overly complex, so it was clunky to use, until you had read all of the 2.5-3' of manuals a number of times, and then trained yourself to do things The Genigraphics Way... ha... it was a fairly user-hostile interface for the newbie.

 

It was called a "Workstation"... meaning...The whole system was built into a large 6' table. They had DECwriters for terminals (looked like electric typewriters), quad 8" & dual 5.25" disk drives, and modems that Hayes totally stole their industrial design style from, and made a mint... but they were about an inch higher, and had a hardwired, large, black 70's style deskphone that provided a high-speed direct-coupling (not an acoustic modem). Once the system was up, all input was handled by lightpen input, and input from a huge 3' white graphics tablet (that felt like a marble countertop... exquisitely smooth & highly polished) the tablet was puck-based. Cool system, very exotic, extremely high-quality, in all regards, but you really had to devote yourself to the interface to get great with it... once you did, though, it was very efficient. I have no idea what the original price on these systems was, but I used them when they were about 6-10 years old already, and the guy that owned them had paid about as much as a house for them.

 

Of course, a few years down the road, SGI systems ruled the whole graphics industry (with their "Geometry Engine"-based technologies), but the systems were only affordable to those with SERIOUS cash. During the time of the Amiga, an SGI could easily cost $25,000-45,000 USD for a low-entry-level-midrange system. A high-end SGI graphics supercomputer ran in the range of $80,000-800,000, plus supporting infrastructure, additional user-workstations, and the large electrical costs to power these badassed multiprocessor graphics supercomputer systems.

 

The big breakthrough was when SGI launched the Indy, though... at around $9-15K (IIRC) it was "almost affordable" to PC users, and was a type of "Holy Grail", ultra-desirable item for both high-end Amiga & high-end graphics PC owners, at the time, since their Indigo2 systems were pretty much in the luxury-sedan price range.

 

The Sun systems with the Creator graphics subsystem came a bit later, and were meant to compete with Indigo2 systems... but Sun pretty much stuck with their Networking sales angle, and didn't really pursue Graphics very wholeheartedly.

 

When Jim Clark left SGI, SGI began it's slow death-spiral, thinking that they could make up for his absence by buying Cray, and by introducing the non-UNIX-based SGI 320 & 540 Visual Workstations. Unfortunately, despite the spectacular design of the 540, people considered it to be too expensive for a "PC", at around $6,000.00.

 

The 540 Workstation is still a very usable system, even in 2011, and it' integrated video input hardware makes it a very nice compliment for a Powerful Amiga.

 

Having had used all of these systems, at a highly technical level, I would say that the Amiga had more usable software, making it an excellent link in the chain, when used with other systems, in the same studio.

 

I love the Amiga & always will. Mastering the Amiga's CLI, in my teens, provided me with foundation for really learning UNIX (at a time when having access to a real UNIX-based systems was much harder to come by), and facilitated the opportunity to use all of the exotic systems listed above, and many other non-graphics-oriented, kickass systems. This gave me a good profession for many years.

 

While, of course, AmigaDOS wasn't UNIX, it was devised by people from a UNIX culture, and plenty of additional commands were available to extend it, on the BBSs, back then. It was close enough to go from a novice telecommuting UNIX experimenter (even going back to the Atari 800 days, as a kid), to someone who could do similar scripting, locally, and progress to a more intermediate level. By the time I did have access to a big Prime system, and their 1' wide metal covered manuals that were chained to a metal desk in a computer lab building (lol, no joke), I had a good idea of what I was doing, specifically from having had an Amiga, & I progressed quickly.

 

One thing that was very impressive about the early 80s, when I was connecting to the online world, via a 300 bps modem, was that there was a wealth of unbelievably skilled hackers and computer scientists who would be willing to share all kinds of computer lore, if you showed that you were genuinely interested. It effected the way that I do things, and in particular, my posting style, which can be seen, right here in this post, and most of my non-BOFH (lol) posts here. I found it to be a great teaching mechanism, almost like an ancient culture where secrets were passed, via an oral tradition, in a closed circle.

 

Well, hope that you enjoyed that little bit of nostalgia.

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]

I can appreciate the Amiga for its technical merits. And I so much wanted it to make it big-time. I guess I didn't have the patience to watch it develop. Or perhaps I was already indoctrinated too deeply with the Apple II way of things to switch sides or anything.

 

It was really frustrating to know and understand the true "potential" of the machine and not see it fully utilized. Having some good arcade game ports would have gone a long way toward "helping" me "like" the Amiga all that much more.

 

To be fair I learned a lot about digitizing video and some of the basics of Photoshop-like operations via Deluxe Paint III & PhotonPaint.. Operations and ways of working I would not again really do till 2002 on the PC. The few games I jammed on were JET and FLIGHT SIMULATOR II, F/A -18 INTERCEPTOR. Cool. And despite the tediousness I explored some of the more "sophisticated xfer protocols like Z-Modem and others.

 

Anyways I have no definitive exact precise reason why I hated the machine as much as I did. Perhaps it was the advertisements, cool in their own right, but pretty much out of my full grasp.

 

Come to think of it I truly disliked a lot of the 16-bit era. The machines did not seem as crisp and snappy as the 8-bits that came before.

 

Maybe there wasn't an established network of warez distribution.. I really don't precisely know!!!

 

OK, I will give you that, it was very painful and frustrating to see the Amiga potential wasted. Wasted potential, horrendous marketing, and worst of all

Commodore's biggest mistakes seemed to be an arrogance that their machine was so far ahead of the curve that it would sell itself and nothing would ever surpass it, it is well known also the higher up's squandered a lot of the machines profits instead of putting it back into further research and development. To say that Commodores handling of the machine in general disappointed the fans was an understatement. Promises, promises, promises never being fulfilled was something we Amiga fans had grown accustomed to. Presence in USA / CANADA was virtually non-existent outside of commercial high end use and in fact I admit I only "discovered" the Amiga when I went to a friends house and saw a game running on his Amiga 1000 with a parallax scrolling effect, amazing colors and sound I was amazed and asked him all about it. I could not believe how impressive this machine was, how could such an amazing multimedia computer exist that I never heard of? It did not seem possible. Immediately I went to the downtown bookstore, found Amiga Format import form the UK and began reading up and was hooked forever.

 

Yes it was a frustrating thing to be a fan of the Amiga here in Canada that is for sure, if you were interested in Amiga and compatible products you had to carefully seek out sources and even finding and actual retailer 90% of the time entering the store you would be directed to a dark dusty section at the back or in the corner, always seemed to that anytime I asked about Amiga related product I was treated like "Why do you want that anyway? Are you sure you don't want a PC?" and the lacked any real knowledge on the products, man it pissed me off. Occasionally I would actually locate a distributor that not only proudly displayed and sold Amiga products but was genuinely enthusiastic and definitely "Got it" it was fun relating to others who actually were into it.

 

Despite hard to find product, the lack of knowledge most people had (I am proud to say I introduced the AMIGA to many and some even bought machines) I loved the platform so much, I persevered picking up magazines and books wherever I could. Looking through the Ad's and articles in the UK magazines it seemed to be an Amiga fans heaven over there! In the end over time I had an A500 expanded 1mb and was amazed how useful just that setup was and all the things I could do with it creatively, personally I liked the Workbench interface and got pretty good and creating my own self-booting compilation disks some of which would even greet you upon boot up with speech capability, in fact it was the last machine I would say I did anything close to what might of been considered programming lol. The last machine I had was an A1200 with 20gb harddrive, 8 mb fast ram and blizzard board '030 / 50 mhz cpu upgrade, what a great machine.

 

I WILL END by saying though, there was indeed a huge scene of warez distribution, in fact if not for that being young and poor I would never of experienced any of the great Paint or animation programs and thanks to friends and associates at swap meets and meetings I admittedly acquired pretty much all the Amiga had to offer software wise so I can at least say I had hands on experience with all the Amiga software. Also, there was a massive Public Domain and Shareware software network. So much so that there were companies (at least in the UK but at least one in the US) that there sole purpose was the compilation and distribution of Public domain and Shareware. The greatest thing about that is I hooked up with a couple in the UK and swapped disk per disk with them by creating my own compilations and choosing compilations that were supplied by others in their software catalog or advertisements, I even had greetings and mentions in some ads for V12 PD and some other companies, ah what great times those were.

 

So, to sum up, yes support sucked in Canada, Commodore screwed up what they had and sat on their asses while the Amiga technology grew stagnant but as for the machine itself I loved it, as hard as it was to be an Amiga fan, as painful as it was to see the tech wasted my use of the machine whether gaming or as a creative tool are some of my fondest computing memories to this day and I would not change a thing. My only regrets of course was selling everything I had Amiga wise years ago out of desperation and need but I hope to one day get a hold of a real Amiga again just for old times sake.

Edited September 23, 2011 by OldSchoolRetroGamer

[Mr.Amiga500]

The big breakthrough was when SGI launched the Indy, though... at around $9-15K (IIRC) it was "almost affordable" to PC users, and was a type of "Holy Grail", ultra-desirable item for both high-end Amiga & high-end graphics PC owners, at the time, since their Indigo2 systems were pretty much in the luxury-sedan price range.

 

I've got an Indy. It's a nice, solidly built computer with some nice features. I still definitely prefer the Amiga.

 

One thing that was very impressive about the early 80s, when I was connecting to the online world, via a 300 bps modem, was that there was a wealth of unbelievably skilled hackers and computer scientists who would be willing to share all kinds of computer lore, if you showed that you were genuinely interested. It effected the way that I do things, and in particular, my posting style, which can be seen, right here in this post, and most of my non-BOFH (lol) posts here. I found it to be a great teaching mechanism, almost like an ancient culture where secrets were passed, via an oral tradition, in a closed circle.

 

Well, hope that you enjoyed that little bit of nostalgia.

 

Yes, I miss that. Compare the skill those people had with today's "hackers". Every time I hear about "geniuses" in the Apple Store, I want to puke.

[UNIXcoffee928]

Ha, well, actually, now that I think about it... it was those old-timers that taught an Elite class in BOFH-dom, too. lol.

[UNIXcoffee928]

One thing that was very impressive about the early 80s, when I was connecting to the online world, via a 300 bps modem, was that there was a wealth of unbelievably skilled hackers and computer scientists who would be willing to share all kinds of computer lore, if you showed that you were genuinely interested. It effected the way that I do things, and in particular, my posting style, which can be seen, right here in this post, and most of my non-BOFH (lol) posts here. I found it to be a great teaching mechanism, almost like an ancient culture where secrets were passed, via an oral tradition, in a closed circle.

...

 

Yes, I miss that. Compare the skill those people had with today's "hackers". Every time I hear about "geniuses" in the Apple Store, I want to puke.

 

Pre-Apple Store Visit Technical Tutorial Training Film:

[media='']http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFVGbdbhF-Q[/media]

 

This link will yield many more...

 

Use the material wisely, though; in more recent years, the actor in these films has sought legal damages, ha.

Edited September 23, 2011 by UNIXcoffee928

[oky2000]

For me almost all late 70s/early 80s colour machines have a charm. Got a TI99/4A yesterday and that has charm indeed.

 

I have many superb emulator+games+cover art+magazines archives TI99 Retrogenius DVD included but using the real machines gives you a sense of better times. Feel sorry for PC/Mac sheep of today. And emulators are no replacement.

 

As for Amiga it was the first time a machine was superior in every feature, PCW and BYTE magazines knew how special the A1000 was in 1985. But yeah shit like Outrun and Chase HQ meant I sided with pirates....£25 for that under programmed shit? no! Sword of Sodan/Lotus II, Shadow of the Beast=exceptions among sea of turds. 80s was all about greed though eh?

 

I'm collecting issues of PCW to scan historic bench tests like A800/400,520ST,C64,ARCHIMEDES,Ti99,Memotech 500 etc, have the A1000 issue and the editorial/review quality is world class.

[Keatah]

Being a primary school kid and being poor has enabled me to acquire vast amounts software for the Apple II. It was much more cost effective to buy a few boxes of disks than the actual software. And because of that I "experienced" everything the II series had to offer! It didn't matter that we'd play with it or actually use it or not. The goal was to be the first to acquire it and pass it on. Once in a while we'd come across something useful or a game we'd play over and over. But you know how it goes.

 

There were cool games, and nice Atarisoft ports. We really did believe Atari had some sort of MAGIC or knew about some hidden graphics chip in //e that no one else was aware of. This sparked many a debate of which chip it was or what part of the circuit. By the time the Atarisoft games were out, we had upgraded to a //e, so the debate always surrounded the MMU or IOU or CPU, with the roms always being a vague mystery. We knew they held BASIC and the MONITOR and other things like keyboard characters. We always thought they had some other funky secret function. The ram was no mystery, for that's where the programs were loaded into!

 

Once thing we always did agree on, was that the bigger the chip the smarter it was! The more brainlike it was. So you can imagine my surprise when we got a hold of an Amiga 1000, that 68000 cpu was a monster! First time I'd ever seen so many big chips in one computer!

 

Or how about those games from Gebelli or Sirius Software, and Br0derbund - all great stuff and the ignorance of youth. Made for wondrous times indeed.

 

You can understand that because our "user groups" and meetings were "arranged" by our parents and we had to absolutely make the most of a 4 hour "copy session". We'd even structure the "get togethers" to ensure everything flowed smoothly. There was time for copying and time for playing games.

 

One thing I wished we had back then, in 1977-1981, was the file handling and cataloging capability like we have today with the simple Windows Explorer, and a USB drive perhaps. I tried a database using PFS: but it was tedious and a nightmare doing it with one computer. Oftentimes we'd just resort to index cards and chronologically stacking disks on top of each other. It got better with AppleWorks and a 2nd computer equipped with a Sider though; and we developed a work style not unlike a dual monitor configuration of today.

 

Despite having equal access to Atari 400/800 and C-64 (and to lesser extents Ti-99/4A - CoCo-1 - A500/1000's - Adam, Beeb, Zx-81, Vic-20) we only went balls out on the II series. Though libraries of Atari and Commodore stuff were amassed as well.

 

To a 10-year old, all the above is sophisticated stuff. Black magic. Heady, futuristic, and it made you feel like a god! Especially being unofficial curator of the neighborhood waREz depot. And I didn't even touch on the BBS'ing aspects and how that was an integral part of the early computing experience. To us, Apple II computing was WAreZ & Games. Nothing else mattered until we discovered modems. Moonlighting as a SYSOP made you feel like a special agent. Conducting nefarious operations that no-one else (especially parents) understood was really the Cat's ass!

 

There were times when we'd get the Radio Flyer out, and tie it up to our bikes. Making the journey a mile away to the "bigger-kids" houses, the ones with elite 0-day connections, and parents in professional positions, you know. And we'd have the wagon filled till stuff fell out! Apple II+ and a Trinitron monitor and 2 Disk II drives + a small box of hookup wires and cords and "stuff" like modem connectors, and TG joysticks and paddles that perpetually got tangled, and drive extension cables. You know, things! -- like what ever else you pack in your laptop case.

 

Blasting through the neighborhood, always the red wagon bouncing noisily and somehow sometimes on 2-wheels through the sidewalk turnpike! -- We'd get so excited when we got wind that somebody had gotten a box of disks with "new stuff" on it.

 

We had stuff to offer too! Like a Wildcard and some modified firmware and cracking roms. Disk II's with a nice big potentiometer for speed adjusting. Or one that had a track readout on 2 7-segment displays. That was our "currency". Trading time on our hardware for exchange and access to stuff not yet posted on the AE and Catfur lines. And we guarded the stuff to high heaven. I still have my EF cracking rom, it's a 28 pin DIP EPROM with pin 28 busted off - from all the insertions and removals. I later soldered a strand of wire to the minuscule stub and mounted it into a socket, thereby regaining use. Since I was good with a soldering iron I put some zif sockets into other folk's computers and burned more of these crack roms.

 

It was especially cool when, that we'd make the trip in morning and by late afternoon it started raining and was overcast. Parents, sometimes being lazy, didn't want to take the time to haul all this shit back in the family sedan, oftentimes made arrangements by phone for an impromptu sleepover.

 

I truly believe it was only the 8-bit systems that were really pushed to the limit. These systems were pushed and used and abused till you couldn't get anything more out of them. Absolutely nothing, there was only so much capacity and performance increase you could wring from these things. Thrilling! Then and only then did we move on to another platform. This type of "full-usage" product cycle was kick ass. Ever since the hybrid 8/16 IIgs, every computing platform and hardware iteration has had its life-cycle artificially ended prior to discovering its maximum capabilities. This was in full swing as 286-386-486 era came to pass. And has been forcefully maintained by modern marketing departments. Now the Atari 2600 is different. It actually died and was resurrected by the community right here. But that is a topic for another thread.

 

Take the DISK ][ drive as an example. Things we dicked around with were half-tracking, quarter-tracking, and spiral tracking. Or the addition of a custom DOS and perhaps tacking on track $23 and in some rare cases $24. I personally liked the spiral recording. You could cut the single concentric track into 4 segments and space them .25th's a track farther apart. And you could do this and read data continuously in one stream. Stepping the tracks in 1/4th's meant faster access time. You could increase density a little bit and with some experimenting we managed 162K bytes per side. Just one of the things we fucked around with. Pure analog recording with a microphone and speaker/amplifier was another, though the amount of time was really limited and made for amusing sound effects. We replaced the pulse shaping circuitry with a "real op-amp" and a microphone and the stepper motor with a "real motor" and gearbox. And we used it like a tape-deck. You had to start the spinning motor and the head motor at the exact right time, because we didn't have any way to make the head follow the "audio track". Just think of this as a CD player that uses a magnetic "laser" to read and write the audio signal.

 

 

As the scene died down. I began packing everything all together, in 25+ Rubbermaid tubs and haven't opened them since, other than to inspect and re-arrange the contents for space efficiency and layout.

 

Fast-forward to today, the present. My software acquisition activities consist of keeping track of payment receipts and license key codes. It's either that route or (increasingly) freeware alternatives. I do find carefully selected freeware and stuff from Source-Forge to be far superior to their commercial counterparts.

 

If we were kids again and tried to do waREZ today like we did back then, I would safely say we'd need a whole warehouse-sized building! Not to hold the wareZ, but the staff needed to gleen it all from the internet!! I am envisioning huge racks of hard disk servers and petabytes of stuff, every version of every program! Back in the day, when there was not a lot of software, it was indeed, ALMOST, I repeat ALMOST possible to have every piece of software ever written for a platform.

 

Anyways, here are two nice articles for Apple II enthusiasts - Not about WaREz but about some of the early design philosophy of the II.

http://www.filfre.ne...9/the-apple-ii/

http://failuremag.co...iak_interview/#

 

--and other tidbits--

http://www.radioflye...-red-wagon.html

http://www.dataswamp...ips-closeup.jpg

http://www.stockly.c...Cut%20Edges.jpg

Edited September 24, 2011 by Keatah

[flashjazzcat]

I truly believe it was only the 8-bit systems that were really pushed to the limit. These systems were pushed and used and abused till you couldn't get anything more out of them. Absolutely nothing, there was only so much capacity and performance increase you could wring from these things. Thrilling! Then and only then did we move on to another platform. This type of "full-usage" product cycle was kick ass.

Heh... I'm not so sure all the 8-bit systems were completely pushed to the limit before they were deemed exhausted. We're still finding extra "slack" in the A8 today by taking a different stance on what's possible.

[Tezz]

As well as the total connection that you have working with 8-bits, the fact that the A8 hasn't been pushed to it's limit is one of the reasons for my continued interest and trying to take it further is one of the most enjoyable things about working on it.

[oky2000]

Being a primary school kid and being poor has enabled me to acquire vast amounts software for the Apple II. It was much more cost effective to buy a few boxes of disks than the actual software. And because of that I "experienced" everything the II series had to offer! It didn't matter that we'd play with it or actually use it or not. The goal was to be the first to acquire it and pass it on. Once in a while we'd come across something useful or a game we'd play over and over. But you know how it goes.

 

There were cool games, and nice Atarisoft ports. We really did believe Atari had some sort of MAGIC or knew about some hidden graphics chip in //e that no one else was aware of. This sparked many a debate of which chip it was or what part of the circuit. By the time the Atarisoft games were out, we had upgraded to a //e, so the debate always surrounded the MMU or IOU or CPU, with the roms always being a vague mystery. We knew they held BASIC and the MONITOR and other things like keyboard characters. We always thought they had some other funky secret function. The ram was no mystery, for that's where the programs were loaded into!

 

Once thing we always did agree on, was that the bigger the chip the smarter it was! The more brainlike it was. So you can imagine my surprise when we got a hold of an Amiga 1000, that 68000 cpu was a monster! First time I'd ever seen so many big chips in one computer!

 

Or how about those games from Gebelli or Sirius Software, and Br0derbund - all great stuff and the ignorance of youth. Made for wondrous times indeed.

 

You can understand that because our "user groups" and meetings were "arranged" by our parents and we had to absolutely make the most of a 4 hour "copy session". We'd even structure the "get togethers" to ensure everything flowed smoothly. There was time for copying and time for playing games.

 

One thing I wished we had back then, in 1977-1981, was the file handling and cataloging capability like we have today with the simple Windows Explorer, and a USB drive perhaps. I tried a database using PFS: but it was tedious and a nightmare doing it with one computer. Oftentimes we'd just resort to index cards and chronologically stacking disks on top of each other. It got better with AppleWorks and a 2nd computer equipped with a Sider though; and we developed a work style not unlike a dual monitor configuration of today.

 

Despite having equal access to Atari 400/800 and C-64 (and to lesser extents Ti-99/4A - CoCo-1 - A500/1000's - Adam, Beeb, Zx-81, Vic-20) we only went balls out on the II series. Though libraries of Atari and Commodore stuff were amassed as well.

 

To a 10-year old, all the above is sophisticated stuff. Black magic. Heady, futuristic, and it made you feel like a god! Especially being unofficial curator of the neighborhood waREz depot. And I didn't even touch on the BBS'ing aspects and how that was an integral part of the early computing experience. To us, Apple II computing was WAreZ & Games. Nothing else mattered until we discovered modems. Moonlighting as a SYSOP made you feel like a special agent. Conducting nefarious operations that no-one else (especially parents) understood was really the Cat's ass!

 

There were times when we'd get the Radio Flyer out, and tie it up to our bikes. Making the journey a mile away to the "bigger-kids" houses, the ones with elite 0-day connections, and parents in professional positions, you know. And we'd have the wagon filled till stuff fell out! Apple II+ and a Trinitron monitor and 2 Disk II drives + a small box of hookup wires and cords and "stuff" like modem connectors, and TG joysticks and paddles that perpetually got tangled, and drive extension cables. You know, things! -- like what ever else you pack in your laptop case.

 

Blasting through the neighborhood, always the red wagon bouncing noisily and somehow sometimes on 2-wheels through the sidewalk turnpike! -- We'd get so excited when we got wind that somebody had gotten a box of disks with "new stuff" on it.

 

We had stuff to offer too! Like a Wildcard and some modified firmware and cracking roms. Disk II's with a nice big potentiometer for speed adjusting. Or one that had a track readout on 2 7-segment displays. That was our "currency". Trading time on our hardware for exchange and access to stuff not yet posted on the AE and Catfur lines. And we guarded the stuff to high heaven. I still have my EF cracking rom, it's a 28 pin DIP EPROM with pin 28 busted off - from all the insertions and removals. I later soldered a strand of wire to the minuscule stub and mounted it into a socket, thereby regaining use. Since I was good with a soldering iron I put some zif sockets into other folk's computers and burned more of these crack roms.

 

It was especially cool when, that we'd make the trip in morning and by late afternoon it started raining and was overcast. Parents, sometimes being lazy, didn't want to take the time to haul all this shit back in the family sedan, oftentimes made arrangements by phone for an impromptu sleepover.

 

I truly believe it was only the 8-bit systems that were really pushed to the limit. These systems were pushed and used and abused till you couldn't get anything more out of them. Absolutely nothing, there was only so much capacity and performance increase you could wring from these things. Thrilling! Then and only then did we move on to another platform. This type of "full-usage" product cycle was kick ass. Ever since the hybrid 8/16 IIgs, every computing platform and hardware iteration has had its life-cycle artificially ended prior to discovering its maximum capabilities. This was in full swing as 286-386-486 era came to pass. And has been forcefully maintained by modern marketing departments. Now the Atari 2600 is different. It actually died and was resurrected by the community right here. But that is a topic for another thread.

 

Take the DISK ][ drive as an example. Things we dicked around with were half-tracking, quarter-tracking, and spiral tracking. Or the addition of a custom DOS and perhaps tacking on track $23 and in some rare cases $24. I personally liked the spiral recording. You could cut the single concentric track into 4 segments and space them .25th's a track farther apart. And you could do this and read data continuously in one stream. Stepping the tracks in 1/4th's meant faster access time. You could increase density a little bit and with some experimenting we managed 162K bytes per side. Just one of the things we fucked around with. Pure analog recording with a microphone and speaker/amplifier was another, though the amount of time was really limited and made for amusing sound effects. We replaced the pulse shaping circuitry with a "real op-amp" and a microphone and the stepper motor with a "real motor" and gearbox. And we used it like a tape-deck. You had to start the spinning motor and the head motor at the exact right time, because we didn't have any way to make the head follow the "audio track". Just think of this as a CD player that uses a magnetic "laser" to read and write the audio signal.

 

 

As the scene died down. I began packing everything all together, in 25+ Rubbermaid tubs and haven't opened them since, other than to inspect and re-arrange the contents for space efficiency and layout.

 

Fast-forward to today, the present. My software acquisition activities consist of keeping track of payment receipts and license key codes. It's either that route or (increasingly) freeware alternatives. I do find carefully selected freeware and stuff from Source-Forge to be far superior to their commercial counterparts.

 

If we were kids again and tried to do waREZ today like we did back then, I would safely say we'd need a whole warehouse-sized building! Not to hold the wareZ, but the staff needed to gleen it all from the internet!! I am envisioning huge racks of hard disk servers and petabytes of stuff, every version of every program! Back in the day, when there was not a lot of software, it was indeed, ALMOST, I repeat ALMOST possible to have every piece of software ever written for a platform.

 

Anyways, here are two nice articles for Apple II enthusiasts - Not about WaREz but about some of the early design philosophy of the II.

http://www.filfre.ne...9/the-apple-ii/

http://failuremag.co...iak_interview/#

 

--and other tidbits--

http://www.radioflye...-red-wagon.html

http://www.dataswamp...ips-closeup.jpg

http://www.stockly.c...Cut%20Edges.jpg

 

Funny thing even today I don't think the Apple II is anything special. Between PET....Atari 800.....C64.....Amiga 1000 all bases are covered. And IIRC Apple II used NTSC artifacting for the 4 colour games like Gauntlet which means any PAL versions would be like a Commodore PET game

[Mr.Amiga500]

Funny thing even today I don't think the Apple II is anything special. Between PET....Atari 800.....C64.....Amiga 1000 all bases are covered.

 

Yes, exactly. I have an Apple II+ and two Apple IIc computers (with matching monitor). I tried hard to like them, I really did. I love the built in floppy drive and wish there was an Atari like that (but with XL colour scheme). But.... anything the Apple II can do is much better done on other computers. If I want glowing green-screen, command line fun: I'll use my Kaypro. If I want quick, portable text editing: I'll use my TRS-80 Model 100. If I want 8-bit gaming: I'll use my Atari 800XL. If I want to do anything else, I'll use my Amiga 500. I can even run Apple II software on the Amiga. (and still get the same lowres scanlined feel - unlike with PC-based emulators)

 

Back in the day, the Apple II was unbelievably overpriced. I never knew anyone who had one and I never saw one in real life - until 1987, when I saw an Apple IIc on "blowout clearance sale" at a store closing (the death of Robinsons). I looked at the clearance sticker and it said $1100. It just didn't make sense to me. I was sure it was a typo and that it was actually supposed to be $110. That sounded reasonable to me, having bought a new CoCo III the year before for $99 - and this was supposed to be a store closing sale and the IIc was an out of box store demo model! The cashier came back and said, "No, it's not a typo. It's $1100." I stood there, baffled, confused, discombobulated... and anything else you can find in a thesaurus. Then I said, "Holy F****** S***!"

[Ross PK]

I love the 80's, I'm a very nostalgic person. But I also love the present. The 80's have been back in vogue for a long time now, fashions have come back, remakes, etc. And with the Internet, it's never been easier to relive those days, watch old shows, and buy things from back in the day that you remember. This is why I think the present is probably just as good.

[ACML]

I loved the 80's, but I was born a decade too late. In 1980, I was 16 and saw my first floppy disk my lab partner had in chemistry. I asked him what that "thing" was. When he told me, I said he was full of it. I took the computer course the following Spring (my high school has Apple II's). I really enjoyed programming, but the Apple II was monochrome and just didn't wow me. A new friend in the computer class said he had an Atari computer. I had the 2600 since 1977, but had no idea Atari made a home computer. He had an 800, 810 and the original 410. That was it, I had to have one. The price was too high for a new 800, but I saw the 400 at a new store which had Star Raiders playing. After shrewd politicking, I got my father to buy a 16K 400 and 410 for me for Christmas. I've been an 8-bit geek ever since. Yes, there was some dark ages in the 90's and 00's, got married, had kids and I never touched the stuff for years. I'm 47 now and got the nostalgia bug. I guess you could call it a mid-life crisis for nerds.

 

As far as I'm concerned, the Atari 8-bits were the cat's a$$ in the early 80's. I don't know why I didn't get excited about the ST's. It would make sense to jump to the 16 bit machine, but I never did. IBM XT's became within reach in the late 80's and I was a college engineering student. Transitioned to the 8088. I used Mac's in college and again the 9" monochrome monitor left me flat. I remember in 1989 getting a sound board (sound blaster) for me PC and thinking, about time, my 8-bit had good sound in 1981. The 8-bit Atari were way ahead of their time. As I alluded to in the opening, if I'd been born 10 years earlier, I'm convinced I would have been working for Atari or Apple in the 1980's. It was just too cool of a technology that you just had to immerse yourself in. Lots of good memories.

[Keatah]

Fire and Brimstone! Totally Unstoppable! All hail Star Raiders!

 

 

That had to have been the first killer-app written for any computer. Some of my finest and most "sophisticated" gaming moments were with Star Raiders and several other Atari 400/800 based games. Namely Missile Command and Defender. It has been said that Star Raiders was the one game that sold more of the Atari 400 computers than any other application. It's like you buy a computer today to get on the internet, well.. Back then, it was you buy a 400 to play Star Raiders.

 

Indeed the 400/800 were ahead of their time. But not by alot. And it was a good. If they were any more advanced then they were they most certainly would have failed. Folks would not have known what to do with them, just like the Amiga.

 

For me, as I've said before, the Apple II+ and //e were the quintessential 8-bit units. We did everything with them. However, I frequently had my 800 perched right atop the II+. And would often switch back and forth between them. You could liken the scenario to a modern day computer that can only switch between two applications or windows at a time.

 

I'd set up a transfer on my 300 baud modem on the Apple, go have dinner, then jam games on the 800. Periodically, switching between the two systems with a red lever I had wired up to the TV to swap between channels. I was hot shit back then. Nobody else in town had a setup like this going. Each computer had two drives each, and thus was the ultimate warez copying station.

Edited September 27, 2011 by Keatah

[HuckleCat]

These are all awesome replies. The OP was completely incoherent, but we all understood it anyway.

 

Yah, I really, really miss the 80s. Wish I could do it all again. Maybe it was just because I was younger, but alot of things seemed "better". I'd say "magical", but that sounds totally gay.

 

 

I do have to say though -

 

If I want 8-bit gaming: I'll use my Atari 800XL. If I want to do anything else, I'll use my Amiga 500. I can even run Apple II software on the Amiga. (and still get the same lowres scanlined feel - unlike with PC-based emulators)

 

AppleWin does this fine.

 

How was Wasteland on the Atari 800?

 

Oh wait...