am1933 Posted February 4, 2014 Share Posted February 4, 2014 Ah thanks, that makes sense. I remember back in the 80´s I thought that maybe I could plug in some kind of vocabulary update but never saw one in the shops. I just got the Terminal Emulator 2 cartridge recently and when I have some time I have to look into what I could do with it in combination with the speech synthesizer. There was also some speech editor cartridge available but I don´t have that and never found a ROM file for it. Don't bother looking for the speech editor If you already have Terminal Emulator II,although easy to use-the speech editor cartridge is pretty much limited to the set vocabulary that you will find in the extended basic manual and lacks the flexibility of the TE2 cartridge. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vectrexroli Posted February 5, 2014 Author Share Posted February 5, 2014 (edited) Don't bother looking for the speech editor If you already have Terminal Emulator II,although easy to use-the speech editor cartridge is pretty much limited to the set vocabulary that you will find in the extended basic manual and lacks the flexibility of the TE2 cartridge. I expected that with the speech editor I have even access to the phonems or certain "components" of the speech synthesizer vocabulary, as with Extended Basic I only had access to full words if I remember correctly and could not build my own words. I didn´t look into the capabilities of the TE2 cartridge yet what I can do with that. Edited February 5, 2014 by vectrexroli 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keatah Posted February 5, 2014 Share Posted February 5, 2014 I never did too much with the TI99/4A but I rather kinda liked it though. I wish I still had mine. But for some inexplicable reason I don't.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted February 5, 2014 Share Posted February 5, 2014 If you want to put YOUR VOICE on the TI, check this out. I've not had time to screw with it myself (too many irons in the fire), but it's interesting! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVDE-6TtmFQ#t Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vectrexroli Posted February 5, 2014 Author Share Posted February 5, 2014 I never did too much with the TI99/4A but I rather kinda liked it though. I wish I still had mine. But for some inexplicable reason I don't.. Finding TI 99 stuff in my country can get a bit expensive unfortunately as you don´t see that stuff in the wild. I guess in the US you may find that still at some garage sales. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vectrexroli Posted February 5, 2014 Author Share Posted February 5, 2014 If you want to put YOUR VOICE on the TI, check this out. I've not had time to screw with it myself (too many irons in the fire), but it's interesting! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVDE-6TtmFQ#t Great! So you can create your own speech samples and sound effects for your own TI 99 games. Awesome stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 European TI-99/4A gives really nice pic out if modify tv modulator composite mod. I can't understand why they had change it from US model. There you just need cable. Speech extension there usually isn't even connector behind that door but understand that earlier models had. But soon removed. Love speech at Parsec and Alpiner. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 I wish someone make Multicart for TI-99/4A Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vectrexroli Posted February 15, 2014 Author Share Posted February 15, 2014 European TI-99/4A gives really nice pic out if modify tv modulator composite mod. I can't understand why they had change it from US model. There you just need cable. Speech extension there usually isn't even connector behind that door but understand that earlier models had. But soon removed. Love speech at Parsec and Alpiner. From what I know you can use a component cable for HD TVs on the European TI 99 model and connect it directly to the modulator plug, but unfortunately I don´t have such a TV at home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vectrexroli Posted February 15, 2014 Author Share Posted February 15, 2014 I wish someone make Multicart for TI-99/4A I also would like to have one. I just got a new NanoPEB and I hope this one will live longer than my previous one and it works nice, but sometimes I would just prefer a multicart to play some game. I saw one on eBay once but it was too expensive for me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 We did try component cable first. But signal is a little different than component. It doesn't work Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 That European video connector is really strange. Signal it almost like component, but it's little different also you can't get composite directly out of it like US version. There comes some kind of non standard RGB that's mixed to RF signal at tv-modulator. But it's possible modify modulator so you get composite out of that modulator box. At it looks great at monitor. Picture is very nice even at small Samsung LCD 19" 940MW tv monitor. Usually old machines look bad at LCD but TI look very nice. However I haven't try it at my 52" living room yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 There are a couple of different multicart options for the 99/4A. If you use a 64K Guidry board, you can make a multicart that holds up to 8 of the ROM-only cartridges--so long as they are 8K each (this won't work with the ones that are 16K ban-switched or any cart with GROM). There are also designs for 128K and 512K versions of this (we only made a few of those as test objects, but the layouts to make more of them exist). The final option is a board with 512K of 8K ROM banks and 128K of 8K GROM "slots," which work a bit differently than banks do--up to 5 slots are visible to the computer at a time, allowing it to effectively emulate almost any TI cartridge made (there are about a dozen or so possible exceptions which would have to be modified to work with it). It is not ready for release as of yet, though we did a partial demonstration of it at the Chicago TI Faire this past November. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 15, 2014 Share Posted February 15, 2014 Thanks. Hope that there will be ready release with lot of games. I even have Multicart for Aquarius and TI has lot more games released. I have loads of cartridges and Multicart would make gaming lot more easy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted February 18, 2014 Share Posted February 18, 2014 That European video connector is really strange. Signal it almost like component, but it's little different also you can't get composite directly out of it like US version. There comes some kind of non standard RGB that's mixed to RF signal at tv-modulator. But it's possible modify modulator so you get composite out of that modulator box. At it looks great at monitor. Picture is very nice even at small Samsung LCD 19" 940MW tv monitor. Usually old machines look bad at LCD but TI look very nice. However I haven't try it at my 52" living room yet. Your best bet would be to get one of these: Available << HERE >> Then you can just plug your TI into any VGA computer monitor or a huge flat-screen modern TV. There is no substitute for playing your favorite TI games in SHARP, CRISP video... or for having 80 columns in many programs like the modified BA-Writer which is a TI-Writer clone, or the 80 column hack for Multiplan. Some new games even take advantage of some of the 'extended options'. It's an easy plug-in board, no soldering required. This is what the back of my TI looks like with it installed: This is what the board looks like on the TI motherboard: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
retrorussell Posted February 18, 2014 Share Posted February 18, 2014 I got mine in I believe Christmas of '82 or '83. I was totally lost at programming then, even more than I am today. I think my keyboard was white. And the only extra I had was the cassette deck. Had it hooked up to a very small about 13 inch B&W tv in my bedroom over the garage. When I moved to Auburn/Federal Way, WA in the late 80s with my mom & stepdad they had one with the floppy drives! And a bunch of homebrew games! Woo hoo! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 18, 2014 Share Posted February 18, 2014 (edited) That VGA looks very intresting. That works PAL model? How you get audio out? Edited February 18, 2014 by Mika73 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted February 18, 2014 Share Posted February 18, 2014 That VGA looks very intresting. That works PAL model? How you get audio out? NTSC, PAL, SECAM none of those apply, output is not to a standard TV. After this is installed, it will only output to a VGA COMPUTER MONITOR. Sorry, I am not up-to-date on the TV's in Europe, over here there was a digital conversion a few years ago, most all analog TV's went to the dump. All new TV's sold here are also digital come with multiple connectors including HDMI and of course a VGA. This little F18A device will hook up to them all. Audio comes from the connector on the back like it always has and will easily plug into the back of an equipped TV, or monitor. If worse came to worse, you could always plug in an old set of computer speakers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 18, 2014 Share Posted February 18, 2014 (edited) It's PAL at Europe and HDTV also has VGA, component, composite, svideo , VGA and hdmi connectors here. But your TI99-4A has audio output? We don't have. Only RF modulator box. I have got mine modified so it can output composite and audio with RCA connectors. After this VGA mod TI still has working video connector or is it replaced with VGA? I can't see way get audio output after mod if connector where comes modified RF box is gone. Edited February 18, 2014 by Mika73 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted February 18, 2014 Share Posted February 18, 2014 It's PAL at Europe and HDTV also has VGA, component, composite, svideo , VGA and hdmi connectors here. But your TI99-4A has audio output? We don't have. Only RF modulator box. I have got mine modified so it can output composite and audio with RCA connectors. After this VGA mod TI still has working video connector or is it replaced with VGA? I can't see way get audio output after mod if connector where comes modified RF box is gone. I'm sure your TI has audio as well. The video & audio came off the 5pim DIN on the back of the TI. It was COMBINED in the RF modulator for a TV to use. If you cut the end off an old RF modulator, you can connect the audio connector of your choice. You can see the proper pinouts << HERE >> You are correct, after the modification the RF modulator box will be worthless for video. But the audio still comes from the same source and IS STILL AVAILABLE. So if you already have a composite cable with RCA connectors for a regular analog monitor, you can still use the audio portion of the cable, but it will probably require a converter plug at the end to change it from the RCA phono type. In the photo below, you can probably see the speaker holes in my monitor. I use my old monitor cable for the audio and the new VGA cable for the video. It works great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vectrexroli Posted February 18, 2014 Author Share Posted February 18, 2014 The only minor issue I see with the F18A is that it gets harder then to capture gameplay footage as I cannot use a dirt cheap USB stick any more to capture a VGA signal. Whenever I check the F18A web page it says "out of stock", so let´s see when it will be available again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Ksarul Posted February 19, 2014 Share Posted February 19, 2014 Kevan, note that the European TI had a six-pin DIN connector on the back--not the same as the US five-pin one. It does still have an audio line though, and that is the one that you'd use with the F18A. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omega-TI Posted February 19, 2014 Share Posted February 19, 2014 Kevan, note that the European TI had a six-pin DIN connector on the back--not the same as the US five-pin one. It does still have an audio line though, and that is the one that you'd use with the F18A. Thanks for that clarification, I did NOT know that. I'll remember that excellent bit of info for future use. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mika73 Posted February 19, 2014 Share Posted February 19, 2014 By the way I have loads of TI-99/4A cartridges if someone intrested. Many Financial cartridges, children learning and games etc. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+eebuckeye Posted February 24, 2014 Share Posted February 24, 2014 Excellent video! I feel the same way about my TI.. I got it around 82 and created a science fair project based on basic programming for 5th grade. People were amazed at the time. You are a talented programmer and I would have loved to have had those games! I really hope a multicart comes out (especially SD) that could store every rom image to play just like many other classic gaming systems. Thanks for sharing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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