TI-99/8

[JB]

... the "Commodore 65" would only have emulated the 64 in software, resulting in a compatibility of 75% or so (which I have never really understood what that means - it seems like it could mean that like all of the software would be 75% compatible, or, to put that another way, not compatible at all!).

Eh? My impression was that the C65 was backwards-compatible hardware, with the new chips being extensions of the C64 chips.

Software emulation seems... implausible for the early 90s on a platform where everything had direct hardware access.

 

 

 

I must say the Commodore 64 software/hardware scene is rather robust for a machine dead 25 years now, and I guess that is not maybe the case with the TI-99 scene, but it seemed like it was from a (mostly) outsider's perspective.

The difference between the C64 and 99/4a scenes is one of scale. We have a small number of very passionate people, they have a huge number of people at multiple passion levels. Unfortunately, scale of the community has a lot of impact on what sort of projects are going to go places.

 

 

Personally, I think an FPGA 99/8 with an F18a replacing the 9918a would be pretty rad. But I know nothing about programming FPGAs.

On the other hand, I know enough about business that I doubt a 99/8 reproduction would ever recoup the costs of setting up case molds.

The Mega65 is highly likely to recoup all its costs just because the market is so much larger. And garnering positive press is easier. You send an e-mail to Gizmodo or Kotaku or whoever is cool these days announcing that you're making a new, more powerful C64, you're front-page news and relinked a million times before the day is out. If instead you announce that you're making a new, more powerful TI 99/4a, they click delete while wondering why anyone would bother announcing a new calculator.

[+9640News]

Yeah... but didn't you say it was like $600? That's a lot to pay for a retro machine... I was pretty interested until I heard that. (If I misunderstood, please correct me!)

 

Yeah, you are wrong. Unfortunately in the wrong direction. More like $800...…….

[willbilly]

I would figure any new-build hardware may as well be an improvement, since both avenues are backwards-compatible (the 99/8 and the Geneve) - which is why I lean towards the Geneve when doing hypotheticals, it being the biggest improvement.

 

I figure priced well enough it might engender more homebrew for the original Geneves as well. If you really wanted to jumpstart homebrew development, you could also release a devkit/emulator disguised as a "fantasy" console, like the Pico-8.

Edited December 26, 2018 by willbilly