Can't solder? External U1MB

[+Stephen]

Just now, zbyti said:

ALERT! underwear argument!

 

Please do not use mom and underwear in the same sentence.

 

Let's think of this instead

 

[candle]

i just wonder where this thread is going to...

 

[_The Doctor__]

it will go with us all ordering 1 to a few external candle memory upgrades. where there is candle there is light.

[BillC]

3 hours ago, ZuluGula said:

for example 2x SIDE2

I have 2 x SIDE V.1 from the batch by @zaxon, AFAIK it is the same as SIDE2 except for the case.

[svenski]

On 2/6/2021 at 1:12 AM, Stephen said:

Again - I ask.  Do you have more than one pair of jeans?  More than one pair of shoes?  More than one shirt?  Why would anybody do that.  What a stupid way of supporting clothing manufacturers.  Sure is strange to own more than one of something.

I was going to formulate a reply but Stephen has done it so eloquently. 

[+orpheuswaking]

On 2/5/2021 at 3:45 PM, ZuluGula said:

With, Ataris you have limited supply and there aren't new one made. Still, you can use only one at the time. 

Buying more than one of such expansion, defeats its designed purpose, to be easily movable from one machine to another. How many SIDE2, SIDE3 or AVD carts you need?

 

There are other ways to support creators.  

As I have more than 20 Atari 8bit machines not including XEL/XLD/NUC and Eclaire units I find it disingenuous to say that I wouldn’t need more than 1 u1mb even if it is portable. I will likely buy at least two and possibly more to use with a number of my unexpanded 

machines that I don’t want to modify internally.

 

just because YOU can’t see a use for multiple doesn’t mean it’s not there. I have several each of different multicarts, IDE interfaces, SD and CF carts and I don’t plan on selling any of them for profit or not (besides maybe my original SIDE 1 for cheap) 

[MrFSL]

 

On 2/5/2021 at 6:48 PM, flashjazzcat said:

Here's an idea: how about the consumer supports the creator in any way they damn well choose? Someone said they'd like to buy two without having their arm twisted and for some reason you and you alone seem to have a problem with that.

  

On 2/5/2021 at 8:15 PM, Stephen said:

Where is the harm in letting people spend their money the way they see fit?  Why is it any of your business?

 

15 hours ago, orpheuswaking said:

I find it disingenuous to say that I wouldn’t need more than 1 u1mb even if it is portable. I will likely buy at least two and possibly more to use with a number of my unexpanded 

machines that I don’t want to modify internally.

 

Are you all being overly harsh on @ZuluGula? I didn't read any criticism in his posts. I found his questions reasonable and honest; as in the person was trying to understand and asking to be enlightened with answers from people whom might be able to provide answers. Why all this hostility? At least twice now this person has apologized for perhaps being misunderstood as English is not their first language. Furthermore, as discussion on the subject continued they didn't push back unreasonably (a sure sign of someone not asking a question but trying to instead push a secret agenda in the form of a question.)

 

15 hours ago, orpheuswaking said:

just because YOU can’t see a use for multiple doesn’t mean it’s not there

...which it seems to be the reason why ZuluGula asked their original question. He felt others new something that he didn't understand; not that he wished to challenge any other person's motivations. I used the forum tools to read all the posts by this author consecutively and it seems that I must be missing something. Perhaps Z. is a nefarious troll and my lack of experience here leaves me ignorant? 

 

Might it be that folks are actually responding more to other people's comments rather than to the original posts by this individual?

 

--- That last sentence I guess is a good example of conjecture wrapped in a fake question. --- Is this what you think ZuluGula was up to? Because I am new and ignorant and candle's responses were extremely enlightening to me. I thought I understand the work that went into these new Atari parts but there was so much I did not understand including: candle's motivations, the personal monetary contributions to projects by the developers, even ways to support developers other than device purchases. 

 

M questions above (with one exception) are legitimate and honest and I will respond to ZuluGula saying, there are devices I have purchased in my time here that are no longer available and I wish I had purchased multiple. Atari's might be getting rare but these devices are actually much more rare. Some people are collectors and that is reason enough, I just like the way these things work and don't want them to break someday because I don't have the skills to fix them.

 

Also, @candle, I see you don't believe in open hardware/software, in the event that something is abandoned or obsoleted, how do you feel about making things available at those times if someone wished to continue developing or repairing your devices? Would it be your thought that someone might purchase a license or something similar at that time? I am just curious. 

 

Thank you.

 

[Frankie]

If this is turning into a pre order thread put me down for one.

 

Frankie

[+ZuluGula]

17 hours ago, MrFSL said:

M questions above (with one exception) are legitimate and honest and I will respond to ZuluGula saying, there are devices I have purchased in my time here that are no longer available and I wish I had purchased multiple. Atari's might be getting rare but these devices are actually much more rare. Some people are collectors and that is reason enough, I just like the way these things work and don't want them to break someday because I don't have the skills to fix them.

 

Also, @candle, I see you don't believe in open hardware/software, in the event that something is abandoned or obsoleted, how do you feel about making things available at those times if someone wished to continue developing or repairing your devices? Would it be your thought that someone might purchase a license or something similar at that time? I am just curious. 

Your concerns has been addressed by @candle in this thread and in many other before. All his creations are available exclusively from Lothareks store, because he can guarantee constant supply, warranty and he runs legitimate business since 2008 if I'm not mistaken.

[candle]

all devices that were available with all documentation for repair (schematics, cpld/mcu programming files) have been cloned and are "offered" as new products

how should i feel about that?

 

[TGB1718]

38 minutes ago, candle said:

all devices that were available with all documentation for repair (schematics, cpld/mcu programming files) have been cloned and are "offered" as new products

how should i feel about that?

Very true, I think your absolutely right to protect your hard work, I for one am glad you do and will only purchase 'genuine' items like so many here. 

[danwinslow]

concur ^

[MrFSL]

34 minutes ago, candle said:

all devices that were available with all documentation for repair (schematics, cpld/mcu programming files) have been cloned and are "offered" as new products

how should i feel about that?

 

I would feel rather put out if I was you. I might feel a bit taken advantage of. Even 'open' products don't usually approve of simple re-branding. Otherwise its about advancing through collaboration. There is no judgments here, only questions.

 

I was asking somewhat academically about the future. As ZuluGala says it has already been answered in the forum I will not waste your time here. Instead I will find answers in the forum. It is the nature of the uninitiated to sometimes approach the old topics as new. It sounds like an old topic.

 

All the best and thanks for the hard work!

 

[ivop]

It all depends on what you expect to get in return. I open almost all my projects to the public under a BSD0 or (L)GPL2 license. If I hadn't done that, we would probably have no MIDI on MyTek's boards. Serdashop took my CS waveblaster in production as a solderkit. In return I got a free copy and an X1. I did not ask for that, but got it anyway. Which is very vool IMHO The VS waveblaster I designed was never tested because I couldn't manage to solder the chip by hand. I published it anyway. Year or more later, somebody from China steps in, builds the board, fixes a bug, adds digital MIDI in, and publishes all his changes! I love that

 

Edited February 8, 2021 by ivop
typo

[Mclaneinc]

 

I get a little busy and not on the forum as much and suddenly there's threads with semi naked ladies and underwear all over the place...And it wasn't me, I'm losing my touch!

 

As for the cloning, like many I try and buy the original makers product, seeing your own work that you are selling being cloned and sold is just wrong and taking steps to stop that must be saluted. But in some cases as Ivop has said items that have been dropped and left that get reinvented and fixed are great. I have only one clone and that is a dreamcast iso board, the Russian original is just soo expensive and at the time the guy was time bombing the code so it only worked for a certain time. The clone I have can't be updated but its part of the price I pay for getting the clone.

 

So good to see a solder free one, I have the soldered one and its great but this opens extra doors for the people who don't feel safe soldering. I also like that its being feature updated..Really nice...

 

Now where are those semi naked women again....(furious mouse clicking)

[BillC]

4 hours ago, ZuluGula said:

All his creations are available exclusively from Lothareks store,

Thebrewingacademy is a reseller for many of Lothareks products, including U1MB/Incognito. While they have to charge more it can be less expensive for North American buyers after shipping is added, they also carry many other products not available from Lotharek.

[Sinjinhawke]

17 minutes ago, BillC said:

Thebrewingacademy is a reseller for many of Lothareks products, including U1MB/Incognito. While they have to charge more it can be less expensive for North American buyers after shipping is added, they also carry many other products not available from Lotharek.

If you are in Canada be careful with shipping UPS from Brewing Academy.  I was charged over $50 to import the U1MB.  Most of that went into UPS's pocket as duty was only $14.  Next time I order from Brewing Academy I'll see if there are non UPS options.

[BillC]

1 minute ago, Sinjinhawke said:

If you are in Canada be careful with shipping UPS from Brewing Academy.  I was charged over $50 to import the U1MB.  Most of that went into UPS's pocket as duty was only $14.  Next time I order from Brewing Academy I'll see if there are non UPS options.

I know about the "brokerage fees" charged by the courier companies, they charge tax on items that usually wouldn't be taxed if shipped via USPS/Canada Post in order to justify their fee. If taxes are charged Canada Post just adds a $5 fee for collecting the taxes when receiving the item.

 

I had an eBay order that stated shipping via USPS, when I received a tracking# I noticed they had used UPS instead. The package was delivered by Purolator!, a couple weeks later I received an invoice from UPS for taxes paid + brokerage fee. I called UPS and explained the situation, that since the order was supposed to be shipped USPS I hadn't agreed to their brokerage fee. After about a week they got back to me informing me that they were waiving the ~$$30 fee, asking just reimbursement for the taxes they had paid(~C$8).

[Mark2008]

I don't know how the dealers charge so little.

 

Amiga on the lake sells the side2 for $57, lotharek charges $70.

I ordered a sio splitter from Brewing Academy for $35, lotharek charges $28.  That's some nice pricing, I think.

 

What isn't cheap at all, is custom installs.  Which brings me back to this product, I think I prefer this product over an internal u1mb.

Right now I have a flaky 1200xl, well it doesn't ahve a pbi bus anyway, so bad example.

But say you did have an old atari started acting up, it'd be so convenient just to unplug this and move it to a new atari. Both to save the gear, but even as a troubleshooting step, it always helps to simplify a configuration.  But the main thing you save months of time with an external device....yeah, the more I think about it, this device is a must have.  But then again, it's not finished yet, so maybe still just a want, for now

 

 

 

[bfollowell]

9 hours ago, BillC said:

Thebrewingacademy is a reseller for many of Lothareks products, including U1MB/Incognito. While they have to charge more it can be less expensive for North American buyers after shipping is added, they also carry many other products not available from Lotharek.

 

Marlin is open to other Lotharek items as well. I wanted to use one of his 64KB SRAM modules to upgrade a recently purchased 600XL rather than the normal RAM chip swap upgrade that many have done for decades. Shipping was twice what the product cost though. I asked Marlin if he'd consider selling those and he agreed to give it a try. I bought one when they showed up in stock and a couple of weeks later he showed them out of stock. Now they're back in stock again, so obviously some people are buying them. They were like $20 from Lotharek, but shipping was going to be about another $30-$35 to the states. Marlin sells them for $27.50. He's probably making at least a couple of bucks on them and I saved a decent amount on shipping. It was win-win as far as I'm concerned. That's just another reason I support Marlin whenever I can. He's definitely a class act!

 

Also, for some of those specialty chips, I'll pay more from Marlin, though he's no always more, than to mess with the nightmare of ordering through Best anymore. Between the $20 minimum order and the ever changing policies and Brad's quirkiness, it just isn't worth it anymore. Marlin will often have things like that in stock that he'll consider selling, even if he doesn't show them in his store.

 

[BillC]

23 minutes ago, bfollowell said:

I wanted to use one of his 64KB SRAM modules to upgrade a recently purchased 600XL rather than the normal RAM chip swap upgrade that many have done for decades.

tf_hh also sells SRAM upgrades, one is a 512KB memory expansion for all XL/XE computers except the 16KB 600XL, and also a version designed for the 600XL that also has 64KB SRAM base memory for 576KB total, both are out of stock at this time. Since he is based in europe shipping costs for his products are also high, but he does have items unavailable elsewhere.

http://www.van-radecke.de/STUFF/tfhh_HW_info.pdf

 

There are also open-source versions of the 64KB SRAM upgrade, here is a picture of a version sold by zaxon on the sellmyretro auction site.

The URL listed on the PCB has pictures/schematics/gerber files/BOM/etc. Everything a hobbyist(with good soldering skills since we're talking SMD components) should need to be able to order parts/PCB and build their own.

The 3 smaller ICs are SMD single gate logic chips, easier to fit when you only need 1 or 2 gates of a specific type.

[Mclaneinc]

Don't you just love that these carrier companies can invent their admin charge, no controls at all..In the UK Parcel force add 12.00UK for doing an automated digital xfer of money to Customs..12.00 for a blink of an eye operation..Shocking..

[flashjazzcat]

It's a racket.

 

 

[BillC]

23 minutes ago, Mclaneinc said:

Don't you just love that these carrier companies can invent their admin charge, no controls at all..In the UK Parcel force add 12.00UK for doing an automated digital xfer of money to Customs..12.00 for a blink of an eye operation..Shocking..

It's a reason why I try to have international items shipped via regular postal service instead of courier whenever possible, there is no brokerage fee and if taxes are due Canada Post only charges a C$5.00(about 2.85UK) fee. International shipments via Canada Post also often get delivered with no tax assessed.

[Mclaneinc]

Fortunately or unfortunately depending how you look at it I rarely have international stuff and what I have had has been pretty lucky but my daughter who loves Japanese culture and also gets from Aliexpress has had a few hits, its just damn annoying when most of the 'customs fee' is courier charges, thankfully most of her bits are small inexpensive things that just arrive. As FJC said, "its a racket" and it needs controlling, I don't think people would mind paying 3 - 5UK for something that their software can do automatically (personally even 3UK is a rip off) but just letting the courier decide how greedy they want to be is daft as a brush.

 

Anyway, let's hope products from our great vendors reach us as cheaply and as safely as possible..Or in the UK, just reach us