@JB - Commodore did the same with the Amiga (68000 running at just 7.14MHz compared to ST's 8MHz, but with Gary, Agnus and Denise, looking after gfx, memory and I/O it ran faster).
Funny you should say that, DH! Both the Atari 8-bit range and the Amiga were designed by the same guy - Jay Miner. So that explains the connection!
DaddyHoggy wrote:
When programmers were ringing up CBM and saying I want to know how this bit of the chipset works because I want to do X, Y and Z, Commodore would ask why, the programmer would say he was writing a game, Commodore would explain that this wasn't a game machine it was a small business computer and the line would go dead...
You just have to shake your head, because there's not much that you can say.....
My consoles and computers from 1983 to present in this Order:
Atari VCS: still got
ZX 81 (got it given me lol)
Vectrex (BTW did anyone ever own 1 of these? i believe there worth a fortune now)
ZX Spectrum 48k
Sega master system
Sega megadrive
Comodore Amiga A500
Neo Geo:Not got it anymore Gutted!!!!
Comodore CD32: still got
Atari jaguar: still got
Sega Saturn:still got
Playstion
Sega Dreamcast:still got
Playstation 2
Xbox 360:Still got
$Au400+ for the plus three!! Not that I am interested in selling mine, but this might force me into diving into the garage to see if I can find it and whether it works.... not sure what I'd connect it to though. I suppose the tv might have the correct connectors.... used to have a small monochrome monitor too. I wonder if thats in the garage too.
Oh well ....a hunting I will go...
(JohnnyBoy's eyes dart about mischievously while he fantasises about owning an Electron floppy drive so that he can fulfil his childhood ambition of being an 6502 assembly language superstar.... )
@TB808 - I used to have a Vetrex (or however it was spelt) - Tall black thing with a monochrome screen that you slipped coloured screens into the front of to get the right effects for that particular game - mine died...
@TB808 - I used to have a Vetrex (or however it was spelt) - Tall black thing with a monochrome screen that you slipped coloured screens into the front of to get the right effects for that particular game - mine died...
The funny thing is, now that 8-bit chips would cost pennies to make and buy, a replica of a Beeb or Elk would be so easy and cheap to remake - possibly with some modifications to allow it to use a PC keyboard, a TV with a SCART socket and a USB pen drive for storage. Briel Computers in the US have been making replica Apple 1 motherboards for a few years now. If we could do the same in this country and sell them for peanuts, the current generation of 12 and 13 year old nerds would have a simple machine that would teach them so much and fire their interest in creating programs rather than just playing GTA on a PlayStation.
I've just downloaded SimCity converted to Java to my £30 SE W200i and it seems to play just like I used to remember (although the icons are truly tiny - only 179K - is that the benefit of Java because it seemed to take a long time to load in my Amiga days off the floppy). You can a C64 in a stick that plugs directly into your TV. I've also just downloaded "MobiCraft" a Java Starcraft clone onto my better half's SE C902 and it plays amazingly well!
I bought "Impossible Mission" for myself to play on my daughters NDS and in "original C64" mode I finally completed it - something I never managed in my youth (I still have the game and the C64 so I could try again I guess). Oddly the C64 version plays much better than the enhanced for NDS version of the game (which goes to prove sometimes you can't mess with the classics)
I'm guessing this trend: old games, apps and computers turning up in different forms and formats is set to continue.
)
