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My Mega65 has arrived

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Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#61

Post by sys_64738 »

the_af wrote: post #33

I'm really enjoying the current retrocomputer craze. I bought the "TheC64" myself (full size with working keyboard, wouldn't have it any other way), which is just a C64 lookalike case with a tiny ARM computer running VICE inside. I know it's not a real C64, but it sure looks like one! The Mega65 in particular is not for me though: it's way too expensive and it's not an actual computer I owned as a kid, so the nostalg…

Agreed. TheC64 has hit the sweet spot for what this type of gizmo should be and it really does deliver. They are great for vendor support too.

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#62

Post by everslick »

technofiend wrote: post #52
300bps wrote: post #4

I have quite a number of Commodore 64s lying around by virtue of developing a hobby of learning component level repair on them. I'm tempted to buy one of these Mega65s to play around with it but at $832.50 including shipping to the US, it's a bit much. The main reason I am interested in old computers is because I used those old computers back in the day! Really have to hand it to them on the engineering of it though…

Things I'm nostalgic for are slightly older like the VT100 and PDP 11 series. There was something just amazing about the soft blip when turning on the VT100, and something very powerful about clacking away on that keyboard, writing code to do whatever you could think of. But even if someone made a brand new VT 100 with a proper CRT and embedded a PDP 11 equivalent, would I pay $832.50 for it? Nah, probably not. Still…

Actually it is a recreation of the C65. (Which happened to have a C64 mode) Running 3rd party cores is possible though.

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#63

Post by russellendicott »

technofiend wrote: post #52
300bps wrote: post #4

I have quite a number of Commodore 64s lying around by virtue of developing a hobby of learning component level repair on them. I'm tempted to buy one of these Mega65s to play around with it but at $832.50 including shipping to the US, it's a bit much. The main reason I am interested in old computers is because I used those old computers back in the day! Really have to hand it to them on the engineering of it though…

Things I'm nostalgic for are slightly older like the VT100 and PDP 11 series. There was something just amazing about the soft blip when turning on the VT100, and something very powerful about clacking away on that keyboard, writing code to do whatever you could think of. But even if someone made a brand new VT 100 with a proper CRT and embedded a PDP 11 equivalent, would I pay $832.50 for it? Nah, probably not. Still…

I've always wanted a PDP11 but having never used one I'm overwhelmed when looking for them. I have no way of knowing if I'm buying the right parts or how to tell if they function.

Are there any retro recreations of PDP machines? All I've ever been able to find are emulators.

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#64

Post by Keyframe »

hedora wrote: post #45
FullyFunctional wrote: post #35

My only interest in this is as an FPGA dev kit. It was surprisingly hard to find details on the actual hardware but it appears to be a Xilinx™ Artix A7 200T according to https://shop.trenz-electronic.de/en/TE0765-03-S001-MEGA65-hi... That page curiously doesn't specify the amount of external DRAM, but various hints suggests it might be 8 MiB of HyperRAM (that's DRAM with a simpler protocol). Cute.

I was wondering the same thing. I wonder if they could produce a "lite" version without some of the physical components (like the floppy disk and "expansion port"), and maybe some of the retro stuff swapped for cheap modern bits, like USB. Does anyone know if the FPGA code that makes this thing work is open source? It might be a nice starting point for some other hobby project / processor architecture experiments / e…

Nexys 100T was recommended as a stand-in until you get the real mega65, that it's pretty much the same thing once set up. So, one could view it as a lite version: https://shop.trenz-electronic.de/en/29376-Nexys-A7-100T-FPGA...

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#65

Post by salgernon »

mindcrime wrote: post #12
dfxm12 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I'd be really curious to know how they managed that part of the whole thing. Searching the linked development blog yields this: https://c65gs.blogspot.com/2019/03/floppys-floppys-everywher... After some searching, we found what we were after: A local supplier here in Germany who has some quantity of different models, including a large number of ALPS 3.5" 1.44MB drives.

Wow, so it sounds like they actually had to go with used drives. I was thinking maybe they got lucky and found some unsold NOS ones in an old warehouse or something. No such luck. But at least they found something to let them move forward with the project. It does lead me to wonder though: How many floppy drives would one have to commit to ordering, and how much would it cost, to get a company to manufacture a run of…

There’s some interesting reading from the creator of a Mac Floppy emulator on sourcing the obscure (DB19) connector it uses - and his setting out I do a new production run. This [1] is kind of in the middle of the thread - but still interesting reading:

[1] https://www.bigmessowires.com/2015/03/20/finding-a-db-19-ang...

Better[2] link:

[2] https://www.bigmessowires.com/2016/06/04/db-19-resurrecting-...

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#66

Post by [deleted] »

com2kid wrote: post #60

> In my view the ongoing race to the bottom of slave labour to make cheaper systems is not sustainable. As someone who has worked in consumer electronics, and worked closely with the people who were on the factory line, employees on electronics manufacturing lines are not slave labor. They are often times well paid, with pay that would make for a good living in more rural parts of the US. After having worked on a pro…

[deleted]

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#67

Post by jansan »

the_af wrote: post #51
mlindner wrote: post #37

I really don't understand the love people have for the commodore 64. It wasn't especially advanced for it's time nor was it especially good. Finally it basically required the use of a horrible language like Basic to use. There's like zero reason to re-create it as a retro computer. Then you compare it to things like the Amiga which was incredibly advanced for it's time with amazing graphics and sound that even today…

> I really don't understand the love people have for the commodore 64. It wasn't especially advanced for it's time nor was it especially good. Finally it basically required the use of a horrible language like Basic to use. There's like zero reason to re-create it as a retro computer. Happy to help you understand: Like a lot of people, I owned a C64 and not an Amiga, which was very expensive and uncommon in my country…

Just the other day I ran into this video of a recent C64 demo. It just blew my mind (5:02 is my favorite part). THere were demos at the time I played on the C64, but this is just pushing the limits so far, it is pure art.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q56-23D7omY

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#68

Post by wang_li »

SeanLuke wrote: post #9

> Back in the 1980's, Commodore released the famous Commodore 64 (8 bit computer), and then followed it up with the Commodore 128, and Amiga (16 bit computers). ??? Pretty sure the 128 was an 8-bit computer.

And the amiga was Motorola 68000 based which is a 32 bit processor by any coherent definition.

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#69

Post by Koshkin »

markus_zhang wrote: post #13
DeathArrow wrote: post #7

Since the CPU is emulated by an FPGA, FDD is emulated, then why not save all the money and just use a software emulator?

Maybe holding some real hardware gives much joy? I'm thinking about maybe emulating it using a Pi and buy some peripherals such as external floppy. Not sure if it's doable though.

The real real hardware - sure, but emulated on a FPGA… not so much. But that’s just me.

Emulation in software (and the virtual space in general), on the other hand, is close to perfect these days. In fact, material things get boring pretty fast (and tend to end up in the attic) whereas virtual reality (like games) remain a source of perpetual joy.

Re: My Mega65 has arrived

#70

Post by watmough »

technofiend wrote: post #52
300bps wrote: post #4

I have quite a number of Commodore 64s lying around by virtue of developing a hobby of learning component level repair on them. I'm tempted to buy one of these Mega65s to play around with it but at $832.50 including shipping to the US, it's a bit much. The main reason I am interested in old computers is because I used those old computers back in the day! Really have to hand it to them on the engineering of it though…

Things I'm nostalgic for are slightly older like the VT100 and PDP 11 series. There was something just amazing about the soft blip when turning on the VT100, and something very powerful about clacking away on that keyboard, writing code to do whatever you could think of. But even if someone made a brand new VT 100 with a proper CRT and embedded a PDP 11 equivalent, would I pay $832.50 for it? Nah, probably not. Still…

Enjoy ... https://obsolescence.wixsite.com/obsolescence/pidp-11

The 8 and 11 have been made. There was a PiDP-10 in progress, but not sure what the status is on it currently.

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