Very nice finding a random VGA cable on the road. Happened to me once or twice, but never when I wanted one of them.
Thrift store?
I often see those at flea markets / garage sales, sometimes by the metric ton (OK, exaggerating a bit).
MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
41–50 of 180 posts
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#42Why not store emulated RAM on disk and get the full 512KB experience? Killing the drive from overuse?
Surely the flash speed of the RP2040 surpasses the RAM speed of the original Mac.
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#43Holy cow. I took a stab at hacking vMac to run on an ESP32 and gave up (it’s been done on some models, but not on the one I had handy), but this is several levels above and beyond. I take off my metaphorical hat to you, sir.
I ran Mini vMac on a Raspberry Pi and got a decent looking Mac clone.
https://imgur.com/gallery/raspberry-pi-running-mini-vmac-cus...
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#44I was considering doing something like that for an Amiga, running AmigaOS 3.2. It's a cute idea, especially once you 3D print a shell that looks like the original (shrunken down). I do think that the lack of an old school floppy drive means that something is kinda missing from the experience, but I do like the idea of having a machine dedicated to running this instead of just firing up an emulator on my existing desk…
You could check out the A500 mini, more of an emulator though - https://retrogames.biz/products/thea500-mini/
Yeah, I have one, and the keyboard being non-functional is a real bummer. It's a neat mini console (especially once you add some additional games), but I wish they would make a version with a working keyboard, like they made TheC64. But the quality of the case is great, and the tank mouse definitely is the way to use workbench)
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#45How are these people finding VGA cables in the street :S I needed like 10 or so VGA cables recently for an art installation and asked everyone I could and nobody had any lying around... I ended up having to buy new ones which seems a shame considering how many are thrown away!
You would be surprised how much trash there is in the city around us, that you suddenly start noticing when you have a diy project. Let me share you some moments of my own with you. I was leaving university campus with my buddies, talking about building magnetic card reader to check contents of my campus library card. Just as I was explaining magnetic heads to one of the guys I see a random cassette player few meters…
Unfortunately, some of use are not so lucky, at least I am not, haha.
I got the idea to tinker with satellite dishes to make a simple radio telescope. I remember riding around and constantly seeing old DirectTV satellite dishes constantly on the side of the road for trash. Before this idea. So I figured, oh, I can easily get my hands on one. As soon as I committed to that project, I never saw a single satellite dish sitting by the street as I rode around.
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#46How are these people finding VGA cables in the street :S I needed like 10 or so VGA cables recently for an art installation and asked everyone I could and nobody had any lying around... I ended up having to buy new ones which seems a shame considering how many are thrown away!
You would be surprised how much trash there is in the city around us, that you suddenly start noticing when you have a diy project. Let me share you some moments of my own with you. I was leaving university campus with my buddies, talking about building magnetic card reader to check contents of my campus library card. Just as I was explaining magnetic heads to one of the guys I see a random cassette player few meters…
My personal favourite save is a Bosch dishwasher that was kerbside. The drain motor was stuck, had melted plastic around the impeller. I have it in my workshop but it’s better than the one in the house.
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#47Want! Looks like fun.
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#48How are these people finding VGA cables in the street :S I needed like 10 or so VGA cables recently for an art installation and asked everyone I could and nobody had any lying around... I ended up having to buy new ones which seems a shame considering how many are thrown away!
The thrift stores in my area have tonnes of VGA cables. If you're the type of person who regularly visits thrift stores, taking the time to go through the cables and wall-warts is worth it. The staff don't know what they have and everything is priced more-or-less the same. You can end up getting some quality and rare cables for a pittance. It is one of the few sections of modern thrift stores that feel like thrift st…
> It is one of the few sections of modern thrift stores that feel like thrift stores of old.
Also home theater speakers.
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#49How are these people finding VGA cables in the street :S I needed like 10 or so VGA cables recently for an art installation and asked everyone I could and nobody had any lying around... I ended up having to buy new ones which seems a shame considering how many are thrown away!
I get most of my “old” tech by volunteering community computer refurbishing places. Good way to meet people and stock up on tech supplies at the same time!
Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5
#50Why not store emulated RAM on disk and get the full 512KB experience? Killing the drive from overuse? Surely the flash speed of the RP2040 surpasses the RAM speed of the original Mac.
If only the RP2040 supported SPI PSRAM!