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MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

axio.ms

61–70 of 180 posts

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#61
post #26

I had a Saturday job at a computer shop when the Mac came out, and we got one as a demo. I remember just staring at the genius of those rounded corners in the corners of the screen, and thinking how beautiful it was that they'd thought of that.

In case you haven't read it - https://folklore.org/Round_Rects_Are_Everywhere.html

This is brilliant, thanks!

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#62
post #34

The VGA interface is the most impressive part to me somehow.

Yeah, that's what sets the RP2040 apart from other micros. I think of it as being analogous to the recent advent of "software-defined radio" -- the RP2040's PIO are fast enough to allow for software-defined Composite video, software-defined VGA, software-defined DVI, software-defined USB, etc etc etc.

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#63
post #13

I 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/

A500 Mini isn't as cool IMO. It's just a generic arm board running linux with an Amiga emulator. The keys don't even work. May as well just use a Pi or a PC.

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#64
post #38

How 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…

Is the girl from the date with the TV now the wife?

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#65
post #51
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

We need to deal with some important issues you raised. > After the date... She quickly learned I'm no stranger to dumpster adventures. Ah, was there another date? > Recently, I was renovating something with my wife Any relationship to dumpster adventuress?

Yes, according to a llm. He had a particularly touching moment repairing a broken drone he found with his son. Shortly after the story took a dark turn with the cancer diagnosis. As the condition worsened, he made an effort to document his projects, scavenging 3D printers, partly as a manual and partly as a diary. "The knowledge that my kids would have these memories and skills to carry forward, and perhaps pass on to their children, made the days feel meaningful."

Not what I was expecting. Perhaps the model was not a reliable source.

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#66

How 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!

In every city I lived there were either some local recycling facilities/organizations where you can buy old things dirt cheap. So not really found in the streets but easily findable.

Also second hand market offer a lot of obsolete stuff for very little money.

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#67
post #36

How 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 feel like a lot of major urban centers have "that" store whose entire business model is collecting electronics from failing businesses and then selling that. Great way to get a bunch of extremely underpowered Windows laptops or Android tablets. Terrible computing devices in general but if you're lucky it'll work well enough.

not in Poland... :(

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#68

How 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!

A hill I will die on is that tech products should just stop bundling cables, for anything, with the possible exception of unit-specific power adapters. A while back I purchased a KVM switch - it came with 3 DP cables, which went straight into my e-waste box. I've also seen office fit-outs where mountains of cables that came with monitors went straight from factory to landfill because they were the wrong length.

I understand some of the reason it happens - it's not a great experience to buy a product and then be unable to start using it immediately because you don't have the right cables. And there are a lot of low-quality cables out there which might have the right connectors but not actually work - I bought at least 3 different 5m DP cables before I found one that reliably worked at 4K. But surely that can't justify the literal mountains of e-waste the practice creates.

Sadly I don't think it'll ever change without regulation.

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#69
post #68

How 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!

A hill I will die on is that tech products should just stop bundling cables, for anything, with the possible exception of unit-specific power adapters. A while back I purchased a KVM switch - it came with 3 DP cables, which went straight into my e-waste box. I've also seen office fit-outs where mountains of cables that came with monitors went straight from factory to landfill because they were the wrong length. I und…

Printers stopped coming with a USB A-to-B cable many years ago. Who knew that the printer makers were in the right all along?

Re: MicroMac, a Macintosh for under £5

#70
post #68

How 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!

A hill I will die on is that tech products should just stop bundling cables, for anything, with the possible exception of unit-specific power adapters. A while back I purchased a KVM switch - it came with 3 DP cables, which went straight into my e-waste box. I've also seen office fit-outs where mountains of cables that came with monitors went straight from factory to landfill because they were the wrong length. I und…

A really bad one now is devices providing crappy power only usb micro cables, very often these will still have the 4 pin head. I've started instantly binning them to avoid situations where I need to transfer data and can only find these ones lying around
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