General Stuff(tm)

[stephen_usher]

Yeah, the FDX expansion unit back in the 1980s came with CP/M.

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[mrbombermillzy]

That machine seriously looks 20+ years ahead of its time, cosmetically. Im really liking the design.

[stephen_usher]

And all brushed aluminium. None of this ABS plastic rubbish.

[bigbloke]

So many memories there in that picture. I had an MTX512 and the FDX box. The FDX was huge and connected with a really ungainly giant ribbon cable out of the back of the MTX where your MFX is now sitting (it also gave the MTX the two 25way RS232 connectors that were listed on the connection panel). If you look at the plastic strip within the MTX (where all the connectors come out) you'll see a depression to get the ribbon cable out. It meant the keyboard had to be kept in the same place, relative to the FDX, as there wasn't much play in the system.

Unfortunately I sold all my MTX gear to fund my Atari ST for uni. Seeing prices now, that's a real downer!

So my claim to MTX fame is I wrote the game Dr Frankie (sold by Syntaxsoft). A sort of manic miner game. I miss those old days of Z80 assembler coding.

[stephen_usher]

Did you use the built-in assembler and debugger?

(I thought I saw a frank.mtx or frankie.mtx on the CF card but I was mistaken.)

[bigbloke]

I certainly did. I also wrote a basic compiler, to speed up writing some of the non timing critical game code. I'd write chunks of code in basic and then optimise the assembler code and incorporate into the game. It's all lost now, the only copy of Dr Frankie I have is running in the Memotech emulator I downloaded onto an old PC. The only evidence I have that I was even involved in all this is my "contract" from Syntaxsoft, for £1 for each game sold. I got £86 which seemed a fortune to a 16yr old!

[stephen_usher]

[mrbombermillzy]

@bigbloke Thats a really great story.

Details like these are so often lost to time. These days its easy to document/record everything, but it was such a different story back then.

Thanks for your contribution. I LOVE hearing stuff like this

[stephen_usher]

The RGB2HDMI has now arrived. I'm going to have to make up some more cables for the other systems. It's only the TTL version so not suitable for the 16 bit machines.

[stephen_usher]

I've now had a chance to sand down the 3D printed end plate for the MFX and spray it with sealant lacquer. I should have sanded it a bit more I see now but it doesn't look too bad and at first glance does look as if it could be an aluminium plate.

What do you think?

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