exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

PhilC wrote: 23 Sep 2024 21:20

stephen_usher wrote: 22 Sep 2024 20:43

Yes, and another recent (2019) book


IMG_3975.jpeg

Would you be willing to art with those Stephen? Obviously for whatever you think they are worth. I'll keep them with my C128 & 128D.

Btw, those plus 4 keys are made of very cheap weak plastic, if you do need to remove one be careful as the centre square pins snap off so very easily.

I'll second that about the weak key posts, IIRC the C128 uses the same or similar and they are very fragile.

stephen_usher wrote: 22 Sep 2024 20:20 Sorting through the horde, some interesting finds, other than the HTC Clio 110 Windows Mobile phone/Atom based Windows tablet with slide-out keyboard...

A set of Atari 800XL manuals but not Atari 800XL.

A complete set of Commodore 128 manuals, including the programmer's guide... but no C128.

RISCOS ANSI C compiler and documentation.

Two AMX mice, one set with User Port connector and ROMs, the other older version with documentation but no ROMs.

Do you still have the 800XL manuals? If so I'd be interested, thanks.

Obviously I do understand somebody has already asked for them so I'm the backup asker :)

stephen_usher wrote: 24 Sep 2024 11:50 Yay! My dad's house sale has been pushed back yet again. :-/

Was supposed to exchange contracts last Thursday/Friday/Yesterday with completion on Thursday. Now that's been postponed to either the 2nd or 8th October.

It's not my direct buyers who are the problem, it the ones one link up the chain. My buyers are pulling their hair out.

Ahh damn, that sucks big time. Selling is such a traumatic experience, and these sorts of shenanigans just drive you mad.

rubber_jonnie wrote: 24 Sep 2024 13:15

PhilC wrote: 23 Sep 2024 21:20

Would you be willing to art with those Stephen? Obviously for whatever you think they are worth. I'll keep them with my C128 & 128D.

Btw, those plus 4 keys are made of very cheap weak plastic, if you do need to remove one be careful as the centre square pins snap off so very easily.

I'll second that about the weak key posts, IIRC the C128 uses the same or similar and they are very fragile.

I do have a spare Plus 4 keyboard somewhere, already minus some keys, so if you need a key or two then give me a shout.

PhilC wrote: 24 Sep 2024 13:24 [I do have a spare Plus 4 keyboard somewhere, already minus some keys, so if you need a key or two then give me a shout.

There are two (at least) completely different types of Plus4 keyboard apparently. One is an Alps dome, like the ST, and the other is Mitsumi with the conductive rubber fingers, like the TT.

stephen_usher wrote: 24 Sep 2024 11:51

Hellraiseruk wrote: 23 Sep 2024 21:14 Oooh, might be interested in those if you feel a need to part with them....

JD

Yeah, I'll have to see how to send them in the post, and find an envelope large enough.

That would be most excellent 👌

JD

The machine screws and speaker for the Electron have arrived. Should be able to get that fully complete in short order.

stephen_usher wrote: 26 Sep 2024 14:25 The machine screws and speaker for the Electron have arrived. Should be able to get that fully complete in short order.

:yay:

The Electron... It beeps! It screws together! :-)

Yesterday I was off work trying to get a GP appointment... Managed to get a "physician associate" appointment instead and, most importantly antibiotics.

Anyway, that left me with the afternoon spare so, having noticed that the upper "pin 2" of both the Commodore 64 tape port and the Plus/4 user port were both +5V and the SD2IEC virtual floppy drive used the cassette port for power I thought, why not make the adapter fit so the SD2IEC can work on both machines?

So, out with the Dremel... Bwahahahaha!


The result... it works!


Found how to load the file browser/launcher application...


Downloaded a game and put it onto the SD card to test...


Yay! I can now use more than just the built in office suite and the diag cartridge.

Modern games, which are written with the Plus/4 rather than C16 in mind, actually look quite nice. The sound is nothing like the C64, more the BBC Micro, but it's generally OK and good enough for most games. There's even a port of the C64 version of Elite which seems to play just as well as the Beeb version but with more colours.

I can see why the machine didn't take off though... The C16 killed it. All the original games are targeted at that cheap machine which had too little memory and they are quick, cheap and awful games and none take advantage of the Plus/4's extra memory.