On Tue, 16 Feb 2010 11:03:15 -0600, Mark Lloyd
wrote:

On Mon, 15 Feb 2010 22:04:26 -0600, ron_tom
wrote:

[snip]

Could probably find the OS for my
hubby's Commodore 64 ) I think he said it has 3k of memory )

The 20K OS was burnt into ROM on the C-64. The 64 in the name referred to
the 64K of available RAM, though only 38K of it was available for BASIC
programming.

The previous machine, the Commodore VIC-20 (The worlds first color
computer for under $300) came with 5K RAM (3.5K available for BASIC
programs). There was an additional 1K*4 bit RAM for color. It was
possible to add 24K additional RAM using a plug-in cartridge (plus
another 3K and 8K, but the screen makes it non-contiguous)

Right after I hit send, I remembered the VIC. =) I ran into them when I was
fixing friend's computers that wanted me to add in the extra SID chip to
their C-64's for stereo.


Though you can find the OS and many C-64 emulators online
today

The Bally Arcade sold in 1977-78 with the drop in BASIC cartridge had 2K of
RAM and 2K of ROM. It preceded the C-64 by a couple years. You'd be
surprised what you can author in only 2K of RAM if you are creative enough.

I wrote a BASIC expansion (called BASIC PLUS) for the C-64, which was
designed to fit into the lo cartridge address space ($8000-$9FFF). I
really got a lot into that 8K. I added a version for the C-128 too.

I vaguely recall using that. =)

HEX editing printer drivers was my main ML coding at the time, trying to
get obscure printers to work with the C-64/128's at the highest resolutions
possible. My earliest full-color printer with the CMYK ink bands on the
ribbon was a real challenge to get it to work in GEOS. It finally produced
some fairly decent images at something like 280dpi. Quite the feat for what
is originally a 72dpi platform. I had built an NTSC to GIF converter board
and wanted to print some of those captures from my VHS-recorder and VHS
video camera. The days before they contained the tape within the camera
itself. =)

The C-128 with the RAM expansion pack, still hooked up in the basement with
the GEOS operating systems on it, was my first taste of CP/M. When I later
migrated into DOS I realized there was some major Gate's thievery going on.
There was virtually no difference between the two. My previous CP/M
experience making the move totally painless. About the only difference
being that .COM and .BAT files were named by different extensions, which I
forget at the moment.


BTW, these Commodore machines had very slow disk drives. A 1200BPS
modem was faster.

[snip]

A whopping 168k on a single-sided 5.25" floppy! At the allotted 1-2 hour a
day access to BBS's it would take a good 3-7 days to download a new game or
application to fill a 168k floppy. The days when shareware actually meant
SHAREware. Today it's been renamed to freeware after the greedy and
self-serving usurped the title of community shareware. My box of 8" 168k
floppies in storage is even more fun to look at. There's also an
interesting 150 baud modem in that storage pile. It weighs about 30-40
lbs., the size of a medium suitcase. You have to hardwire the phone line,
no modular plugs back then.

Interesting (to me) I found I can type faster than 300 baud modems. Chats
were highly annoying. Did you ever lose connection on a P2P file transfer
in Punter protocol and had to resume it by one party typing GOOGOOGOO...
real fast and the other typing ACKACKACK... ? ("go" and "acknowledge")
Those were the days ... =)

The more interesting thing about these old "slow" machines is that they
weren't all that slow at the time. Programmers had the discipline to
tighten up their code, making every byte count within those limited memory
constraints. I attribute the eventual move from 1MHz to 3.4GHz CPUs being
caused by really sloppy programmers and those that got paid by how many
lines of code as opposed to functionality--bloatware. They wondered why
their programs ran so slow, always blaming the CPU speed instead of their
own terrible programming skills. By using some creative thinking I found a
way to scan all 4 game-controllers' switches and pots in that Bally Pro
Arcade with only 3 short lines of BASIC for a 4-player "Simon" game I
wrote. Those 3 lines becoming a real assist for any later BASIC programs.
Run Windows 3.1 on a present PC machine sometime. Be amazed at the blinding
speed at which it operates.

This off-topic got me interested in searching out emulators for these old
machines. I found a program called MESS at .org. Then on rapidshare I found
a pack of 631 gaming-machine and early computer ROM images to plug into it.
Everything from my first gamer the Odyssey II with PONG (1974-75? still
have it), to Gameboys, Playstations, Kaypros, early Macs, TI's, and
C-128's, etc. It'll be a fun walk through nostalgia-land.

I'm glad someone brought this up. This was a good "net-suck".

[Net-suck: n. Minding your own business on the net and you see some
obscure thing that triggers a memory and you are sucked into the net into a
remote and distant place that had absolutely nothing to do with what you
had intended on accomplishing. The original reason for surfing now just an
obscure memory. Usage: (usually derogatory) "Well there goes 7 hours of my
life I'll never get back, all thanks to that nasty net-suck."]