24 Oct
2004
24 Oct
'04
7:07 a.m.
I think A good write up of this needs to exist.
if someone would care to write it up and provide some graphics and pictures
and advertisements please sent to info(a)smecc.org and I will find a place
for it on the web site... it is indeed unique...
Thanks Ed Sharpe archivist for SMECC
Please check our web site at
http://www.smecc.org
to see other engineering fields, communications and computation stuff we
buy, and by all means when in Arizona drop in and see us.
address:
coury house / smecc
5802 w palmaire ave
glendale az 85301
----- Original Message -----
From: "Fred N. van Kempen" <waltje(a)pdp11.nl>
To: <julesrichardsonuk(a)yahoo.co.uk>uk>; "General Discussion: On-Topic and
Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk(a)classiccmp.org>
Sent: Sunday, October 24, 2004 11:53 AM
Subject: Re: software via radio
Jules,
Was it this list where people were recently
talking about receiving
software via the radio?
Yeah.
Apparently the UK service was called Basicode -
I'm just slogging my way
through a pile of documentation donated to the museum to sort out the
useful stuff and stumbled across an apology letter from the BBC. Seems
they'd moved transmission from Radio 1 VHF to Radio 1 MW and they didn't
exactly tell people in advance :-)
That service existed in Holland, too, at around the same time. They
used simple FSK modulation to send out files.. the programme presenter
would babble for a bit, then say "OK folks, time for the <C64> fans to
hit their RECORD button... counting down 10... 1 <beeeepsqueeeeek>"
Of course, they'd send out several programs for several kinds of puters,
I remember the Commodore ones, the Philips systems (Philips actually did
invent this), some MSX stuff, and programs for the COMX-35. I remember,
because I had both C64 and the COMX, and Basicode was pretty much the
only source of software for that system :(
Now, I'm certain I remember seeing a manual
about Basicode; I just left
it in the pile at the museum that I'm yet to look through as it had
'basic' in the title and so didn't look immediately interesting :-) It
was with a Dragon 32 machine (which also came with a lot of software),
but whether any special hardware was needed I don't know.
I am quite sure Kees
Stravers (kees.stravers atsign xs4all.nl) has
all the info you need.. he worked with that a lot.
Fred
--
Fred N. van Kempen, DEC (Digital Equipment Corporation)
Collector/Archivist
Visit the VAXlab Project at
http://VAXlab.pdp11.nl/
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Email: waltje(a)pdp11.nl BUSSUM, THE NETHERLANDS / Mountain View, CA,
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