26 Mar
2006
26 Mar
'06
12:08 p.m.
Hi, I've got an old C64 that I've been unable to make it work and
don't have time to play with it. Free to anyone that could use it for
parts or fix; has power supply (brick). If you could help me w/
shipping I'd appreciate it.
Please email me if interested. If there is no interest its going to
the trashbin.
L
--
Louis Florit
AIM: lflorit MSN:louis_florit at hotmail.com Y!: indygolunaria
GoogleTalk: florit at gmail.com
26 Mar
26 Mar
1:40 p.m.
On Sunday 26 March 2006 04:08 pm, Louis Florit wrote:
Hi, I've got an old C64 that I've been unable
to make it work and
don't have time to play with it. Free to anyone that could use it for
parts or fix; has power supply (brick). If you could help me w/
shipping I'd appreciate it.
Please email me if interested. If there is no interest its going to
the trashbin.
I've responded to this off-list, but if any of the rest of you guys have or
know of c64s or c128s that might be available for parts please drop me a
line. They don't need to be working, or have power supplies with them
either, and in fact I don't even necessarily need cases and keyboards and
such, though those won't contribute all that much to shipping weight. I
have someone who is looking for certain chips...
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
8:25 p.m.
On 3/27/06, Roy J. Tellason <rtellason at blazenet.net> wrote:
either, and in fact I don't even necessarily need
cases and keyboards and
such, though those won't contribute all that much to shipping weight. I
have someone who is looking for certain chips...
ooh...a SID hunter!! :-)
9:24 p.m.
New subject: Wang 2200 available in New Zealand
Hi all!
I have to move a few items on, I've found myself very short on space, so
quite a few classic comp type bits and pieces have to go.
I have a Wang 2200 (just the machine, no peripherals) available, free to a
good home, in Auckland, NZ. It was given to me a while back but I've never
had time to search for the peripherals. Anyone wanting me to ship this will
have to be VERY persuasive. In a couple of days I'll list it on a local
auction site, sale price to go to charity.
This machine was running when decommissioned, and is in good physical
condition. I haven't powered it up, care would be required due to the length
of time since it was last running.
It has multiple cards, looks like all slots have been populated both
internal and external. The IO cards are two multi-function I/O cards
(keyboard, printer/plotter, disk), a typewriter controller (?), a plotter
controller, cassette, video. Internal cards are harder to identify without
spending research time, but it looks about as RAM-populated as it could be.
Pics are here (large image warning - 316k each):
http://host.fenz.net/DSC07196.JPG
http://host.fenz.net/DSC07198.JPG
http://host.fenz.net/DSC07199.JPG
Info is here (the site of someone very familiar to this list):
http://www.thebattles.net/wang/wang.html
28 Mar
28 Mar
10:37 p.m.
New subject: Wang 2200 available in New Zealand
Michael van Bokhoven wrote:
Hi all!
I have to move a few items on, I've found myself very short on space, so
quite a few classic comp type bits and pieces have to go.
I have a Wang 2200 (just the machine, no peripherals) available, free to a
good home, in Auckland, NZ. It was given to me a while back but I've never
had time to search for the peripherals. Anyone wanting me to ship this will
have to be VERY persuasive. In a couple of days I'll list it on a local
auction site, sale price to go to charity.
This machine was running when decommissioned, and is in good physical
condition. I haven't powered it up, care would be required due to the length
of time since it was last running.
It has multiple cards, looks like all slots have been populated both
internal and external. The IO cards are two multi-function I/O cards
(keyboard, printer/plotter, disk), a typewriter controller (?), a plotter
controller, cassette, video. Internal cards are harder to identify without
spending research time, but it looks about as RAM-populated as it could be.
Pics are here (large image warning - 316k each):
http://host.fenz.net/DSC07196.JPG
http://host.fenz.net/DSC07198.JPG
http://host.fenz.net/DSC07199.JPG
DSC07198.JPG doesn't seem to be there, but DSC07197.JPG does.
Info is here (the site of someone very familiar to
this list):
http://www.thebattles.net/wang/wang.html
heh, heh, it is familiar
The card types are indicated by the numbers on the left side of the 7199
image. The I/O backplane is completely symmetric, but the cards behind
the black cover all have a very specific slot they belong to.
6311+6710+6709 are the CPU. 6311 mostly does control for the I/O bus
that it is adjacent to; 6710 mostly is the ALU (all four bits of it)
plus the eight nibble register file; 6709 is mostly the memory pointer,
the microcode instruction pointer, and the pointer stack.
"ROM" cards: there are two ROM slots but most 2200's fit it all into a
single card as mask ROMs had gotten dense enough pretty early on. These
are the microcode for Wang BASIC. Wang shipped different versions of
BASIC and some options could be added by stuffing in more ROMs (like
MATrix math, and the SORT option). The full blown BASIC occupied 42.5
KB of ROM.
6708 is the timing generator plus it contains a ROM containing the atom
and constant table. in the first generation cpu, the microcode couldn't
read itself. by setting a certain mode bit, reads came from this ROM
instead of from RAM.
RAM: those cards use dynamic RAMs. you'd have to take the cards out and
see how many chips and what type were in it to know how much. the most
ram possible is 32 KB. the cpu has a 16b address, but it is addressing
nibbles, not bytes. the machine is also weird in that in a given cycle
the CPU can either write 4b or read 8b. reads have two addressing
modes: one mode reads nibbles at address PC and (PC ^ 1) to fetch the
two nibbles of a byte; the other mode fetches the nbbles at PC and (PC ^
0x10) to retrieve corresponding nibbles from two locations eight bytes
apart. The latter mode was useful for simultaneously grabbing the
corresponding nibbles of two floating point numbers (in Wang BASIC all
numbers are double precision float, stored in eight bytes in BCD format).
The 2216 display generator is a bit unusual. The stock display
generator for the early machines produced a 64x16 characters. Only 6b
were stored per character, so only upper case letters, numbers, and some
punctuation were available. The 2216 is called a "dual language" card;
it adds another RAM so that there are now 7b per character, and it adds
another character generator ROM, yielding either upper and lower case
ASCII characters, or upper case ascii plus kana characters.
27 Mar
27 Mar
12:41 a.m.
On 3/27/06, Wai-Sun Chia <waisun.chia at gmail.com> wrote:
On 3/27/06, Roy J. Tellason <rtellason at
blazenet.net> wrote:
What do bare SIDs fetch these days? (I wouldn't be parting out
machines - I have the remnants of an old Commodore dealer service
department.
-ethan
either, and in fact I don't even necessarily
need cases and keyboards and
such, though those won't contribute all that much to shipping weight. I
have someone who is looking for certain chips...
ooh...a SID hunter!! :-)
12:43 a.m.
On 3/27/06, Roy J. Tellason <rtellason at blazenet.net> wrote:
I've responded to this off-list, but if any of
the rest of you guys have or
know of c64s or c128s that might be available for parts please drop me a
line. They don't need to be working, or have power supplies with them
either, and in fact I don't even necessarily need cases and keyboards and
such, though those won't contribute all that much to shipping weight. I
have someone who is looking for certain chips...
Well... the two that come immediately to mind are the PLA (since they
die so often), and the SID (since there still isn't a modern
replacement for *that* sound)...
-ethan
11:59 a.m.
On Mon, 27 Mar 2006, Ethan Dicks wrote:
On 3/27/06, Roy J. Tellason <rtellason at
blazenet.net> wrote:
Here's a guy who's doing a very good job at replicating the SID on FPGA.
http://myhdl.jandecaluwe.com/doku.php/projects:phoenixsid_65x81
It's not ready yet, but much of the spec works right now. There are even
some sound samples.
--
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu
I've responded to this off-list, but if any
of the rest of you guys have or
know of c64s or c128s that might be available for parts please drop me a
line. They don't need to be working, or have power supplies with them
either, and in fact I don't even necessarily need cases and keyboards and
such, though those won't contribute all that much to shipping weight. I
have someone who is looking for certain chips...
Well... the two that come immediately to mind are the PLA (since they
die so often), and the SID (since there still isn't a modern
replacement for *that* sound)... 
5:48 p.m.
David Griffith wrote:
Here's a guy who's doing a very good job at
replicating the SID on FPGA.
I am a complete noob on this subject matter (something that is most
likely going to get me booed off the stage in about five seconds) but
wouldn't there be a way to just, I don't know, slice open the chip
somehow and trace things to reproduce the chip exactly? (Ignore
patent/copyright issues for now, I'm just curious in the technical
feasibility of the process.) Is something like that possible?
--
Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/
Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/
Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/
A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/
7:55 p.m.
On Mon, 27 Mar 2006, Jim Leonard wrote:
David Griffith wrote:
Theoretically, the SID handbook published by Commodore should be enough to
recreate the SID. Since NMOS isn't used very much anymore, that may be a
roadblock to making exact copies. There are some xrays of the SID on the
web, which would be a big help.
I'm not very keen on FPGA. Can someone tell me if one can take FPGA
design specs and make a run of masked chips?
--
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu
Here's a guy who's doing a very good job
at replicating the SID on FPGA.
I am a complete noob on this subject matter (something that is most
likely going to get me booed off the stage in about five seconds) but
wouldn't there be a way to just, I don't know, slice open the chip
somehow and trace things to reproduce the chip exactly? (Ignore
patent/copyright issues for now, I'm just curious in the technical
feasibility of the process.) Is something like that possible? 
8:22 p.m.
Theoretically, the SID handbook published by Commodore
should be enough to
recreate the SID.
Tell that to the fanboys. Because SID has some analogue components in it,
it is very difficult to duplicate the sound precisely. Some SID-philes
insist they can discern a difference not only between major versions (6581/2
and 8580) and minor revisions, but even individual chips.
There are some software libraries that closely emulate the SID, such as
Dag Lem's reSID, but making a perfect working modern form that everyone
agrees on has been a minor holy grail.
--
--------------------------------- personal: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ ---
Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- Dalai Lama to hotdog vendor: "Make me one with everything." ----------------
8:36 p.m.
On 3/27/2006 at 9:22 PM Cameron Kaiser wrote:
Tell that to the fanboys. Because SID has some analogue
components in it,
it is very difficult to duplicate the sound precisely. Some SID-philes
insist they can discern a difference not only between major versions
(6581/2 and 8580) and minor revisions, but even individual chips.
...and the best ones are the ones that have vacuum tubes sticking out of
the top and are connected with gold-plated litz wire... :)
--Chuck
8:44 p.m.
Tell that to
the fanboys. Because SID has some analogue components in it,
it is very difficult to duplicate the sound precisely. Some SID-philes
insist they can discern a difference not only between major versions
(6581/2 and 8580) and minor revisions, but even individual chips.
...and the best ones are the ones that have vacuum tubes sticking out of
the top and are connected with gold-plated litz wire... :) 
28 Mar
28 Mar
12:20 a.m.
Chuck Guzis wrote:
...and the best ones are the ones that have vacuum
tubes sticking out of
the top and are connected with gold-plated litz wire... :)
Have you priced Litz wire lately? I don't see any gold plated stuff.
http://www.schmarder.com/radios/sale/wire.htm
I suspect the analog parts could be done as surface mount parts
as well as a CPLD or FPGA on a small PCB.
--Chuck
12:35 a.m.
On 3/28/2006 at 2:20 AM woodelf wrote:
Have you priced Litz wire lately? I don't see any
gold plated stuff.
http://www.schmarder.com/radios/sale/wire.htm
Sheesh, at those prices, it might as well be gold plated! Another sign of
my increasing age, I suppose. I wanted to say "solid silver speaker cable",
but that would be too large for IC use, so I thought of litz wire--the best
excuse for owning a solder pot.
Cheers,
Chuck
4:16 a.m.
At 03:35 AM 3/28/2006, Chuck Guzis wrote:
Sheesh, at those prices, it might as well be gold
plated! Another sign of
my increasing age, I suppose. I wanted to say "solid silver speaker cable",
but that would be too large for IC use, so I thought of litz wire--the best
excuse for owning a solder pot.
You learn something new every day. I remember that wire as being
used in some crystal set-ish earphones I had as a kid, and I never
knew the name to describe it.
- John
4:31 a.m.
At 07:16 AM 3/28/2006, John Foust wrote:
You learn something new every day. I remember that
wire as being
used in some crystal set-ish earphones I had as a kid, and I never
knew the name to describe it.
Hmm, after examining litz-wire.com, I'm not so sure any more.
What I remember is that the conductive part of the wire was
a thin ribbon and wound around a silky core like a tight candy cane,
and there were several strands of this inside the plastic sheath.
- John
7:14 a.m.
On 3/28/2006 at 7:31 AM John Foust wrote:
Hmm, after examining litz-wire.com, I'm not so sure
any more.
What I remember is that the conductive part of the wire was
a thin ribbon and wound around a silky core like a tight candy cane,
and there were several strands of this inside the plastic sheath.
Litz wire was very useful for winding high-Q LF and MF inductors. Used to
be that most IF transformers and quite a few RF chokes were wound with it.
I guess it was pretty much rendered obsolete with the advent of ferrites.
From the looks of it, it's now almost the exclusive
domain of antique radio
enthusiasts.
Cheers,
Chuck
11:01 a.m.
New subject: Commodore 64 for grabs - litz wire
Chuck Guzis wrote:
Litz wire was very useful for winding high-Q LF and MF
inductors. Used to
be that most IF transformers and quite a few RF chokes were wound with it.
I guess it was pretty much rendered obsolete with the advent of ferrites.
That is mostly new Xtal or one or two tube radios.Cost cutting from hand
labor to the most cheapest transformer made is the real reason I bet.
If you want a real coil look at all the hard work to make one.
http://www.detektor-radios.de/gollum/
From the looks of it, it's now almost the
exclusive domain of antique radio
enthusiasts. Cheers,
Chuck
.
27 Mar
27 Mar
8:24 p.m.
Theoretically, the SID handbook published by Commodore
should be enough to
recreate the SID. Since NMOS isn't used very much anymore, that may be a
roadblock to making exact copies.
Also, I should point out that while both the 6581/2 and 8580 are NMOS, the
later 8580 is technically HMOS-2, which is a Commodore-specific high speed
NMOS manufacturing process. In addition, the 8580 *is* different w/r/t
waveforms, and corrects a voltage leak which was widely exploited as a cheap
4-bit D/A converter ($d418).
--
--------------------------------- personal: http://www.armory.com/~spectre/ ---
Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckaiser at floodgap.com
-- #include <std_disclaimer.h> ------------------------------------------------
29 Mar
29 Mar
7:05 p.m.
Cameron Kaiser wrote:
In addition, the 8580 *is* different w/r/t
waveforms, and corrects a voltage leak which was widely exploited as a cheap
4-bit D/A converter ($d418).
Yes, us fanboyz at the time called it the "Best. Hack. Ever." IIRC, the
trick still works in the 8580 but is *much* quieter.
--
Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/
Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/
Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/
A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/
8:40 p.m.
In addition,
the 8580 *is* different w/r/t
waveforms, and corrects a voltage leak which was widely exploited as a cheap
4-bit D/A converter ($d418).
Yes, us fanboyz at the time called it the "Best. Hack. Ever." IIRC, the
trick still works in the 8580 but is *much* quieter.
27 Mar
27 Mar
8:25 p.m.
David Griffith wrote:
On Mon, 27 Mar 2006, Jim Leonard wrote:
...
I just did a google search and there is a patent on the chip -- it has
already expired. US Patent 4,677,890.
The chip is a hybrid digital/analog chip. Duplicating it via pure
digital means would be hard. Apparently too the chip had bugs and so
are unspecified, but people exploited those bugs for generating sound
effects.
David Griffith wrote:
Theoretically, the SID handbook published by Commodore should be enough to
recreate the SID. Since NMOS isn't used very much anymore, that may be a
roadblock to making exact copies. There are some xrays of the SID on the
web, which would be a big help. Here's a guy who's doing a very good job
at replicating the SID on FPGA.
I am a complete noob on this subject matter
(something that is most
likely going to get me booed off the stage in about five seconds) but
wouldn't there be a way to just, I don't know, slice open the chip
somehow and trace things to reproduce the chip exactly? (Ignore
patent/copyright issues for now, I'm just curious in the technical
feasibility of the process.) Is something like that possible?
10:24 p.m.
On Mon, 27 Mar 2006, Jim Battle wrote:
The chip is a hybrid digital/analog chip. Duplicating
it via pure
digital means would be hard. Apparently too the chip had bugs and so
are unspecified, but people exploited those bugs for generating sound
effects.
The hybrid nature comes more from using digital components for analog
purposes. A "proper" state-variable filter is made with opamps or a
Moog-style transistor ladder. The SID's filters are made with digital
inverters and that's where a lot of the unique flavor comes from. Because
the PhoenixSID's filter is made of discrete CMOS inverters, I'm guessing
that pulling such a stunt in FPGA is difficult.
--
David Griffith
dgriffi at cs.csubak.edu
28 Mar
28 Mar
12:09 a.m.
David Griffith wrote:
On Mon, 27 Mar 2006, Jim Leonard wrote:
Theoretically, the SID handbook published by Commodore
should be enough to
recreate the SID. Since NMOS isn't used very much anymore, that may be a
roadblock to making exact copies. There are some xrays of the SID on the
web, which would be a big help.
I'm not very keen on FPGA. Can someone tell me if one can take FPGA
design specs and make a run of masked chips?
A CPLD design might be better since they are cheaper, if you can fit
the design in one and a adaptor to the 40 pin packaging.
6673
days inactive
6677
days old
24 comments
12 participants
participants (12)
-
bfranchuk＠jetnet.ab.ca -
cclist＠sydex.com -
dgriffi＠cs.csubak.edu -
ethan.dicks＠gmail.com -
florit＠gmail.com -
frustum＠pacbell.net -
jfoust＠threedee.com -
mike＠ambientdesign.com -
rtellason＠blazenet.net -
spectre＠floodgap.com -
trixter＠oldskool.org -
waisun.chia＠gmail.com