Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting), Quinn Dunki, and Jack Nutting

Topic: Learning programming using retrocomputers

Learning programming today using retrocomputing technology? Is this a good idea?

Topic and feedback notes:

• Beginning Programming Using Retro Computing (Gerald Friedland)
• MicroM8
• Usborne computer and coding books
• 8-bit guy complete Commodore 128 restoration and board repair
• GERmulator 8800 (part 4)
• SeaMonkey
• iMazing

Retro Computing News:

• BassoonTracker, an Amiga MOD tracker that runs in a browser
  • Blog post about BassoonTracker release 0.3.0
• John Pfaff got reacquainted with an Apple IIe from his parents’ attic
• F18A MK2 maybe soon? Maybe exists?
• Tom Greene’s collection of 44 ALA software titles
  • ALA software playable on the Internet Archive
  • “joeentropy” wrote a couple of ALA titles
  • Derwyn Joseph Booker v. Commissioner (Tax Ct. 1996)
  • Bevel M. and Patricia N. Hoffpauir v. Commissioner (Tax Ct. 1996)
  • Allen v. Columbia Financial Management Ltd. (S.C. Ct. App. 1983)
  • Jason Scott’s tweet re: ALA Software

Upcoming Shows:

• Computer Conservation Society lecture series, Manchester and London
• Retro Gathering, Västerås, Sweden, Feb 23, 2019
• VCF Pacific Northwest, Living Computers: Museum+Labs, Seattle, WA, Mar 23-24, 2019
• GORF (The Great Oz-stralian Retro-technology Festival), Melbourne, Apr 24-28, 2019
• WOzFest 12:00, Sydney, Apr 27, 2019
• QFest 12, Brisbane, Apr 27, 2019
• VCF East, InfoAge Science Center, Wall, NJ, May 3-5, 2019
• CoCoFest, Lombard, IL, May 4-5, 2019
• KansasFest, Kansas City, MO, Jul 15-21, 2019
• Fujiama 2019, Lengenfeld, Germany, Aug 26-Sep 4, 2019

Vintage Computer-related Commercial:

• Tandy 102

Retro Computing Gift Idea:

• Makey Makey Classic
• Also mentioned: Otamatone

Auction Picks:

• Jack: Choplifter for 7800, “works”
  • See also: About the Choplifter glitch
• Paul: Recapped Apple IIe cards
  • eMac cat bed
  • G3 B/W stealth serial port
  • Apple logo items
  • Tandy 102, Siemens SD-80 PABX stuff?
  • TI 99/4a, with Apple sticker
  • Many many PC disks
  • VM-4509 monitor, cheap-ish
  • VIC-1541 drive, couldn’t test, no cords. See other auction for one with cords.

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting), Jack Nutting, and Carrington Vanston

Topic: The oldest software you’re still using

What programs do you still find use for today that originated back in the hazy past? Why are you doing this to yourself?

Topic and feedback notes:

• Xcode pipeline for Apple II development
• CROSS-CHASE
• JVC Floppy Disk Adapter MultiMediaCard-to-3.5” CU-VFM40U
• Sony Mavica memory stick to 3.5” floppy adapter
• Apple Presents: Computer Capers

Retro Computing News:

• Advanced Mac Substitute
  • Ars Technica article on Advanced Mac Substitute
• Real life Tron on an Apple IIGS
  • Real life Tron commentary
• This year’s 10-line BASIC contest
  • Poke Pig
  • Mini-character-editor
• Big Mess O’ Wires: Yellowstone goes open source
• Big Mess O’ Wires: The end of the ROMinator
• Big Mess O’ Wires: Floppy Emu adds WOZ support
• Apple II Desktop alpha released
• Cross-development for a 2600 using a C64 and a Starpath Supercharger

Upcoming Shows:

• Retro Gathering, Västerås, Sweden, Feb 23, 2019
• VCF Pacific Northwest, Living Computers: Museum+Labs, Seattle, WA, Mar 23-24, 2019
• VCF East, InfoAge Science Center, Wall, NJ, May 3-5, 2019
• CoCoFest, Lombard, IL, May 4-5, 2019
• KansasFest, Kansas City, MO, Jul 15-21, 2019
• Fujiama 2019, Lengenfeld, Germany, Aug 26-Sep 4, 2019

Vintage Computer-related Commercial:

• Starpath Supercharger

Retro Computing Gift Ideas:

• Max Headroom: The complete series boxset

Auction Picks:

• Carrington: Friden FlexoWriter
  • Silver-Seiko Silver Reed Exp 400 daisy wheel printer
  • See also: 1971 Royal (Silver-Seiko) Swinger typewriter
• Paul: PET 2001 manual
  • Mouse holster
  • Gravis MouseStick and GMPU
  • Apple III license plate and an ID-the-old-Apple-stuff game
  • TI 99/4a CC 9900 Micro-Expansion System
  • Some 3” disks

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting) and Carrington Vanston (not hosting)

Topic: The eBay-er Necessities

For finding retrocomputing-related stuff, eBay is the main place to go. How does it work? How can you find things? What should you be careful about? Turns out, there’s a lot to say about this.

Topic and feedback notes:

• PCW-8256: Guide for connecting a 3.5″ drive”
• PCW-8256: Replacement disk drive belts”
• PCW-8256: Disk images
• Nerdly Pleasures blog
• PSA: Get your batteries out

Retro Computing News:

• New Hampshire to commemorate BASIC with historial marker
• Barbara Keremedjiev has re-opened the American Computer & Robotics Museum in Bozeman, MT, created by her late husband, George Keremedjiev
• Direct3D team office has a wall of GPU history
• Darkstar: Xerox Star emulator now available
• Introducing Darkstar
• ROMchip journal, call for submissions
• Apple Lisa turns 36

Upcoming Shows:

• CoCoFEST, Lombard Illinois, May 4-5, 2019
• VCF East, InfoAge Science Center, Wall, NJ, May 3-5, 2019
• Fujiama 2019, Lengenfeld, Germany, August 26-September 4, 2019

Vintage Computer-related Commercial:

• Xerox Star Professional Workstation

Retro Computing Gift Ideas:

• BX Foundry BX-110 joystick

Auction Picks:

• Carrington: Macintosh Color Classic with Mystic 040 board upgrade and Apple IIe card
• Paul: Popular Electronicses
  • EMMA II 6502 trainer
    • See also: Information/manuals for EMMA and EMMA II
  • CBM 4040
  • Mac2USB
  • Fix Your Own Computer
  • Using Word 97
  • Encyclopedia of Computer Science, 1976
  • Xerox 820-II

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting) and Jack Nutting (not hosting)

Topic: Virtual retrocomputing

For things you can’t physically interact with, how would you like to see or experience retrocomputers? What’s important to you for, say, an internet-accessible museum? Photos, movies, emulation? In-browser? Documentation? “Everything, all the things” is a possible answer, but realistically, what would you use, and what might the use case be? What is frustrating about existing online repositories you’ve used? Is there anything that you’d find more useful than things you’ve seen already? There’s a lot of possible information, maybe too much to really digest in one place.

Topic and feedback notes:

• Homebrew Club (augmented reality iOS app)
• Hidden Powers of the Model 100 (Christopher L. Morgan)
• Pete Foley reminiscing about a RISC-based implementation of the 6502 nearly created within Apple

Retro Computing News:

• Atari800MacX 5.0 released (brings sound back in newer Mac OSes X)
• ContrAlto emulator (LCM+L)
• IRATA online
• Robert Justice on cross-compiling Apple /// drivers, Apple /// copy-protection
• Kevin Savetz’s 10-line basic tool for helping write 10-line basic games
• Preserving a floppy disk with a logic analyzer and a serial cable

Vintage Computer-related Commercials:

• Amstrad PCW-8256
• Xerox Alto

Retro Computing Gift Ideas:

• John Aycock’s “6502: The Card Game”

Auction Picks:

• Paul: Run a Raspberry Pi using your Apple II as… a… power supply?
  • Pi1541 kit
  • Amstrad e-mailer plus
  • Amstrad PCW-8256
  • Be a computer literate
  • NeXTstation TurboColor simplified
  • SOL-20
  • PDP 11/440

Closing discussion notes:

• Busting legends of the QWERTY keyboard
• TextWare’s FITALY stamp
• Dave Gorman’s Modern Life is Goodish s01e01 (poor copyright-robot-dodging version)

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Earl Evans (hosting), Ken Gagne, and Paul Hagstrom

Topic: Bring on 2019

What plans are on the horizon for 2019? [Perhaps the same question as “What didn’t you manage to get to in 2018?”] There are some new products, new archives, any plans about things that are newly available as of 2019? Can we make it through this without making the New Year’s Resolution joke? No? Yeah, I didn’t really think so.

Topic and feedback notes:

• Pods (WordPress plugin)
• Juiced.GS
• Gaming Patreon at PAX East 2018 (Polygamer podcast)
• Epic Apple II versus Commodore 64 Chess Match
• Chicken Lips Radio podcast
• Next Without For podcast
• Drop /// Inches podcast
• Transporter Lock – A Star Trek: Discovery podcast
• Strong Bad draws a diskette
• Accenture demos the “Pocket Supercomputer”
• Pocket Supercomputer video demo
• Video search makes phone a second pair of eyes (New Scientist)
• Puma is rereleasing its classic 1986 RS-Computer running shoe (The Verge)
• Puma Shoes for the Apple II (Apple II Bits blog)
• Apple II papercraft design
• Electronics is Fun
• Plipbox design and firmware
• C65 classroom computer prototype

Retro Computing News:

• Apollo Guidance Computer Restoration (YouTube playlist)
• Restoring an Apollo Guidance Computer (Hackaday)
• Charles Mangin releases DROPBLOCKS and BLOCKCHAIN
• BLOCKCHAIN on Internet Archive
• Freeload/Ocean Loader tape speeder-upper-and-protector
• C74-6502, a 6502 in 7400 series logic chips
• Forum comments about C74-6502 project
• flashx20 for HX-20
• Blurry photo of TRS-80 DVI in action

Vintage Computer-related Commercial:

• Radio Shack TRS-80 Computer Commercial (1978)

Retro Computing Gift Ideas:

• Robot Odyssey I: Escape from Robotropolis (Fred D’Ignazio)
• Hear also: Fred D’Ignazio interviewed on ANTIC

Auction Picks:

• Earl: Commodore PET 4032
  • See also: Perspectives on PET
• Ken: Puma RS-Computer (2018)
  • Snake Byte
• Paul: ALF’s Apple Music II demo record
  • 3M Whisper Writer 1000
  • Memorex banner paper
  • Commodore plus/4 and printer
  • ZX-80s, ZX-81
  • Jingle Disk 1986 (Apple/PC)
  • Jingle Disk 1985 (Apple/C64)
  • See also: Jingle Disk video on YouTube

Closing discussion notes:

• Blake Patterson’s helping of 8-bit holiday cheer

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting), Earl Evans, and Jack Nutting

Topic: Feedback

Lots of feedback (mostly links people sent in), so we go through some of that.

Topic and feedback notes:

• PC Classic
• Doors and Dungeons Gaming Podcast
• TRS-80 Prototype tape system
• If PHP were British
• GuruNet for the Amiga
• Stagecast Creator
• The Coming Crisis in Home Computers
• How to design an 8-bit Z-80 computer, part 1
• How to design an 8-bit Z-80 computer, part 2

Retro Computing News:

• Walk Around an 80s City with LASERDISC! The Domesday Project
• Mini vMac for iPad
• ISS astronaut finds NASA floppy disks in space
• Mac Portable ejects a disk in space
• No Such Thing as a Fish, episode 243
• 1987 Ardent Titan Graphics Supercomputer
• COBOL all the way down
• Bill Godbout, early power in S-100 design, passed away
• George Keremedjiev, founder of Bozeman, MT’s American Computer Museum passed away
  • See also: Floppy Days episode 5
  • See also: Retrocomputing Roundtable episode 177 (Aug 26, 2018)

Vintage Computer-related Commercial:

• Prodigy

Retro Computing Gift Ideas:

• TRS-80 shirt (Radio Shack)
• The Almighty C shirt (Commodore)

Auction Picks:

• Earl: Commodore 2031 Computer Single Disk Drive
• Paul: Slomo ZX Spctrum Pacesetter
  • CoCo mini disk drive with poncho
  • Miniature PowerMac 8500
  • CompuServe Starter Kit
  • PDP 11/35 system
  • Turtle Tot Educational robot
  • SEGA SC-3000
  • See also: SEGA SC-3000 survivors

Closing discussion notes:

• #tweetcart
• VidHD orders open

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Earl Evans (hosting), Paul Hagstrom, and Carrington Vanston

Topic: OK. OK. What’s next?

How do you pick what to do next with your retro computer hobby and collection? Free time can be unpredictable, and sometimes projects get started and then stuck in limbo. Also, related – what is your “white whale” project that you’d like to do “someday” but you know in reality you might never get to it.

Topic and feedback notes:

• GATE (in modern macOS, try Gate.app/Contents/MacOS/Gate\ Release from Terminal to run)
• Robot Odyssey I emulated online
• The Hardest Computer Game of All Time
• Let It Beep (Welcome to Macintosh podcast)
• 1995 One More Thing interview with Jim Reekes

Retro Computing News:

• How many computers are in your computer?
• Atariprojects.org
• Eric Raymond’s Things Every Hacker Once Knew document
• KbooHK WDrive floppy emulator
• Call-A.P.P.L.E. review of KbooHK WDrive
• How big is the Atari 8-bit community?
• Sonore Model 100 software arcive
• Apple II disk server
• Apple II game server

Vintage Computer-related Commercials:

• Honeywell Computers – Automated Office
• Prime Computer

Retro Computing Gift Idea:

• Digirule2

Auction Picks:

• Carrington: Apple II Interface Accessory Function Strip
• Earl: Commodore calculator
  • Much cheaper Commodore calculator
• Paul: ET-3400, EWA-3400
  • Sears Telegames System heavy 6 with box and everything
  • Exidy Sorcerer lot
  • Tandy 200
  • Mailstation Mivo 100
  • Mailstation 150
  • See also: Mailstation info pages
  • See also: Mailstation Yahoo group
  • See also: The Only 8 Gadgets You Need (Forbes)

Closing discussion notes:

• Mosaic 1.0 turned 25 years old

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting), Michael Mulhern, and Carrington Vanston

Topic: Getting and Regretting

What vintage computer did you get… and regret?

Topic and feedback notes:

• LowEndMac’s Road Apples
• Our Founder
• Docubyte
• Macs in Austria need a home

Retro Computing News:

• The Adventures of Captain Midnight: an Early History of Pay TV Scrambling (Paleotronic)
• Ken Sherriff – Fixing an IBM 1401 printer
• Paul Allen obituary
• Virtual BASIC
• Magic GOTO (for Apple II)
• Slammer (for Apple II)
• VIC20 full motion video (192×160 12fps)
• Jan Derogee’s page
• Internet Archive now does Commodore PET
• Retrochallenge results
• Inside NeXT book

Vintage Computer Commercials:

• Apple Macintosh Quadra
• Palm VII
• I’m a Mac

Retro Computing Gift Idea:

• Floppy disk clocks
• Floppy disk note pads

Auction Picks:

• Carrington: Macintosh Quadra 630
• Michael: Fujitsu FM R-30 FD
• Paul: Megabucks from your microcomputer
  • See also: Megabucks from your Microcomputer (review)
  • Not actually a TAM
  • “Sinclair ZX Spectrum”
  • Alcatel Telic
  • Apple’s best cable ever

Closing discussion notes:

• Judge John Hodgman talked a little bit about Dark Castle

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting), Jack Nutting, and Carrington Vanston

Topic: Playing today’s games in 1000 years

To what extent should “we” expect to be able to play the games of today in 1000 years.
What challenges might there be? To what extent can the experience survive? Is there anything
we can do to make this work?

Topic and feedback notes:

• Playing today’s games in a thousand years
• Crypt of Civilization
• The Long Now
• Oldenburger Computer Museum
• HCC computer club

Retro Computing News:

• Conserve the Sound
• CHIP-maker NTC now defunct
• Gigatron, TTL microcomputer
• Return of the Obra Dinn
• 1959 Wurlitzer Sideman
• Mr Wonderful helped kill the educational computer games industry [AV Club]
• The rise and fall of The Learning Company [Theoutline.com]
• Apple Logo source code on github (within the PDP-10 ITS repository)
• Tweet: Lars Brinkhoff found the source code and compiled it.
• Tweet: Lars announces GitHub location.

Vintage Computer-related Commercial

• 3M Diskettes

Retro Computing Gift Idea:

• Cubetto: Screenless Coding Toy

Auction Picks:

• Carrington: Basic BASIC-English Dictionary for the Apple, PET, & TRS-80
  • Or buy it on AbeBooks for $1100.99
• Paul: Romantic Robot Multiface 1 for ZX Spectrum
  • Interview 20 plus network tester
  • Calmpute for the IBM PC
  • People Didn’t Punch this tape
  • New Apple II clone case
  • Hot Wheels PC
  • See also: PowerBook 170 JLPGA
  • 8” 3M diskettes

Closing discussion notes:

• Assembly Lines video podcast
• Michael Harrison 1982 interview with Steve Wozniak

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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September 30, 2018. Panelists: Paul Hagstrom (hosting), Earl Evans, Michael Mulhern, and Carrington Vanston

Topic: Having no topic didn’t help

In an attempt to keep the time under control, we skipped the host topic. Spoiler: It didn’t work.

Topic and feedback notes:

• EEVblog visits the Australian Computer Museum site, part 1
• EEVblog visits the Australian Computer Museum site, part 2
• ob. Omnivore link
• Halfway to telecommuting
• Restoring a ThinkPad 701 using CF media
• Jason Scott will come help image big Apple II disk collections
• S-80 Retro

Retro Computing News:

• Playing today’s games in a thousand years
• Federico Faggin: The Real Silicon Man
• TRS80 images online by Peter Cetinski
• Retrobrite with blue LED bulbs?
• The history of a security hole
• C64 emulation joins the Internet Archive
• Emulate ZX Spectrum on emulated Commodore 64 on emulated DOS on emulated Windows on Linux
• Two-bit history on where VIM came from
• Two-bit history on what Ada Lovelace’s program actually did

Vintage Computer-related Commercials

• Colossus – The Forbin Project trailer
• Epson HX-20
• WarGames trailer

Retro Computing Gift Idea:

• Trifecta of computer nuke movies:
  • Colossus – The Forbin Project
  • WarGames
  • Terminator
  • See also: Apple II Bits blog on the Terminator’s 6502 code

Auction Picks:

• Carrington: “Vintage” “Antique” “Intel CPU” Display
  • Apple “Notebook” Floppy Disks
• Earl: Vintage IBM Model 5140 Convertible Laptop Computer with Printer WORKING!
• Michael: Computer Peripherals That You Can Build
  • “Hirigana” (really, Katakana) Mac 128/512 Keyboard
• Paul: Two Xerox 820-IIs
  • Victor 9000 (probably needs new keyboard pads)
  • Letter quality GE printer (with Commodore/Atari adapter)
  • MT-Mac Apple II clone
  • COSMAC Elf
  • Analog Joystick adapter
  • CoCo 1

Closing discussion notes:

• Melaleuca deanei

Feedback/Discussion:

• @rcrpodcast on Twitter
• Vintage Computer Forum
• RCR Podcast on Facebook
• Throwback Network
• Throwback Network on Facebook

Intro / Closing Song: Back to Oz by John X – link
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